Bees, Oranges, and Externalities: The Answer is Transaction Costs

The Answer Is Transaction Costs

Send us a text

Bees and Valencia oranges from my family's farm in rural central Florida provide a snapshot of externalities and transaction costs. A local beekeeper wasn't just a boon for our crops but also an illustration of Arthur Pigou's theories on the divergence between supply price and marginal supply price.
Real-world practices, such as apple orchard owners paying for pollination services while beekeepers pay for the privilege of orange blossom honey, reveal how market dynamics naturally balance costs and benefits.

• M.C. Munger. "The Lighthouse Myth." https://www.aier.org/article/the-lighthouse-myth/
• M.C. Munger. "Orange Blossom Special." https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2008/Mungerbees.html
• J.E. Meade, 1952, "External Economies and Diseconomies in a Competitive Situation." https://www.jstor.org/stable/2227173
• Shawn Regan, "How Capitalism Saved the Bees", PERC. https://www.perc.org/2017/07/20/how-capitalism-saved-the-bees/
• SNS Cheung, "Fable of the Bees." https://www.pauldeng.com/pdf/stevencheung/fableofbees.pdf
• Bruce Frohnen and Ted McAllister, Character in the American Experience: An Unruly People. https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781666914528/Character-in-the-American-Experience-An-Unruly-People

If you have questions or comments, or want to suggest a future topic, email the show at [e-mail] !

You can follow Mike Munger on Twitter at @mungowitz

Chapters

1. Bees, Oranges, and Externalities: The Answer is Transaction Costs (00:00:00)

2. Externalities, Bees, and Transaction Costs (00:00:01)

3. Market Solutions to Bee Externalities (00:10:37)

4. Bearer Bonds and Trust in Transactions (00:21:21)