The age of minorities

[Husar]

Yes actually. It may be a simplification of a very complex dynamic, but it doesn't change the manifestation.
The explication of the power dynamic, and the manipulation needed to get there is at least as old as Huckleberry Finn.

There might be the problem that this is to some extent a biological trait and not just a manipulation.
Of course there is plenty of manipulation to reduce people to these lizard reflexes rather than make them question them using the rest of the grey matter they call a brain.

[HopAlongBunny]

There might be the problem that this is to some extent a biological trait and not just a manipulation.
Of course there is plenty of manipulation to reduce people to these lizard reflexes rather than make them question them using the rest of the grey matter they call a brain.

Nature/Nurture what?

[Husar]

I've finally found a relevant article after I previously didn't know what terms to look for, but here we go:

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan.../op-schermer13

Would you rather earn $50,000 a year while other people make $25,000, or would you rather earn $100,000 a year while other people get $250,000? Assume for the moment that prices of goods and services will stay the same.

Surprisingly -- stunningly, in fact -- research shows that the majority of people select the first option; they would rather make twice as much as others even if that meant earning half as much as they could otherwise have. How irrational is that?

[...]

Human as it sounds, loss aversion appears to be a trait we've inherited genetically because it is found in other primates, such as capuchin monkeys.

[...]

If there are behavioral analogies between humans and other primates, the underlying brain mechanism driving the choice preferences most certainly dates back to a common ancestor more than 10 million years ago. Think about that: Millions of years ago, the psychology of relative social ranking, supply and demand and economic loss aversion evolved in the earliest primate traders.

I recommend reading the entire thing, it's not too long.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I've finally found a relevant article after I previously didn't know what terms to look for, but here we go:

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan.../op-schermer13



I recommend reading the entire thing, it's not too long.

Seen a number of research pieces with this theme. I teach it in principles of conflict management. It is one of the things that exacerbates conflict to no end. because this emotional response tends to make conflict/no conflict decisions even more irrational.

In some ways this is the "best" argument against 'trickle-down' economics. Too many folks simply get angrier that others' lots in life is improving faster than theirs does even if they are experiencing substantial improvement themselves.

[Shaka_Khan]

In the United States, every ethnicity has been a minority for a long time.

[Husar]

Seen a number of research pieces with this theme. I teach it in principles of conflict management. It is one of the things that exacerbates conflict to no end. because this emotional response tends to make conflict/no conflict decisions even more irrational.

In some ways this is the "best" argument against 'trickle-down' economics. Too many folks simply get angrier that others' lots in life is improving faster than theirs does even if they are experiencing substantial improvement themselves.

Yes and no. I agree that it is important and can be irrational. What I'm not sure about it whether it is entirely irrational behavior.
First of all, I would think the root could be in Darwinism. Every organism could be inherently inclined to try and get an edge over others in order to ensure survival of its own line. The kind of affluence we have today hasn't existed nearly long enough to have any affect on this potentially ages-old genetic predisposition, even if it's not in every organism.

And secondly, one could argue that in today's economy, the wealth accumulated at the top is illogical itself according to the principles as taught by the elites themselves. It is practically impossible for one man to actually earn this wealth through his own work. I'm not aware of any one-man company where the owner is a billionaire. The argument that all the workers agreed to work for their wages and so on usually ignores the price elasticity or whatever elasticity else there is. A worker with a family is far less flexible in choosing a place to work than a billionaire investor who chooses where to invest. There is an inherent power imbalance that can explain seemingly bad choices by poor people via game theory (prisoner dilemma).

Basically two people apply for a job, there are four potential outcomes:
1) Both agree, one gets the job - 50% chance to win, lowest wage since the employer can negotiate
2) You agree, other guy declines - you win, get mediocre wage since you can negotiate a little
3) You decline, other guy agrees - you lose, get nothing, live under bridge, other guy gets low wage
4) both decline - the employer needs to offer more money (good wage) to one of them

Now option 4 would be the logical one to take for job applicants, but chances are that both are afraid of scenario 3 and would rather have a scenario 2 for themselves. This makes them most likely to end up in scenario 1.

A billionaire on the other hand does not risk anything by withholding an investment. If a billionaire refuses to give money to a project that does not seem lucrative enough, he does not have to live under a bridge after two months because he has so much padding that he could live just fine until the end of his life.
This obviously makesa trickle up effect of relative wealth far more likely than any trickle down. At best, "trickle down" delays the poverization of the lower levels of society. And due to rising prices aka inflation, it is not even given that the lower levels of society do see an absolute rise in wealth. Maybe in "things" that are bought with debt...
In the 50s it may have been different, but since then a lot has changed. In the 50s the relative income of a CEO was something like 20 times that of the average employee, nowadays it's 100 times that and more (don't have the exact statistic at hand).

