Towards a Sustainable Fishery: The Price-Cap Approach
Overfishing is the classic tragedy of the commons. So far, governments have pursued a variety of solutions to incentivize sustainable commercial fishing practices, realizing only mixed results. After describing the costs associated with implementing overfishing controls, I propose a new method of regulating commercial fishing: the price cap. This Article explains the theory of how price caps can incentivize sustainable fishing, analyzes the implementation costs associated with price caps, and compares price caps to existing overfishing regulations. Because each fishery is unique, no single method will produce the greatest benefit at the lowest cost in all fisheries. Accordingly, I analyze the factors that might make a fishery a better or worse candidate for the implementation of price caps.
