At 09:19 5-5-01 -0500, Dan Minette wrote:
>The people in the United States are for Kyoto in principal, but I cannot
>imaging them voting for such a severe a capping of ecconomic growth. The
>senators actually reflect US sentimate. People in the US are for
>environmental measures, but not to the point where joblessness will rise 2%
>or 3% as a result.
Ah, so *that* is the problem: the people want environmental measures, but
they don't want to pay the price for it.
>IIRC, the US would be allowed virtually zero increase
>now, because the increase that was allowed has all been used up.
Yes, so what? I remember from my Business Economics classes in Business
School that one of the pillars of capitalism is permanent and unlimited
economic growth. History has already proven that you *cannot* have that. A
slow economic growth will probably be benificial in the long run, as it
provides more economic stability.
>Third
>world countries, on the other hand, have a lot of room for expansion.
>One of the main effects of Kyoto would be a transfer of wealth.
Doesn't sound like such a bad thing to me. Actually, I'd say this is an
incentive to ratify Kyoto: once the overall wealth in the Third World
increases, it will become a huge new market for everything we Westerners
take for granted. Imagine how much money can be made once everyone in the
Third World can afford anything from big-screen televisions to fast cars to
high quality health care to state-of-the-art computers to first-class
airline tickets to foreign foods to cell phones to ...
Of course, this would require the capitalists to start thinking long-term...
Jeroen
_________________________________________________________________________
Wonderful World of Brin-L Website: http://go.to/brin-l
Brin-L Party Page: http://www.geocities.com/jeroenvb.geo/party.html
