Personal Story: Lola's Second Chance

My sister inspired me when she drove two hours to Miami-Dade to save a dog named Chocolate who was set to be euthanized the same day. She fell in love with Chocolate when she saw a picture posted to a social media page and after hearing that she was going to be killed she sprung into action! It was pretty cheap to adopt her compared to buying a pet from a pet store that can be sold for thousands.

She is the light of our lives and the best dog ever. 

Lola: Corgi-Terrier Mix

Sweet, protective, cuddly, well-trained, obedient, loving!

How to Help

• Be a responsible pet owner!

Get your pets fixed and prevent more animal overpopulation.

• Adopt a pet

Buy from local shelters and pounds. Skip the pet store the buys from breeders and resells for entirely too high margins. 

• Adopt a pet from the kill-list

Go to a shelter that euthanizes animals and adopt an animal that is set to be euthanized the day of! You will feel so ecstatic after adopting that animal having saved their life. 

• Volunteer/Use Your Voice

Educate people on Animal Overpopulation and the ways to help. 

Analysis Questions

1. Examine the possible solutions against your criteria.

Make a statement about how each possible solution either meets or does not meet each of your criteria.

I believe that every solution meets the criteria because they're possible if we all join together and realize the underlying issues of Animal Overpopulation. If we know we are supporting a good cause by adopting from shelters instead of buying an animal from a pet store that helps Animal Overpopulation tremendously.  

2. Choose the best option and explain reasons for choice.

Select your best solution to turn into action. Explain why you made this choice over the other possible solutions. Refer back to the criteria and externalities.

Out of every solution, the most effective would be adopting from shelters instead of pet stores. This would bring shelters so much ease and reassurance of the hard work they do for the stray animals. It's a really tough job to euthanize pets that have been in a shelter for a long time. They don't want to do it but they have to to keep animal overpopulation to a minimum and do their part to keep animals off the streets. Positive externality would be more room in the shelter for an animal to be placed in, and more pets being adopted from the shelters. The only negative externality is possibly having to train your new pet if it has a tough personality and wasn't trained when it was a baby. 

Externalities, both positive, and negative, that could result from each possible solution?

Negative externalities

- Poor sanitation in public areas, poor environment enrichment when there are numerous amounts of strays in communities, places of business, and around busy streets.

- The government has to help cover the expenses of keeping animals in shelters.

- Local Businesses have to take extra time to clean up outside around their business.

- Consumers may complain about the stray animals and the dangerous possibilities of getting bit because of territorial issues.

Positive Externalities

- Less stray animals in the world.

- Less animals in kill shelters where they usually don’t make it out alive.

- Less court cases including people getting bit by a stray animal in a public area.

- More animals have the opportunity to be adopted and the chance of being placed in a permanent home.

Possible Solutions

Solution #1: Change the adoption process, get every animal fixed before putting them up for adoption.
Pros: Saves people time and money.
Cons: Pay more taxes each year to support shelter to carry out this idea.
Solution #2: Law that specifies only licensed breeders can breed their animals and people without a license cannot and must get their animals fixed.
Pros: Would decrease the number of animals being born in homes.
Cons: It would have to be passed by the government to take it into action.
Solution #3: Adopt your pet from a local shelter.
Pros: Save the life of two- your new pet, and one animal on the street will have a new home.
Cons: Your pet might need special training because it's not used to having a permanent home.

Circular Flow Diagram

The Issue Affecting Our Community

Animal Overpopulation is when there are too many animals in the streets and in housing shelters. There are too many stray animals on our roads, in public space (near businesses), and in our neighborhoods. It is ultimately a problem for us and the animals that aren't receiving the care and attention they deserve. This ultimately affects sanitation of public space, when businesses leave out food for the stray animals to survive on. At an economic perspective, we pay the government taxes to go towards fixing the problem. Animal overpopulation can affect local business that are trying to do business and there are lots of stray animals around. It could potentially scare consumers away.