The Heritage Insider: What else belongs on the Taiwan agenda, Europe isn't pulling its weight in NATO, global warming costs in perspective, let information flow to North Korea, how to do regulatory reform

December 10, 2016

 

 

So the President-elect talked to Taiwan. There’s a lot more we can do to build the U.S.-ROC relationship. Adding European nations to NATO has not increased the European contribution to NATO. The models producing the highest cost estimates of global warming show an impact of one-tenth of 1 percent—not nothing, but not a catastrophe either. To help the North Korean people, let the information flow. States that want to reform their regulations now have a handy how-to guide.

 

A Taiwan reset? President-Elect Trump’s phone call with Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen has been criticized as a reckless provocation of China—a potential signal that the one-China policy of the United States might change. In fact, writes Walter Lohman, there are many aspects of the United States-Taiwan relationship that can and should be changed that do not amount to abandoning the one-China policy: “U.S.-Taiwan relations operate under a number of restrictions derived from the three communiques with China that form the basis of America’s one China policy. Some of them are a necessary part of honoring America’s decision in 1979 to formally recognize the People’s Republic of China. Many are not. The restrictions range from the symbolic, yet seemingly arbitrary—like the circumstances under which Taiwan’s Washington representative is permitted to use its historic residence, Twin Oaks, or display its flag—to more critical areas, like interaction between U.S. and Taiwanese military officers. Building on Trump’s phone call, the incoming administration should review the range of restrictions on interaction between the two countries with an eye to loosening them.” [The Daily Signal]

 

Adding European nations to NATO has not increased the European contribution to NATO. Write David Grantham and Christian Yiu: “After the last expansion in 2009, NATO’s defense expenditures per capita increased 2 percent, and spending per square kilometer decreased by 11 percent[.] […] In 1990, the 14 European members of NATO spent around $314 billion on defense, but in 2015, the 28-member organization spent only around $227 billion on defense (before adjusting for inflation). According to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, while European membership in NATO nearly doubled, defense spending by member states decreased 28 percent. That means the United States picked up the tab. NATO says in a discussion of indirect funding that ‘the volume of the US defense expenditure effectively represents 73 per cent of the defense spending of the Alliance as a whole.’ […] Europe’s combined GDP and population is $19.79 trillion and 552 million, compared to $17.95 trillion and 323 million for the United States.” [Internal citations omitted.] [National Center for Policy Analysis]

 

Apocalypse not. Oren Cass puts the estimates of cost of projected global warming into perspective: “The DICE model, which estimates the highest cost in percentage terms, provides a concrete illustration. It estimates that, without climate change, global GDP would grow from $76 trillion in 2015 to $510 trillion in 2100. With climate change of 3.8°C, it estimates that global GDP in 2100 would instead total $490 trillion—a $20 trillion cost but one that still leaves the world 6.5 times wealthier than today. Nor does that $20 trillion impact strike suddenly. Rather, as temperatures increase and impacts worsen, costs rise as well. Economic growth each year is slightly lower than it would otherwise have been but never is reduced by more than one-tenth of one percentage point. And economic growth continues despite the climate change: the climate-change-impacted world of 2105 is already wealthier than the no-climate-change world of 2100. This, again, is the highest-cost estimate of those considered by the Obama administration.” [Manhattan Institute]

 

What can be done to the help the North Korean people in their struggle with a totalitarian government? Get information into the country. The North Korean people, writes Olivia Enos, are hungry for it: “One report found 16 percent of North Koreans accessed computers, one-fourth of the population listened to radio broadcasts, and 42 percent of defectors reported access to DVD players. […] There may be as many as 100,000 privately owned computers in North Korea, but there are an estimated two million government-owned computers, many of which elites in Pyongyang use. These elites can access the Intranet, a government-monitored form of the Internet, and some especially trusted elites enjoy full access to the Internet.” The best way for the South Korean government to defeat Pyongyang’s information firewall is not to impose its own monopoly on disseminating information into the North. Enos writes that the South Korean government should grant private organizations access to AM frequencies for the purpose of broadcasting to the North: “Interviews with defectors reveal that (1) North Koreans have limited access to NGO broadcasts, but upon leaving North Korea they realized that NGO broadcasting was more relevant than government-run broadcasts; and (2) North Koreans prefer entertainment-oriented broadcasts to the analytical and often demeaning news broadcasts disseminated through government programming.” [The Heritage Foundation]

 

How to do regulatory reform: States whose economies are stuck in second gear may want to consider the possibility that too much regulation is weighing down entrepreneurs and start-ups. How can lawmakers get regulation right? James Broughel has written a guide to regulatory reform for states. He notes that states need to have both retrospective reviews of regulations and processes in place to ensure new regulations deliver benefits that are worth their costs. In the former category, states may want to consider targets for cutting back on the number of rules, pay-as-you-go limits for rules, requiring the elimination of old rules in order to create new rules, independent review commissions, and sunset requirements. In the later category, states should consider regulatory budgets, economic analysis requirements, and requiring review of rules by outside parties before they take effect. [Mercatus Center]

 

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