More Curves: Richer and Greener

Following on Nick Gillespie's post/insult to his colleagues, I'll offer a few more curves for Hit & Run readers to appreciate.

Check out some sexy, sexy Kuznets curves below—supplied by New York Times science columnist and my former boss John Tierney—which illustrate that "over the long term, being richer often translates into being greener."

Many environmental problems get worse as a country first industrializes, but once it reaches a certain level of income, the trend often reverses, producing a curve shaped like an upside-down U. It's called a Kuznets curve (in honor of the economist Simon Kuznets, who detected this pattern in trends of income inequality): 

Read the whole Tierney column here.

Dip into Reason's past Earth Day coverage here.