{"id":674,"date":"2017-02-14T10:12:53","date_gmt":"2017-02-14T09:12:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.icrei.fr\/en\/?p=674"},"modified":"2017-02-14T10:19:23","modified_gmt":"2017-02-14T09:19:23","slug":"the-welfare-state-as-an-illustration-of-the-tragedy-of-the-commons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.icrei.fr\/en\/2017\/02\/14\/the-welfare-state-as-an-illustration-of-the-tragedy-of-the-commons\/","title":{"rendered":"The welfare state as an illustration of “The tragedy of the Commons”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Students for Liberty<\/strong> et Atlas Network<\/strong>, two market friendly think tanks, have published a small book \u201cAfter the welfare state: politicians stole your future\u2026you can get it back<\/a>\u201d <\/em><\/strong>edited by Tom Palmer with some ten contributions. (Jameson Books, , 2012,, 175 pp)<\/p>\n

In the first paper \u201cThe tragedy of the welfare state\u201d Tom Palmer explains that the famous Hardin\u2019s thesis \u201cThe tragedy of the Commons\u201d does apply to the welfare state the resources of which are too often in open access , \u201cEach of us may know that catching lots of fish now means that the lake will be fished out \u2026and in the end everyone is worse off\u201d<\/p>\n

Mutual plundering is a rational behavior since \u201cif I don\u201dt get that government subsidy, someone else will\u201d. But the situation is worse than for environmental resources since we are plundering each other and accordingly we spend resources both way: extract resources from our neighbors and avoid being plundered by these same neighbors. \u201cThe result is exhaustion\u201d<\/p>\n

Palmer gives several examples :<\/p>\n