Gallup, 19 March 2009
http://www.gallup.com/poll/116962/Americans-Economy-Takes-Precedence-Environment.aspx
Americans: Economy Takes Precedence Over Environment
First time majority has supported economy in 25 years of asking question
by Frank Newport
PRINCETON, NJ — For the first time in Gallup’s 25-year history of asking Americans about the trade-off between environmental protection and economic growth, a majority of Americans say economic growth should be given the priority, even if the environment suffers to some extent.
Gallup first asked Americans about this trade-off in 1984, at which time over 60% chose the environmental option. Support for the environment was particularly high in 1990-1991, and in the late 1990s and 2000, when the dot-com boom perhaps made economic growth more of a foregone conclusion.
The percentage of Americans choosing the environment slipped below 50% in 2003 and 2004, but was still higher than the percentage choosing the economy. Sentiments have moved up and down over the last several years, but this year, the percentage of Americans choosing the environment fell all the way to 42%, while the percentage choosing the economy jumped to 51%.
The reason for this shift in priorities almost certainly has to do with the current economic recession. The findings reflect many recent Gallup results showing how primary the economy is in Americans’ minds, and help document the fact of life that in times of economic stress, the public can be persuaded to put off or ignore environmental concerns if need be in order to rejuvenate the economy.
h/t to Benny Peiser
FULL STORY at http://www.gallup.com/poll/116962/Americans-Economy-Takes-Precedence-Environment.aspx
That is why I only attended a couple of mensa meetings. There does not appear to be any relationship between raw intelligence and common sense or practical critical thinking. I have known some very bright people that were incapable of seeing even the most obvious practical problems to their proposed “solutions” because they simply did not think in real world terms. They over thought everything and their solutions tended to be overly complex theoretical solutions to problems that were of little consequence in the greater scheme of things.
I have come to believe that to be a practicing engineer (or scientist) you should be required to serve an internship in a related hands on field — such as a mechanical engineer should work as a car mechanic for 2 years, before he/she can can be licensed as an engineer.
Years ago I worked as a “client” to an engineering program called EPIC that is used by the Colorado School of Mines to force engineering students to face the facts that real world engineering problems do not have “one correct answer”, but are usually some sort of compromise between what is possible, what is desirable (you can sell to the client) and what is affordable.
It was interesting to watch the groups as their proposals developed and matured. It reinforced my belief that the quality of the out put of the group was very frequently predictable before hand, based on if the group had a “leader” who could or would rein in the more outlandish flights of fancy and direct others in the group to focus on real issues rather than try to chase some pie in the sky solution that could not be built or financed.
I think AGW is an example of that sort of flight of fancy engineering where the concept has over whelmed the science and as a result you have people chasing a predetermined out come rather than gathering data and trying to determine what it must mean. I am sure that many of these AGW scientists are also very bright and talented individuals but somehow they or the system they work in, are looking for only that “correct answer” as if this was some sort of test, and they are determining the correctness of the answer not on the classic process of the scientific method, but whether or not the answer they get fits in with their pre-conceived notions of what the answer should be.
A true scientist would be just as thrilled to get a totally unexpected answer if it resulted in a new understanding of a theory or problem. Many of our greatest scientific discoveries were accidents where experiments produced unexpected results. Some goop in a test tube that should not be there.
Larry
If you in the USA think that you have it bad just look across the pond at what we poor Brits have to put up with. Not only do we have a so-called government busily tearing our economy to pieces (but being frightfully Green at the same time), we also have Hansen over here defending criminals and then acting as an ‘activist’ in Coventry. On top of that we now have the following to tolerate, and we were never even asked to vote on it! How long before being a ‘denier’ falls foul of some other country’s law?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/5018778/You-can-forget-about-getting-British-justice.html
I went to school in Pittsburgh in the winter of 1936-37. The pollution was terrible, with soot flakes coming out of the sky. Pneumonia was endemic and nearly killed my mother. The landscape was grim. Then in the 1940’s I worked in the industrial triangle between South Chicago, Gary, and East Chicago, Indiana. The air pollution was so bad that you could literally tell the wind direction by which smell was in the air. Every building in Gary was colored brick red from hematite dust. Drinking water from Lake Michigan contained chlorinated phenols, with an awful taste. I enjoyed my work, but after four years decided I didn’t want to spend my life in such a dump, so I quit. So I became a philosophical environmentalist before the word was invented. I don’t want beautiful parts of our nation despoiled unnecessarily. But now the reaction has swung so far in the opposite direction that further progress of our economy is being undermined by uninformed citizens for sake of the word “green”. Yes, I want energy independence for our country, and we can have it by conservation and using domestic coal, crude, and natural gas resources; and the CO2 emitted is not a pollutant, but makes plants grow faster. I hear the clamor for “renewable energy”, but I never hear where it is coming from at night or when the wind is not blowing. I looked up solar electricity storage, and I find all kinds of schemes being studied, many in the exploratory laboratory stage. I never hear how they are going to protect many square miles of solar cells from lightning strikes in the southwest where there are frequent summer thunderstorms. I worry about where our industrial capacity (that saved our bacon in WWII) is going to be if we burden it with large carbon taxes that are not being paid in China, India, and other growing economies. So now I consider myself a “conservationist”, and hope that the greenies don’t force us down the road to ruin before our countrymen come to their senses. My letters to newspapers, Senators, or the American Chemical Society along these lines don’t get published. I therefore appreciate being able to express my views on this blog, even though I can’t follow all the details of the statistical analyzes.
