Final answer:
The statement is false; both traditional goods and environmental quality can be valued in monetary terms, but accurately measuring these values poses challenges. Societal preferences determine tradeoffs between economic output and environmental protection, reflecting that environmental quality does have a monetary consideration even if it's difficult to quantify.
Step-by-step explanation:
The assertion that traditional goods and services have equivalent monetary values while environmental quality should not be valued in monetary terms is false. Economics often involves tradeoffs like the one described in Figure 12.5, which shows the balance between economic output and environmental protection. Economies choose between options like point 'P' with more economic output and less environmental protection, and point 'T' with more environmental quality but less economic output. Different societies value these differently, reflecting varying preferences and values, which suggests that both goods/services and environmental quality can have monetary values attached to them, although there may be challenges in measuring those values accurately.
In Robert Costanza and Lisa Wainger’s article in The Washington Post titled 'No Accounting For Nature: How Conventional Economics Distorts the Value of Things', they argue that conventional economics fails to appropriately value the environment. This further showcases the complexity in defining the worth of environmental quality in economic terms. The notion that goods/services inherently equivalent monetary values disregard the paradox of value, which states that valuable resources like water can have a low monetary value, while less useful items such as diamonds can be highly valued.