Does vegan advocacy really work in reducing global meat consumption? Has anyone tested it?
My point: despite the increasing number of vegans & reducitarians, global meat production & consumption has increased (important exceptions: US & EU). That’s a problem, since effective altruists defend vegetarianism etc. in order to reduce animal slaughter. Economic development aside (and the corresponding new demand for animal protein), I wonder if, in the long-term, markets adjust prices: thus, for each individual reducing meat consumption, there are many others who increase their consumption (because of falling prices due to decreasing demand), so leading the market to a new equilibrium.
So, my question: is there a way to test it? I imagine it could be done by a RCT: we could ask parts of a populations to stop eating meat for some time and measure if there is an observable effect.
in the last 30min, I found out ACE includes considerations about demand elasticity for animal products in its evaluations. It’s not the same as a RCT, but I believe it’s a good enough estimate. I’ll keep the post, though, in case anyone have similar doubts.
Does vegan advocacy really work in reducing global meat consumption? Has anyone tested it?
My point: despite the increasing number of vegans & reducitarians, global meat production & consumption has increased (important exceptions: US & EU). That’s a problem, since effective altruists defend vegetarianism etc. in order to reduce animal slaughter. Economic development aside (and the corresponding new demand for animal protein), I wonder if, in the long-term, markets adjust prices: thus, for each individual reducing meat consumption, there are many others who increase their consumption (because of falling prices due to decreasing demand), so leading the market to a new equilibrium.
So, my question: is there a way to test it? I imagine it could be done by a RCT: we could ask parts of a populations to stop eating meat for some time and measure if there is an observable effect.
in the last 30min, I found out ACE includes considerations about demand elasticity for animal products in its evaluations. It’s not the same as a RCT, but I believe it’s a good enough estimate. I’ll keep the post, though, in case anyone have similar doubts.