A Conservative's Take on Environmental Regulation

When one thinks of environmental policy, one usually assumes that environmental policies primarily fall within the realm of the Democratic Party and left-leaning thinkers.  To an extent, this has been true recently, with Democrats sponsoring legislation to increase regulation of our air and water, including a relatively recent proposal to move to a carbon cap-and-trade system.  However, the Republican Party, usually known as the party favoring business interests, has been sensitive to environmental issues in the past (Richard Nixon created the EPA, after all), and there are parties concerned with the environment within the party that believe that some regulations are actually harmful to the environment.  Thus, by eliminating unnecessary regulations, the state of the natural world can be improved, while the republican philosophy of smaller government can be realized.  One conservative group, R Street, has published a website detailing these cuts, and the head of the firm, Eli Lehrer, shows us how eliminating regulations can be good for the environment as a whole.

Lehrer’s group’s proposal “outlines almost $700 billion in cuts that would improve the environment.”  His group takes the shears to all subsidies for oil companies, as well as for green energy companies, arguing that in times of large deficits, subsidies that go to companies that are already profitable doesn’t help taxpayers with the bills.  He also states that the litany of tax credits and subsidies also ends up distorting the clean energy market, and eliminating those will help the market function more smoothly.  He looks at subsidies for specific insurance programs, like those for agribusinesses and beach houses, and says that the private market can handle those duties as efficiently as the government.  Additionally, Mr. Lehrer recommends that the budget be gone over and eliminated of wasteful programs like the Essential Air Service Program.  The program enacts subsidies that “encourage the use of small, inefficient planes and don’t save significant time for travelers.”  In the end, the report proposes cuts that “include $269.78 billion from energy programs…$167.09 billion of agricultural subsidies…$212.02 billion of transportation subsidies…$101.8 billion of federal flood, crop, and nuclear insurance subsidies…[and] $24.99 billion from wasteful or environmentally damaging public lands and water projects.”

            While it may seem surprising to see these cuts proposed by a member of a party not usually associated with environmental protection as of late, Lehrer proclaims that these cuts came with the support of Taxpayers for Common Sense, and the progressive group Friends of the Earth.  While I believe that pricing pollution effects into the free market can help green tech with its competitiveness, smart regulation changes can be a good thing if properly vetted and administered.  It reminds me of a scene from Pixar’s Ratatouille, where several characters, particularly critic Anton Ego, take offense to chef Gusteau’s slogan “Anyone Can Cook.”  In the end, the point of Gusteau’s slogan was not that anyone can make good food, but rather, that good food can come from anywhere.  It seems that this can hold true with the policy arena as well:  not everyone can create good policy, but smart, pragmatic, well thought-out policy measures can come from anywhere.