The CSR Newsletters are a freely-available resource generated as a dynamic complement to the textbook, Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Sustainable Value Creation.

To sign-up to receive the CSR Newsletters regularly during the fall and spring academic semesters, e-mail author David Chandler at david.chandler@ucdenver.edu.

Monday, November 21, 2011

Strategic CSR - Penn State

Of all the articles that have been written about the Penn State tragedy, the two best that I read appeared together on the op-ed page of The New York Times last Tuesday.

The article in the first url below by David Brooks is titled ‘Let’s All Feel Superior’ and highlights the hypocrisy of those who claim they would have done so much more to prevent the abuse if they had been in the same position as those who have featured so prominently in the Penn State case:

“Unfortunately, none of us can safely make that assumption. Over the course of history — during the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide or the street beatings that happen in American neighborhoods — the same pattern has emerged. Many people do not intervene. Very often they see but they don’t see.”

Brooks concludes:

“Commentators ruthlessly vilify all involved from the island of their own innocence. Everyone gets to proudly ask: “How could they have let this happen?” The proper question is: How can we ourselves overcome our natural tendency to evade and self-deceive. … But it’s a question this society has a hard time asking because the most seductive evasion is the one that leads us to deny the underside of our own nature.”


“As much as we would like to think that, put on the spot, we would do the right — and perhaps even heroic — thing, research has shown that that usually isn’t true.”

The article in the second url below by Joe Nocera is titled ‘Penn State’s Long Road Back’ and charts a course for the university to recover “its moral bearings”:

“[Last] Saturday’s game was just another example: The message it sent was that football comes first. A university with its priorities straight would have forfeited. But Penn State clearly just couldn’t bring itself to do that.”

Nocera outlines five steps the university can take to reprioritize the values that drive Penn State. The surprise lies not in the proposals themselves (which all seem reasonable suggestions), but that Nocera can contemplate any President of a large U.S. university enacting them:

“First, it should announce that it will not participate in a postseason bowl game this year. … Second, it must discipline the rioters. A university cannot allow its students to rampage so destructively — and so amorally — without consequences. Third, it must promise not to use its status as a state institution to shield itself from the inevitable civil lawsuits that will be brought by those who were allegedly abused by Jerry Sandusky. … Fourth, Penn State should establish a compensation fund [for the victims]. … Finally, Penn State should announce that it will cancel the 2012 football season.”

Cancel football? But, what would a major university in this country do without a football season?

“As for the students and the fans, who can scarcely imagine life without Penn State football,  well, that’s the whole point, isn’t it? In words and deeds, they have shown that their priorities are askew. It’s the job of the university to reset those priorities and teach new ones.”
Posted by David Chandler at 7:14 AM

Friday, November 18, 2011

Strategic CSR - Goldman Sachs

The article in the first url below is a response to the Occupy Wall Street protests by comedian, Andrew Borowitz. It is a mock ‘Letter to Investors,’ supposedly from Lloyd Blankfein, Goldman Sachs’ CEO:

“Up until now, Goldman Sachs has been silent on the subject of the protest movement known as Occupy Wall Street.  That does not mean, however, that it has not been very much on our minds.  As thousands have gathered in Lower Manhattan, passionately expressing their deep discontent with the status quo, we have taken note of these protests.  And we have asked ourselves this question:

How can we make money off them?

The answer is the newly launched Goldman Sachs Global Rage Fund, whose investment objective is to monetize the Occupy Wall Street protests as they spread around the world.  At Goldman, we recognize that the capitalist system as we know it is circling the drain – but there’s plenty of money to be made on the way down.”

In particular:

“The Rage Fund will seek out opportunities to invest in products that are poised to benefit from the spreading protests, from police batons and barricades to stun guns and forehead bandages.  Furthermore, as clashes between police and protesters turn ever more violent, we are making significant bets on companies that manufacture replacements for broken windows and overturned cars, as well as the raw materials necessary for the construction and incineration of effigies.”

What is clever and telling about the spoof letter is that it is not hard to imagine someone at Goldman Sachs thinking something similar to these thoughts (and even perhaps writing them down).

Most good comedy contains at least an element of truth!

