How Enforcement and Measurement Kill Incentive-Based Climate Regulation

    First-party enforcement is the most effective way of enforcing environmental regulations. This means that a government entity would not need to enforce rules regarding climate, and that the polluting parties, due to either their beliefs or other personal motives, would self regulate all the time. Unfortunately, first-party enforcement is nearly impossible. It seems the closest we could come is incentive-based regulation. Theoretically our government can incentivize polluting parties through taxes on polluting. It would be in these companies/individuals best interest to abide by the regulations to minimize their operation costs. Issues with mass enforcement and accurate measurement make incentive-based regulation difficult.

    Research has come a long way, but there is still a lot we don't know about climate change. What we don't know, we cant measure. Issues that we are aware of can even be difficult to measure. The inability to effectively measure elements in the natural world make it difficult for economists to create models that will continue to work. The challenge of the unknown usually leads to more learning, which can make the unknown know. Only then can a repeatable economic model be produced. With matters concerning climate change, we cannot make the unknown known, at least not in a reasonable time frame. Without a sustainable and repeatable economic model, it is difficult to determine what regulations should be installed. If the correct regulations can be determined, we will have to deal with enforcing them.

    The perfect government, when concerned with enforcement, would be global. It would be able to control the world's doing as a state government controls its state. Unfortunately, government opinions and abilities differ even within a single country. It is common practice in a free market for a company to move to where the cost to operate is lowest. It works the same on a consumer level. I would prefer to register my vehicle in Montana, where the sales tax is zero and I can save money. A corporation would move to another state if their pollution tax were lower. In the United States, we can create federal regulations to assure that cant happen, but we are just one of many nations. An effective climate control plan would have to be governed by everyone, and preferably a single entity. Pollution based incentives will never be the same across the board and this will lead to competition. A country can offer no incentive tax with the hope that companies will base operations there just as countries can draw companies with lower hourly wages.

    The incentive-based regulation of climate issues seems ideal. If the entire world could work together to identify measurable climate issues, and regulate together, it would be ideal. The current state of the world, however, makes it nearly impossible to effectively implement incentive-based climate control.