September 9, 2006
From the desk of Jane Galt:Why, oh why can't we have a better left-wing blogging corps?
I wish people wouldn't accuse me of misreading them by . . . misreading me.
Am I accusing Brad DeLong et al of wanting to throw acid in Cindy Crawford's face?
Obviously not. If I thought that they actually wanted to throw acid in Cindy Crawford's face, then the metaphor wouldn't work, would it? I'd be saying: "If you like pie, why don't you also like tarts?"
The point is, that if you are saying that we should tax wealth because much of the possessor's enjoyment stems from the fact that it is a positional good, why don't you also want to "tax" beauty? Because if you don't, that means that you don't really care that much about positionality--or that you think that beauty is in some way special, more sacred or worthy, than wealth.
If you are willing to reduce positionality, then you should be willing to reduce positionality wherever it rears its ugly head. If you don't want to throw acid in Cindy Crawford's face, make everyone wear a bag over their head. Otherwise . . . what's so special about money? Except that some of it might actually be earned rather than bestowed by accident of nature?
Sigh. I was really hoping I would get a better answer to that question than "that's ridiculous!" Apparently I'm the only person on the web who cares about non-monetary endowments.
Posted by Jane Galt at September 9, 2006 7:59 PM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links"); ?>Apparently I'm the only person on the web who cares about non-monetary endowments.
You've never been on Match.com, have you?
No, you're just the only person on the web who can tolerate your own pedantic gibberish.
Posted by: scarshapedstar on September 9, 2006 8:57 PMYou must remember that most of those lefty professors spend their time (i) with their peers at the faculty club, where even the most banal observations are considered brilliant if they support B.D.S. and/or (ii) with suck-up students, who treat every observation as brilliant, before they get their diplomas and head off to Wall Street to skew the income distribution and sneer at the idiotic lib/lab professors who gave them A's (beieve me, I know). Thus, most professors have almost no experience with someone who disagrees with them and who can't be bullied, and don't respond very intelligently. (As various people have noted, Prof. DeLong has a comments section, but he responds to critical comments by deleting them and banning comments from the IP address in question.)
Posted by: y81 on September 9, 2006 8:59 PMBrad DeLong has had a tough week. He also made the credibility-shattering statement that "Nobody who is an immigrant or descendant of immigrants has any business voting Republican. Nobody". Take a moment to think about how silly that is on how many levels.
Posted by: tood on September 9, 2006 9:11 PMI have to admit, I misread you, too. I thought you said 'throw acid in Cindy Sheehan's face' and all I could think of was, 'How could you tell...'
Posted by: Mister Snitch! on September 9, 2006 9:14 PMMy grandparents came to this country because it was understood to be the land of opportunity, a place where they could make something of themselves. The way I see things now, the Republicans are far more nearly the party of opportunity.
Posted by: triticale on September 9, 2006 9:18 PMI have got to visit better economics blogs, I think. I have long wondered why beauty, intelligence, education, accent, and a dozen other things are not considered "wealth" in some sense, and only a single type of wealth is taxed, or is even considered "real wealth.". Now I learn that economists have names for these concepts, which would have made several recent discussions of mine much easier.
As I noticed on the Futurist's blog, BTW, DLong was being tongue-in-cheek - he just wasn't doing it very well.
Posted by: Assistant Village Idiot on September 9, 2006 9:22 PMTake a moment to think about how silly that is on how many levels.
Yeah, all the immigrants I know are Republicans or libertarians. Democratic policies are aimed at keeping immigrants poor and on the public tit, which isn't why any of people I know moved here. They want to earn lots of money and keep it.
Anyway, it is a damned shame that none of the leftie bloggers seem willing to step up and debate the issues surrounding natural nonmonetary positionality. That's actually the single biggest hole in libertarian philosophy, after all -- the fact that everyone *isn't* created equal and isn't necessarily capable of the same achievements as everyone else, even if given every opportunity to achieve them. You'd think lefties would be more willing to address those sorts of issues.
