nuisance to modern complex societies, in that a person's use of his property may harmfully affect another's property, or person, far from the nuisance activity, and from causes not easily integrated into historic understandings of nuisance law. Remedies Under the common law, the only remedy for a nuisance was the payment of damages. However, with the development of the courts of equity, the remedy of an injunction became available to prevent a defendant from repeating the activity that caused the nuisance, and specifying punishment for contempt if the defendant is in breach of such an injunction. The law and economics movement has been involved in analyzing the most efficient choice of remedies given the circumstances of the nuisance. In Boomer v. Atlantic Cement Co. a cement plant interfered with a number of neighbors, yet the cost of complying with a full injunction would have been far more than a fair value of the cost to the plaintiffs of continuation. The New York court allowed the cement plant owner to 'purchase' the injunction for a specified amount—the permanent damages. In theory, the permanent damage amount should be the net present value of all future damages suffered by the plaintiff. Inspector of Nuisances An Inspector of Nuisances was the title of an office in several English-speaking jurisdictions. In many jurisdictions this term is now archaic, the position and/or term having been replaced by others. In medieval England it was an office of the Courts Leet and later it was also a parochial office concerned with local action against a wide range of 'nuisances' under the common law: obstructions of the highway, polluted wells, adulterated food, smoke, noise, smelly accumulations, eavesdropping, peeping toms, lewd behaviour, and many others. In the United Kingdom from the mid- 19th century this office became associated with solving public health and sanitation problems, with other types of nuisances being dealt with by the local constables. The first Inspector of Nuisances appointed by a UK local authority Health Committee was Thomas Fresh in Liverpool in 1844. Liverpool later promoted a private Act, the Liverpool Sanatory Act 1846, that created a statutory post of Inspector of Nuisances. This became the precedent for later local and national legislation. In local authorities that had established a Board of Health under the Public Health Act 1848, or under local Acts implementing the Towns Improvement Clauses Act of 1847, the title was 'Inspector of