5 Specialization and Sustainability

5 Specialization and Sustainability
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It is very hard to be against sustainability. In fact, the less you know about it, the better it sounds.
Note:Robert Solow

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economists do not know enough to engineer society,
Note:Definizione

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correct the intuitions
Note:Il loro compito

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Human economic activity alters the environment.
Note:Il problema della sostenibilitá. Come la definiamo?

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We transform plants, animal products, and minerals into different forms.

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Suppose we were to define sustainability as leaving the natural environment exactly as we found it.
Note:Una possibile definizione

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you cannot kill game or gather plants at a higher rate than they are naturally replenished.
Note:Una definizione buona x i cacciatori del passato ma nn x noi

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unfeasible. It is, when you think about it, not even desirable.
Note:Lasciare il mondo com é

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build no roads; build no dams; build no piers.

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Sustainability is an injunction not to satisfy ourselves by impoverishing our successors.
Note:La definizione di Solow

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this economic definition does not offer clear, precise guidance
Note:Purtroppo

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what we leave to future generations includes more than just the natural environment.
Note:Tuttavia

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the built environment,
Note:Tenere conto anche di 1

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technological knowledge.
Note:E 2

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what economists call capital.

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We leave a set of institutions,
Note:Ma anche

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We leave a pattern of specialization and trade

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knowledge that we have accumulated through the process of experimentation, evaluation, and evolution.

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The authors of the U.S. Constitution left the United States
Note:Considera il lascito degli antenati

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Scientists and engineers have left us with their know-how.

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railroad and the means for long-distance

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automobile and the airplane.

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computer and the Internet.

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means of living longer and healthier

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The market measure of sustainability is profit.
Note:Tttttt

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If a business were to deplete one of its crucial inputs, its cost of production would rise, profits would turn to losses, and
Note:Insostenibilità

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The owner of farmland will want to replenish the nutrients in the soil rather than deplete them
Note:X questo che

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If wood becomes more expensive than natural gas, people will switch from burning wood to burning natural gas.
Note:Altro esempio

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“doing more with less.”
Note:L oboettivo

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sustainability is assessed using the price system. If two methods for producing a given output exist, the market will select the method that uses the fewest

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First, market prices would have to reflect the cost of resources.
Note:Mercato e sostenibilitá. Condizione 1

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Second, the issue of intergenerational equity that Solow emphasizes would have to be addressed.
Note:2

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Consider air quality, for example. Since no one owns the air in Pittsburgh, the market has no means for stopping cars
Note:1 nn soddosfatta

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Similarly, since no one owns the oceans, the market has no means for stopping overfishing.
Note:Altro caso

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one approach is for fishermen to get together and agree on quotas
Note:Cap and trade

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Another approach is to create private fish farms.

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when should individuals or policymakers use their own judgment to override the information that market prices give them?
Note:Quando gli incentivi di mercato

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the recycling of paper and plastic.
Note:Esempio

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an entrepreneur could, in principle, start a business of buying old newspapers
Note:Non c é bisogno dell obbligo

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If the benefit of recycling exceeded the cost, then such recycling could be undertaken at a profit.

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we can infer from the necessity to force or subsidize recycling that recycling does not pay.

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recycling wastes resources

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one would have to show that there is a flaw in the market pricing
Note:Per difendere il briciclo

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Perhaps the market does not adequately account for the cost of landfills,
Note:Interventi mirati non casuali

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mandate to add ethanol to gasoline.
Note:Altro esempio x ridurre la CO2

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requires growing more corn to produce ethanol.
Note:Conseguenza

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overall resource use is increased, because of the cost of growing the additional corn.
Note:Tuttavia

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Many people believe intuitively that it saves resources to “buy local.”
Note:Altro esempio

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However, if the grocery store sells cheaper produce that comes from hundreds of miles away, some factor must offset the higher transportation cost.

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the land elsewhere is more suited to growing crops,
Note:Esempio

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The local land might be better used for housing

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Water or other resources may be used more heavily locally than on distant farms.
Note:Oppure

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“buying local” wastes resources.
Note:Se il prezzo é più alto

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market prices work to protect the environment,
Note:Molti scettici tttttt

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Jesse Ausubel,
Note:L autore da consultare

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Since about 1940 American farmers have quintupled corn while using the same or even less land.
Note:Un esempio x nn essere scettici

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The inputs to agriculture have plateaued and then fallen, not just cropland but nitrogen, phosphates, potash, and even water.

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When farming becomes more efficient, farmland reverts to wilderness.
Note:Il ritorno del selvaggio

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the amount of forest is now increasing in many advanced countries.

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Foresters refer to a “forest transition”

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There has been an overall increase in plant life on earth.

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[G]lobal greening is the most important ecological phenomenon on land today.

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use of many commodities, such as cadmium and iron ore, has dropped in the United States, in spite of a near doubling of population. Some of that reduction reflects greater efficiency,

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use of water in the United States has actually declined since 1970. That change reflects greater efficiency in farming. (Ask your friends who proudly “buy local” whether they know how much water their local farmers use compared with the distant farmers from whom the supermarket imports produce.)

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“in 2014 Americans used less petroleum than they did in 1997, despite the fact that the economy is nearly 50 percent larger

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a significant depletion of edible fish in the world’s oceans.
Note:Note dolenti

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By selling books in digital format, online retailer Amazon is letting us read more while using less paper;

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Airbnb is giving us more places to sleep without building hotels;

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iTunes is allowing us to listen to more music without manufacturing records.

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The question of sustainability is this: can we keep doing what we are doing? The market calculates the answer by looking at the profits from specialization and trade. When profits are positive, the market answer is yes. Otherwise, the market answer is no.
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