Which type of goods are non-excludable and non-rivalrous and often provided for the population, such as national defense?

• A. Private goods
• B. Club goods
• C. Public goods
• D. Toll goods

Answer: (C)

Public goods are non-excludable and non-rivalrous, meaning they are available to everyone and one person’s use doesn’t reduce another’s. This is why national defense fits perfectly: a country’s protection benefits all residents, and guarding one person doesn’t take away security from others. Markets struggle to provide such goods efficiently because people can benefit without paying (the free-rider problem), so governments often supply them for the population.

Other categories don’t match these two features as cleanly. Private goods can be both charged for and used up by one person, so they’re excludable and rivalrous. Club and toll goods involve some form of exclusion, and they can become restricted or crowded, introducing rivalry or withholding access, which means they aren’t purely non-excludable and non-rivalrous like public goods.