Even better idea: allow people to get paid for kidney, liver, and marrow donation. The insane prudishness and moralizing we have around the normal concept of getting paid for donations results in a lot of death and suffering. The USA is the source of 70% of the world’s blood plasma, vital for everything from battlefield medicine to critical pharmaceuticals, all because we allow people to get paid for it. The net good of allowing sales of liver, kidney, and marrow so drastically outweighs the negative.

So long as it’s not coercive (they aren’t getting punished or having their sentences elongated for not donations) there is nothing ethically dubious about it. Who cares they are getting something in return? Do we expect the farmer to grow food simply because it’s morally good to feed people or the doctor to forgo payment for services because it’s the right thing to do?

The world would be better if we dropped the insane prudishness and high minded moralizing around organ and marrow donation. The USA is the source of 70% of the world’s blood plasma, because we allow people to be paid for it. Allowing people to get paid for doing something good, whether in money or reduce prison sentences, is morally fine. It generates new organs and marrow that will save peoples lives, lives which otherwise probably wouldn’t be saved. So then how can you say that’s bad?

In fact, we should allow markets for kidney, liver, and marrow - all are things that can be donated safely without significant long-term problems for the donater, and will save peoples lives (and also money by cutting down on the amount of time people are waiting for a donation).

Your are getting lied to. I’ve been quoted $21K for a four head ductless system and new heat-pump water heater for my 1700 sqft house that has some architectural challenges.

The paper “Housing Constraints and Spatial Misallocation” did quantify the effect of zoning restrictions and found that between 1964 & 2009 that it lowered US aggregate output by 36%. So our economy is would be about 50% bigger if not for housing.

Natural gas is an important complement to renewables , because it can be very easily ramped up and down to match variable renewable output.

Natural gas is also an important input to industrial processes and cheaper, more plentiful may tap gas may help retain what manufacturing is still in NE.

Also, we’re still at the phase where additions of natural gas and renewables are displacing oil and coal, which is a net win both for carbon emissions and air pollution that causes stuff like cancer and asthma and heart disease.

Finally, the real solution is fixing our environmental laws (NEPA, MEPA) so that they can no longer be weaponized by NIMBYs to block and kill renewables and transmission projects. All renewable projects should be exempt from public input, granted immunity from litigation, and be given streamlined and expedited approval.

Jones Act delenda est. It’s literally insane that it’s illegal to ship natural gas from the Gulf Coast to MA because of a century old law the result of which is there are like three rickety pieces of junk in the entire US allowed to move gas between two US ports. We essentially buy natural gas from Trinidad and Europe because of that dumb law.

And then there are the environmentalists and NYS which have opposed plans to build a pipeline from the Marcellus & Utica shale fields to NE. The result? We get shortages and MORE carbon emissions because we have to start turning back to coal. (Also obligatory fuck Maine and them blocking the NECEC - would be nice to have a GW of Quebec hydro right now!)