Premium
THE MORECAMBE BAY COCKLE PICKERS: MARKET FAILURE OR GOVERNMENT DISASTER?
Author(s) -
Meadowcroft John,
Blundell John
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
economic affairs
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.24
H-Index - 18
eISSN - 1468-0270
pISSN - 0265-0665
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-0270.2004.t01-1-00495.x
Subject(s) - cockle , tragedy (event) , china , poverty , government (linguistics) , capitalism , economics , development economics , market economy , political science , fishery , politics , economic growth , sociology , law , social science , linguistics , philosophy , biology
The tragic deaths of twenty‐three young Chinese cockle pickers in Morecambe Bay on the Lancashire coast have been attributed to the machinations of global capitalism. In fact, these migrant workers came to the UK to escape the poverty created by socialism in China and were working under a regime of state‐regulated access to the cockle beds. An alternative market‐orientated regime of private property rights in the cockle beds might have prevented the tragedy.