Abstract
This Note addresses the twin problems of political short-termism and intergenerational equity. Although scholars have discussed these concerns extensively, few scholars have developed proposals to modify democratic institutions-particularly legislatures-to better consider posterity's interests. This Note critiques one such set of proposals by several environmental ethicists for including posterity-oriented legislators in present-generation legislatures. It then proposes a system that ties the long-term outcomes of legislators' policy preferences to their pension plans by creating a new commodities market that values the decisions legislators make and their effect on posterity.
Citation
Matthew W. Wolfe,
The Shadows of Future Generations,
57 Duke Law Journal
1897-1932
(2008)
Available at: https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/dlj/vol57/iss6/9