{"id":742,"date":"2013-02-12T12:42:28","date_gmt":"2013-02-12T17:42:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ecooptimism.com\/?p=742"},"modified":"2013-07-07T16:58:16","modified_gmt":"2013-07-07T21:58:16","slug":"its-not-the-economy-vs-the-environment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ecooptimism.com\/?p=742","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s Not the Economy vs the Environment"},"content":{"rendered":"

What to make of the mixed message in Sunday\u2019s New York Times op-ed by David Leonhardt<\/a>? Dispelling the prevalent and stubborn myth that environmental measures are a drag on economic recovery is critical to efforts to gain public and political support. Leonhardt attempts to help, but misses some of the most important points.<\/p>\n

In a piece with the overused title<\/a> \u201cIt\u2019s Not Easy Being Green\u201d (and, speaking of mixed messages, \u00a0the opposing title, \u201cIt\u2019s Easy Being Green,\u201d is just as clich\u00e9), Leonhardt at first downplays the promise and economic viability of a national policy to address climate change. \u201cThe alternative-energy sector may ultimately employ millions of people. But raising the cost of the energy that households and businesses use every day \u2014 a necessary effect of helping the climate \u2014 is not exactly a recipe for an economic boom.\u201d With that, he seems to validate the environment versus economy faceoff.<\/p>\n

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Is this how to gauge environmental policy? Image source<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

He then tempers that a bit when he writes \u201cAlternative energy may not be a solution to our economic problems. But neither is it guaranteed to make those problems much worse, despite the continuing claims of opponents.\u201d Faint praise, but at least it\u2019s not condemnation.<\/p>\n

And he starts to get it right with \u201cThe stronger argument for a major government response to climate change is the more obvious argument: climate change.\u201d Problem is: climate change, in and of itself, has not proved to be a strong enough argument, at least not in our current head-in-the-sands, corporate-driven political arena. It\u2019s clear that in a head to head battle, even with a public relations boost from Sandy and Nemo and the like, the environment still loses out to the economy<\/a>. So it doesn\u2019t help when Leonhardt continues:<\/p>\n

In some cases, [government environmental programs] may even save taxpayers money over the long run. In most cases, however, they probably will not. Government agencies, like households and businesses, use dirty energy today because it is cheaper. And while it\u2019s true that new clean-energy companies may help the economy by earning profits and employing workers, the same is true of coal and oil companies.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Leonhardt misses the boat in exactly the same way, as I pointed out last week<\/a>, the pro-nuclear power advocates do \u2013 seeing only parts of pictures rather than wholes. When he says dirty energy is cheaper, he is looking only at a partial set of costs, ignoring major \u201cexternal costs\u201d like public health, resource depletion and national security. The savings he refers to are merely the direct ones like reduced energy bills and (inconclusively, in his mind) new jobs. Those are well and fine, but it\u2019s incomplete accounting.<\/p>\n

This is the same reason elected officials from coal mining states think they\u2019re doing the right thing in opposing environmental regulations on coal; the loss of coal industry jobs, according to this type of partial accounting, will hurt their constituents. But when true costs such as the health costs for miners and those living nearby and the costs of polluted waters and ravaged land are taken into account, that calculation is turned on its head. (Help me out here \u2013 I read a post just last week which cited numbers for exactly this example, but I can\u2019t find it now. Send me the link if you have it.)<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The costs of coal mining are far more than just CO2 emissions. Image source<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

The same point can be made with mass transit. The benefits are not only in the reduced fuel consumption and air pollution that people tend to focus on, but also in time saved due to less congestion and even improved well-being arising from commuting less stressfully as a passenger rather than a frustrated driver. Not to mention the fact that you can safely text your heart away. (See \u201cPublic Transportation Saved 865 Million Hours Of Delay On US Roads In 2011<\/a>.\u201d)<\/p>\n

At the very bottom of his column, Leonhardt almost gets it. \u201cIn the end, the strongest economic argument for an aggressive response to climate change is not the much trumpeted windfall of green jobs. It\u2019s the fact that the economy won\u2019t function very well in a world full of droughts, hurricanes and heat waves.\u201d Ahah, now we\u2019re talking about the larger picture, or at least some of it. But it\u2019s so far down at the end that it\u2019s all but a footnote, and an incomplete one at that.<\/p>\n

Yes, in that battle for public support, if it\u2019s the environment versus the economy \u2013 especially in a troubled economic time like this \u2013 the environment\u2019s gonna lose<\/a>.\u00a0 But that\u2019s an entirely wrong scenario, one created by the limited vision of conventional political-economic thinking (and avidly supported by corporate self-interests). I\u2019ve noted this<\/a> in earlier posts as, of course, others have as well. In a blog post wonderfully titled \u201cIt\u2019s not the economy, it\u2019s the stupid paradigm<\/a>,\u201d Paula Williams writes \u201cthe economy and the environment are not separate (contrary to the claims of many economists).\u201d<\/p>\n

Public support for environmentalism has been waning since the start of the Great Recession, and not just in the US, as Greenbiz.com notes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Across eighteen countries, public concern about all six issues \u2013 water pollution, fresh water shortages, natural resource depletion, air pollution, climate change and biodiversity loss \u2013 is way down from its peak in 2009, with double-digit falls in the proportion of the public considering them “very serious.”<\/p>\n

[O]ur figures suggest people are starting to tune…out [messages of doom and gloom]. Ultimately, the challenge for the environmental movement is to articulate an alternative to our current economic model that empowers people rather than constrains them, and that is politically achievable in difficult times.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The alternative economic model is the understanding that our environmental solutions are<\/i> <\/strong>our economic solutions. That, along with the observation that those combined solutions \u2013 contrary once again to the claims of many economists and others — will also improve the quality of our lives, is the foundation of EcoOptimism.<\/p>\n

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