Question

either side) stops. This prevents costs from adding up. If the anti- SLAPP motion is successful, the allegation is removed from the complaints (usually ending the lawsuit), and the defendant can be awarded attorney fees. QUESTIONS AND DISCUSSION In an era of tight and shrinking government budgets, how much should 1. on environmental enforcement? Given that speeding causes more we spend deaths than violations of environmental laws, should more resources be dedicated to traffic enforcement than environmental enforcement? Do you think that cost-benefit analysis should determine how we spend scarce enforcement resources? Assume you are a state environmental official, and a state inspector has just informed you that Belching Industry, Inc., exceeded its air-pollution standards for six days earlier in the month. In the early 2000s, Belching often violated environmental law and, as a 2. result, was fined several million dollars. Since a change of management in 2010, Belching has been highly compliant with environmental laws, but is rumored to be losing money and cutting corners to stay in business. Belching voluntarily brought the most recent violation to the inspector's attention and reports that the violation was due to equipment failure that will not occur again. What steps would you take in response to this information?

Answer 1

EPA’s current budget is $8.14 billion, 0.2 percent of the projected $4-trillion fiscal year 2017 federal budget. With the U.S. population at about 324 million, Trump's proposed cuts would bring the EPA's yearly costs down from $25 per American to $18.81 per American. Over 40% of EPA’s total budget is passed through to state, local and tribal governments as grants and low cost loans. The portion of EPA’s 2015 budget that actually went to EPA is $4.7 billion—a mere 0.12% of the total federal budget. Shielding state grants from budget cuts would mean that a “25% EPA budget cut” is actually a 43% cut to the core EPA budget remaining to carry out and enforce the nation’s health and environmental laws. This means the Trump administration budget cuts would reduce EPA’s core budget to $2.665 billion. That figure represents 0.067% of the total U.S. federal budget. In recent times of increasing forest fires and other climate related issues,the budget of $2.665 billion can not be consider sufficient and the major problem of Trump government to not address this issue seriously will further affect in degrading of environmental budget by Trump government. For 2016, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) data shows 37,461 people were killed in 34,436 motor vehicle crashes, an average of 102 per day.In the year 2010, 32,999 were killed in traffic accidents and there is also a decrease of 3.6 % in change in per capita fatalities, even when traffic budget of 2010 is less than 2010. Traffic enforcement tickets are a common source of traffic enforcement budget. The annual budget of U.S. Department of Transportation for year 2015 is $72.4 billion, which is enormously larger than environmental budget. Due to following, I feel that there is no need to increase traffic enforcement budget over environmental budget as the more pressing concern right now is environment. The cost benefit analysis is not always the best approach to distribute government funds as the environmental concerns tops the list of most pressing concern of this time,even though our government is not feeling the necessity to invest in environmental protection just because we are not feeling immediate effects of global change right now,but in due time, big steps must be taken so it is better to take those steps before it became completely impossible to alter back earth's state.

2.) Criminal law characterizes an environmental law violation as a form of white collar crime. The white collar crime are generally encompasses of variety of nonviolent crimes usually committed in commercial situations for financial gain. The convicted violators face fines, probation, jail time, or some combination thereof. Generally, sentence of jail time is used when dealing with individuals while corporations face stiff fines. The fines for a firm endeavor to offset the financial gain of conducting the illegal activity. But if look at the past experience, tens of thousands of businesses have been caught polluting the air, water or soil, but rarely does the federal government prosecute the leaders of these lawbreakers. The US crime report found more than 60,000 facilities in federal databases where there have been violations of U.S. environmental laws, but only less than 0.5% result in prosecutions. This is because of the government, whic has consistently preferred to take administrative or civil actions against corporate polluters, even though laws like the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act make it possible to charge executives criminally during investigations.But in case of voluntarily compliance, the steps should be taken very smartly as voluntary compliance is the main aspect to stop violations of environmental laws. For me,I will make sure that Violators are Not Better Off Than Those Who Comply Voluntarily. Environmental enforcement must be designed to make sure that a firm that complies voluntarily will spend less resources on compliance than if that same firm waited to be caught. I will impose high enough costs on firm Y to remove from it the competitive advantage it gained through its violations. This will encourage X to comply voluntarily. The primary responsibility of enforcement is to make clear that you will be better off if you comply voluntarily. If there is no financial penalty for violating, there is a strong incentive to violate the law and wait until you are caught.