Re: [Pen-l] why don't we legalize hitchhiking?

[Jim Devine <jdevine03@xxxxxxxxx>]

Michael Perelman wrote:
>> Good idea, but not Pareto optimal, unless you offer something to the auto
>> industry.  Remember Pareto optimality is a formula for inaction.

and:
>>Not unless the automobile companies were compensated for their losses.

Robert Naiman wrote:
> I am offering something to the auto industry - the opportunity to make their
> vehicles more fuel-efficient at zero (production) cost.
>
> After all, the auto industry could argue, what really matters is not how
> many miles the _vehicle_ gets per gallon, but how many miles per gallon it
> gets _per passenger_...

Don't these companies worry more about _profits_ per mile?

> Suppose the car comes (voluntarily) equipped with a little electronic box.
> Every time you take a trip in the car of more than X miles, you get some
> kind of economic/pollution control credit if more than one person made the
> trip. You demonstrate this by everybody in the vehicle swiping their cards
> in the electronic box, like frequent flyers on an airline. The electronic
> box has a GPS that counts the miles. Each time the driver and passengers
> earn credit, the auto manufacturer earns economic/pollution control credit
> too, giving them an incentive to promote the program...

good idea, but I'd prefer Kaldor-Hicks hypothetical compensation. It's
like what the IMF/World Bank does to third world countries: if you go
free market all the way (privatizing, deregulating, etc.) it will
increase efficiency so that _in theory_ the losers could be
compensated for their losses. Of course, under these worthies' rule,
the lonely hour of the compensation never comes.
-- 
Jim Devine / "Disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing
in government and business."  -- Tom Robbins
_______________________________________________
pen-l mailing list
pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l