Talberth, J. and E. Niemi. 2019. Environmentally Harmful Subsidies in the U.S.: Issue #1 – The Federal Logging Program. Portland, OR: Center for Sustainable Economy and Natural Resource Economics.

Link: https://sustainable-economy.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/CSE-Federal-logging-report-May-2019.pdf.

Key excerpts:

  • “[These lands play a unique ecological role because they represent islands in a sea of heavily damaged lands managed by states and private landowners. …”.
  • “One of the key justifications for ending the logging program on national forests is so they can serve as a buttress against the extinction threat posed by industrial tree plantations. “.
  • “Because of their unique role and limited suitability, logging on national forestlands is uneconomical.”
  • “Our analysis finds that the logging program on national forests continues to lose money for taxpayers in the range of $1.3 to $1.5 billion per year.”
  • When additional federal logging subsidies related to fire suppression and BLM losses are included, the total exceeds $1.8 billion per year.