Eco chapter 17

Which of the following offers the best example of a positive externality

A coastal dairy farmer's undeveloped land offers unimpeded views of the ocean for a nearby neighborhood

Why is the rate of deforestation frequently higher than would be socially optimal?

Population pressure coupled with a lack of incentives to conserve open-access resources results in deforestation

Which of the following offers positive external benefits in consumption

Public education

An example of an external cost

The harms to private property, open-access resources, and human health caused by pollution byproducts of electricity production

Exhaustible resource

a resource in fixed supply, such as crude oil or coal

Renewable resource

a resource that regenerates itself and so can be used indefinitely if used conservatively such as a well-managed forest

economic efficiency approach

an approach that offers each polluter the flexibility to reduce emissions as cost effectively as possible, given its unique cost conditions; the market for pollution rights is an example

command and control environmental regulations

an inflexible approach that required polluters to adopt particular technologies to reduce emissions by specific amounts

Coase theorem

as long as bargaining costs are low, an efficient solution to the problem of externalities is achieved by assigning property rights to one party or the other, it doesn't matter which

According to the Coase theorem, efficient solution of an externality problem

can be achieved only if one particular party is assigned the property right

Almost 70 percent of U.S. garbage

goes to landfills

When there are positive externalities in the consumption of a good

marginal social benefit exceeds marginal private benefit

Variable technology

occurs when the amount of externality generated at a given rate of output can be reduced by altering the production process

Marginal social cost equals marginal ___ cost plus marginal __ cost, and reflects the true marginal cost to society of an additional unit of production

private; external

From an economic standpoint, the passage of the Clean Air Act of 1970 did which of the following

recognized the atmosphere as an economic resource with alternative uses, and gave Americans the right to breathe air of a certain quality

A renewable resource such as fish which is also an open-access good is

rival and nonexclusive

An open-access good is often subject to which of the following problems

the common-pool problem

Marginal social benefit

the sum of the marginal private benefit and the marginal external benefit of production or consumption

Marginal social cost

the sum of the marginal private cost and the marginal external cost of production or consumption

Common-pool problem

unrestricted access to a renewable resource results in overuse