concept

Open-access resource

A resource from which no one has the right to exclude anyone else. The economic consequence is predictable: entrants keep coming while profit remains, so the stock is ground down to exactly the level where the cost of catching the last animal equals the price it fetches, and the whole industry's profit evaporates. This is not a consequence of individual greed but of the structure of rights: every harvester knows that an animal they leave will be taken by someone else, so restraint is a private loss. One thing worth noting: moving to a single owner solves that dissipation of profit, but does not automatically save the population.