Quoted from CubeSnake:Sadly, we've done this to ourselves over say, the last 40-50 years or so. Stifling EPA laws, restrictive testing procedures, crippling worker benefits, insane tax rates on the physical manufacturing plants, prohibitive insurance costs, legal liability that can shut you down in a heartbeat. I can go on, but this is America 2023.
Well, we could get rid of the EPA. And we could also dump the Clean Water act. Let's do that and roll back the clock and live with burning rivers, again.
In 1969, before EPA, it was this : " Oil spills and oil fires are nothing new. On June 22, 1969, an oil slick caught fire on the Cuyahoga River just southeast of downtown Cleveland, Ohio. The image that the "the river caught fire" motivated change to protect the environment. However, this was in fact the thirteenth recorded time that the river had caught fire since 1868.
The 1969 Cuyahoga River fire catalyzed water pollution control activities, resulting in the creation of the federal Environmental Protection Agency (1970) and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA), and passage of the Clean Water Act (1972) and the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement (1972). As a result, large-point sources of pollution on the Cuyahoga have received significant attention from the OEPA. This river fire also influenced the arts: it is referred to in Randy Newman's 1972 song "Burn On," R.E.M.'s 1986 song "Cuyahoga," the Simpsons episode "Lemon of Troy," and Adam Again's 1992 song "River on Fire."
We learned from the Cuyahoga River Fire and are relearning again from the oil eruption in the Gulf of Mexico that we must invest in pollution prevention to protect human and ecological health. We also still struggle with controlling vast non-point sources of water pollution such as pesticide run-off and agricultural waste. Focusing on short-term gain creates profits for corporations while externalizing the true costs of pollution to the public and environment."
https://www.healthandenvironment.org/environmental-health/social-context/history/the-cuyahoga-river-fire-of-1969
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Or how about Hooker Chemical Company and Love Canal?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Canal
" Love Canal is a neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York, United States, infamous as the location of a 0.28 km2 (0.11 sq mi) landfill that became the site of an enormous environmental disaster in the 1970s. Decades of dumping toxic chemicals harmed the health of hundreds of residents;[1] the area was cleaned up over the course of 21 years in a Superfund operation."
There is more at the link.
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Let's keep going. In 1973-74 I flew into Orange California. The smog was so thick you could cut it with a knife. I'm not lying. When I fly I like looking out the window and as the plane lost altitude on its approach we flew into the smog and in an instant I could see nothing except dirt brown smog. On the ground the air was a hazy brown.
If you wish to return to that then all you need to do is remove all the smog control crap that is under the hood of your car.
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What do you mean by prohibitive insurance costs? The company I worked for was big on safety. Real big. One of the drivers for the company's concern was injured employees drive insurance rates. If the insurance companies would have been more laid back about it, then the corporation would not have been as interested in employee safety.
Insurance has always been high priced. What are your solutions to fix high insurance rates?
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Here is a beauty of a question: "How much clean air do we need?"
" That was the question Lee Iacocca asked Congress when he was vice president of Ford in the late 1960s. He objected to the federal Clean Air Act, which passed in 1970, because he thought it would cripple manufacturing."
" Before those local air pollution control boards were formed, our skies were filled with dense smoke and particles coming out of smokestacks from industry. Air pollution was so bad (how bad was it?) it created visibility hazards on the roads and foul smells in cities of all sizes."
https://ecology.wa.gov/Blog/Posts/February-2018/How-much-clean-air-do-we-need
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What crippling worker benefits are you referring to? Around here some companies pay nice benefits. Many companies pay none: no vacation, no sick time off. Several years ago around here am employe lost his wife and 4 children in a car crash. The paper made it a point to mention that his job offered no benefits and he had to go to work the next day with no time off for mourning the loss of his family.
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Define insane tax rates on physical manufacturing plants, please.
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So how has American business handled these issues? They moved to China where there were no pollution controls and dirt cheap labor. Especially the electronics manufacturers.
Here you go. How would you like to breathing this crap all day long? Remember what I was saying about Orange California above? Yeah. This is what I saw as was walking around in on that sunny California day. Not quite as bad as this---but you get the idea.
AP_Woman-walking-in-Beijing-1068x712-1-1024x683 (resized).jpg
“Too much of the Chinese Communist Party’s economy is built on willful disregard for air, land, and water quality,” Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo said in August. “The Chinese people — and the world — deserve better.”
https://ge.usembassy.gov/chinas-air-pollution-harms-its-citizens-and-the-world/
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Here is a little more about the river that caught on fire. Would you like to return to this?
Wichita, KS
