今日知识点：Policy options for Common Resources

例题

There is a medieval town where sheep graze on common land.  As the population grows, the number of sheep grows.  However, the amount of land is fixed, the grass begins to disappear from overgrazing.  The private incentives (using the land for free) outweigh the social incentives (using it carefully).The tragedy would be people can no longer raise sheep. What could the townspeople (or their government) have done to prevent the tragedy? 

解析

• Impose a corrective tax on the use of the land to “internalize the externality”

• Regulate use of the land (the “command-and-control” approach)

• Auction off permits allowing use of the land

• Divide the land, sell lots to individual families; each family will have incentive not to overgraze its own land

下面我们为大家准备了一道同类型的题目，请大家一起来试试解答。

Categorizing road

A road is which of the four kinds of goods?

Options:

• Public good

• Private good

• Common resource

• Natural monopoly

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正确答案如下：

• Four possibilities:

• Uncongested non-toll road:  public good

• Uncongested toll road:  natural monopoly

• Congested non-toll road:  common resource

• Congested toll road:  private good