greg
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
- Joined
- Jun 1, 2005
- Messages
- 1,071
I just read a brief article that talked about the five milligrams of mercury in florescent bulbs and the subsequent problems with recycling those bulbs. It seems to me that one way to incentivize recycling these bulbs might be to offer one free bulb for every five dead bulbs turned in at the hardware store. This could be paid for by simply raising the price of all new bulbs a bit (I know, I know, it's not really THAT simple). The beneficiaries are those who are conscientious about buying and recycling. The losers in this scheme are those who remain passive or indifferent to financial concerns. Their choice. (I think there is a forced battery recycling program where one must turn in an old car battery to get a new one; doing things thru positive--financial?-- incentives would work better to my mind. The gov't control aspect that so grates on some folk's nerves could be reduced.)
One other quick thought was incentivizing car purchases: if one bought a green car/truck that got higher mileage and/or better emissions one could/should get 10% off the retail price. We already have this roughly in effect with hybrids (although this incentive is slowly being phased out) and their rebates. But . . . it would be nice if this could be made permanent and extended further, say for instance "everytime you buy a new "green" car you get an extra 5%-10% off above and beyond your previous discount. This would mean that your second or third Prius would maybe have a 20% rebate instead of the original 10% one. All those folks that love buying new cars regularly would have a new type of incentive. This might also accelerate the number of used green cars on the roads--driving their prices down for folks who always buy used. This--sort of--favors the rich and the poor
This could be paid for by raising vehicle prices across the board by a few percent initially and gradually rising. After maybe ten-twenty years of this, one could just drop the entire program. There would be a significantly higher percentage of green vehicles on the road and folks wouldn't be so frightened of the [-]change[/-] transformation of society. Car companies would be able to make the transition a bit easier and actually see a green light at the end of the tunnel in the earlier stages of change. They would fight it less--IMO--as would customers.
Thoughts about this idea? Other incentive ideas?
One other quick thought was incentivizing car purchases: if one bought a green car/truck that got higher mileage and/or better emissions one could/should get 10% off the retail price. We already have this roughly in effect with hybrids (although this incentive is slowly being phased out) and their rebates. But . . . it would be nice if this could be made permanent and extended further, say for instance "everytime you buy a new "green" car you get an extra 5%-10% off above and beyond your previous discount. This would mean that your second or third Prius would maybe have a 20% rebate instead of the original 10% one. All those folks that love buying new cars regularly would have a new type of incentive. This might also accelerate the number of used green cars on the roads--driving their prices down for folks who always buy used. This--sort of--favors the rich and the poor
This could be paid for by raising vehicle prices across the board by a few percent initially and gradually rising. After maybe ten-twenty years of this, one could just drop the entire program. There would be a significantly higher percentage of green vehicles on the road and folks wouldn't be so frightened of the [-]change[/-] transformation of society. Car companies would be able to make the transition a bit easier and actually see a green light at the end of the tunnel in the earlier stages of change. They would fight it less--IMO--as would customers.
Thoughts about this idea? Other incentive ideas?