3FOOD

Third Industrial Revolution Consulting Group
In the unfolding struggle between the exchange economy and the Sharing Economy,
economists’ last fallback position is that if everything were nearly free, there would be no
incentive to innovate and bring new goods and services to the fore because inventors and
entrepreneurs would have no way to recoup their up-front costs. Yet millions of prosumers are
freely collaborating in social Commons, creating new IT and software, new forms of
entertainment, new learning tools, new media outlets, new green energies, new 3D-printed
manufactured products, new peer-to-peer health-research initiatives, and new nonprofit social
entrepreneurial business ventures, using open-source legal agreements freed up from
intellectual property restraints.
The upshot is a surge in creativity that is at least equal to the great innovative thrusts
experienced by the capitalist market economy in the twentieth century. The democratization of
innovation and creativity on the emerging Collaborative Commons is spawning a new kind of
incentive, based less on the expectation of financial reward and more on the desire to advance
the social well-being of humanity. And it’s succeeding.
While the capitalist market is not likely to disappear, it will no longer exclusively define the
economic agenda for civilization. There will still be goods and services whose marginal costs are
high enough to warrant their exchange in markets and sufficient profit to ensure a return on
investment. But in a world in which more things are potentially nearly free, social capital is
going to play a far more significant role than financial capital, and economic life is increasingly
going to take place on a Collaborative Commons.
Recent surveys underscore the broad economic potential of the Sharing Economy. A
comprehensive study found that 62 percent of Gen Xers and Millennials are attracted to the
notion of sharing goods, services, and experiences in Collaborative Commons. These two
generations differ significantly from the baby boomers and World War II generation in favoring
access over ownership. When asked to rank the advantages of a Sharing Economy, respondents
to the survey listed saving money at the top of the list, followed by impact on the environment,
lifestyle flexibility, the practicality of sharing, and easy access to goods and services. As for the
emotional benefits, respondents ranked generosity first, followed by a feeling of being a valued
part of a community, being smart, being more responsible, and being a part of a movement.
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