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Energy Star Program Certifies 15 Out of 20 Bogus Products
longacre writes "A Gasoline-Powered Alarm Clock was among 15 bogus products granted the coveted Energy Star seal of approval by the US Environmental Protection Agency during a secret evaluation conducted by the Government Accountability Office. In addition, four fictional manufacturers run by fake people and marketed with crummy websites — Cool Rapport (HVAC equipment), Futurizon Solar Innovations (lighting), Spartan Digital Electronics, and Tropical Thunder Appliances — were granted Energy Star partnerships. The root of the problem: Manufacturers need only submit photos and not actual examples of their products, and they submit their own efficiency ratings, which are not independently verified by the EPA."
The sheer volume of applicants makes it infeasible for a single bureaucracy to effectively test physical hardware.
I guess the secret's out about my Energy Star certified gas-guzzling SUV that gets 10mpg, which I drive a few hundred miles every day?
Pretty much. I for one cannot wait to see what they do with Carbon caps and labels for that one...
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Centralized control is not efficient nor effective.
That's why many people are calling for a simple carbon tax. We already tax gasoline. Just also tax coal and natural gas to encourage efficient use of fossil fuels or use of non-fossil fuels. Of course, we should also tax goods from countries based on the carbon intensity of their industry so we don't simply shift fossil fuel use to other countries.
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
Of course the GAO is a government office, so if I'm not supposed to trust the government...
I'd rather not throw the baby out with the bathwater. I can think of plenty of places where the government is trustworthy: I trust them to bend over for corporate power in a heartbeat. Corporations no doubt benefit from a sham stamp of approval like "Energy Star" to help sell products. Private organizations do plenty of harm (Dow Chemical and Bhopal, war profiteering, financing campaigns that weaken consumer protections, the movie "The Corporation" is filled with more examples) and that harm is (by design) beyond any democratic relief or judicial oversight; we don't need more of that. On issues of life and death, war and peace, it's clear that the US government is plenty willing to keep wars, banks, and now HMOs financed with taxpayer dollars while its citizens suffer; plenty of examples of government-corporate working against the people. People need to fix this not think government is something to throw away. The power of government can be turned to benefit its people.
Digital Citizen
I don't think it is necessarily a question of HOW MUCH in taxes, but what it is spent on. Why do we even have a government agency to put a damn energy star sticker on the side of an appliance? Simply make all manufacturers print the power draw of their item on the side of the package. Done. Anyone who gives two craps about how much power something uses can look on the package. Anyone who doesn't bother to probably wouldn't care about the whole energy star thing anyways.
That money wasted on the 'energy star' bureaucracy could have been used to fill the pothole that you hit.
It's too bad you haven't enjoyed our semi-socialized healthcare system, where half the costs have been fronted by the government, and the other half obscured from the real purchasers by government intervention (limiting what states insurers can compete in and promoting employer-purchases insurance in lieu of insuree purchased insurance). Unfortunately, however much it may suck in your personal experience, it's not a good example for you to cite of American capitalism failing. Fyi, freeways are paid for entirely by the government, although if you are complaining simply about too little money being spent, you should be aware that more money (at least as I've heard it reported) is spent on American healthcare.
I have to wonder what your beef is with the telecoms--do you have a landline? Deregulation of the cellphone market is a rather famous example of where deregulation worked really well--it's an awful lot cheaper now than it used to be.
I would like to point out that a single pothole does not a bad road make. There are going to be anomalous potholes in the highway whether in America or Europe simply because they layout so much road (America has the largest highway system in the world, which is also the largest public works project in history). In addition there may simply be a bad region (did you drive on every highway in Europe before making your comparison?) and certain areas are much more vulnerable to the formation of potholes due to local climate/terrain. America is much less densely populated than Europe, which means we have to layout a lot more road per citizen, and so we may well be making greater expenditures with inferior results.
The point being that you take a tremendously complex multitude of factors and simplify them all into an entirely unrepresentative anecdote. Fyi my own experience with roads, healthcare, and phone bills has all been generally positive.
P.S. IANAL, but if you really "hate paying so little in taxes," I am inclined to think that the IRS would not have a problem with you writing them a bigger check.
In all fairness to this civil servant, there are entities more inefficient than the Federal Government. For example, there are the United Nations, the World Bank, and NATO. Most companies fail when they become this inefficient. It take a lot more to fail a larger company, and it takes a whole lot more to fail a nation, especially one of this size. There is a price to pay for efficiency. As Truman said, "the most efficient government is a tyranny."
You are missing the point. The reason government here can't fix potholes is because conservative business leaders have consistently pushed just the idea you expressed and managed to successfully disguise it as a populist, libertarian movement. Over time this becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. Government is increasingly under resourced making it more ineffectual. This combined with horrible campaign finance legislation has allowed industry lobbyists to essentially control the agencies which are supposed to regulate them.
The fact that this was discovered by the GAO, also a government agency, shows that regulation and oversight can and does have beneficial results. Now just imagine what a new Consumer Protection Agency as envisioned by the Democrats could do.
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Well, we could start in on Dun and Bradstreet, who used to be a reasonably reputable organization, but now they have resorted to the same kind of "important message" scams to get you to sign up as Classmates.com. I needed to get a Duns number from them for my business in order to secure a contract with a customer. I called up to get my free number, and I was unable to get one. The agent tried to sell me something I didn't want, but which i couldn't come up with an acceptable (to him) answer as to why I didn't want the service. He said he would give me a free duns number as soon as I could give him an acceptable reason why I wouldn't purchase their service that I didn't want. I got increasingly firm, and finally belligerent, but he was not to be swayed. Finally after 5 minutes, I hung up in frustration. I did not get the contract with the customer, and now I avoid doing business with any customer that is so far behind the times that they think a DBS number is something worthwhile to have.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
Exactly my point. Instead of continuing down the path of smaller and more ineffective government that has put us in this position, it is time to start rebuilding the regulatory structures that the corporate right has methodically dismantled over the last thirty years with the incessant mantra of deregulation. A well reasoned regulatory structure operating as an independent agency as Obama is proposing could expose hundreds of these types of abuses. Why do you think the Republicans are opposing it so strongly? If their contributors had to actually earn their money their fundraisers might not go so well.
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I don't work for UL anymore, so I obviously do not speak for them, but I've seen their ladder testing and it's pretty neat.
My girlfriend still works for UL and regularly performs UL/NFPA 1901 inspections on new fire trucks as well and it's truly fascinating(to me anyway) to hear about how rigorously new fire trucks are tested.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.