[hntrader]

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.

[anemoiac]

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)

[rorykoehler]

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.

[hntrader]

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?