Part II of my investigation into GLOBAL WARMING WE ARE DOOMED and NASA.
NASA’s purpose, according to NASA, …”is to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery, and aeronautics research.
To do that, thousands of people have been working around the world — and off of it — for more than 45 years, trying to answer some basic questions. What’s out there in space? How do we get there? What will we find? What can we learn there, or learn just by trying to get there, that will make life better here on Earth?”
Clearly NASA contributes to GLOBAL WARMING and should be closed down. The sad part is that, after 45 years of trying, NASA considers “What’s out there in space?” and “How do we get there?” to be basic questions. I would have hoped that by now NASA would have figured out how we get into space, and that what’s out there is stuff so far away that we won’t be going anytime soon, and everything we could get to is either crap that NASA has launched into orbit or boring.
I say we turn space exploration over to the private sector for these reasons: It would be vastly more efficient (if only for the reasons that private companies go bankrupt if they cannot produce something someone wants, and it’s easier to kill an incompetent federal employee rather than try to fire him. Private sector employees have to actually work, and based on experience I’ve learned it is common practice to PROMOTE a bad federal worker, because that is easier than trying to get rid of him any other way. In the private sector there are also stupid employees. The difference is that at the federal level, the stupid people are usually the ones in charge.
Since NASA has that pernicious bureaucratic incentive to spend more and more money each budget year (that is, consume more and more resources) as opposed to the private sector incentive to SAVE money (and thus resources), dropping NASA will save money and reduce pollution. Resources devoted to space exploration will then proceed at a more optimal trajectory. Even if the private sector spends much less on exploring space, they will spend what they have in line with the optimal trajectory, thus the possibility for better results overall , accomplished with less money is quite real.
Now, I haven’t made a strong case for killing off NASA. I have listed some possible benefits of doing so. As a side note, as a non-anarchist libertarian, ‘killing off NASA’ to me means deleting it as an agency. It does not mean “privatizing” it, which is when an agency’s functions are contracted out to a de facto monopoly. This nearly always increases costs and inefficiency, as the “privatized” government agency does not go away. And it now has to be a watchdog over the private company. The Pentagon is the king of contracting out functions, which lead to billions of dollars in overbilling.
Few people here care about NASA. But suppose humans are causing global warming. There is much that is uncertain about what can be done, how much it would cost, and whether it would matter.
But, the realist in me says that politicians will try and “do something.” What are the arguments for government intervention? The government could impose a carbon tax, and do nothing else. If the tax properly internalized the costs of releasing carbon into the atmosphere, prices would adjust toward the (higher) optimal price of carbon. Relative fuel prices would adjust, and people’s incentives would be affected in a way that reduced (inefficient) use of carbon and all its derivative products.
This assumes the implausible idea that the government will not subsidize “alternative energy sources.” Since it does, and will, price signals will be distorted. In utopia, prices reflect all costs. Economists can calculate a tax IF there is a market distortion. But then, even in utopia, the tax cannot be assured of being accurate.
We do not and will never live in Utopia. So assume global warming is caused by humans. In the real world, governments will do something. And what they do will probably be stupid and expensive. Given all that, what do you suggest be done to mitigate government action? And, what do you think the right government action is, if any?
this rather precariously assumes i’ve been able to correctly ascertain their positions, but i think admiral/matt/etc. would say that a government tax is unnecessary in order for the price of a fuel to reflect its environmental impact. the market should be able to do that on its own. sure we want to minimize our carbon footprints, but at what *price* (lol)?
the more ues i ingest, the more clearly i understand the argument that government in general is an inefficient mechanism. in a pseudo-democratic society, our representatives are supposed to… well… be representative. therefore, their carbon tax should reflect the amount of value we collectively affix to being environmentally responsible, shouldn’t it?
why not allow consumers to set the price directly? won’t they take into consideration the “costs of releasing carbon into the atmosphere” in exactly the same way congress would? if not, isn’t that a failure of our political system, in which government is premised on accountability to and derivation from the will of the people?
my response is that this may be one instance in which individuals’ pursuit of their own self-interests might actually betray the interests of the society at large… it’s hard to say…
Slade, that was precious. Thank you for mentioning me. Here’s some background Eric: the topic this week at UES was patents and we ended up on two notable tangents.
1. What makes art better than it already is? What is good art? (fun)
2. Do externalities exist in a free market? Is health an externality?
The jury was out on both topics.
Anyhow, as for NASA, it seems blindingly obvious that it should be deleted as an agency (along with countless others). I remember I used to say wild things about giving NASA more money so it could be like Starfleet, despite its spectacular inefficiencies, but I suppose what I meant was really that we need a third world war so as to get first contact with the Vulcans on time. So let’s just militarize it. I’ll be the Captain of our flagship and you can be the crabby ship’s economist, like Doctor McCoy, but better since you’ve surpassed regular doctors in medical knowledge.