The article in the second url below places this letter within the context of a broader plea for the titans of finance to demonstrate a little appreciation for the iterative relationship between for-profit firms and the societies on which they rely for success (Chapter 1: A Moral Argument for CSR, p14).

Have a good weekend.
David

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)
© Sage Publications, 2011
http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/

Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/


A letter from Goldman Sachs—Concerning Occupy Wall Street
Andrew Borowitz
October 17, 2011
The Borowitz Report
http://www.borowitzreport.com/2011/10/17/a-letter-from-goldman-sachs/

What should Wall Street do?
Schumpeter
October 29, 2011
The Economist
80
http://www.economist.com/node/21534759
Posted by David Chandler at 7:02 AM

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Strategic CSR - FREE 'free markets'

The editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal should be taken with a pinch (read ‘truck full’) of salt. As someone who reads newspapers for informed content, I find them even less helpful than the editorials of The New York Times. Needless to say, Rupert Murdoch’s influence at the WSJ has not improved things! Nevertheless, a recent editorial caught my eye and quickly had me nodding my head:

“The Occupy Wall Street protesters aren't good at articulating what they want, but one of their demands is "end corporate welfare." Well, welcome aboard. Some of us have been fighting crony capitalism for decades, and it's good to have new allies if liberals have awakened to the dangers of the corporate welfare state.”

The column continues:

“Corporate welfare is the offer of special favors—cash grants, loans, guarantees, bailouts and special tax breaks—to specific industries or firms. The government doesn't track the overall cost of these programs, but in 2008 the Cato Institute made an attempt and came up with $92 billion for fiscal 2006, which is more than the U.S. government spends on homeland security. That annual cost may have doubled to $200 billion in this new era of industry bailouts and subsidies. According to the House Budget Committee, the 2009 stimulus bill alone contained more than $80 billion in "clean energy" subsidies, and tens of billions more went for the auto bailout and cash for clunkers, as well as aid for the mortgage industry through programs to refinance or buy up toxic loans.”

I couldn’t agree more. People on both the left and the right tend to favor government intervention when it is in support of a cause they believe in (e.g., subsidies for solar power on the left, tax breaks for oil firms on the right), but at least the left recognizes that it favors government intervention. Right-wing ideology, in contrast, preaches the free market, but then implements heavily subsidized intervention in contravention of that ideology.

What the column does not include, therefore, is the recognition that subsidies and quotas are only one component of the inefficient corporate welfare system we have created in the West. As the article about energy policy in the second url below from the NYT correctly notes:

“Economics 101 tells us that an industry imposing large costs on third parties should be required to “internalize” those costs — that is, to pay for the damage it inflicts, treating that damage as a cost of production. Fracking might still be worth doing given those costs. But no industry should be held harmless from its impacts on the environment and the nation’s infrastructure. Yet what the industry and its defenders demand is, of course, precisely that it be let off the hook for the damage it causes. Why? Because we need that energy!”

It is the combination of reduced government intervention (i.e., the removal of subsidies, quotas, tax breaks, etc.) PLUS the full internalization of all externalities in product pricing that allows a truly free market to emerge. One without the other is not free; at present, we have neither:

“So it’s worth pointing out that special treatment for fracking makes a mockery of free-market principles. Pro-fracking politicians claim to be against subsidies, yet letting an industry impose costs without paying compensation is in effect a huge subsidy. They say they oppose having the government “pick winners,” yet they demand special treatment for this industry precisely because they claim it will be a winner.”

In this light, a government tax on carbon is simply a means of accounting for the full environmental costs of oil/gas extraction, processing, and consumption. In other words, it is a means of creating the conditions for a FREE ‘free market.’ Once the level-playing field has been created (with more accurate prices for all forms of energy—traditional and alternative), then let the market determine which energy sources should drive our future economies.

Take care
David

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)
© Sage Publications, 2011
http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/

Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/


The Corporate Welfare State
November 7, 2011
The Wall Street Journal
A18
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204002304576631192120542046.html

Here Comes the Sun
by Paul Krugman
November 7, 2011
The New York Times
A21
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/07/opinion/krugman-here-comes-solar-energy.html
Posted by David Chandler at 7:16 AM

Monday, November 14, 2011

Strategic CSR - Solyndra

The Solyndra bankruptcy demonstrates the problems with a political entity applying its agenda to suppress market forces and achieve social goals.

