[mothballed]

If it's actually usable economically then the government will partially recover (capture value) it via taxation. If US suppliers fail to match the predicted effects, then Chinese or other suppliers can. This yields tax receipts in China and elsewhere. So if it's actually 'distributable' then it is worth at least some non-zero capturable amount as sales to foreign governments if the US government will not be participating, even if you suppose no private entities will buy the information.

[mindslight]

It seems you're still assuming market efficiency, but just focusing on governments as the actors.

[mothballed]

It seems you've completely lost the plot. Refer to what we're replying to

>Can you think of any economically valuable reason why it might be important to know about weather trends or events in advance? Any at all?

You're damning me for questioning someone who presumed market efficiency with an appeal to economic value to a government that stands to capture that hypothetical value? The premise of the government acting on market efficiency was what I responded to, not my introduction.

If we're discounting the premised market efficiency of the government actor to which I replied, then the question was moot, and you're targeting the wrong commenter. But of course, that wouldn't fit your two-faced (and post response underhanded conniving editing 'centrally-') rebuttal, so you wait to set the catch-22 trap of damning rebuttal comments for acting on a premise introduced in a counter viewpoint.

[mindslight]

I don't see how I've "lost the plot."

The comment you originally responded to does not presume market efficiency. In fact it carries the opposite assumption - if markets were efficient then the loss of economic value from weather forecasting would be immediately apparent and we wouldn't need to discuss larger-concept models with the goal of overcoming inefficiencies.

That original comment posits an idea of "economic value" that is independent from what can be captured by whomever is contributing to it, which is what you seemed to be rejecting.

[mothballed]

The market efficiency it presumes is that an appeal to value is actually a rational actionable appeal to the government actor. That seems to be the whole point of the question (paraphrased) "can't you see the value of the thing we're losing" and speaking that to someone who stands to capture the value via tax receipts.

Of course if the government doesn't care at all about the 'market efficiency' of that value it's not clear why this question is even posed -- a hypothetically irrational rejection of the efficient projection of this value seems to be what the question contends with. The very question relies on a premise of someone somewhere acting with market efficiency on this data. With zero market 'efficiency' from the data, there's no useful market value generated whether you frame it as "capturable" or not.

[mindslight]

> The market efficiency it presumes is that an appeal to value is actually a rational actionable appeal to the government actor. That seems to be the whole point of the question (paraphrased) "can't you see the value of the thing we're losing" and speaking that to someone who stands to capture the value via tax receipts.

Ah, no, but at least this puts our difference in stark relief. One can rationally appeal to government (as a democratic institution with a goal of furthering lofty ideals, like society and the economy in general) without necessarily appealing to government (as a selfish entity) desire to collect more tax receipts. If you must, think of it as appealing to individuals who may or may not support the government, and the government optimizing for that support rather than optimizing for mere tax dollars (which it can always print more of).

[mothballed]

So you're back to to "fallacy" of market efficiency, expecting private actors to advocate to foot taxes with an expected ROI from capturing the value delivered by government implementation of the program. Yes you can appeal to the government without appealing to tax receipts, but under a value proposition premise we have here it's conditional upon the market being 'efficient' enough that either the private actors realize the tax / inflation paid is worth the ROI and/or the government finds it worth the tax receipts -- a value proposition doesn't make sense if none of the actors expect to realize it.

It seems your thesis here contradicts your prior argument. You're merely flip-flopping -- the private actors are acting with "efficiency" when one argues about government efficiency and the government is the one acting with efficiency when you're arguing the private actors aren't.

>Ah, no, but at least this puts our difference in stark relief.

It does nothing of the sort.

The reason why I introduce the notion of tax receipts is in part because some arguments presented appeared to dismiss the "efficiency" of private actors while still asking me to answer the question of how a private actor might "capture" the value of generating the data themselves even in the face of private buyers not buying it (one answer is: foreign governments or those they represent might be "efficient" enough to buy it). You've grasped onto that notion as if it's a "gotcha" presenting some stark difference. In fact it creates no obligation for the government to act solely on tax receipts, it's merely one more value proposition for a non-private actor to buy the data.

Not much point going much further down this "heads I win, tails you lose" flip-flop reasoning you're presenting, but good luck with that. You've created a logical contradiction at this point no matter which side you try to flip back to.