Plus, the system of high wealth differences undermines democracy, since money provides more power and influence in the state and in elections, in the US more so than here. In that sense it is also logical to want to reduce wealth inequality, since democracy becomes oligarchy when 1% of the population gets to decide about 90% of the laws.

I could go on but that shall do for now.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Yes and no. I agree that it is important and can be irrational. What I'm not sure about it whether it is entirely irrational behavior.
First of all, I would think the root could be in Darwinism. Every organism could be inherently inclined to try and get an edge over others in order to ensure survival of its own line. The kind of affluence we have today hasn't existed nearly long enough to have any affect on this potentially ages-old genetic predisposition, even if it's not in every organism.

And secondly, one could argue that in today's economy, the wealth accumulated at the top is illogical itself according to the principles as taught by the elites themselves. It is practically impossible for one man to actually earn this wealth through his own work. I'm not aware of any one-man company where the owner is a billionaire. The argument that all the workers agreed to work for their wages and so on usually ignores the price elasticity or whatever elasticity else there is. A worker with a family is far less flexible in choosing a place to work than a billionaire investor who chooses where to invest. There is an inherent power imbalance that can explain seemingly bad choices by poor people via game theory (prisoner dilemma).

Basically two people apply for a job, there are four potential outcomes:
1) Both agree, one gets the job - 50% chance to win, lowest wage since the employer can negotiate
2) You agree, other guy declines - you win, get mediocre wage since you can negotiate a little
3) You decline, other guy agrees - you lose, get nothing, live under bridge, other guy gets low wage
4) both decline - the employer needs to offer more money (good wage) to one of them

Now option 4 would be the logical one to take for job applicants, but chances are that both are afraid of scenario 3 and would rather have a scenario 2 for themselves. This makes them most likely to end up in scenario 1.

A billionaire on the other hand does not risk anything by withholding an investment. If a billionaire refuses to give money to a project that does not seem lucrative enough, he does not have to live under a bridge after two months because he has so much padding that he could live just fine until the end of his life.
This obviously makesa trickle up effect of relative wealth far more likely than any trickle down. At best, "trickle down" delays the poverization of the lower levels of society. And due to rising prices aka inflation, it is not even given that the lower levels of society do see an absolute rise in wealth. Maybe in "things" that are bought with debt...
In the 50s it may have been different, but since then a lot has changed. In the 50s the relative income of a CEO was something like 20 times that of the average employee, nowadays it's 100 times that and more (don't have the exact statistic at hand).

Plus, the system of high wealth differences undermines democracy, since money provides more power and influence in the state and in elections, in the US more so than here. In that sense it is also logical to want to reduce wealth inequality, since democracy becomes oligarchy when 1% of the population gets to decide about 90% of the laws.

I could go on but that shall do for now.

You are over-simplifying the hiring process with this form of prisoner dilemma. I do acknowledge that fear of being unemployed DOES generate poor offer acceptance decisions in a number of instances. Yet the choice is seldom irrevocable. Things can change and the employer who puts one over on the employee now will probably be incurring turnover costs in the near future. The 'market' does have its corrective functions and the dilemma evaluation is too much of a "snapshot" of one moment in an ongoing process.

Nevertheless, you do remind us that inequalities in wealth can generate threats to democratic stability. Venezuela comes to mind. You are right that the "more equal than others" thing always grinds on those who are 'have nots' by that relative measure.


While I acknowledge these limitations to the capitalist and regulated capitalist socioeconomic systems, efforts to generate equality of outcome have fared even worse then efforts to generate equality of opportunity.


I am not sure what is to be done about it until tech and power advances yield a situation where economics is largely moot because production of goods and services is nearly cost free. And that is a goodly ways off despite the dreams of the 3d fabbers and AI whizzes.

[Husar]

You are over-simplifying the hiring process with this form of prisoner dilemma. I do acknowledge that fear of being unemployed DOES generate poor offer acceptance decisions in a number of instances. Yet the choice is seldom irrevocable. Things can change and the employer who puts one over on the employee now will probably be incurring turnover costs in the near future. The 'market' does have its corrective functions and the dilemma evaluation is too much of a "snapshot" of one moment in an ongoing process.