While the goals are valid (driven by scientific analysis of the unsustainable nature of our current economic model), the means used to pursue them are inefficient. Government should be setting macro objectives and then stepping back to allow the market to micro manage resource allocation in the pursuit of those goals. An overview of the current state of the solar panel industry, which is a direct product of these distorted market and social forces, is presented in the article in the url below:

“Demand for solar panels doubled last year, driven by soaring growth in Germany and Italy. This was a response to tumbling prices of solar panels, triggered largely by a big increase in polysilicon production capacity. In 2008 and 2009, the average price of a solar panel halved. Yet European subsidies for solar power, which are largely responsible for the industry’s emergence, hardly fell. Hence last year’s surge in demand, especially in Italy, where panel sales increased by 857% . The cost to European electricity users was enormous: they cover the subsidies, which are known as feed-in tariffs, in their bills. So Europe’s regulators have moderated their largesse. France announced a moratorium on its feed-in tariff last December, and Italy and Germany also made their subsidies less generous. Wider economic ills in Europe have given investors further pause, causing European demand for solar panels to plummet. In Germany, annual sales are expected to fall by more than 30%. Despite growth in America and China, global demand for solar sales is expected to grow by less than 10% this year. That leaves the market seriously oversupplied.”

In relation to climate change, the government’s role should not be to choose the solution, but to clarify the problem and allow the market the freedom to determine the solution. In particular, it should do this by accounting for the true cost of carbon consumption (resource depletion, environmental degradation, political corruption, etc.) in the price of carbon-based energy sources.

Imposing a tax on carbon is the most effective way to do this. Such a tax ensures a level playing field for the most viable alternative energies (and the most efficient firms) to attract private capital and prosper. Government quotas and subsidies distort market forces in ways that generate inefficient outcomes; a carbon tax ensures a level playing field and comparative market pricing. The former are politically expedient; the latter is a political liability, which is why we will continue to get more government-driven problems, rather than market-based solutions.
Posted by David Chandler at 7:15 AM

Friday, November 11, 2011

Strategic CSR - Stakeholders

On Tuesday, President Bill Clinton was interviewed about his new book, Back to Work, by John Stewart on The Daily Show (http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/tue-november-8-2011-bill-clinton, 19.38 mins. to 20.55 mins.). During the interview, Clinton said the following:

“When I went to law school … in the 1970s, I was part virtually of the last generation of American law students and business students taught that corporations had a responsibility (because they had special privileges under the law, like limited liability) to their stakeholders (to their shareholders, their employees, their customers, and the communities of which they were a part). Then, starting in the late 1970s, that practice changed and all of a sudden the shareholders were way up here and all the stakeholders were down here. It had the ironic consequence of giving the most influence over corporate decisions to the stakeholders with the least concern about the long term profitability of the corporation and the greatest concern about the short term profitability. ... We need to be competitive, … but we also need to try to create an ethic in America where the employees and the customers and the communities can [be successful] too and we need to make it easy for corporations to act that way again.”
Posted by David Chandler at 7:13 AM

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Strategic CSR - HSBC

On the surface, the article in the first url below by Mallen Baker (Foreword, pxvii) is a useful comment on the evolving issue of executive compensation. Increasingly, some firms are beginning to include sustainability-related targets in executives’ performance related bonuses. HSBC is leading this group of firms (for more examples, see CSR Newsletter on September 8, 2010, titled ‘Executive Compensation,’ about similar policies at Akzo Nobel and other European firms, such as DSM and TNT):

“HSBC says that the adoption of this practice has helped to cut waste, water and electricity use within the company. A raging success story. Other companies, such as Kingfisher, also have a direct link.”

Baker is reluctant, however, to support such developments unequivocally. As such, the more interesting point in the article focuses on the issue he highlights regarding the difference between values-led and incentive-led firms:

“For me, the need to incentivise the right payments through bonuses is the device you fall back on when you have a company without embedded values. If you need to offer selfish motivations to achieve public good, you're not valuing the public good properly, or you're not hiring people that will respond to the public good.”

