We never grow up
Adam Ozimek has an interesting post on merit:
The answer is of course that the murkiness Freddie sees exists in all these areas. And yet, should we not praise good behavior? Should we stop praising honesty because, like work ethic of someone who finished med school, we can’t in a rigorous way distinguish when honesty is just a product of how they were brought up?
I would say no, in both cases we should praise the achievements and think of them as such. To me it is simply common sense we should praise honest people. I would say the same applies to those with economic and intellectual achievements, but to folks like Freddie that is not the case. Much like I don’t know how to explain to someone why telling the truth is praiseworthy if they don’t see it, I can’t really explain to Freddie why having a good work ethic or the other characteristics that help make someone economic or academically successful is praiseworthy if he doesn’t see it. I can only draw parallels and ask what the differences are.
But what I do think should be visible to all is that holding aside all of these philosophical difficulties, praising moral behavior and having an economic system that rewards the creation of economic value is instrumentally valuable. A world that praises charitable behavior despite humanity’s widely differing propensities for it means we have more charitable behavior and are all better off, including those without such propensities. And a world that rewards the creation of economic value despite humanity’s widely different propensities for it means we have more economic value and are all better off, including those without such propensities.
In other words, Freddie’s socialist dream is a bad idea even I can’t convince you it’s also immoral.
I think I do know how to explain to someone why telling the truth is praiseworthy, and it isn’t “common sense.”
It’s a mistake to differentiate between how someone was “brought up” and how they are treated as an adult. Being well brought up means being praised when you do good and criticized when you are bad. That process never ends. I’ve been criticized a lot over the past decade, and I’m in my late 50s. The criticism has probably made me a better person, and has certainly changed my behavior in certain respects. When commenters/friends/family criticize me, they help “bring me up.” Ditto for when they praise me. In other words, criticism and praise have instrumental value.
Ozimek is criticizing a post by Freddie deBoer, which ends as follows:
The long-term project of those who decry the role of unearned advantage in human society should not be to try and parse who is most and least privileged. The project should be to deny the salience of “merit” as a moral arbiter of material security and comfort. The very notion of just deserts- the notion that some people have legitimate accomplishments that we must celebrate because they represent “merit,” whatever that is, distinct from their privileges- is what has to die. There is no space where privilege ends and legitimate accomplishment begins. There is, instead, a world of such multivariate complexity that we can never know whose accomplishments are earned and whose aren’t. Instead, we should recognize the folly of tying material security and comfort to our flawed perceptions of other people’s value, and instead institute an economic system based on the absolute right of all people to food, shelter, clothing, health care, and education.
Unlike 99% of libertarians, I agree with much of this paragraph, except for the last half of the last sentence. I wish he had ended his post as follows:
Instead, we should recognize the folly of tying material security and comfort to our flawed perceptions of other people’s value, and instead institute an economic system based on maximizing aggregate utility. That system is called capitalism.
I also slightly disagree with deBoer’s comments on merit. I certainly don’t think we “must celebrate” the success of billionaires, but I do think praise is appropriate for the sort of good behavior that has positive external benefits. It’s worth mentioning in the media that Bill Gates spends his wealth on charity, not 500 foot yachts. Not because Gates needs our praise, or even “merits” it in the common sense meaning of the term. Rather we should praise him because poor kids in Africa need his mosquito nets.
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8. September 2014 at 17:22
Disagree, since it says nothing about the distribution issue and that’s what Freddie is driving at with these types of posts – he’s in favor of a basic income, not really “socialism” per se. “Greater aggregate utility” can still leave large populations in a bad or worse place – see Ireland amidst industrializing 1840s Great Britain in the potato famine.
8. September 2014 at 17:47
I wish he had ended his post as follows:
“Instead, we should recognize the folly of tying material security and comfort to our flawed perceptions of other people’s value, and instead institute an economic system based on maximizing individual property rights, that is, individual economic freedom. That system is called capitalism.”
8. September 2014 at 18:06
Brett, That’s not much of an argument against utilitarianism. Surely if the English had transferred some food to Ireland during the potato famine the aggregate utility would have increased. Isn’t that right?
In any case the post is about merit, not socialism.
8. September 2014 at 18:18
Aggregate utility is a chimera.
If you use force to transfer wealth from some to others, you are reducing the utility of some and increasing the utility of others in the short run, and reducing everyone’s utility in the long run.
8. September 2014 at 19:09
Someone really should write a comprehensive post taking on these two sentences by the WSJ editorial board:
“The problem comes from believing that QE is some magic growth elixir. The world’s Keynesians have convinced themselves that the U.S. is now growing faster than Europe simply because the Federal Reserve implemented QE while Europe hasn’t.”
http://online.wsj.com/articles/the-draghi-default-1409861214
8. September 2014 at 20:01
I think everyone can support “an economic system based on the absolute right of all people to food, shelter, clothing, health care, and education”. But I think deBoer is actually talking about an economic system in which everyone who produces or has things has an absolute obligation to share them.
The argument for redistribution boils down to “just because” (unless you believe in a god who requires it).
8. September 2014 at 20:40
TravisV, it’s like monetarism never existed. Weird.
8. September 2014 at 20:48
Scott, I find these conversations awkward, because determinism is the 800-lb gorilla that is never directly mentioned, and I can’t tell if it just doesn’t occur to people as a possibility or if it is easily dismissed by non-rigorous people on accounta the subjective free will feeling experience.
I remember reading Charles Murray’s Losing Ground back in college. I recall a passage along the lines of “Society needs to hold people responsible for their actions, even if in some metaphysical sense, they are not.” That’s the last time I saw this addressed head-on.
