Technology Needed to Provide Accounting of Public Benefits

If public good becomes quantifiable, accounting is needed before it is tradable. With today’s technology and low costs of computing and data communication, this technical requirement is not an impediment. Public Benefits Funds (PBF) could be set up at the global, national, state, local, and corporate levels to keep track of various public goods and the account balances owned or owed by all entities, citizens or corporate entities.
Participation in PBF is automatic by virtue of residency (or citizenship) and work status, etc. Actions taken by an individual or a corporation which have a public good impact will be credited or debited in the appropriate Public Benefits Funds.
Public good has categories (accounts) such as air quality, water quality, land quality, waste, wild life and vegetation quality, well-being of the poor and unprivileged, peace, education, and voluntary social services, etc.
Quantified measures will be used for each account, and a dollar value per measured quantity will be set periodically by some scientific, market or democratic process.
Consumer products will carry two prices, Tier 1 and Tier 2. Some will evolve into a single price. In addition to the monetary price currently adopted in Capitalism (Tier 1), there will be a Tier 2 price or credit equal to the consumption or creation of public good in producing or consuming the product. For example, an orange needed x gallons of water for its growth, removed y pounds of CO2, occupied z sq. ft. of land, and provided w sq. ft. of vegetation. When the orange is eaten, it will generate m oz. of waste. Altogether, the Tier 2 price can be computed by an approved formula using the current values of these public goods. A trial period will be used so that people can appreciate these Tier 2 prices and understand the true cost to society of all consumer products.
When a consumer product’s Tier 2 price is found to be reasonable and stable, it may be phased into a real price. The revenue from Tier 2 prices will be received by the corresponding Public Benefits Funds. Some funds will receive a credit and some a debit. For example, if water quality is worsened by a product, the water quality PBF will receive Tier 2 money from the sale of that product. If land quality is improved by a product, the land quality PBF will pay or credit the producer of that product for the improvement.
PBFs that accrue a positive fund balance will be able to take on projects to improve that public good. Members of that PBF may be allocated financial benefits, if democratically approved, to be taken one time or at a payout schedule, such as for retirement. For example, if people are willing to accept the existing level of air quality, the money collected from air polluters may be paid out to the people instead of using that money to make the air more clean than necessary.
PBFs that accrue a negative balance, e.g., from making payments to enterprises which have improved water quality, may charge a usage fee on other uses of that public good in order to make the PBF financially viable. For example, cleaner campgrounds may have to charge recreational users a higher fee. Moreover, there would be data to support a market value for such recreational fee.
National goals may be set up for automobile gas mileage or for air emissions per mile traveled. The owner of a car certified to perform better than the national goal will receive an air quality credit in his or her PBF account computed each year by the miles traveled on that car and its emission rates. Likewise, the owner of a car certified to have under-par gas mileage will receive an air quality debit in his or her PBF account. Depending on implementation, these debits and credits may be charged via the income tax process, or simply reconciled in the person’s total PBF account balance.
Volunteers for social work will receive PBF credits for performing accredited social work, such as voluntary work at the hospitals, prisons, and shelters or tutoring students, serving as voluntary business consultants for under-developed countries, etc.
Each person will receive a regular statement of his PBF accounts (or accessed through the Internet). A procedure for converting these credits into cash would be set up and could be used for retirement benefits. Because the PBF account is a tangible financial account, it is a powerful financial incentive for individuals to increase its value through social-conscious actions.