As I said some of the most heavily regulated economies are as bad as the unregulated ones but see the US as an example of a lightly regulated economy notorious for the sort of lobbying and corruption your talking about. Its less obvious in Britain but again under the Tories over recent decades my country has become more corrupt and inefficient in many ways.
Unfortunately your also inaccurate in your latter analysis. Some companies are taking steps to repair environmental damage, especially as you say when they can make a profit from it. However most others are still treating such damage as a 'cost' for other people/the future that they can avoid to maximise their short term profits because that's what most of them are primarily concerned with. Hence the backing for climate change denial by many big industries.
The idea of logging companies planting more trees is not a good example. Both because as their doing this to make a profit by cutting them down in the relatively near future, which totally negates any CO2 reduction measures. Also since they often plant plantations of commercial crop timber even if they weren't due to be cut down such 'forests' would be environmentally far poorer than the sort of natural woodlands that used to be there.
By definition less regulated markets can be more flexible but that's missing my point. Largely unregulated markets don't need to be flexible because they can get away with just about anything. Especially if less regulations includes removing the ability to record what's actually going on so problems may be missed/avoided until its too late to avoid severe damage, including often loss of lives. [Hence why many big companies seek to reduce/remove bodies that study the environment.]
The entire thing is getting a level of balance. Enough regulation to keep the corrupt and rogues under some restraint while not choking the operation of the economy. Too much or too little is bad. Furthermore the other big issue here which cases problems in many countries is when extremists take the stance that all government/regulation/taxes are bad as that seeks to and often does undermine the sense of moral responsibility and helps make government structures more corrupt and open to bribery by large vested interests. Again we're seen this in both primary Anglo countries with Thatcher's "there's no such thing as society" and Reagan's "government is the problem not the solution". Such excessive BS along with their other lies have done both countries much harm.
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@LogicMeister
As I said some of the most heavily regulated economies are as bad as the unregulated ones but see the US as an example of a lightly regulated economy notorious for the sort of lobbying and corruption your talking about. Its less obvious in Britain but again under the Tories over recent decades my country has become more corrupt and inefficient in many ways.
Unfortunately your also inaccurate in your latter analysis. Some companies are taking steps to repair environmental damage, especially as you say when they can make a profit from it. However most others are still treating such damage as a 'cost' for other people/the future that they can avoid to maximise their short term profits because that's what most of them are primarily concerned with. Hence the backing for climate change denial by many big industries.
The idea of logging companies planting more trees is not a good example. Both because as their doing this to make a profit by cutting them down in the relatively near future, which totally negates any CO2 reduction measures. Also since they often plant plantations of commercial crop timber even if they weren't due to be cut down such 'forests' would be environmentally far poorer than the sort of natural woodlands that used to be there.
By definition less regulated markets can be more flexible but that's missing my point. Largely unregulated markets don't need to be flexible because they can get away with just about anything. Especially if less regulations includes removing the ability to record what's actually going on so problems may be missed/avoided until its too late to avoid severe damage, including often loss of lives. [Hence why many big companies seek to reduce/remove bodies that study the environment.]
The entire thing is getting a level of balance. Enough regulation to keep the corrupt and rogues under some restraint while not choking the operation of the economy. Too much or too little is bad. Furthermore the other big issue here which cases problems in many countries is when extremists take the stance that all government/regulation/taxes are bad as that seeks to and often does undermine the sense of moral responsibility and helps make government structures more corrupt and open to bribery by large vested interests. Again we're seen this in both primary Anglo countries with Thatcher's "there's no such thing as society" and Reagan's "government is the problem not the solution". Such excessive BS along with their other lies have done both countries much harm.