What do the Clean Air Act and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s acting career have in common? According to Schwarzenegger, they are both examples of “American success stories.” But just as the former governor of California is ready for a new Hollywood chapter, he is worried about the future of regulation of our country's air pollution.
In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Schwarzenegger writes, “In 1968, I came to California and didn't know why my eyes were constantly filling with tears. I quickly learned about smog and bad-air days. These days, the air is much cleaner thanks to the Clean Air Act and technologies that resulted from it, such as catalytic converters on cars and particle traps on diesel exhaust.”
But the Governator writes that today he has “tears in [his] eyes again, but for a very different reason.” They've come as some Republicans in Congress have led efforts to “limit enforcement of our clean-air rules, create special-interest loopholes, and attempt to reverse scientific findings.”
Not only will this create dirtier air, Schwarzenegger says, but it could also hurt the economy. With more pollutants in the air, more people will get sick and be forced to miss work. Also, he writes, the clean-air rules in California have led to “innovation and new technologies that have created hundreds of thousands of new jobs.”
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