8. September 2014 at 21:49
Wonderful stuff. This is why I read your blog even though I don’t know much Econ. Who else offers the freshness of credible insight? Different from 99%, indeed! Thanks again.
9. September 2014 at 03:23
Despite theoretical disagreement about these issues, you can see in the real world almost everyone shares Prof Sumner’s broad opinion.
Telling the truth is not always praiseworthy, and when somebody is telling it in a way that decreases general utility (by shouting it too loud, or repeating it over and over, or by focusing on something relatively unimportant and aesthetically unpleasant) we don’t usually praise them. Think of your child telling a stranger they have an ugly face.
As for Gates, I’m sure many people inclined to critise him from afar are doing it as an intellectual exercise. If they suddenly became intimate with him, and felt they were speaking to him personally and might be heard, I think most would come around to the idea of coaxing him into giving as much wealth away as possible even if that meant sucking up a little.
But from a thousand miles away, it’s not clear if praising or criticizing Gates is the better option–he might be driven to charity as much to combat negative perceptions as encourage positive. It depends on his personality, and the overall mix of praise and criticism he is receiving.
9. September 2014 at 06:03
TravisV, I have. It will be posted at Econlog later today.
Peter, You said:
“The argument for redistribution boils down to “just because””
Not at all, there are good utilitarian arguments for redistribution.
Brian, As far as I know, determinism does not have any implications for how people should behave. FWIW, I don’t believe in free will.
Thanks Riccardo.
9. September 2014 at 06:08
Scott, as far as I know, determinism doesn’t understand the word “should”.
Thanks for addressing this head-on, even if it were ordained from time immemorial that you would do so, and I’m not saying it was, but maybe.
9. September 2014 at 06:32
Dr Sumner
“institute an economic system based on maximizing aggregate utility.”
Agree with that especially since you seem to recognize there are many ways to measure aggregate utility. (Maximize the peak, maximize the average, maximize the minimum etc.)
Major.Freedom
“maximizing individual property rights, that is, individual economic freedom.”
Agree there is a possibility this is true because it may maximize utility. However, it seems that in practice advocates push too far and enable the over consumption of the “commons” by those with the capital to do it. Society should be able to control externalities by pricing them appropriately without having it “infringe on property rights.”
9. September 2014 at 06:41
‘Not because Gates needs our praise, or even “merits” it in the common sense meaning of the term. Rather we should praise him because poor kids in Africa need his mosquito nets.’
Gates served his fellow man by making computer technology available to those previously denied it. I can’t prove it, but I believe he did much more for even poor kids in Africa, as a businessman, than as a charitable institution.
9. September 2014 at 08:01
Patrick, That might be true.
9. September 2014 at 09:26
I wasn’t sure what Freddie meant, so I read all the way back – Freddie is responding to Phoebe Maltz Bovy who was responding to Rod Dreher who was responding to Ta-Nehisi Coates.
At the end of the day, not only am I not sure what Freddie means exactly, I’m not sure what any of them mean, or whether any of them exactly understood any of the earlier links in the chain.
I think Freddie is saying that good progressives should use the concept of privilege to critique the idea of merit, and thereby to argue that all people should be entitled to a certain minimum livelihood regardless of their endowments or decisions.
I’m not sure that Freddie’s critique as written extends much above this minimum livelihood – maybe he thinks that Bill Gates is fine, since his praise and wealth will encourage future innovators and have produced a wide variety of somewhat adequate software.
If I’ve understood Freddie, then it’s a moral argument to which I don’t have much to contribute, except to note that the higher the minimum guaranteed living standard gets, the more the social costs, and that I think we do want to incent people to work, because it’s mostly good for them compared to the alternatives.
9. September 2014 at 09:29
P.s.: I’m responding to Freddie, not Scott, which you wouldn’t know from the fact that I posted my response in Scott’s comment thread.
I totally agree with “That system is called capitalism.”
9. September 2014 at 10:40
“I remember reading Charles Murray’s Losing Ground back in college. I recall a passage along the lines of “Society needs to hold people responsible for their actions, even if in some metaphysical sense, they are not.” That’s the last time I saw this addressed head-on.”
Hear Hear.
I find the methods used to argue there is no free will, do so by expanding the definition of determinism, where most people simply mean, you have a choice to make and will be judged accordingly.
Definitional debates suck.
9. September 2014 at 11:18
Brian D,
Do you recall what page or chapter of Losing Ground I can find that passage on?
It strikes me as the biggest loser from deBoer’s plan is in fact the most disadvantaged. Despite the short-term emotional and material comfort he offers, the long-term prosperity of the poor depends on a low personal discount rate. This often includes full-time work–often meaning an unpleasant job at first–where he/she can build the experience and skills to get a better job and start a fulfilling career and self-sustaining material life. It also means building strong families which are the best transmitters of social capital.
The biggest winner strikes me as the highly-educated, affluent moral relativists whose personal success brings them guilt and requires flamboyant atonement.
Thanks,
Ryan
9. September 2014 at 13:57
Bill Gates does rent $300M yachts. To be fair, the yacht is only 450 feet and has only one helicopter.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/news/video-1110870/Up-close-300m-super-yacht-Bill-Gates-holidaying.html
9. September 2014 at 14:03
@Ryan,
I’m sorry, it was 30 years ago and I can’t find the book. Somewhere in the second half is the best I can do.
10. September 2014 at 17:58
TallDave, Well then I’ve lost all respect for him. 🙂