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Does rent-seeking entrepreneurship hurt the environment? Historical insights from the US meatpacking industry
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DOI：10.1007/s11187-026-01241-4.png)
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Abstract
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This paper uses a historical case study of the American meatpacking industry to examine how rent-seeking entrepreneurship can harm environmental outcomes. We first show that Chicago’s largest meatpackers simultaneously reduced pollution and their production costs through innovative by-product utilization. We then demonstrate how these successes provoked rent-seeking behavior from less efficient competitors who pressured policymakers into dismantling the system of industrial organization created by the Chicago meatpackers. Our analysis reveals that rent-seeking behavior can obstruct market-based innovations that promote sustainability. We outline a novel causal model in which rent-seeking actively undermines the capacity of private-sector initiatives to improve environmental outcomes. Our findings challenge some of the dominant assumptions in the environmental policy, management studies, and circular economy literatures. We suggest that profit-seeking entrepreneurship in a regime of competitive and lightly regulated markets may, at least in some circumstances, deliver superior environmental results compared to management by elected officials. In the late nineteenth century, the big meatpacking companies in Chicago reduced pollution not because of a government mandate, but because they found it profitable to turn waste into saleable products. These innovations helped them cut production costs and outperform their competitors in national markets. In short, the Chicago meatpackers simultaneously reduced pollution and cut the cost of meat. In response, less efficient companies from across the country lobbied for regulations to weaken these successful firms. Our research shows that government actions such as antitrust laws can sometimes harm the environment by disrupting market-driven solutions. Rent-seeking entrepreneurship and the use by businesses of the political process to gain unfair advantages can have negative environmental effects. Our findings should prompt researchers, policymakers, and environmental advocates to rethink how regulation interacts with entrepreneurship and environmental goals.
Keywords:
Rent-seeking entrepreneurship
Pollution
Antitrust
Meatpacking
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