Strong suspicion you've never studied game theory, or even Adam Smithian economics. "Everybody just agree to what is best for everyone" pretty much never works.
People don't work like that. Frankly, it is hopelessly naive of the human condition and akin to saying "why don't we all stop wasting money on locks and just all of us agree to stop stealing?" Or "why do we need money? Can't we just all do our part and only take what we need?" Or "why can't we agree to end wars?"
People tend to (mostly) calculate what is best for them. Most people would just say "the only thing I can control is what I do, not what everyone else does. The best outcome for me is to live like I want to live, regardless of what everyone else does." Some people have more awareness of what is good for all than others, but very few will make huge individual sacrifices for the sake of making a hard-to-detect positive impact on the common good.
See "prisoners' dilemma", "tragedy of the commons", "invisible hand", and so on.
A government, on the other hand -- especially one as big as the US government -- is generally the only way to address this sort of thing. I'm not saying this is a great plan, but I suspect things like this are worth looking into.
People don't work like that. Frankly, it is hopelessly naive of the human condition and akin to saying "why don't we all stop wasting money on locks and just all of us agree to stop stealing?" Or "why do we need money? Can't we just all do our part and only take what we need?" Or "why can't we agree to end wars?"
People tend to (mostly) calculate what is best for them. Most people would just say "the only thing I can control is what I do, not what everyone else does. The best outcome for me is to live like I want to live, regardless of what everyone else does." Some people have more awareness of what is good for all than others, but very few will make huge individual sacrifices for the sake of making a hard-to-detect positive impact on the common good.
See "prisoners' dilemma", "tragedy of the commons", "invisible hand", and so on.
A government, on the other hand -- especially one as big as the US government -- is generally the only way to address this sort of thing. I'm not saying this is a great plan, but I suspect things like this are worth looking into.