Retired BChE (12:40:50) :
Well said.
Check out the Triumph of Reason. I like those polls numbers more.
” * 92 percent supported more funding for research on renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind power;
* 85 percent supported tax rebates for people buying energy efficient vehicles or solar panels;
* 80 percent said the government should regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant;
* 69 percent of Americans said the United States should sign an international treaty that requires the U.S. to cut its emissions of carbon dioxide 90% by the year 2050.
”
You’re too easy
probably should add the link 😛
http:// gristmill.grist.org/story/2009/3/19/111321/562
I’m all for environmentalism. Provided it is done the most cost effective way.
AGW prevention efforts and Carbon taxing will do nothing for the environment — maybe even hurt it (more CO2 is probably a good thing). But they will waste $Trillions that could be spent to make the environment better. So, being an environmentalist, I’m not for AGW/CO2 mitigation programs.
Retired BChE
Do you still see the places you mentioned? How do they compare? Are we making progress?
Swing, meet Pendulum
The more people read up on the science behind AGW the more likely that they become skeptical about it. It is amazing that they find out water vapor is about 95% of the “greenhouse effect” and man contributes so little of the CO2, they formerly though man contributed at least 70-80% in some cases. You can imagine what they think when they find out the facts.
Simply put, man’s 3% of total CO2 which is 0.03% of the atmosphere causing a catastrophe because temperatures have risen about 1.5 degrees F over a Century appears ridiculous when temps can change 20 or more degrees F during a day and we exhale 40,000 ppm of CO2.
I have yet to meet a skeptic that has become an alarmist, but there are former believers of AGW that now consider AGW bovine poop.
“* 80 percent said the government should regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant;”
Dear government,
I’ve got a device that turns a toxic, tetragenic, mutagenic, carcinogenic, volatile, hazardous, environmentally damaging waste product that’s a very strong greenhouse gas into plant food, water and energy.
May I turn it on? Pricing starts at $10k, and you can get 100kmile warranties on them.
You must stop thinking that at some point eyes will open and that a realization of Co2 as a harmless gas will stop the Cap and Trade in the United States. If its not housed under Climate Change it will reappear under Energy Independence. Please see this movement for what it really is. It is a money making scheme for our federal government. They are already counting on the taxes they will be getting from Cap and Trade. When Obama says he will cut the deficit in half by whatever date, he is planning on using the proceeds from Cap and Trade to do it. It has never been about the environment, it has always been about funding or the results from the countries that have implemented Cap and trade and the lack of results in Co2 reduction would have scrapped the idea.
I almost feel badly for some of the organizations and individuals that this hidden tax has been using to move ahead. Even radical environmentalists will agree Cap and Trade is a failure as far as lessening Co2 emissions.. so if you look at the situation logically the only reason to put it into effect is to tax the crap out of everyone in the name of “our children” i.e. the greater good, ie socialization. People like James H are being used.. his thing is coal power, if it gets rid of coal power its all good by him, but how will he feel when those same coal plants are still in use or worse, used more with increased pollution and land destruction because it will be ok as long as the industry buys the proper amount of carbon credits. . . The only thing Cap and Trade will solve is the “how to justify” part of the huge gov. budgets we will be seeing over the next two years.. it will serve to depress an already sick economy but that wont matter don’t you see because big br.. err Uncle Sam will be here to care for our every need. Perhaps then the righteous being used to push forward this agenda will open their eyes and see how they have been used, maybe then we will be on the same side eh?
