Social costs in modern capitalism∗

The Social and Environmental Costs of Milk Production: Trends and Resistance in Vermont

“…While increased farm productivity may appear to indicate a “decoupling” of economic growth from environmental impacts, evidence indicates that the costs of this efficiency are manifesting themselves in ways not reflected in many statistics. As social cost theory (Kapp ; Beckenbach ) argues, the externalities imposed by petrochemical agriculture (for example, contaminated water supplies, soil depletion, threats to environmental health) tend to be hidden and borne by third parties. This appears to be true for the dairy industry.…”

“…Drawing on multiple sources of data, this study uses Vermont as a vehicle to explore agricultural change and changes in the state's dairy industry through the lens of social institutions. Data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture show that a significant reorganization of the dairy industry has taken place in the past 50 years and that these changes are accompanied by a variety of costs (Kapp ; Beckenbach ), or irrationalities (Ritzer ), that manifest themselves socially and ecologically. Face‐to‐face interviews with three organic dairy operators offer insight into how this reorganization is understood and how some dairy operators are responding.…”

Hazardous Sites and Local Taxes: An Application of Social Cost Theory

“…Lavelle and Coyle (1992) analyze Superfund responses to contaminated communities by comparing compensation awards across communities, but do not focus on contributions from the polluting facilities to the communities themselves. Yet, as Beckenbach (1989) argues, it is possible to operationalize, at least partly, compensation for social costs. This expands the definition of environmental injustice from only those communities that are overburdened to those communities that are not fairly compensated.…”

“…Frank Beckenbach (1989) challenges Kapp's definition. By developing an elaborate typology of social costs, he convincingly argues that social costs are not limited to third parties and that social costs can be, at least partly, monetized (Beckenbach, 1989:74).…”

“…He is careful, however, to note the lack of methods to account for social costs, particularly when limited to monetary terms. Similar to Kapp, Beckenbach (1989) claims that commodities are produced privately, but the context in which they are produced is social. The externalization of industrial byproducts has the simultaneous effect of 1) maximizing the amount of surplus value realized by the sale of commodities and 2) lowering the quality of life in the communities where those byproducts are externalized.…”