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Why the government shouldn’t mandate technologies

by Greg Krehbiel on 28 October 2008

Air Cars: A New Wind for America’s Roads?

When it comes to environmental regulations, government decisions often err by specifying a particular solution. It has to be ethanol or electric or biodiesel or solar or whatever. A big problem with this is that the odds are good that five years later those choices will look stupid.

You never know what’s really going to work. It might be solar, or it might be cold fusion. (Ha ha.) I tend to doubt that it will be compressed air, but who knows? I’d like to have a flying car that runs on dilithium crystals, but I don’t think I’ll ever see that.

If we were to grant (for the sake or argument) that the government has a compelling reason to lower emissions, the laws should target emissions and leave the technology to the inventors.

BTW, I said “if we were to grant” because there are other ways to get cleaner air than lowering emissions. E.g., somebody might come up with a way to pull pollutants out of the air.

From that perspective, an ideal solution would be to target the air quality that we want and not specify anything else. The trouble is that no one would be accountable. You can hold car manufacturers accountable for vehicle emissions, but what industry can you hold accountable for overall air quality?

If it’s necessary to regulate emissions, then the government should simply do that and then get out of the way — with no subsidies or grants or anything else. Let the innovators and the markets decide. That’s what they do best.

2008-10-28  »  Greg Krehbiel