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Preserving or escaping? On the welfare effects of environmental self-protective choices

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  • Antoci, Angelo
  • Borghesi, Simone

Abstract

In modern societies individuals often try to alleviate their personal damages from environmental degradation by increasing their consumption of private goods. Although this “self-protective” behavior is very frequent in industrial economies, insufficient attention has been paid to its economic and environmental consequences. In this paper we show that such a behavior can make everyone worse-off. For this purpose, using as paradigmatic case a two-islands evolutionary model, we prove analytically that environmental “self-protection” may trap the system into an undesirable (Pareto-dominated) situation and discuss a few real-life examples in which this mechanism may have actually occurred. Although the proposed model is deliberately extremely simple, it may provide some interesting insights on an aspect that has been mainly ignored in the literature so far.

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  • Antoci, Angelo & Borghesi, Simone, 2012. "Preserving or escaping? On the welfare effects of environmental self-protective choices," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 248-254.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:41:y:2012:i:2:p:248-254
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2011.12.012
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    1. Angelo Antoci & Simone Borghesi & Gerardo Marletto, 2012. "To drive or not to drive? A simple evolutionary model," ECONOMICS AND POLICY OF ENERGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2012(2), pages 31-47.
    2. Luisa Corrado & Andrea Fazio & Alessandra Pelloni, 2020. "Pro-environmental attitudes, local environmental conditions and recycling behavior," Working Paper series 20-21, Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis, revised Nov 2021.
    3. Antoci, Angelo & Borghesi, Simone & Russu, Paolo & Ticci, Elisa, 2015. "Foreign direct investments, environmental externalities and capital segmentation in a rural economy," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 341-353.
    4. Antoci, Angelo & Borghesi, Simone & Galeotti, Marcello & Sodini, Mauro, 2021. "Living in an uncertain world: Environment substitution, local and global indeterminacy," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    5. Antoci, Angelo & Borghesi, Simone & Galeotti, Marcello & Russu, Paolo, 2022. "Maladaptation to environmental degradation and the interplay between negative and positive externalities," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    6. Angelo Antoci & Paolo Russu & Elisa Ticci, 2022. "Modeling maladaptation in the inequality–environment nexus," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 17(1), pages 115-140, January.
    7. Alessandro Fiori Maccioni, 2018. "Environmental depletion, defensive consumption and negative externalities," Decisions in Economics and Finance, Springer;Associazione per la Matematica, vol. 41(2), pages 203-218, November.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Self-protective choices; Defensive expenditures; Environmental degradation; Negative externalities; Economic growth;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q01 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - General - - - Sustainable Development
    • Q26 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Recreational Aspects of Natural Resources
    • Q29 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Other

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