~Eco-nomics : What Everyone Should Know About Economics and the Enviroment~ adroitly illustrates the vitality of market processes and private property rights while making it clear that the market is not incompatible with civil society's desire to protect the environment. Far from being detrimental to the environment, a liberal market economy, particularly over time, serves our societal goal of environmental protection. Private property encourages good stewardship and accountability, and making more "commons" is not necessarily advantageous to cause of environmental protection by any means. Many laws have been enacted to preserve scenic natural beauty and prevent pollution, but such regulations often have unintended consequences. Richard Stroup opens with a straightforward introduction to economics and the problems posed such as scarcity, and the upside and downside to competition. Stroup astutely explains how free market exchange is conducive to a prosperous society. Stroup incisively explains the consequences of strict environmental protection or "protection at any cost" measures. They are quite a few ridiculous cases where overbearing regulators trample property rights and extort exorbitant sums of money from property owners-in the name of environmental protection. Stroup clearly ascertains why public policies that erode the protection of property rights actually serve to reduce the ability and incentive of owners to protect and conserve their resources. With innovate public policy solutions, however, society can set and attain reasonable environmental protection goals while not biting the hand that feeds it. Pollution credit charges and a trading system to exchange those credits have served well. He concludes that the burden of proof for a regulatory intrusion should be on the government, not on the private property owner. Nonetheless, Stroup surmises in the end that market solutions prove more effective than mindless intervention.

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