What is a social cost?

Answer 1

Social costs are those costs of a a product that are considered externalizes. Someone produces a product, and not all the costs are being covered by producer. All of society is paying the social costs. The most common cited example is pollution. They also argue that allowing gambling and drinking causes a reduction in moral standards and/or leads to crime. That smoking tobacco doesn't take into account the effect of health risks, and how unhealthy people cost more sick time away from work plus extra burden on the health care system.

Answer 2

Social cost
Social cost, in economics, is generally defined in opposition to "private cost". In economics, theorists model individual decision-making as measurement of costs and benefits. Rational choice theory often assumes that individuals consider only the costs they themselves bear when making decisions, not the costs that may be borne by others.
In most cases, the costs borne by the individuals involved are the only economically meaningful costs. The choice to purchase a glass of lemonade at a lemonade stand has little consequence for anyone other than the seller or the buyer. The costs involved in this economic activity are the costs of the lemons and the sugar and the water that are ingredients to the lemonade, the opportunity cost of the labor to combine them into lemonade, as well as any transaction costs, such as walking to the stand.
Since these two individuals are involved in the economic transaction and are the only ones involved in the transaction, all the costs and benefits can be said to be "internal" to the economic transaction. In this case, the social cost is the same as the private cost. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_cost

Victor Navasky, Naming Names
(New York: Viking Press, 1980)
"The Social Costs"
The social costs of what came to be called McCarthyism have yet to be computed. By conferring its prestige on the red hunt, the state did more than bring misery to the lives of hundreds of thousands of Communists, former Communists, fellow travelers, and unlucky liberals. It weakened American culture and it weakened itself. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/50s/navasky-social-costs.html



THE ROADS AREN'T FREE: ESTIMATING THE FULL SOCIAL COSTS OF DRIVING AND THE EFFECTS OF ACCURATE PRICING by Clifford W. Cobb Publisher's note -- this is the executive summary of a recently-completed research study. For information on obtaining the full study, see the foot of this page. http://www.progress.org/cobb01.htm

The Social Cost of Sharing (The Social Cost of Sharing. Hal R. Varian. University of California, Berkeley ... Note that there are now no social costs to sharing for http://www2.sims.berkeley.edu/research/conferences/p2pecon/papers/s3-varian.pdf