Public Good

In economics, a public good refers to a commodity or service that is made available to all members of a society 1.

A public good has two key characteristics which make it difficult for market producers to sell the good to individual consumers 2.

  • Nonexcludable means that it is costly or impossible for one user to exclude others from using a good
  • Nonrivalrous means that when one person uses a good, it does not prevent others from using it.

  1. See definition: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/p/public-good.asp ↩︎

  2. See definition: https://www.khanacademy.org/economics-finance-domain/microeconomics/market-failure-and-the-role-of-government/externalities-topic/a/public-goods-cnx ↩︎