IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/engenv/v18y2007i1p75-85.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Economics of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Author

Listed:
  • Emily Schaeffer
  • Walter Block

Abstract

Should the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) be used to drill for oil, or should this type of economic development be forbidden, in favor of protecting environmental amenities? In economics, this is a classical question of the allocation of resources, and we propose to answer it in a similar manner in this case, even though such reasoning is not typical of debates in this field. We answer the ANWR challenge with arguments favoring solutions emerging from private property arrangements, and provide an illustrative example of markets at work. We take neither side, but urge that the free enterprise system be allowed to address the issue. It is our claim that this is a superior system, as entrepreneurs who make mistakes suffer economic penalties, and this feedback mechanism is either entirely missing in political and bureaucratic institutions, or at the very least greatly attenuated there.

Suggested Citation

  • Emily Schaeffer & Walter Block, 2007. "The Economics of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge," Energy & Environment, , vol. 18(1), pages 75-85, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:engenv:v:18:y:2007:i:1:p:75-85
    DOI: 10.1260/095830507780157221
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1260/095830507780157221
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1260/095830507780157221?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Block Walter, 1998. "Roads, Bridges, Sunlight and Private Property: Reply to Tullock," Journal des Economistes et des Etudes Humaines, De Gruyter, vol. 8(2-3), pages 315-326, June.
    2. Murray Rothbard, 1982. "Law, Property Rights, and Air Pollution," Cato Journal, Cato Journal, Cato Institute, vol. 2(1), pages 55-99, Spring.
    3. Donald H. Rosenthal & Robert H. Nelson, 1992. "Why existence value should not be used in cost-benefit analysis," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(1), pages 116-122.
    4. Murray N. Rothbard, 1997. "The Logic of Action One," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 968.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jordan Reel & Walter E. Block, 2013. "Educational Vouchers: Freedom to Choose?," Contemporary Economics, University of Economics and Human Sciences in Warsaw., vol. 7(4), December.
    2. Makovi, Michael, 2015. "The Welfare Costs of Rent-Seeking: A Methodologically Individualist & Subjectivist Revision," MPRA Paper 63270, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Jankovic Ivan & Block Walter, 2019. "Private Property Rights, Government Interventionism and Welfare Economics," Review of Economic Perspectives, Sciendo, vol. 19(4), pages 365-397, December.
    4. Klein, Daniel, 2003. "Mere Libertarianism: Blending Hayek and Rothbard," Ratio Working Papers 29, The Ratio Institute.
    5. Ioana Negru, 2013. "Revisiting the Concept of Schools of Thought in Economics: The Example of the Austrian School," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(4), pages 983-1008, October.
    6. Calcagno, Peter T. & Hall, Joshua C. & Lawson, Robert A., 2010. "Objectivism versus subjectivism: A market test," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 445-448, November.
    7. Groeneveld, Rolf A. & Wesseler, Justus & Berentsen, Paul B.M., 2013. "Dominos in the dairy: An analysis of transgenic maize in Dutch dairy farming," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 107-116.
    8. William Hongsong Wang & Vicente Moreno-Casas & Jesús Huerta de Soto, 2021. "A Free-Market Environmentalist Transition toward Renewable Energy: The Cases of Germany, Denmark, and the United Kingdom," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-27, July.
    9. Stenger, Anne & Harou, Patrice & Navrud, Ståle, 2009. "Valuing environmental goods and services derived from the forests," Journal of Forest Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(1-2), pages 1-14, January.
    10. Jochem, Patrick & Doll, Claus & Fichtner, Wolf, 2016. "External costs of electric vehicles," MPRA Paper 91602, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. David Howden & Joakim Kampe, 2016. "Time preference and the process of civilization," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 43(4), pages 382-399, April.
    12. Marc David Davidson, 2021. "How Fairness Principles in the Climate Debate Relate to Theories of Distributive Justice," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(13), pages 1-16, June.
    13. Gage Counts & Walter E Block, 2016. "Fracking: A creature of government?," Energy & Environment, , vol. 27(8), pages 933-941, December.
    14. Richard Carson & Nicholas Flores & Norman Meade, 2001. "Contingent Valuation: Controversies and Evidence," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 19(2), pages 173-210, June.
    15. Rondeau, Daniel & Rollins, Kimberly S. & Martin, Patrick, 1993. "Costly Information and Estimating Existence Values," Department of Agricultural Economics and Business 258751, University of Guelph.
    16. Cozzolino, Stefano & Moroni, Stefano, 2021. "Multiple agents and self-organisation in complex cities: The crucial role of several property," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    17. Michela Loi & Alain Fayolle & Marco van Gelderen & Elen Riot & Deema Refai & David Higgins & Radi Haloub & Marcus Alexandre Yshikawa Salusse & Erwan Lamy & Caroline Verzat & Fabrice Cavarretta, 2022. "Entrepreneurship Education at the Crossroads: Challenging Taken-for-Granted Assumptions and Opening New Perspectives," Post-Print hal-03983114, HAL.
    18. Mihaela Iacob & Rodica Gherghina & Georgiana Camelia Cre?an, 2019. "„Comparative (Bio)Economic Systems” in Terms of Social Responsibility: The Natural Environment – Between Ideal Capitalism, Utopian Socialism and Real-World Interventionism," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 21(52), pages 707-707, August.
    19. Octavian-Dragomir Jora & Mihaela Iacob, 2011. "A Praxeological And Ethical Check-In For The Alleged Virtues In Statesmanship," Romanian Economic Business Review, Romanian-American University, vol. 6(2), pages 132-149, June.
    20. Carson, Richard T., 1998. "Valuation of tropical rainforests: philosophical and practical issues in the use of contingent valuation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 15-29, January.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; Bidding; Conflict resolution; Existence value; Free market environmentalism; JEL classification; K32; Markets; N5; P14; Private property;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K32 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Energy, Environmental, Health, and Safety Law
    • N5 - Economic History - - Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment and Extractive Industries
    • P14 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Property Rights

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:engenv:v:18:y:2007:i:1:p:75-85. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.