Save the Planet By Eating Locally?
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As taboo as this might be in certain circles, I will now be critical of Elizabeth Edwards:
"Eating locally" is a variation of that other utter nonsense, "buying locally." The best way to preserve the environment (whatever that means) is to consume as efficiently as possible, in terms of utility as well as cost.
If "long-distance food" is a better offering to a consumer (in terms not only of price but of utility), then it is the optimal purchase, not just for the consumer herself but for the environment as well.
The mere fact that transporting food (or anything else) over longer distances may require burning incrementally more fossil fuels merely suggests a properly crafted Pigou tax to correct the supposed externality (i.e., to make the price reflect the true cost). Abstinence is not only unnecessary but also counterproductive.
Consider: What next-best item will you spend your money on if not a tangerine? What "carbon footprint" will it leave? You're not eliminating the total carbon footprint of the tangerine, merely the marginal footprint between the tangerine and the next-best item. While making yourself worse off in terms of utility in the process. You're simply trading one cost (carbon emissions) for another (lost utility). In a way that, by definition, makes you worse off.
All this, somehow, makes the world a better place?
Think of it this way: Getting the biggest bang for your buck also means the fewest bangs on the environment.
Incidentally, one wonders, as do the commenters at Politico, whether Mrs. Edwards will also be giving up things like orange juice and bananas, neither of which are grown in North Carolina. Giving up tangerines is hardly the express lane to selfless asceticism.
More thoughts at Marginal Revolution.
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By the same token and for the same reasons, the best path to economic prosperity is not to "buy American" or "buy local" or "buy black" or "buy gay," but simply to "buy cheap." To deliberately make yourself worse off economically by limiting your choices only empowers those who cannot successfully compete freely and fairly -- the same kind of collectivists who insist that "we" (i.e., they) need quotas and tariffs and subsidies. See, ironically, "farmers."
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Note also that if Mrs. Edwards is merely bemoaning the fact that there is not yet such a Pigou tax on her tangerines (or anything else), then she could simply "tax herself" and agree to donate money to an environmental group every time she "eats transported." Just like how when Bill Clinton or Warren Buffett lament that they are not taxed enough, they could simply cut a check to the Treasury any time they felt like it. But they don't. Go figure.
Elizabeth Edwards raised in passing the importance of relying on locally-grown fruit.This is, of course, utter nonsense.
"We've been moving back to 'buy local,'" Mrs. Edwards said, outlining a trade policy that "acknowledges the carbon footprint" of transporting fruit.
"I live in North Carolina. I'll probably never eat a tangerine again," she said, speaking of a time when the fruit ... reaches the price that it "needs" to be.
"Eating locally" is a variation of that other utter nonsense, "buying locally." The best way to preserve the environment (whatever that means) is to consume as efficiently as possible, in terms of utility as well as cost.
If "long-distance food" is a better offering to a consumer (in terms not only of price but of utility), then it is the optimal purchase, not just for the consumer herself but for the environment as well.
The mere fact that transporting food (or anything else) over longer distances may require burning incrementally more fossil fuels merely suggests a properly crafted Pigou tax to correct the supposed externality (i.e., to make the price reflect the true cost). Abstinence is not only unnecessary but also counterproductive.
Consider: What next-best item will you spend your money on if not a tangerine? What "carbon footprint" will it leave? You're not eliminating the total carbon footprint of the tangerine, merely the marginal footprint between the tangerine and the next-best item. While making yourself worse off in terms of utility in the process. You're simply trading one cost (carbon emissions) for another (lost utility). In a way that, by definition, makes you worse off.
All this, somehow, makes the world a better place?
Think of it this way: Getting the biggest bang for your buck also means the fewest bangs on the environment.
Incidentally, one wonders, as do the commenters at Politico, whether Mrs. Edwards will also be giving up things like orange juice and bananas, neither of which are grown in North Carolina. Giving up tangerines is hardly the express lane to selfless asceticism.
More thoughts at Marginal Revolution.
---
By the same token and for the same reasons, the best path to economic prosperity is not to "buy American" or "buy local" or "buy black" or "buy gay," but simply to "buy cheap." To deliberately make yourself worse off economically by limiting your choices only empowers those who cannot successfully compete freely and fairly -- the same kind of collectivists who insist that "we" (i.e., they) need quotas and tariffs and subsidies. See, ironically, "farmers."
---
Note also that if Mrs. Edwards is merely bemoaning the fact that there is not yet such a Pigou tax on her tangerines (or anything else), then she could simply "tax herself" and agree to donate money to an environmental group every time she "eats transported." Just like how when Bill Clinton or Warren Buffett lament that they are not taxed enough, they could simply cut a check to the Treasury any time they felt like it. But they don't. Go figure.
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Posted by Kip on
25 July 2007
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