Comedy of the Commons
Overfishing. Pollution. Littering. All of these are ways in which society as a whole misuses common resources (in these cases, animal populations, the environment, and public spaces). These resources are all subject to a phenomenon known as the Tragedy of the Commons, a situation in which everyone has an incentive to use as much of a shared resource as possible but no one has an inherent incentive to maintain it. Fixing the problem involves individuals making decisions that make them worse off while everyone else benefits. Take littering in a public park as an example. Say there are 100 people Continue reading Comedy of the Commons