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Market Distortions Encouraging Wasteful Consumption

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Responsible Consumption and Production

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals ((ENUNSDG))

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Synonyms

Externalities

Definitions

Market distortions are events, decisions, or interventions taken by governments, companies, or other agents, often in order to influence the market. They are often the response on market failures, i.e., circumstances that prevent perfect competition and achieving an optimal equilibrium in the market.

Wasteful consumption is the difference between the amount of resources required and the amount of resources used for a consumption activity; it may manifest as taking more resources than needed or as inefficient use of resources.

Introduction

Scarcity of nonrenewable resources is becoming one of the new areas of concern for our economic, industrial, and political systems. In the past, problems related to wasteful consumption of resources, like forests, water, and food, have led to the collapse of past societies (Diamond 2005), and resource scarcity can cause a catastrophe for the interconnected globalized society. Since the second half of the twentieth...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate School of Environmental Science, Nagoya University, Nagoya, Japan

    Wendy Wuyts

Authors
  1. Wendy Wuyts
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Wendy Wuyts .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. European School of Sustainability, Hamburg University of Applied Sciences, Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

    Walter Leal Filho

  2. Center for Neuroscience & Cell Biology, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal

    Anabela Marisa Azul

  3. Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Passo Fundo University Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Passo Fundo, Brazil

    Luciana Brandli

  4. Istinye University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Pinar Gökcin Özuyar

  5. International Centre for Thriving, University of Chester, Chester, UK

    Tony Wall

Section Editor information

  1. La Rochelle Business School - Excelia Group, La Rochelle, France

    Morgane M. C Fritz

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Wuyts, W. (2019). Market Distortions Encouraging Wasteful Consumption. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A., Brandli, L., Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Responsible Consumption and Production. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71062-4_45-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71062-4_45-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-71062-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-71062-4

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