Economics · Level 4 · 212 words
The Shared Field
Original passage © Team AM, written for Hone Literacy.
Picture a meadow open to every herder in a village. Each may graze as many animals as they like, free of charge. For any single herder, the logic is simple: adding one more cow brings a clear private gain, while the cost of slightly overgrazed grass is spread across the whole village. So each herder, acting reasonably, keeps adding animals.
The trouble is that everyone reasons the same way. The grass, which could have fed the herds for generations, is stripped bare within a few seasons. What was rational for each person turns out to be ruinous for all. This pattern is known as the tragedy of the commons, and it appears wherever a shared resource has no limits on its use: fisheries emptied of fish, air thickened with smoke, roads choked with traffic.
The lesson is not that people are wicked. The herders are not villains; they are responding sensibly to the incentives in front of them. The failure lies in the structure. When the benefits of use are private but the costs are shared, individual good sense produces collective harm. Solutions usually require changing that structure, by assigning ownership, setting enforceable limits, or charging for use, so that the cost of taking more lands on the one who takes it.
Comprehension questions
1. What is the central point of the passage?
- A Herders are greedy and should be punished
- B Shared resources with no limits get overused because costs are spread while gains are private
- C Meadows are the best place to raise cattle
- D People always act against their own interests
Show answer
B. Shared resources with no limits get overused because costs are spread while gains are private
The passage defines the tragedy of the commons: private gains plus shared costs lead to overuse and collective harm.
2. Based on the passage, why do the proposed solutions focus on structure rather than character?
- A Because changing laws is cheaper than educating people
- B Because the harm comes from incentives, not from people being wicked
- C Because herders cannot understand the problem
- D Because shared resources can never be saved
Show answer
B. Because the harm comes from incentives, not from people being wicked
The text stresses that herders are not villains; the failure is in the structure of incentives, so fixes target structure.
3. Which example of the tragedy does the passage give?
- A Banks running out of money
- B Fisheries emptied of fish
- C Forests planted too densely
- D Crowds at a concert
Show answer
B. Fisheries emptied of fish
The passage lists 'fisheries emptied of fish' as an example of a shared resource being overused.
Source: Written for Hone Literacy. Original passage © Team AM, written for Hone Literacy.