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Tuesday, April 03, 2007

Comments

Johnathan Pearce

I would not say that global warming is the "archetypal" freemarket failure. The former Communist bloc had horrendous pollution, such as East Germany, etc. Pollution happens in any significant industrialised nation, not just one practising laissez-faire. It is a good point, however, that markets also provide some of the solutions to so-called man-made global warming.

The tragedy of the commons is in fact an example of what happens when you do not have property rights.

Mark Holland

Global warming is the archetypal free-market failure? What rot.

State run industry's pollution is non-polluting is it? News to the Elbe and the Ukraine and the Aral Sea and so on. I wonder why Volkswagen even bothered to build new plants in Dresden if the old Trabant works were so delightful.


dearieme

I'd have thought that libertarians would point to Iraq as a classic case of the awfulness of governments - Saddam's as evil, W's as incompetent, foolish and rash.

Johnathan Pearce

There is a good shredding of the NYT review of Brian Doherty's excellent history of American libertarianism here. Judging by that article, the Leonhardt review was a piece of sloppy work albeit with some good points. Well, it is the NY Times, after all.

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