Jim Choate wrote:
>On Tue, 24 Apr 2001, Declan McCullagh wrote:
>
>> On Tue, Apr 24, 2001 at 06:43:20PM -0700, Tim May wrote:
>> > From our perspective, it will show the foolishness of government
>> > overreaction (ordering a million animals to be slaughtered and burned
>> > with tires and old pressure-treated lumber railroad ties).
>
>> Yes, top-down government regulation is clearly the best way to handle
>> environmental crises, as the Brits showed so very well.
>
>What and why would the Anarcho-Capitalist responce be?
The "crisis" wouldn't have happened in a free market. (Of course other
crises would have that might be as bad or worse...)
Agricultural land in the UK is, in effect "zoned", You can't use it for
any other purpose without permission from local government. So a lot of
land that might be more economically productive turned to other uses
remains in the hands of farmers. This has undesired side effect. The
price of land is lower than it would be if there was a free market but
higher than would be expected from the demand generated by farming,
because some land is sometimes released for building, so the price of
agricultural land is slightly inflated. Undesired consequence -
agriculture can't support the mortgage on farmland, so small producers
go out of business, and land is in the hands of property companies and
insurance companies who are in effect betting on the chances of it being
released for development. Land prices away from London are inflated as
well, there is a knock-on effect.
Government subsidies and artificially high prices encourage farmers to
overstock and overproduce, leading to food surpluses, quotas (and quota
trading). Subsidies exist for some commodities (such as cow meat and
milk) but not others (such as vegetables) so farmers grow what they get
paid for In a free market there would be very little mass production of
meat in lowland England. There would probably be more specialist farms,
rare breeds, diverse stocking, market gardening, hobby farming, and lots
more suburban sprawl and golf courses. Land would fetch a lot more
around London, and slightly less away from London.
We have absurdities such as pigs and beef cattle being kept the
south-east of England, on land that could be sold for over a million
pounds an acre, slaughtered for meat that can't be sold, and being paid
for by the government - whilst we are importing fresh vegetables and
flowers by air freight from Kenya and Chile.
If there were a free market in farming in the UK there would be less
livestock, and it would be more diverse. So it would be worth more, and
farmers would be more inclined to vaccinate to preserve valuable
breeding stock.
But then there would also be a lot more golf courses, bungalows and
landfill. You pays your money and you takes your choice.
Ken
(PS Jim, why do you write "response" like that? Freudian slip?)
