Articles
Most Recycling Is A Waste
[Subscription Required] Metals and some plastics are worth separating, but the rest of it is costly and can hurt the environment.
October 7, 2026
Published February 28, 2025
Despite remarkable environmental improvements in air quality, water pollution, and biodiversity, widespread pessimism persists about our planet's future. This disconnect may stem from environmental researcher that increasingly uses subjective, alarmist, and otherwise biased language that gets more citations and attention than objective analysis. Scientific objectivity in environmental communication must be restored to ensure policies are guided by evidence rather than emotion.
Dominic (Nick) Parker is the Ilene and Morton Harris Senior Fellow (adjunct) at the Hoover Institution and serves editorial roles at three leading journals on environmental economics. Parker joins Hoover senior fellow Terry Anderson in directing Hoover projects on Renewing Indigenous Economies and Markets vs. Mandates, which analyzes incentives for improving environmental quality.
Check out more from Dominic Parker:
- Watch "Markets vs. Mandates" from Dominic Parker & Terry Anderson here.
- Watch "Environmental Science vs. Environmental Advocacy" from Dominic Parker as part of the Hoover Institution's Summer Policy Boot Camp here.
- Read "The Creation and Extent of America's First Environmental Agencies" from Dominic Parker and Dean Lueck here.
The opinions expressed in this video are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Hoover Institution or Stanford University. © 2025 by the Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Junior University.