We talked about shading and frontier economies this past week, and it made me reflect on the ways in which business externalize costs, especially in terms of environmental justice. Understanding these two concepts are crucial in recognizing how negative consequences of consumption are often hidden from us. Shading is when businesses focus on short-term benefits of their products or services, while downplaying the long-term environmental and social costs. For example, companies market their products as “eco-friendly” but hide the harmful waste or exploitation in their production and disposal processes. Frontier economies takes this even further by exploiting regions with weaker regulations. Businesses target areas that are often economically disadvantaged because they can extract resources at a very low cost while leaving the environmental burden on the local poor communities. This is very common in industries such as mining, electronics, and textiles. Through shading and operating in frontier economies, companies avoid taking any responsibility for their negative impacts on the environment. Marginalized communities are forced to bear the negatives such as waste disposal and pollution, while the consumers are oblivious to the harm caused by their consumption habits. More consumer awareness will lead to less people buying products from certain companies. However, the consumers are not completely at fault here as we need structural change to ensure that businesses are held accountable for the entire lifecycle of their products.