How to effectively align private incentives with the public good (e.g preserving biodiversity, reducing carbon output) is a question for economists, not ecologists.
How big is the negative externality relative to other things we care about? Pigovian tax or another regulation? How much tax to disincentive the negative externality without killing industry? Where exactly should that tax be applied in the vertical chain? How do we do it with minimal bureaucratic overhead? How do we do it in a way that can be enforced and isn't open to abuse?
These are questions that the specific domain expert (e.g ecologist) isn't equipped to answer, although they should be heavily consulted with.
Part of this problem, as I (a non-expert) see it, is that so-called mainstream economists tend to operate within a specific paradigm that imbues a certain perspective toward the subjects of their analysis. Accompanying that perspective are the same sort of limitations you allude to when you point to ecologist as a domain expert (tangent: economists are also domain experts, with all of the limitations that implies, even if some economists seem to imply that virtually everything is economics...). This remains true even among environmental economists, who largely share the approach of their peers in the world of mainstream economics. While the questions you provide are examples of relevant and necessary concerns, and might be easily addressed (at least superficially) in an undergraduate environmental econ. textbook, they also reflect the limitations of the field.
In my opinion, when it comes to ecological concerns, effectively aligning private incentives with the public good is a question for ecological economists * , not just (plain old) economists or ecologists. Ecological economists, though fewer in number and typically relegated to more liminal realms of the field than mainstream economists, utilize a relatively more wholistic approach that carries with it a different set of limitations. If humanity is going to successfully address the monstrous environmental challenges it faces in the 21st century, I suspect it will be accomplished by asking different questions than those (mainstream) environmental economists are prepared to answer.
* as well as other scientists and social scientists (e.g. environmental sociologists)
Economists have a terrible understanding of the importance of biodiversity if you use how we’ve set up our economy with too big to fail corporations dominating everything as the litmus test.
I'm also highly sceptical of economics as a discipline, but still can't think of who would be more appropriate to work alongside an ecologist in order to design practical policies.
Economists aren't a monolith. As the other poster in this thread mentioned, there's such a discipline called ecological economics.
Besides, even if all of them do have a terrible understanding of ecology and the importance of biodiversity, that's the reason we need a multi-disciplinary team to tackle the issue. Ecologists by themselves won't know how to align incentives or create practical policies, and economists without ecologists will be lost.
Would climatologists be able to design an effective emissions trading scheme by themselves without working with an economist/policymaker?
If we want to establish a legal framework to prevent companies to damage the environment and to require civil remediation in case of failure we probably need to perform this exercise.
Otherwise the required remediations are whimsical and the justice delivered at best a sham. Typically, the sum requested as is currently often the case for oil spills, are far inferior to the actual remediation cost.
Finally, as other comments mention, it would also be good to know when the cost would be infinite or near infinite, to have a clear understanding of our limits and in those cases privilege using a criminal justice framework over a civil one.
Not disagreeing with you, but from my perception of economics as a field, biodiversity is not a topic that attracts a lot of attention. Working on biodiversity topics does not lead to a top 5 journal publication or a job in a prestigious institution for an economist. I doubt there is a strong incentive for economists to take on this problem. On the other hand, ecologists have been working on biodiversity for a long time. Of course, a collaboration between economists and people who work on biodiversity would seem most effective.
It's not a difficult problem to cost though is it, if we continue on the path we are on and destroy all biodiversity, we'll have killed the planet that sustains us and the side effects will quickly destroy our civilization. Thus the cost is infinite.
We can't survive without other life on earth, and life on earth dies without enough biodiversity.
What is "enough" though? 30%, 50%, 90%? And how much are we willing to spend to hit each of those targets. We're obviously not going to spend "infinite" economic resources to protect biodiversity and we've long since accepted that we are willing to sacrifice a bit of 'nature' for a bit of 'comfort' and that won't change. We're now negotiating how much we are willing to give up to save how much of nature, and that is, demonstrably, a very difficult problem.
I think it may be helpful to invert the framing of your question - you allude to spending economic resources to protect biodiversity, but aren't we actually talking about spending biodiversity (and other natural resources) to gain economic resources?
Your framing takes acquiring economic resources (a.k.a. the destruction of natural resources) for granted, assuming that we're losing, or giving up, something by opting to not destroy some portion of the natural environment for economic gain. Aren't we losing, or giving up, something every time we choose to gain economic resources by destroying part of the natural environment?
