Thursday, November 9, 2017

Support for Redistribution Shaped by Compassion, Self-Interest, Envy


Investigation referenced by libertarians at Cato so tread carefully (ie not an endorsement). They put the focus on envy (takes only 2) rather than jealousy (takes 3 minimum) as operative in the "rich vs. poor" thing.


The more surprising findings involved envy and fairness. 
Envy, directed toward those better off than you, predicted support for redistribution. 
"When a rival outperforms you in some activity, your relative standing decreases," said Sznycer. "People sometimes act to chip away at their rivals' advantages, even when that also harms third parties or even sometimes themselves." 
Envy and the spite it generates are socially destructive, he noted, but "they can make sense in the context of an ancestral world that included competitive zero-sum games."  
When given two hypothetical policies—lower taxes on the rich resulting in more revenue to help the poor versus higher taxes on the rich but less money for the poor—one in six people preferred the second, more spiteful option. This willingness to hurt the poor to pull down the rich was predicted only by the individual's proneness to envy.

So they are implying that the whole "Bernie!" thing, probably 1 out of 6 are Bernie people (i.e. the tax the rich / screw the poor people)  is driven by envy and thus the Bernie people are using a 2 agent model or view of the world; when it is certainly more than simply a 2 agent system we have; i.e. its possible jealousy could be operating and confused with envy here by these libertarians.




18 comments:

Tom Hickey said...

Envy is the proponents of "socialism" made by proponents of capital standard criticism of the left.

Who conducted the "study" the Über-Libertarian Cato Institute cites?

Human Progress.

From the Human Progress site:

Note: HumanProgress.org is a project of the Cato Institute with major support from the John Templeton Foundation, the Searle Freedom Trust, the Brinson Foundation and the Dian Graves Owen Foundation.

May some bias there?

Tom Hickey said...

First line should read:

Envy is the standard criticism proponents of capital use against the proponents of "socialism." Envy is supposedly the basis of calls for class warfare shouted by the left.

Six said...

All human interactions are shaped by emotions, to some extent.

Tom Hickey said...

All human interactions are shaped by emotions, to some extent.

To a much greater extent than rationalists are willing to recognize.

But this is a gamut of emotions, some positive and some negative, and they strongly influence behavior according to cognitive scientists. Cognitive scientists also report findings that indicate that reason and emotion cannot be disentangled, since they are entangled in brain functioning.

For example, is the objection to wealth and income inequality chiefly the result of envy and jealousy, or fairness and righteousness?

That would depend on one's mindset, which is the result of many factors affecting the opening and closing of neural pathways — from individual disposition (innate, unique) to upbringing and association (acquired, mostly shared).

Matt Franko said...

These libertarians don’t include the policy makers themselves in the analysis...

So there a three agents, 1 the poor 2 the rich and 3 the Policy people themselves some of whom are rich while in the side of the poor ...

So it’s probably not envy...

Matt Franko said...

It would probably be envy if it was straight up rich vs poor...

Tom Hickey said...

It would probably be envy if it was straight up rich vs poor...

Not really. It's not just an economic issue but also a social and political one.

Ordinary people are not stupid. They understand that the people that are rich and powerful are not there because they are smart but because they are lucky, or well-connected, or otherwise privilege.

The issue largely involved privilege instead of just wealth.

People are seeing the great divide in wealth and power as an indication of net-feudalism and the rise of an oligarchy. Many of these people are not on the left but are the Trump-supporing "deplorables" that resent the US increasingly becoming an oligarchy.

Matt Franko said...

You don’t get there digging ditches Tom

Matt Franko said...

Terrel Owens took out $70 million from the NFL and he’s broke

Tom Hickey said...

CNBC
Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos and Warren Buffett have more wealth than half the population of the US combined
Catherine Clifford

Matt Franko said...

They have all been hard at it for a very long time...

Gates has the big software firm, Buffett a 40 year insurance scheme and Bezos has Amazon which is big and get bigger all the time...

Those 3 guys are pretty smart in what they do also... I would not say any of them are dumb in what they do...

The other thing is that they don’t have their wealth in USD accounts they have equity shares of the firms which have a mark to market value in USDs...

What about all the real dopes who win the lotteries every week?

Matt Franko said...

My point here is that the libertarian people twist this into envy and I think it may rather be some form of jealousy....

Matt Franko said...

Because many of the people who take the side of the poor are in fact rich themselves... so they would have no reason to be envious of the rich...

Tom Hickey said...

Gates was known for his ruthlessness. A key aspect of Microsoft's business strategy was destroying competition.

Gates is a ruthless schemer, says his Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen

Bezos owes Amazon's success to exemption from sales tax.

How Tax Avoidance Is a Big Reason For Amazon's Success

Buffett made his money from financial investment, which is a form of saving rather than productive investment. The productive contribution of this is zip. It's was simply good portfolio management. From this standpoint Buffett is a rentier.

Tom Hickey said...

Because many of the people who take the side of the poor are in fact rich themselves... so they would have no reason to be envious of the rich..

Shows it is rather a matter of fairness?

Buffett: "There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning." (Wikiquote)

Matt Franko said...

Well even if it ‘fairness’ it is still not envy...

Matt Franko said...

Tom, rich kid with $150 kicks walks thru poor neighborhood and gets mugged by poor kid who takes the shoes and puts them on, THAT is envy ie only TWO people involved...

Tom Hickey said...

Matt, that's not because of "envy." It's greed based on maxing utility. They want the money and are willing to take a chance to get it. Entrepreneurial spirit. Completely rational (according to Econ 101), since they figure the risk versus the reward and decide the take is likely large enough and the risk of being caught small enough to make it worthwhile.