Assessing the U.S. Environment

摘要

On 1 January 1970, President Nixon signed into law the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), noting that the 1970s would be "the decade of the environment." Among other provisions, NEPA established a three-member Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) analogous to the Council of Economic Advisors (CEA). The act also instructed CEQ to prepare an annual report on the environment similar to the well-known report prepared by CEA. In this report, CEQ was to identify indicators of ecological, economic, and social trends and present them as a guide to federal policy. Like all of its predecessors, however, CEQ's 24th annual report fails to fulfill these requirements.