Logically, both framings are valid, but they don't appear wholly equivalent to me. Perhaps I'm missing something, but economic resources seem far more fungible than natural resources, which seems to imply that the latter framing may be more appropriate.
This difference, highlighted here, in this essentially ephemeral internet-space, may seem to occupy the border between semantic and pedantic, but I think it will take on a fundamental role in determining humanity's future prospects. How we define our relationship to the earth determines how we live. Your framing of the economic/environmental calculus seems to represent the status quo, but I don't think it represents a sustainable future for humanity. If/how/when the status quo shifts, I have no idea, but it does seem (from my limited vantage point, anyway) that more and more people are developing sympathy for the notion that modern society doesn't optimize for human well-being.
Because those in the environmental space have talked and waffled and maybe don't have the reach they need. Money talks and they might get something more done.
Yours sincerely, someone who works adjacent to those in the environment space.
> Leave it to ecologists and other biodiversity experts? Not everything warrants an opinion from economists.
Exactly. Economists are impulsive and bend to the whim of fashion far too much, they will make up theories to suit their agenda and justify it with arcane sounding jargon, which is clear to see every time they speak. When you can actually read through the BS the IMF, Federal Reserve and ECB and all other central banks are nothing more than crooks with better tailors then your average thief.
When you understand how things like derivatives like CDO, MBS or (re)Hypothecation work and how they create massive risks in the financial system (2008) you soon realize this is the biggest con in Human History.
And that the IMF and World bank have so much more influence than perhaps the UN or G20 combined. And ALL OF THEM are guilty of of crimes against Humanity.
No, the World needs to realize this cohort has vested interests in keeping the World as it is is, which protects them and their class and often lends itself to depraved things that rely on Human exploitation, slave labour in the developing World, environmental disasters for resource/mineral extraction which lends itself to human trafficking and sex trafficking of minors for all to see: Jeffery Epstein was just the most high profile case.
Those Qanon imbeciles were filled with too much of Trump's BS tasting kool-aid to realize he was Jeffery Epstein's close friend who was tried and convicted for being a sex offender of children, and that Trump was implicated in that trial of molesting young children as he was part of their class.
The fact that most people still honestly think these people have any merit, let alone would be put in a compromising position to exposing them to crimes like that let alone ecocide, is the real problem.
No, the World has to move on from this suicidal fiat based ponzi scheme we call 'the traditional' fiat based economy, and it's priests (economists) in reality this what bitcoiners like me really want the most: for average people to lose complete confidence in the monetary system that keeps Humanity from flourishing with boom and bust models that entrench thier wealth more deeply with every passing crisis and makes reform entirely impossible since it's so entrenched, and would sooner destroy the World, itself and everyone within in before it reformed itself. Most don't even realize how much more sustainable our network and system is and actively seeks and creates renewable energy sources that would otherwise be impossible due to 'economists' opinion on value creation. We create auxiliary systems and wealth creation with out excess energy (gardens or plant nurseries are the most common), whereas the fiat system will burn off it's excess gasses in plain sight and then send countries to war based on this tired notion that securing oil makes us 'safe' and charges 4+ gallon in the US when oil in ~$60/barrel, it's so absurd...
Being an environmental activist for nearly 20 years, with a background in reformative and sustainable Ag (biodynamic), and a biology degree and nearly 10 years in fintech I can say with absolute confidence NO ONE should be able to make these violations on our environment justifiable: economists, politicians, Nation-State or otherwise. And these environmental violations (Ecocide) should come with at least lengthy prison time or penalty of death, not fines that simply add up to a cost of doing business which they never pay taxes on.
I wish public outrage and cancel culture seen on social media for the most feckless and pointless of things would be directed for environmental causes, because if they only understood the calamity and chaos the ensues by poisoning our ecosystems and how it can have domino effects in precipitating mass extinction events (like we're currently experiencing) they would stop with this BS pro-noun and divisive hateful SJW tirades and mob mentality and put their energy into an actual cause with meaning that may give them purpose in life: something I'm certain every single one of the lack.
How big is the negative externality relative to other things we care about? Pigovian tax or another regulation? How much tax to disincentive the negative externality without killing industry? Where exactly should that tax be applied in the vertical chain? How do we do it with minimal bureaucratic overhead? How do we do it in a way that can be enforced and isn't open to abuse?
These are questions that the specific domain expert (e.g ecologist) isn't equipped to answer, although they should be heavily consulted with.