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Paper Companies' Windfall of Unintended Consequences
Jamie found a post on ScienceBlogs that serves as a stark example of the law of unintended consequences, as well as the ability of private industry to game a system of laws to their advantage. It seems that large paper companies stand to reap as much as $8 billion this year by doing the opposite of what an alternative-fuel bill intended. Here is the article from The Nation with more details and a mild reaction from a Congressional staffer. "[T]he United States government stands to pay out as much as $8 billion this year to the ten largest paper companies.... even though the money comes from a transportation bill whose manifest intent was to reduce dependence on fossil fuel, paper mills are adding diesel fuel to a process that requires none in order to qualify for the tax credit. In other words, we are paying the industry — handsomely — to use more fossil fuel. 'Which is,' as a Goldman Sachs report archly noted, the 'opposite of what lawmakers likely had in mind when the tax credit was established.'"
In the short term the solution for this is for the president to order the IRS to withhold these payouts until congress can close the loophole. If the paper companies sue, they would get laughed at or scolded by the judges as this is an obvious and evil perversion of the intent of the law.
Exactly, and in this case, they did just that : they pursued their own intrest the way the law forced them to, instead of the most profitable (and therefore, at least in this case, most environmentally friendly, way).
In general, the cheapest way for factories is often the one using the least raw material, and therefore at least close to the most environmentally optimal way.
but I think copious legislation should be applied to ensure that you can only have achieve this by benefiting society.
You're assuming that laws always benefit society. I guess women should be glad they get stoned in muslim countries. After all, it benefits society, right ? That's what the law does. Of course, very nearly all muslim countries are, at best, third world countries, racist dictatorships or worse. Seems their laws are less than optimal ... for both society and the environment.
But of course, "America is different !". Oh wait, not at all in this case. I guess that what happened here, totally in compliance with the law, and bad for BOTH society and the environment ... means nothing to you ?
But this was in compliance with the law, and against market forces, so surely it must have been good for society and for the environment ... oops ...
Why don't we look at the environmental situation in a country where "copious legislation", in fact as copious as it gets, was in force.
And there we find ... chernobyl, in the soviet union.
It seems to me your argument is flawed, both in theory and in practice.
You see, you assume laws are in the intrest of society, which is a standpoint that's idiotic, to say the least. In fact, given the world's current situation, the less laws a society has, the better it does.
The problem has nothing to do with intention. The problem is that the law was very badly written for every purpose. The law gives a $0.50 tax credit for every gallon of diesel mix used but the credit should have been based on some fraction of the price of diesel. The paper makers scam only works because the price of diesel has fallen so much.
Indeed, if diesel and biofuel prices fell far enough we could all make money simply by burning gallons of it in our back yards: spend $0.40 on a gallon of mix; claim $0.50 from the IRS.
If the law had been drafted by someone who wasn't retarded this situation would never have arisen.
"So, even then, Government is too easily corrupted. Unfortunately, I don't have a better idea."
I do. You have to take the law back to principles, rather than specifics. Here's a few many of you are familiar with:
THOU SHALT NOT KILL.
THOU SHALT NOT STEAL.
Therefore, undisclosed mercury in Tuna and defrauding an energy subsidy as a paper mill would be considered BREAKING THE LAW.
While we're at it, I have another recommendation. Since waterboarding is simply "enhanced interrigation", I'd suggest it should be a viable questioning technique for these types of white collar crimes. I have a strange belief system where if someone elses' countrymen are trying to kill me, I can at least see they were raised and taught that way. When my OWN countryman are trying to kill me, they should be punished ten times worse.
You can get 15 minutes of fame, but you can go down in history for infamy.