Rent Seeking

Trying to capture a larger share of existing wealth rather than creating new wealth.

Rent seeking covers lobbying for a favourable regulation, a protected licence, a tariff or a subsidy — effort spent on redistribution rather than production. The cost to society is not only the transfer itself but the resources consumed fighting over it. The term's economic meaning has nothing to do with renting property.

Lobbying for an exclusive licence is rent seeking: it moves profit around without producing anything new.