It was a bit simplified, yes, but it's still basically in effect in quite a lot of branches. Obviously less qualified labor is more affected than specialists. There are companies that fire employees here and then re-hire them through time-sharing comapnies that pay the same employees significantly less. And it works. The turnover costs hardly seem to be an inhibitor. They don't seem very high and they're one-time costs vs long-term savings in wages.
Of course single companies can get problems if they go way further than the rest of their branch, as happened here to Schlecker. There are still plenty of branches where this works, harvest is one of them. They re-hire people every season anyway and the re-hired people have to teach the newbies (plus it's a simple task), so turnover costs are not a concern for them.

The way the market might solve this is automation. Once even the cheapest labor cannot compete with machines anymore, they will just pile up on the unemployment pool. And unless our unhealthy food is a Machiavellian first step to thin the herd more quickly, once the unemployment pool gets really large, these people will need to get money for doing nothing or might revolt.

Nevertheless, you do remind us that inequalities in wealth can generate threats to democratic stability. Venezuela comes to mind. You are right that the "more equal than others" thing always grinds on those who are 'have nots' by that relative measure.


While I acknowledge these limitations to the capitalist and regulated capitalist socioeconomic systems, efforts to generate equality of outcome have fared even worse then efforts to generate equality of opportunity.


I am not sure what is to be done about it until tech and power advances yield a situation where economics is largely moot because production of goods and services is nearly cost free. And that is a goodly ways off despite the dreams of the 3d fabbers and AI whizzes.

I don't think equality of outcome is the solution. I'm thinking more in terms of maximum and minimum caps of sorts.
The lower cap would basically mean all the basic needs are provided for, including a bit for entertainment.
The upper cap would basically mean you won life, but don't get greedy now. One may argue that this would stifle growth, but on that one I'm not so sure, since:
a) many people are driven by more than money, there is also purpose, morality, etc.
b) as long as we can't leave the planet, endless growth is the road to hell anyway.

Now where exactly those caps should be would be a topic for fierce public debate. Too far and it would be indistinguishable from the current situation, too close and all incentive is lost. Of course this would also have to be done taking into account that automatization may soon make a whole lot of jobs superfluous. Perhaps not just the lower ones, e.g. an AI might make more rational business decisions than a human CEO etc....
One potential problem then is that rich people won't really need the poor anymore to produce anything...including weapon systems, food, etc. And that they're perfectly willing to ignore any suffering can be exemplified best by walls for example...
https://theconversation.com/limas-wa...nto-peru-53356

As for AI being way off, see e.g. this video: https://youtu.be/92tn67YDXg0?t=242
Might be closer than we'd like to think. It's not the most complicated game I guess, but entirely self-taught and not very simple either! Consider the free movement, various other actors and lots and lots of potential actions to perform.

So before the world is entirely controlled by rich folks with flexible moral codes who don't need the rest anymore, perhaps we should make sure that the AI won't kill us all. Wait, that's not what I wanted to wri....the comp.....no!....stop!.......

[Montmorency]

Seen a number of research pieces with this theme. I teach it in principles of conflict management. It is one of the things that exacerbates conflict to no end. because this emotional response tends to make conflict/no conflict decisions even more irrational.

In some ways this is the "best" argument against 'trickle-down' economics. Too many folks simply get angrier that others' lots in life is improving faster than theirs does even if they are experiencing substantial improvement themselves.

Importantly, it's not just that people get angry at "someone" (i.e. anyone) improving their lot faster than themselves; depending on who you are, specific groups receive the brunt of the resentment.

Yes and no. I agree that it is important and can be irrational. What I'm not sure about it whether it is entirely irrational behavior.
First of all, I would think the root could be in Darwinism. Every organism could be inherently inclined to try and get an edge over others in order to ensure survival of its own line. The kind of affluence we have today hasn't existed nearly long enough to have any affect on this potentially ages-old genetic predisposition, even if it's not in every organism.

...

In some sense it may be immoral to maintain disproportionate wealth, separate or not from how wealth is obtained or accumulated. But from there things get tricky: is any billionaire acting immorally if they are not investing their whole wealth into undermining the wealth and power of all other billionaires and their economic system? From an absolutist perspective a wealthy individual giving half their net worth to charity may not be much better than a rapacious individual pillaging small countries and installing dictatorships.

If you end our current framework of money and exchange, then the nature of distribution and wealth also changes, so perhaps there is no longer money to regulate but there's still pure interpersonal power and influence to account for.

Anyway, referencing the "Robot Ibn Saud" thread:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Also consider the following regarding AI:

I see this thought experiment is a bad one for "AI", but if you look at it differently it it's just another way of describing our reality of perpetual-growth capitalism. You just have to make the connection to the capitalist maxim of "maximizing revenue":