The past decade has witnessed a rapid expansion of human activity in Earth's orbit, elevating outer space as a domain of growing scientific, economic, and strategic importance. Yet this emerging sector is beset by market failures and regulatory gaps that hinder its growth and long-term viability: ill-defined property rights over extraterrestrial resources, orbital congestion, debris pollution, and the latent risk of weaponing commercial assets. The continued emergence of novel commercial applications is poised to amplify congestion and pollution frictions, bringing environmental concerns to the forefront of space policy analysis. This paper surveys foundational literature on the economics of outer space, highlighting connections to established areas of environmental, resource, and public economics. We argue that timely intervention is essential to unlock the sector’s economic potential and to mitigate conflict among spacefaring actors, and we identify open questions to guide future research in this promising and largely unexplored field.
Bongers et al. (2026) studied this question.