While recognizing that values-led firms remain the exception (and incentive-led firms the rule), Baker argues that it is important to retain sight of the difference, while also recognizing that altering the basis on which executives are rewarded is at least a step in the right direction:

“… the majority of businesses are not values-led, they follow a conventional business logic which is amoral. And in that situation, you have to create a system that will encourage the right outcomes. … Tying large executive remuneration to sustainability outcomes is therefore a good thing. It concedes that the our businesses are run by people who will only respond to large financial incentives. It operates within the short term business logic of the current prevailing culture - one which has helped put us in the mess we're in. But if we accept that we change the world by accepting the way it is, not pretending it is the way we would like it to be, then it is not a bad step to take.”

Just because the outcomes may look the same, however, does not mean that the motives driving the behavior are inconsequential and won’t matter in more substantive ways in different contexts.

The article in the second url below gives different examples of other organizations, such as Walmart, that are trying to instill a values-led culture firm-wide:

“AS WALMART grew into the world’s largest retailer, its staff were subjected to a long list of dos and don’ts covering every aspect of their work. Now the firm has decided that its rules-based culture is too inflexible to cope with the challenges of globalisation and technological change, and is trying to instill a “values-based” culture, in which employees can be trusted to do the right thing because they know what the firm stands for.”

Take care
David

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)
© Sage Publications, 2011
http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/

Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/


HSBC ‘bonuses for sustainability’ is the best of the second best
By Mallen Baker
June 3, 2011
http://www.mallenbaker.net/csr/post.php?id=398

The view from the top, and bottom
Business – Corporate Culture
September 24, 2011
The Economist
http://www.economist.com/node/21530171
Posted by David Chandler at 7:30 AM

Monday, November 7, 2011

Strategic CSR - Carbon footprints

The article in the url below reviews a book written by Mike Berners-Lee about carbon footprinting. The book is titled ‘How Bad Are Bananas? The Carbon Footprint of Everything,’ which tells you all you need to know about the book’s general content. The detail, however, is well worth exploring:

“Author Mike Berners-Lee writes about 100 or so items, ordering them by the size of their carbon footprints. Flipping through his book reveals that a store-bought rose has a bigger footprint than driving a mile, and that a banana makes a more carbon-friendly breakfast than a bowl of porridge.”

The goal of the book, in broad terms, is to understand more comprehensively how our actions affect the environment. In doing so, however, Berners-Lee also allows us to focus on which actions are causing the most damage and, as a result, prioritize our efforts in order to generate more efficient outcomes:

“We might agonize over paper versus plastic in the checkout line, even though grocery bags account for just 1/1000th of the carbon footprint of the average shopping trip. Rather than worrying so much about how many bags we’re using, the carbon-conscious consumer would do better to skip the asparagus airlifted from Peru in favor of produce shipped by boat or truck. Conversely, we might not think twice about picking up a bottle of water, even though bottled water is 1,000 times more carbon-intensive than its tap equivalent.”

While the accuracy of some of the numbers in the book have been questioned and Berners-Lee is unclear about some of his sources, his ultimate goal is to educate, rather than preach:

“‘How you decide to live is a choice that only you can make,’ he writes. ‘I just want to help you understand carbon so that you can do whatever you decide to do with more knowledge.’”

For more information, there is an interview with Berners-Lee about the book at: http://www.theworld.org/2011/06/how-bad-are-bananas-author-mike-berners-lee-explains/

Take care
David

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)
© Sage Publications, 2011
http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/


Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/


How Bad Are Bananas? The Carbon Footprint of Everything
By Aaron Couch
June 13, 2011
The Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/Books/Book-Reviews/2011/0613/How-Bad-Are-Bananas-The-Carbon-Footprint-of-Everything
Posted by David Chandler at 7:19 AM

Friday, November 4, 2011

Strategic CSR - Corporate Governance

The article in the url below makes the argument that, in spite of growing liability concerns, the directors of the largest corporations face very minor risk of being held accountable for their decisions (Issues: Corporate Governance, p161):

“… the truth is that they have about the same chance of being held liable for their poor management of a public firm as they have of being struck by lightning.”