Posted by: Dan on September 9, 2006 9:25 PMThose who want to tax "positional" advantanges should be daily forced to read Kurt Vonnegut's Harrison Bergeron.
Posted by: Cato the Censor on September 9, 2006 9:25 PMThis is deliberate misreading of what you wrote. Those on the left (and unfortunately some on the right too) do it all the time. The following came up in The Corner.
Example:
Point: Illegal immigrants are just trying to improve their lives.
Counterpoint: So what? So are bank robbers.
Counter-counter point: Now you're saying illegal immigrants are the same as bank robbers!
Of course, the counterpoint did not say that illegal immigrants were the same as bank robbers. The point is simply that if wanting to improve your life is sufficient justification for doing something, then bank robberies would be justified too. But everyone knows this. The "now you're saying ..." is just a cheap shot.
Posted by: chris on September 9, 2006 9:35 PMBeauty is not a currency that effectuates the exchange of the excess value of labor that has been coopted by the ruling class. Beauty isn't real but Dollars are.
Posted by: Terry on September 9, 2006 9:40 PMMy first mate has a couple of really nice non-monetary assets that are definitely positional. Their current position is excellent.
So the question is: should Pam Anderson be taxed according to this year's state of her non-monetary assets or would a five year running average be better? Are natural's worth more? etc.
Money is easier because you can count it.
Posted by: M. Simon on September 9, 2006 9:46 PMThe difference between bank robbers and illegal immigrants is simple.
Nobody offers bank robbers money.
Posted by: M. Simon on September 9, 2006 9:49 PMLook, DeLong's observation was not rocket science. It is very frequent in revisionist utilitarianism to argue that some gains in utility should not even be accounted for. The classic example is making people fight lions in the Colosseum; many people who think seriously about normativity hold that enjoyment derived from watching people be thrown into pits full of lions *should not even be counted* (as opposed to a more cold-blooded view where you just try to figure out whether the pain of being torn apart is outweighed by the amusement of the spectators). DeLong's original point was *very* similar to this; policy makers need to make choices that effectively translate into income distribution, and gains due to positional goods *should not even be counted*. Not as clearcut as lions and Christians, perhaps, but pretty standard. Note that policy makers face no choices about whose faces to splash with acid, or about how to distribute beauty.
Side note. In the following exchange, B has accused A of wanting to X:
A: I think we ought to do Y.
B: If you think we ought to do Y, then wanting to do X is logically entailed.
For you to express shock that someone would then portray you as "the crazy person who thinks that wanting to not give weight to the positional gains of the rich is the same as wanting to make pretty people more ugly" is disingenuous. (In fact, I feel that there must be a latin name for this trick.)
Posted by: anon on September 9, 2006 9:51 PMApparently I'm the only person on the web who cares about non-monetary endowments.
I am becoming accustomed to the notion that I will *always* love Jane G.
Posted by: Tom Maguire on September 9, 2006 9:56 PMThe Left Wing hasn't really got an option, J.G. They are forced to go to cultural war with the blogging corps they've got. Perhaps if they had committed more troops early on...
Posted by: Dick Eagleson on September 9, 2006 10:06 PMSoooo, only American Indians have any business voting Republican? That would certainly come as a surprise to nearly every one of them that I know (and I know a couple of hundred).
Posted by: Letalis on September 9, 2006 10:06 PMCato's right, so for anyone interested, here's a link to Harrison Bergeron. It was written in 1961, before Vonnagut went nuts.
Posted by: G. Hamid on September 9, 2006 10:10 PMSide note. In the following exchange, B has accused A of wanting to X:
A: I think we ought to do Y.
B: If you think we ought to do Y, then wanting to do X is logically entailed.
Not what's happening here. Try instead:
A: I think we ought to do Y for reason Z.
B: Reason Z also implies we ought to do X. Surely you don't want to do X!
Terry said "Beauty isn't real but Dollars are."
You've never been to the Spearmint Rhino in Vegas, Buddy.
