I’m not sure I’m catching your meaning, but if you’re talking about people making decisions regarding personal TEMS expenditure, then yes, I think many of the biases would still be present.
But here’s an example of what I’m thinking:
We want a reliable quantification of the underlying TEMS costs of production and processing, that way economic decisions, such as investing in plastics can be compared to their TEMS utility at the consumer level.
For example, how much TEMS is this plastic bottle saving the consumer and how many people are using it would be a measurement of TEMS utility. How does that compare to the TEMS cost to produce it? What are the TEMS costs of its end-of-life (EOL) cycle? I’d bet that the TEMS utility is lower than the aggregate TEMS costs, especially if you account for TEMS EOL costs in novel ways.
The theory is that the consumer demand is high for these products because of the TEMS utility at that level and that most consumers ignore the TEMS costs of production and processing. The EOL information in particular is not available in the price that they pay—it is abstracted away into taxes. I think the lack of information causes irrationality in decision-making. The idea is to reduce irrationality by improving the quality of the information—in part by making per unit TEMS values available to the consumer.
That sounds like you would be trying to do economic analysis/decision making using something like bills of material (+labor, externalities etc.). I can see how that would eliminate certain irrationalities, as you say. However, I am having a hard time imagining how one would use a the TEMS cost of a product in practice.
For example, why would it be more useful (or differently useful) to estimate a the TEMS cost of a water bottle instead of calculating the social cost (sum of private costs and external costs like EOL)?
When thinking about the plastic bottle, we not only care about TEMS we care also how many of those plastic bottles will end up in the ocean and what effects they have in the ocean.
We care about the health effects of the substances in plastic. Both those that are already scientifically known as well as health impacts we haven’t yet researched.
In Ohio, a train derailment that might have very well in the supply chain of water bottles that were produced a lot of problems.
If you focus on TEMS you are going to ignore such effects. Ideally, there are taxes that price all the externalities into the price of the plastic bottle. It’s unclear to me why it would be good for actors to focus more on TEMS values.
One of the core ideas is to quantify these externalities for ease of analysis. Many of these things would be quantified as TEMS values.
For example, bottles in the ocean is an M value in the EOL cycle.
Health effects would be T utility of the body in QALYs.
Many of things are already quantified as TEMS values in the existing economic environment, its just that the relationship between physics and economics, or physics and human behavior, is not officially recognized in the pedagogy. That is what I’m trying to address.
The great thing about monetary prices is that there are market mechanisms that keep the numbers honest.
If you want to measure your TEMS value you don’t have information about a lot of the involved factors that matter.
By forcing people to collect those values, you force people to spend a lot of work to account for those values and try to get the accounting to look the way they want it to.
To raise $4.1 trillion in total taxes, the bureaucratic work was around $313 Billion. If you force people to report those TEMS all of those terms are likely similarly complex. The questions of how the numbers will be determined are also very complex so you will need a lot of lobbyists who fight over the values. You need lawyers to litigate cases where people cheated their numbers.
If you hire a plumber then the plumber has to know the TEMS values for all his equipment and know the rules for how much of that will apply to the job for which you hire him.
I’m not sure I’m catching your meaning, but if you’re talking about people making decisions regarding personal TEMS expenditure, then yes, I think many of the biases would still be present.
But here’s an example of what I’m thinking:
We want a reliable quantification of the underlying TEMS costs of production and processing, that way economic decisions, such as investing in plastics can be compared to their TEMS utility at the consumer level.
For example, how much TEMS is this plastic bottle saving the consumer and how many people are using it would be a measurement of TEMS utility. How does that compare to the TEMS cost to produce it? What are the TEMS costs of its end-of-life (EOL) cycle? I’d bet that the TEMS utility is lower than the aggregate TEMS costs, especially if you account for TEMS EOL costs in novel ways.
The theory is that the consumer demand is high for these products because of the TEMS utility at that level and that most consumers ignore the TEMS costs of production and processing. The EOL information in particular is not available in the price that they pay—it is abstracted away into taxes. I think the lack of information causes irrationality in decision-making. The idea is to reduce irrationality by improving the quality of the information—in part by making per unit TEMS values available to the consumer.
That sounds like you would be trying to do economic analysis/decision making using something like bills of material (+labor, externalities etc.). I can see how that would eliminate certain irrationalities, as you say. However, I am having a hard time imagining how one would use a the TEMS cost of a product in practice.
For example, why would it be more useful (or differently useful) to estimate a the TEMS cost of a water bottle instead of calculating the social cost (sum of private costs and external costs like EOL)?
Regarding use in practice—in a database accessible from one source linked to the product via the label, or on the product page.
Something like:
Product A
Production Cycle:
T34, E45, M23, S15
Externality Watchlist:
CO2 = 300kg
P = 150kg
Utility
T3, E22, M4, S4
EOL Cycle:
T15, E25, M35, S10
Alerts:
Company B of product production line implicated in Ohio train wreck with (TEMS) externality outputs.
///
Then maybe you could click on the individual letter-number pairs to get more info on the underlying values. Something along those lines.
Regarding the second question, precisely because the social cost is prone to dollar value distortions.
When thinking about the plastic bottle, we not only care about TEMS we care also how many of those plastic bottles will end up in the ocean and what effects they have in the ocean.
We care about the health effects of the substances in plastic. Both those that are already scientifically known as well as health impacts we haven’t yet researched.
In Ohio, a train derailment that might have very well in the supply chain of water bottles that were produced a lot of problems.
If you focus on TEMS you are going to ignore such effects. Ideally, there are taxes that price all the externalities into the price of the plastic bottle. It’s unclear to me why it would be good for actors to focus more on TEMS values.
One of the core ideas is to quantify these externalities for ease of analysis. Many of these things would be quantified as TEMS values.
For example, bottles in the ocean is an M value in the EOL cycle.
Health effects would be T utility of the body in QALYs.
Many of things are already quantified as TEMS values in the existing economic environment, its just that the relationship between physics and economics, or physics and human behavior, is not officially recognized in the pedagogy. That is what I’m trying to address.
The great thing about monetary prices is that there are market mechanisms that keep the numbers honest.
If you want to measure your TEMS value you don’t have information about a lot of the involved factors that matter.
By forcing people to collect those values, you force people to spend a lot of work to account for those values and try to get the accounting to look the way they want it to.
To raise $4.1 trillion in total taxes, the bureaucratic work was around $313 Billion. If you force people to report those TEMS all of those terms are likely similarly complex. The questions of how the numbers will be determined are also very complex so you will need a lot of lobbyists who fight over the values. You need lawyers to litigate cases where people cheated their numbers.
If you hire a plumber then the plumber has to know the TEMS values for all his equipment and know the rules for how much of that will apply to the job for which you hire him.