Friends of the Behavioral Economics Blog, this week we present the paper “Addressing Consumerism and the Planetary Health Crisis: Behavioral Economics Approach in Public Policy” by Sarkar, A. (2022), in which the author speaks about the different environmental problems that have been emerging in the last few years and are related to consumption, plus, he points out the utility of behavioral economics to improve the reduction of the negative impacts they have.
Climate change, environmental pollution and the loss of biodiversity are the great enemies of humanity and, currently, its greatest threat.
They are called “The Planetary Crisis Triad”, and they cause serious problems in numerous areas of life. For example: the increase in extreme weather events, the spread of vector-borne infectious diseases due to the expansion of invasive arthropods into regions that were previously cold climates, hormonal diseases due to exposure to pollutants, even mental illnesses, among others many consequences.
That is why, for some years, the guidelines dictated by a series of international protocols and agreements have been followed, which have achieved some progress. For example, a decline in the production of hazardous chemical materials such as persistent organic pollutants, the rapid growth of renewable energy, and a commitment to stop promoting coal-fired power plants.
Even so, no international treaty has focused on stopping the unnecessary mass consumption at the individual level. Consumption is the main pull factor for high energy demands and depletion of the Earth’s finite resources, and industries are constantly increasing their output to meet customer demand.
In this sense, the rich countries and emerging economies cannot deny their part of responsibility in controlling current levels of consumption.
In recent years, the promotion of electric vehicles has been very important in stopping greenhouse gases, and its effects are expected to be even greater in the coming years.
However, it is worth noting that growing energy demands cannot be met by renewables alone. Renewable energy sources provide clean energy, but they also produce toxic waste. The evidence therefore makes it clear that success in tackling the planetary health crisis depends on tackling our consumption.
This is where the concept of circular economy appears. It is a novel discipline that aims to operate in the use of resources within closed-loop systems, reduce pollution and prevent resource leakage while maintaining economic growth. The system is called “circular” because it aims to reduce, reuse, recycle and recover.
However, circular economy has been criticized for having a limited conceptual basis and lack of consistency in terms of how it can contribute to sustainable development, for example if recycling itself is energy intensive.
In today’s society, a pervasive sense of dissatisfaction drives humans to desire material things and their subsequent rapid disposal, resulting in the purchase of newer products (here terms such as “planned obsolescence” become relevant). For example, we now buy 4-5 times more clothes than we did 30 years ago, leaving a staggering environmental impact. Globally, the fashion industry produces almost 90 million tons of waste per year, and consumes at least 80 billion liters of water.
Drawing on psychology and economics, behavioral economics has repeatedly proven its usefulness for many purposes, and the author believes that it could provide effective answers to the problem of the environment.
For example, humans are known to move in a fast, immediate world, so simple messages about stopping buying so much and using biodegradable products, switching to “eco-friendly” alternatives, might be more helpful.
Taxes and allowances can work well at times; however, simple economic incentives are not useful for everything; for example, charging for plastic bags in stores does not prevent customers from taking them away.
The author also mentions nudges, which are based on the fact that humans sometimes need nudges to act rationally. Well thought out, they can be effective. For example, placing information on restaurant menus about plates made with local or vegetarian products, to encourage their consumption.
The conclusion is that a paradigm shift is necessary to motivate and lead people towards a pro-environmental path, through effective social learning, advertising and communication campaigns, etc. For this, it seems that behavioral economics and the architecture of choice are very useful tools whose application should be explored.
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