How many light bulbs does it take to change a money-wasting, air-polluting homeowner?

Inertia and an inability to see beyond the higher purchase price are all that prevent consumers from embracing energy-efficient light bulbs and rendering the regular incandescent variety to the history books.  After all, the energy-efficient bulbs last much longer, are indisputably cheaper to operate — lots cheaper — and their widespread use would do wonders for the environment.  

So what has to happen to change consumer habits?

Just ban the incandescent bulbs — much as happened with the aerosol sprays of yore — or at least tax the bulbs into oblivion, says Matt Prescott, organizer of an online effort to bring about one or the other outcome. You can read all about it at www.banthebulb.org and in opinion pieces Prescott penned for the BBC here and here.

The anti-government sorts will reject the idea out of hand, of course, but everyone else should find Prescott’s arguments interesting if not compelling.