/liberty/ - Liberty

p.s. check the reading thread if you want the book, it's in the last posts

>>82654

Pollution is a good thing. Production > environment. If you cant set the water on fire your economy is suffering.

>>82654

>>82655

>>82664

>what is the Coase theorem?

>>82666

I read for about 2 seconds on wikipedia. Does that theorem basically say that without outside influence like taxes rational calculation could happen and therefore there is less likely to have such things happen or what?

>>82672

The reason that Ronald Coase formulated the theorem was to provide a counter argument to Arthur Pigou's agitation for taxation in order to direct externalities. At the time there was a trend in economics departments of Anglosphere countries to set up so-called Blackboard models, as was Pigou's argument for taxation. One such assumption of these Blackboard models was zero transaction costs. That is not to say, that Keynesian economists didn't understand that in the real world there would not be such an ideal situation in most occasions (which, ironically, is the criticism usually leveled against the theorem), however Coase's contention was that assuming such preconditions, the market would be more efficient at resolving negative externalities than a central planner. Fundamentally, Coase's argument isn't to show that the market is perfectly efficient at resolving externalities, only that it is more efficient than a state planner.

>>82674

That's interesting but it still doesn't answer any of my questions.

>>82675

whoops, I mean besides the need for government

>>82672

Sorry, to answer your question more directly, the central thesis of the theorem is that assuming zero transaction costs, the market will more efficiently allocate resolutions of issues involving negative externalities.

>>82676

Yeah, as I was trying to get at before, that would be outside the scope of the theory. I was juat replying to the remarks about pollution.

bump because I am still waiting for an answer to my questions

Anon, try viewing NAP as an agreement rather than a universal law, and anarcho-capitalism, to some extent. It is not about creating a certain system, but more about predicting how things would be if the current system changes. You can have private courts, but they are not obligatory, adn if system somehow exists without them, its totally fine. So, on to the example of NAP it can really be treated very differently, as in the end who has the power is what matters, and so, there can be a society where enslaving your children to then rapture them, sell their organs and sell burgers of their meat in your own restaurant would be ok, while in another one you would be violently murdered if you decided to leave your child or make an abortion. Generally, i would treat, say, environmental damage as direct one, as air pollution influences the air on my property, so there can be requested reparation, which might be small, but incoming from everyone affected might be a suitable restraint. There can even emerge companies that live on suing other companies from the position of other property owners for part of the received money. The same may also be extended on, say light or sound, as it only counts if it was increased magnitude that caused property damage.

>>82647

>Wouldn't in that case it'd be wiser to make preventative measures

Yes, such as dikes and reservoirs. It does not require laws.

Look into the concept of homesteading.

The basic idea is that ones property rights include basic things like water/noise levels/air quality, and that if someone degrades these things significantly (some degradation is intrinsic in development), than it is a form of property damage, or even a form of assault if someone is harmed (eg. by absorbing pollution). Clearcutting resulting in flooding that would otherwise not occur would fit the bill IMO.

Also worth noting that governments (especially via the military) are the biggest polluters out there, and that arguing against the government with a government agent acting as the judge is an intrinsically biased process.

Related reading: The Machinery of Freedom