The assignment of property rights on the western frontier: Lessons for contemporary environmental and resource policy

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: University of California System; University of California Santa Barbara; National Bureau of Economic Research
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC HISTORY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-0507
• 发表日期: 2007
• 页码: 257-291
• 关键词: contractual failure; wealth-accumulation; UNITED-STATES; common-pool; water-law; california; LAND; allocation; EFFICIENCY; possession

摘要

I examine the assignment of private property rights during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to five natural resources on federal lands in the Far West. Assigning property rights required adaptation from established, eastern practices. The resulting property rights and their long-term welfare effects inform over-fishing, excessive air pollution, and other natural resource and environmental problems. Allocations based on local conditions, prior use, and unconstrained by outside government mandates were most effective in both addressing the immediate threat of open-access and providing a longer-term basis for production, investment, and trade. Initial faulty property allocations and path dependencies are discussed.