With regard to Mark’s question, I have not returned to either Pittsburgh or the area south of Chicago in many years. However, a few years ago my son went to Pittsburgh, and he found it nothing like it was when I lived there. The city has evidently been completely cleaned up, I’m glad to say.
Stefan (07:45:07) wrote: “Broadly speaking, in human social and material development, we always need every stage that the whole thing is built on. …”
Very, very nice, Stefan! Thank you for much to think on.
Chicago is cleaner too. I lived in Chicago in the mid 1960s, 10 or 15 miles from the steel mills and refineries. Their greasy dirt settled on everything. Sometime between 1968 and 1975, things got much cleaner. Some visits in the mid 90s showed further improvement. Laws, public opinion, and business failures all contributed.
Dear Mr. Watts,
A good story on the UK Daily Telegraph, Comment section, by Melanie McDonagh. In the UK, belief in global warming is now officially regarded by the courts as a religion, or philosophy, on a par with Islam or Judaism. Tom Nicolson, an ardent green, was dismissed by his firm when he made himself a pest about their carbon footprint among other things. The courts have ruled that he can sue for unlawful dismissal on the grounds of religious discrimination.
Worth a line or two, do you think?
I’d suggest this has to do with the fact that the economy has just fallen off off a cliff and is in absolutely critical condition. I think many people are aware that catastrophic failure of global economic systems is unlikely to result in many environmental benefits.
More on the “Warmism is a Religion” story.
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/tim-nicholson-a-green-martyr-1648388.html
@dale jennings McIntyre (21:11:41) :
“[…]In the UK, belief in global warming is now officially regarded by the courts as a religion, or philosophy, on a par with Islam or Judaism. Tom Nicolson, an ardent green, was dismissed by his firm when he made himself a pest about their carbon footprint among other things. The courts have ruled that he can sue for unlawful dismissal on the grounds of religious discrimination. […]”
So when somone writes “OMG!!!” it now probably means “Oh My Gaia!”
I don’t know if anyone has posted this, but $2T for cap-and-trade isn’t going to help the U.S. economy.
“At the meeting, Jason Furman, a top Obama staffer, estimated that the president’s cap-and-trade program could cost up to three times as much as the administration’s early estimate of $646 billion over eight years. A study of an earlier cap-and-trade bill co-sponsored by Mr. Obama when he was a senator estimated the cost could top $366 billion a year by 2015.
A White House official did not confirm the large estimate, saying only that Obama aides previously had noted that the $646 billion estimate was ‘conservative.'”
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/18/obama-climate-plan-could-cost-2-trillion/
Cap-and-trade will not pass the U.S. Senate. There are way too many Democratic senators who must oppose such legislation on the grounds that their constituents will be badly hurt economically by such a scheme. There are only so many Barbara Boxers in the Senate. Combined with most of the Republican votes, there is a solid majority against imposing trillions of dollars of new energy taxes through cap-and-trade. Add on top of that the current economic climate and there is just no way this is going through. It might pass the House, but not the Senate.
I am a rabbid environmentalist! I love natural settings, clean air, and clean water.
Unfortunately, we need a THRIVING economy to pay for our environmental clean-ups and to create technology that is “green”.
Poorly performing economies do not generate enough wealth to pay for a “green” lifestyle.
So much for this idea.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/03/21/feinstein-dont-spoil-desert-solar-panels/
What the hell does she want?
Perhaps she is in the pocket of “Big Oil” (sarc off)
Kirk W. Hanneman (09:05:53) :
Gee I sure hope you are right.. I have seen some crazy crap coming out of Washington in the last 60 days or so… I was shocked by quite a few things that “should’nt pass” this year already so at this point nothing is going to suprise me. Ive taken to calling, writing and emailing my reps, the president and anyone else I can think of but to date, no joy. Although my states representives, both house and senate, seem to be behaving themselves. Tea bag tags are the new thing:P
But still I keep hope:) Hope that they didnt just slide it into the bill that no one read, but i bet we have a nasty little suprise to come out of that still. I used to think; well how much damage could possibly be done .. now thats just like asking, could it get any worse. Its a Murphy’s law sort of deal.. you never ask if things could get worse, because the answer is always yes:)
Obama thinks he can pass cap and trade or any other form of carbon tax without the Senate and before Copenhagen.
He thinks going on Jay Leno like he’s plugging a stupid movie is all he needs to do to get support and make people forgive him.