Last week, PERC was featured on the Fox Business Channel’s Stossel program for a Thanksgiving special giving thanks to property rights. Executive director Terry Anderson joined Manny Jules, former chief of the Kamloops Indian Band, to discuss how property ownership benefits Native Americans. Watch the video interview from Fox here. American Indian tribes are the singleContinue reading “How Government Perpetuates Native American Poverty”
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Is FME Taking Root?
by Reed Watson This report by the World Resources Institute begins as most environmental reports do: with alarming news of man-made environmental destruction and a dire prognosis for maintaining the status quo. The focus of this particular report is deforestation in the South and the critical importance of protecting “Intact Forest Landscapes” from suburban development.Continue reading “Is FME Taking Root?”
The Pilgrims and Property Rights
by Shawn Regan From the folks at reason.tv: And don’t forget, tonight Terry Anderson and Brian Yablonski will appear on Stossel to discuss property rights. Tune in to the Fox Business Network at 9PM or midnight EST. Details here. Happy Thanksgiving!
And Environmental Justice for All
by Shawn Regan The Washington Post reports this week that the EPA is ramping up its efforts to address environmental justice—a concern that director Lisa Jackson calls “the biggest chunk of unfinished business when you think of the environmental landscape.” As the WaPo writes, the EPA has “forced emitters, including container-glass plants, cement plants andContinue reading “And Environmental Justice for All”
Watch PERC on the Fox Business Network
by Shawn Regan As John Stossel writes, the first Thanksgiving almost didn’t happen. Communal property arrangements caused early Plymouth settlers to nearly starve. Food production was low and famine soon resulted. It wasn’t until settlers began assigning property rights to parcels of land that Thanksgiving was possible. Corn was planted, harvests rose, and in 1623,Continue reading “Watch PERC on the Fox Business Network”
New Food Safety Regulations Will Limit Food Choices
by Sarah Schwennesen
As a small producer who sells beef locally, I am suspicious of the S. 510 Food Safety Modernization Act — the government’s latest power grab to curtail economic freedom and competition in the food market. If this bill successfully becomes law, consumers will continue to see a decline in the diversity of foods that they can legally purchase because small producers will be smothered by onerous regulations and fees.
Those in support of this bill declare that they seek the safest food for all Americans, while the skeptic points out that industrial food producers are feeling the squeeze by farmers markets/Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares and hope to quash this threat through regulation. Direct, local food sales were a fringe of the overall food market just a few years ago, but sales are up, some even say 105% in the past decade – double the rate of growth of overall agricultural sales. So it’s reasonable to contend that the ‘industrialists’ are feeling the squeeze.
I believe that S. 510 is simply a turf battle for who gets your food dollars. While small agricultural producers competed with the industrialists through local networks and personal presence (in contrast to shiny wrapping and sterile stores), the industrialists have brought the game back to their turf in order to exploit their home field advantage of capital reserves, lobbyists, established government networks, and economies of scale that will be only slightly impacted by the new regulations of S. 510.
To ameliorate these concerns, a proposed Tester–Hagan amendment would exempt small producers (defined as those that make under a certain amount of money, and that earn at least 50 percent of their revenue from direct-to-consumer sales like farmers markets or CSAs) from some of the bill’s requirements.
However, this amendment has come under attack by the ‘industry lobbyists’ who demand that all food should comply with the same regulations. I tend to agree with this line of thinking, though in a dissimilar manner. All food should be treated the same way; it should be unregulated. People should be free to make their food choices unimpeded by government regulations which are never a one-size-fits-all solution to perceived problems.
If people desire sterile food, then they can buy from industrial operations which will devise ways of “third party accreditation for safety and quality.” But if people crave ugly tomatoes with out-of-this-world taste, raw milk, eggs directly from the chicken’s nest, and meat from their local butcher, then they ought to have the right to make these purchases with their monies.
Yes, I grant that food safety is important, and our nation’s food safety is second to none—but that is in spite of limiting the food choices that people have, not because of it.
High density energy spares landscapes; low density consumes it.
by Pete Geddes Over millennia, plants and animals have adapted to changing climates by migrating to more favorable locales. If the climate continues to change in a manner consistent with current expectations, most warming will occur in the high latitudes. In order for plants and animals to adapt, large areas of habitat — especially thoseContinue reading “High density energy spares landscapes; low density consumes it.”
The Fate of the Bogus Bidder
by Laura Huggins A federal judge just set a new trial date for environmental activist Timothy DeChristopher, asserting that serving “the ends of justice” outweigh the college student’s right to a speedy trial. DeChristopher, an economics major at the University of Utah, was indicted in April of 2009 on federal charges of violating an onshoreContinue reading “The Fate of the Bogus Bidder”
Romance in the parks
At the annual meeting of the Society for Enviromental Journalists, PERC researcher Holly Fretwell suggested that the national parks would benefit most from earning their own funds from entrance fees rather than depending on politicians to hand over more tax dollars. Meanwhile, the parks continue to deteriorate.
Saving Toads thru Off-Road Racing
by Laura Huggins In my neck of the woods there’s a saying that pertains to endangered species; “shoot, shovel, and shut-up.” Interestingly, in the case of the rare (and not too cute and cuddly) Amargoso toad, the local folk are working hard to protect it. What keeps these land owners from shoot, shovel, and shut-upping? DoContinue reading “Saving Toads thru Off-Road Racing”