August 21, 2024
Wednesday Open Comments
Rob Henderson posts a blast from the past—an entry from three years ago.
Here a snippet:
As I pointed out in the above findings, our relationships are at least as important to life satisfaction as money. Yet our elites are reluctant to promote marriage, friendship, social bonds, neighborliness, etc. The non-material factors that give rise to a rich and fulfilling life.
Somehow we’ve become reluctant to publicly endorse any sort of value that lies outside of economics. Governments pay people to take vaccines. Cities are paying residents not to shoot people.
Leaders have become reluctant to appeal to higher ideals or principles. The belief seems to be that all that matters is economic incentives.
In a 2019 New York Times op-ed, two Nobel laureates share research findings indicating that people overestimate the strength of economic incentives. The authors report that “status, dignity, social connections” are more powerful drivers of behavior.
So why the focus on economic redistribution? Many reasons, some noble. But one is that promoting friendship and marriage doesn’t hurt one’s enemies. Malicious envy is the strongest predictor of support for coercive redistribution. Rich people want to see people richer than themselves suffer. If the richest 90-99th percentile of people discovered that marriage among the poor would inflict pain on the richest 1 percent, then that 9 percent would be the strongest supporters of matrimony.
It’s the sort of stuff I agree with, of course, nicely tied together with the bow on top regarding politics as punishment.
Our politics is so vituperative it’s almost claustrophobic. And when I get my hands on the bastards who caused this, just you wait…
Good morning. It's cooler here today, which is nice, because I have a lot of things to do. The science team had a presentation from a paper products company yesterday. It was really interesting. They gave out t-shirts and tchotchkes. I'm getting the impression that manufacturing companies have to do a lot of goodwill work, because of a public mindset that you "should" be provided with everything you want at a "reasonable" price without consuming any resources or creating any negative externalities.
Rob Henderson's thoughts remind me of some of the discussion about Kevin Williamson's Monday article, and similar recent pieces, in which people were apparently unironically arguing that markets don't work - "price gouging" by "greedy corporations" is occurring - because they, personally, feel that the price of specific consumer products they prefer is too high.
What can one say to an argument that "inequity" in access to Disney vacations is a serious societal issue about which Something Should Be Done, except, "Madam, are you mad?"
As I've mentioned before, I think one of the "solutions" is for people to pin on their Oppositional Defiance badge and say, "No. I refuse to want what you're telling me I'm supposed to want. Stick it in your ear, Disney."
Good morning. There is the possibility of a "record low" in the forecast.
Our daughter is off to a good start at NCSU. But my mother is not doing well and we hope to move her into assisted living Friday. She has agreed to go. She has no appetite and doesn't remember to eat. This in spite of the fact my brothers tempt her with phenomenal cooking. So I am off to buy her some new pajamas to take with her and will go down afterwards.