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Articles by Jason D Scorse

Jason Scorse, Ph.D., is Associate Professor and Chair of the International Environmental Policy Program at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. His book What Environmentalists Need to Know About Economics is available at Amazon.

All Articles

  • Carbon trading in the news

    Check out the latest article on carbon trading in The NYT Magazine. It is quite interesting and underscores why markets and property rights are almost certainly going to be the foundation of any large scale carbon-reduction policy.

  • Some inconvenient truths

    With the release of Al Gore's movie, global warming awareness has gone mainstream and the consensus among environmentalists is that now is the time for drastic action to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. On Gristmill, we are witnessing calls to turn combating global warming into a "moral crusade" in order to enlist religious-minded folks and to elevate the issue to a debate about right and wrong conduct. Unfortunately, I think many environmentalists are repeating the mistakes of past environmental campaigns.

  • Do monopolies undermine the environment?

    For many skeptics of the environmental benefits of market economies, the fear of monopoly control over natural resources is one of their greatest concerns. The reality is actually much more complicated; here's why.

  • What is a “free market”?

    I have written a few pieces over the past week about economic policies that would greatly benefit the environment. A major contention that keeps coming up on the comment threads is that I use the term "markets" or "free markets" too loosely. So it's time for a quick summary of what the market system is and isn't.