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Greene 24 (0:52)
Topic(s): Government
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Economists generally all accept that individuals don't buy public goods. They won't individually go buy clean air. They won't individually go buy national defense. Collectively, they're willing to pay for them. They want everybody to pay. They want everybody to share in the burden, and at that point they say, "Yes, we'll pay for national defense. We'll pay for clean air." But only a few people will go and pay for clean air when other people are freely polluting the air. And so we're not able to rely on individual decisions in the marketplace to clean up the air, to solve the problem of climate change, to solve the problem of oil dependence. It takes collective action; it takes government action.