A Basic Accounting of Variation in Municipal Solid-Waste Generation at the County Level in Texas, 2006: Groundwork for Applying Metabolic-Rift Theory to Waste Generation

Autor/in	Clement, Matthew Thomas
Titel	A Basic Accounting of Variation in Municipal Solid-Waste Generation at the County Level in Texas, 2006: Groundwork for Applying Metabolic-Rift Theory to Waste Generation
Quelle	In: Rural Sociology, 74 (2009) 3, S.412-429 (18 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0036-0112
Schlagwörter	Educational Attainment; Counties; Environmental Standards; Sanitation; Case Studies; Regression (Statistics); Income; Population Distribution; Social Systems; Economic Factors; Conservation (Environment); Urbanization; Texas + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Bildungsabschluss; Bildungsgut; Umweltauflage; Betriebshygiene; Case study; Fallstudie; Case Study; Regression; Regressionsanalyse; Einkommen; Demographical distribution; Bevölkerungsverteilung; Social system; Soziales System; Ökonomischer Faktor; Conservation; Environment; Konservierung; Bewahung; Umwelt; Urbanisation; Urbanisierung
Abstract	Environmental social scientists debate whether or not modern development reduces society's impact on the biosphere. The empirical research informing the discussion has not yet adequately examined the social determinants of municipal solid-waste (MSW) generation, an increasingly relevant issue, both ecologically and sociologically. A primary problem for this research concerns the increasing exchange of MSW across state and county borders. A convenient way to avoid this problem is to examine variation between counties with landfills that service only the county in which the landfills are located. I applied this restriction to a cross-sectional analysis of total MSW generated in Texas at the county level for 2006. Using robust regression, this study found that two basic measures of modern development, population per square mile and per capita income, are both positively related to total MSW generated at the county level and together explain about 73 percent of the variation in the dependent variable. The evidence corroborates the metabolic-rift theory. The concentration of people onto smaller land areas, or urbanization, and increasing wealth in a capitalist economy contribute to the metabolic rupture between human society and the environment. (Contains 8 footnotes, 4 tables, and 1 figure.) (As Provided).
Anmerkungen	Rural Sociological Society. 104 Gentry Hall, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211-7040. Tel: 573-882-9065; Fax: 573-882-1473; e-mail: ruralsoc@missouri.edu; Web site: http://www.ruralsociology.org
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10