I was trying to catch up on my reading this weekend and spent a lot of time on magazines that I have sitting around. I have converted most to the digital format, because they tend not to stalk me by phone if I have the digital version of the publication, and second, it’s a lot easier to clean out my inbox than it is to carry a stack of magazines outside. It gets heavy after a while.
As I was reading, I noticed how doom and gloom the predictions of global warming are getting. Apparently we will have no land left in 10 years and we should all learn how to swim. Or how the Bush administration caved in to extremist environmentalist and froze solar power research because we might ruin the environment by stepping on the grass. Of course there are a million people out there with their own ideas as to how to fix the global warming issue and their idea is the only idea as far as they are concerned. But the more I look into this, the more I realize, those most invested in the global warming problem are the least among us to be listening to. Here’s how I came to this conclusion.
Look around the world, you will notice something in common, countries that pay the most attention to the environment have two things in common, citizens are free and they are wealthy. Poor countries are more focused on basic needs, the environment is not on that list of needs. China is not a free nation, so it doesn’t focus on the environment (yes they claim to care but really go and look, that is if your eyes don’t burn from the pollution in the air).
A lot of the people invested in global warming want the government to control things, tell everyone what to do, but history has shown that the real way to help the environment is to help people become wealthy, then they have the money to be worried about the environment. Take the current situation, 10 years ago when gas was around $1 a gallon, many people were against off shore drilling and anwar. Now, the majority of people are for it. Why? Simple economics, when you have to spend $4 a gallon, that adds up fast and that leaves little for other things, so many Americans are focused on basic needs, not the environment because they do not feel wealthy anymore.
Capitalism is best for the environment, not socialism, not communism, but capitalism. Look at China, it is a communist nation, and the worlds largest polluter. Socialist countries are not much different, it is when people are free to make money and enjoy money that they can afford to be concerned about the environment. So things like wage depressions through outsourcing, H1-B visa abuse and illegal immigration are all actually bad for the environment. When wages are held down, people make less and are therefore, more concerned about basic needs than the environment.
When I say capitalism is the answer I don’t mean the Bush style of the rich get richer, I mean everyone has to! It is nice that the rich can afford nice things but the vast majority needs to be able to. Then we have to replicate this to other nations as well. When people are wealthy, they can afford to be concerned and when incentives are in place to put in the effort to find new ways of doing business that are cleaner, then we have a winning formula. This idea that some how the government is going to get us to be green is just nonsense. People, not governments, change the world.