Environment

Commentary

Creating Better Forestry Certification Programs through Competition

It is basic Economics 101. Competitive markets create better outcomes than monopolists. Monopolists restrict supply and charge higher prices. Dynamically, monopolists face fewer incentives to create new products or improve how their products are made. In fact, creating new technologies or processes could undermine a monopolist’s current market dominance. What ...
Business & Economics

Obama’s Green Team

The four leaders of Barack Obama’s second-term “Green Team” are nearly all in place: John Kerry has been confirmed as Secretary of State, Sally Jewell has been confirmed as Secretary of the Interior, Ernest Moniz has been confirmed as Secretary of Energy, and only the confirmation of Gina McCarthy remains ...
Commentary

Happy Earth Day!

Just in time for Earth Day on April 22, the American Enterprise Institute and the Pacific Research Institute are out today with their annual Index of Leading Environmental Indicators. Despite the scare talk of groups like the Sierra Club, after four years of President Bush in the White House and ...
California

2013 Supplement to the 2011 Environmental Almanac

The reduction in air pollution continues to be the most successful domain of pollution reduction since the first Earth Day in 1970. Since the first edition of this Almanac two years ago, reductions in air pollution have been astonishing. The EPA recently updated its inventory of ambient air pollution levels ...
Agriculture

Uncle Sam likes his sugar

The federal government continues to envision itself as Saint Michael, whose role is to save failing industries from the horrors of the market’s cruel discipline. At least it would seem so from its recent actions. Government bailouts for investment banks, insurance companies, large banks, small banks and the automobile companies ...
Agriculture

Environmentalists Try to Squash a Bug Killer

Green groups blame a widely-used insecticide for bee ‘die-offs,’ but the evidence is weak. In January, the European Commission advised the EU not to use neonicotinoids, a relatively new class of agricultural insecticides. Now the member countries are considering whether to ban the chemical. The Commission’s warning came after heavy ...
Agriculture

New Report Provides Recommendations to Improve CA’s Agriculture Industry

San Francisco – The Pacific Research Institute, a free-market think tank based in San Francisco, released a new report today that reviews the state of California’s agriculture production, examines the barriers that are impeding California’s agricultural economy, and provides recommendations for policy reforms that will spur additional growth. Growing California’s ...
Education

Next-Gen Education

The Pacific Research Institute is pleased to co-sponsor the study “Education Savings Accounts: A Path to Give All Children an Effective Education and Prepare Them for Life” by Jonathan Butcher, Education Director at the Goldwater Institute. Education savings accounts provide an innovative solution to children’s educational needs. Conceived by the ...
Commentary

The EPA Is Politicized—So Make It Official

Lisa Jackson, who announced on Dec. 27 that she was stepping down as head of the Environmental Protection Agency, will be leaving under a cloud. It turns out that she had been using an email account, under the alias “Richard Windsor,” to conduct official business, in an apparent attempt to ...
California

Getting to Vegas, baby

Yahoo Travel ranks the Las Vegas Strip as the nation’s second most popular tourist attraction, trailing only Times Square in New York City. Southern California residents can easily reach Las Vegas. They can pile the kids in the car for a weekend jaunt and be there in from 4 to ...
Commentary

Creating Better Forestry Certification Programs through Competition

It is basic Economics 101. Competitive markets create better outcomes than monopolists. Monopolists restrict supply and charge higher prices. Dynamically, monopolists face fewer incentives to create new products or improve how their products are made. In fact, creating new technologies or processes could undermine a monopolist’s current market dominance. What ...
Business & Economics

Obama’s Green Team

The four leaders of Barack Obama’s second-term “Green Team” are nearly all in place: John Kerry has been confirmed as Secretary of State, Sally Jewell has been confirmed as Secretary of the Interior, Ernest Moniz has been confirmed as Secretary of Energy, and only the confirmation of Gina McCarthy remains ...
Commentary

Happy Earth Day!

Just in time for Earth Day on April 22, the American Enterprise Institute and the Pacific Research Institute are out today with their annual Index of Leading Environmental Indicators. Despite the scare talk of groups like the Sierra Club, after four years of President Bush in the White House and ...
California

2013 Supplement to the 2011 Environmental Almanac

The reduction in air pollution continues to be the most successful domain of pollution reduction since the first Earth Day in 1970. Since the first edition of this Almanac two years ago, reductions in air pollution have been astonishing. The EPA recently updated its inventory of ambient air pollution levels ...
Agriculture

Uncle Sam likes his sugar

The federal government continues to envision itself as Saint Michael, whose role is to save failing industries from the horrors of the market’s cruel discipline. At least it would seem so from its recent actions. Government bailouts for investment banks, insurance companies, large banks, small banks and the automobile companies ...
Agriculture

Environmentalists Try to Squash a Bug Killer

Green groups blame a widely-used insecticide for bee ‘die-offs,’ but the evidence is weak. In January, the European Commission advised the EU not to use neonicotinoids, a relatively new class of agricultural insecticides. Now the member countries are considering whether to ban the chemical. The Commission’s warning came after heavy ...
Agriculture

New Report Provides Recommendations to Improve CA’s Agriculture Industry

San Francisco – The Pacific Research Institute, a free-market think tank based in San Francisco, released a new report today that reviews the state of California’s agriculture production, examines the barriers that are impeding California’s agricultural economy, and provides recommendations for policy reforms that will spur additional growth. Growing California’s ...
Education

Next-Gen Education

The Pacific Research Institute is pleased to co-sponsor the study “Education Savings Accounts: A Path to Give All Children an Effective Education and Prepare Them for Life” by Jonathan Butcher, Education Director at the Goldwater Institute. Education savings accounts provide an innovative solution to children’s educational needs. Conceived by the ...
Commentary

The EPA Is Politicized—So Make It Official

Lisa Jackson, who announced on Dec. 27 that she was stepping down as head of the Environmental Protection Agency, will be leaving under a cloud. It turns out that she had been using an email account, under the alias “Richard Windsor,” to conduct official business, in an apparent attempt to ...
California

Getting to Vegas, baby

Yahoo Travel ranks the Las Vegas Strip as the nation’s second most popular tourist attraction, trailing only Times Square in New York City. Southern California residents can easily reach Las Vegas. They can pile the kids in the car for a weekend jaunt and be there in from 4 to ...
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