The primary reason for this, the article argues, is the preeminence of state law as the governing authority regarding corporate rights:

“Since most companies are incorporated in Delaware, this means Delaware law. And Delaware law on this matter sets an extremely high standard for finding directors and officers liable for a company’s mismanagement. A Delaware court is not going to find them liable no matter how stupid their decisions are. Instead, a Delaware court will find them liable only if they intentionally acted wrongfully or were so oblivious that it was essentially the same thing.”

And, even if an individual director should be held legally responsible, the firm’s insurance policies that is takes out to protect directors and top executives usually means they will not personally have to pay the fine:

“One study found that from 1980 to 2006, there were only two instances of directors of a company incorporated in Delaware being required to personally pay for their misconduct. … [and] no more than $8.35 million in personal payments by directors over more than 26 years.”

In those few areas covered by federal law, the record indicates an equally risk-free environment for corporate directors:

“The same study found only nine cases where a director was held personally liable for securities fraud in a 26-year period. Three of these were highly notable, Enron, WorldCom and Tyco.”

In terms of the recent financial crisis (Issues: Financial Crisis, p235):

“… no directors from the financial crisis have yet been found liable under these laws.”

Nice work if you can get it:

“Outside director salaries average about $200,000 for Fortune 500 companies.”

Have a good weekend.
David

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)
© Sage Publications, 2011
http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/

Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/


Despite Liability Worries, Serving at the Top Has Little Risk
By Steven M. Davidoff
June 8, 2011
The New York Times
Late Edition - Final
B5
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/06/07/despite-worries-serving-at-the-top-carries-little-risk/
Posted by David Chandler at 7:18 AM

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Strategic CSR - Walmart

The article in the url below discusses the layaway scheme re-introduced by Walmart for this year’s holiday season. While initially appearing to be a means for less affluent customers to avoid excessive credit and spread the costs of their purchases over a number of weeks, the article highlights a more sinister side to the policy:

“… as a financing option, layaway is decidedly worse than most credit cards. Imagine a mother going to Wal-Mart on Oct. 17 and buying $100 worth of Christmas toys. She makes a down payment of $10 and pays a $5 service fee. Over the next two months she pays off the rest. In effect, she is paying $5 in interest for a $90 loan for two months: the equivalent of a credit card with a 44 percent annual percentage rate, a level most of us would consider predatory. … Then consider what would happen if she couldn’t finish all the payments. Wal-Mart would give her the money back, less $10. If she borrowed that $90 and paid $15 in interest for two months, she would have the equivalent of a jaw-dropping interest rate of 131 percent. These numbers assume she borrowed for the maximum amount of time, two months, and put double the minimum required amount on layaway. But if that period were shortened or the shopper put the minimum amount on layaway, those rates would go up proportionately.”

Walmart has made great strides in recent years integrating a strategic CSR perspective throughout all aspects of operations. Largely, however, the focus has been on sustainability policies designed to lower costs through reduced resource use. The questions raised about this layaway scheme [see also the recent announcement about scaling back the firm’s health insurance for part-time employees: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/21/business/wal-mart-cuts-some-health-care-benefits.html] indicate Walmart still has a long way to go to satisfy critics who remain skeptical of the firm’s overall commitment to CSR:

“Retailers talk about the plans as a way to give consumers more choice, but in fact it’s the result of the opposite: the desperation arising from many Americans’ inability to borrow, save and, most important, earn.”
Posted by David Chandler at 7:46 AM

Monday, October 31, 2011

Strategic CSR - 7 billion

The article in the url below reports that, today, the United Nations estimates that the world’s population will surpass seven billion people (probably somewhere in India). See the World Population Clock for confirmation: http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/. The shock is not the number itself, but the speed at which the total has grown exponentially in recent years:

“The first billion people accumulated over a leisurely interval, from the origins of humans hundreds of thousands of years ago to the early 1800s. Adding the second took another 120 or so years. Then, in the last 50 years, humanity more than doubled, surging from three billion in 1959 to four billion in 1974, five billion in 1987 and six billion in 1998.”

