Abstract
‘Rent seeking’ refers to the investment of resources in efforts to create monopolies. Such investments impose a social cost (which may outweigh the benefit to the monopolist) because they are unproductive. That cost is greater than the mere cost of lobbying by special interests for privilege when the privilege is conferred in a way that is economically inefficient but politically feasible (which is often true of regulations). Research on rent seeking has demonstrated that the true social costs of promoting special interests thus greatly exceed the deadweight costs of the distortions introduced into the economy.
This chapter was originally published in The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, 2nd edition, 2008. Edited by Steven N. Durlauf and Lawrence E. Blume
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Bibliography
Buchanan, J., R. Tollison, and G. Tullock, eds. 1980. Toward a theory of the rent-seeking society. College Station: Texas A and M University Press.
Krueger, A.O. 1974. The political economy of the rent-seeking society. American Economic Review 64: 291–303.
Tullock, G. 1967. The welfare cost of tariffs, monopolies, and theft. Western Economic Journal (now Economic Inquiry) 5: 224–232.
Tullock, G. 1980. Efficient rent seeking. In eds. Buchanan, Tollison and Tullock, 91–112.
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Tullock, G. (2008). Rent Seeking. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_1745-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_1745-2
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Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-95121-5
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Chapter history
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Latest
Rent Seeking- Published:
- 20 March 2017
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_1745-2
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Original
Rent Seeking- Published:
- 23 November 2016
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_1745-1