The Best Solution for Ohio's Auto Pollution Woes
When it comes to smog and air pollution, Ohio is a virtual paradise compared to locales such as California and New York. Nevertheless, in the federal government’s zeal to regulate air quality, Washington has mandated that Ohio’s major cities reduce air emissions by 15 percent by 1996 as required by the Clean Air Act of 1990. To achieve this goal, the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA) has the flexibility to use a variety of methods, from strict regulations to incentives encouraging voluntary compliance. However, most of the EPA’s guidelines suggest top-down regulatory enforcement, largely ignoring incentive-based approaches.
The OEPA is wasting little time in moving toward the heavy handed regulatory approach to control auto pollution. One forthcoming measure requires citizens to annually test their cars emissions and meet state-mandates standards before their vehicles are registered. These tests, required by the Cleveland area already, will expand to include 49 percent of the state’s work force by 1996. If a car doesn’t meet the minimum requirements determined by the OEPA, registration will be denied. This could have substantial adverse impact on the state’s poorest citizens, who typically own late model vehicles.
A better approach, using market incentives, would require drivers to pay for the amount of pollution they produce. For example, the owner of an older car that pollutes more would pay a higher registration fee. The owner of a newer, more efficient car would receive a discount. This would still adversely impact the poor, but not as nearly as much as denying them the ability to drive. A market-based approach has numerous advantages over the current system administered by the OEPA. First, it puts decision making in the hands of consumers rather than bureaucrats. People are allowed to make reasonable tradeoffs based on their particular situations. Under a strict regulatory approach, the state doesn’t care about individual circumstances, only compliance with legal standards and law.
Second, a market-based system provides incentives for innovation. Rather than merely meeting the minimum pollution requirements, drivers would have financial incentives to reduce emissions to the lowest possible levels. A growing demand would naturally develop among consumers for pollution-reducing technologies. Third, the prospect of lower registration fees would encourage people to properly maintain their vehicles throughout the year through such relatively inexpensive measures as annual tuneups. One chemist from the University of Denver, Donald Stedman, found that older model vehicles from the 1950s and 1960s, when properly cared for, run as cleanly as today’s newer models.
The technology to measure varying levels of auto pollution levels already exists: In Cuyahoga County drivers presently take their cars to private monitoring facilities to have their emissions measured. A computer printout could easily be developed to match the level of each car’s emissions with a corresponding registration fee. A system that ties the cost of driving a car to the level of pollution it generates is inherently more fair and flexible than the current system that arbitrarily sets a cutoff for all vehicles on the road.
The one-size-fits-all approach will inevitably lead to frustration, grief, and acrimony among many drivers, especially those who cannot afford a new car that costs more than they earn in a year. A much better answer is to encourage people to make improvements to their current vehicles – or pay the price when they register.
Dennis Miller, Ph.D., is an associate professor of economics at Baldwin-Wallace College and a research advisor with The Buckeye Institute. Samuel Staley is a senior fellow with The Buckeye Institute.