The article goes on to question whether the planet can support this many people. The author reports plenty of good news to suggest, in theory, that the Earth can easily support its current population and even a much larger one:

“Between 1820, at the dawn of the industrial age, and 2008, when the world economy entered recession, economic output per person increased elevenfold. Life expectancy tripled in the last few thousand years, to a global average of nearly 70 years. The average number of children per woman fell worldwide to about 2.5 now from 5 in 1950. The world’s population is growing at 1.1 percent per year, half the peak rate in the 1960s. The slowing growth rate enables families and societies to focus on the well-being of their children rather than the quantity.”

In practice, however, there is also cause for concern:

“Nearly half the world lives on $2 a day, or less. In China, the figure is 36 percent; in India, 76 percent. More than 800 million people live in slums. A similar number, mostly women, are illiterate. Some 850 million to 925 million people experience food insecurity or chronic undernourishment. … While the world produced 2.3 billion metric tons of cereal grains in 2009-10 — enough calories to sustain 9 to 11 billion people — only 46 percent of the grain went into human mouths. Domestic animals got 34 percent of the crop, and 19 percent went to industrial uses like biofuels, starches and plastics. … Already, more than a billion people live without an adequate, renewable supply of fresh water.”

And, the future prospects are daunting:

“The United Nations Population Division anticipates 8 billion people by 2025, 9 billion by 2043 and 10 billion by 2083. India will have more people than China shortly after 2020, and sub-Saharan Africa will have more people than India before 2040.”

The conclusion, which is hardly news, is that we are growing at an unsustainable rate—not only in terms of numbers, but the amount of resources being consumed by those numbers and, more importantly, the way those resources are being consumed:

“Human demands on the earth have grown enormously, though the atmosphere, the oceans and the continents are no bigger now than they were when humans evolved. … The mismatch between the short-term incentives that guide our political and economic institutions and even our families, on one hand, and our long-term aspirations, on the other, is severe.”

The upshot is that, while we should be able to manage the world’s population growth; the reality is that we are shooting ourselves in the foot (or, I suppose, our 14 billion feet).

Take care
David

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)
© Sage Publications, 2011
http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/

Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/
The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/


7 Billion
By Joel E. Cohen
The New York Times
October 24, 2011
pA19
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/24/opinion/seven-billion.html
Posted by David Chandler at 7:05 AM

Friday, October 28, 2011

Strategic CSR - Green Tea Party

The article in the url below presents the case for a Green Tea Party. Building on the libertarian strain of politics that fuels much of the Tea Party debate today, the author argues that a similar distrust of government, together with a desire for meaningful market-oriented action, could form the basis for an environmental (or Green Tea) political party:

“The GTP would not be for you if you think increasing Washington bureaucracy budgets will produce a cleaner environment. Since 1980, the Environmental Protection Agency's inflation-adjusted budget has been relatively flat, but air and water quality have improved. Most improvements came through cost-saving technologies in the private sector, not regulations. The GTP's platform would be that only prosperity and incentives can drive environmental improvements. The first plank: Wealthier is healthier. … The second plank: Incentives matter.”

I am forwarding it because I like the play on words, but also because I found the arguments interesting:

“Here are a few GTP environmental policies that make economic and common sense because they rely on market forces to discover what works:
• The GTP would make land management agencies such as the Forest Service, Park Service and Bureau of Land Management turn a profit on the federal estate.
• The GTP would tap water markets instead of tapping the U.S. Treasury.
• The GTP would establish tradable catch shares to halt the decline of ocean fisheries.”

Ultimately (the article did appear in the Wall Street Journal, after all):

“It is not enough to strut your stuff in clothes made of recycled materials while driving your hybrid to an environmental protest. And environmental quality cannot be bought simply by throwing more tax dollars and regulations at problems. The GTP would serve environmental quality, budget cuts and economic prosperity.”

After searching for the article online, I found that this idea has been around for a while. It was featured in one of Thomas Friedman’s NYT columns (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/opinion/25friedman.html) and has its own website, manifesto (http://www.greenteaparty.us/), and international branches (http://www.melaniephillips.com/britains-green-tea-party). The slogan for the movement in the U.S. is:

“Making a More Perfect Union―One Cup at a Time!”

Posted by David Chandler at 8:38 PM
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)