I think one difference between money power and beauty power is that money can be used to gain influence to acquire more money. As a liberal (but speaking for myself) I am bothered more by how the money is used rather than the amount possessed. Also, rich people don't create all that wealth themselves. They benefit from living in a society in which they can flourish and have some obligation to repay what they can. I can't see how this would apply to the physically attractive.
Posted by: Jeremy Wight on September 9, 2006 10:21 PMNobody offers bank robbers money.
I'll bite. How do the physical bits of paper move from the possession of the bank to the possession of the robber?
Seems like a case of comparative advantage to me.
Posted by: fishbane on September 9, 2006 10:23 PMBecause if you don't, that means that you don't really care that much about positionality--or that you think that beauty is in some way special, more sacred or worthy, than wealth.
Beauty is special because it is not only subjective, but by any one person's standard it is completely non-quantifiable. What is 10% of Cindy Crawford's beauty? It is much easier to compute 10% of $1.
Studies have shown that perceived beauty is roughly proportional to the "average face" of the viewer (the average of the faces that the viewer sees on a daily basis), but this is as difficult to compute as the below. What picture do you use? What collection of pictures do you use to find the average? People are simply too ugly to devise a cost-effective tax scheme. Taxing elective plastic surgeries, models or photoshopish software would make for decent indirect ways of taxing beauty, but our primary means of taxing income is not indirect.
A more entertaining counterexample would be taxing incidences of happiness. Since we could measure amounts of the chemicals that affect pleasure receptors (relative to the size of the part of the brain that controls the pleasure) in a reasonable way. Not to mention that the quality of governance is largely independent of beauty but a well run state provides more happiness per person on average than a poorly run state. We could do away with alcohol/cigarette taxes while simultaneously taxing illegal drugs, nymphomania (conservative definition: any sex and masturbation), high school graduations, birthdays, candy and your baby's first steps.
Posted by: Vivian Darkbloom on September 9, 2006 10:24 PMBrad DeLong has deleted at least three of my immigration-related comments; details at the link. Perhaps it's because of all those bad things I said about the idiotic OpenLetter on Immigration he signed.
And, like the Futurist (link above), I also defended to a certain extent the Laffey ad. But, that's because I'm familiar with the MC cards mentioned in the ad, and I realize just how dangerous they are.
DeLong might have a PhD in economics, but when it comes to understanding everything involved in immigration he's a complete lightweight.
Posted by: AllBradDelongAllTheTime on September 9, 2006 10:24 PMBrad DeLong has deleted at least three of my immigration-related comments; details at the link. Perhaps it's because of all those bad things I said about the idiotic OpenLetter on Immigration he signed (link at the link).
And, like the Futurist (link above), I also defended to a certain extent the Laffey ad. But, that's because I'm familiar with the MC cards mentioned in the ad, and I realize just how dangerous they are.
DeLong might have a PhD in economics, but when it comes to understanding everything involved in immigration he's a complete lightweight.
Posted by: AllBradDelongAllTheTime! on September 9, 2006 10:40 PMWealth is easy to tax, because we can use money as a go-between. If you have a fancy house on fancy land, based on property taxes you owe cash - tearing down a room of your house or digging up a truckload of dirt isn't acceptable payment. If you get a paycheck, you can give a portion directly to pay your income tax. If you're making a purchase (exchanging money for a good or service), then the seller can collect extra money to pay the sales tax or VAT.
Once the government has the money collected in manners like this, it can use the money directly to buy goods, pay for services, pay the wages of civil servants, or give the money to those on the dole.
Suppose we could accurately measure beauty, or athletic ability, or intelligence. How could we remove this from one who posseses it in a way that would be useful for the government?
Taxing beauty is a silly idea because removing it from one person can't directly benefit anyone else. Beauty isn't particularly liquid or fungible, unlike goods or cash.
Posted by: Kelly on September 9, 2006 10:50 PMBeauty is special because it is not only subjective, but by any one person's standard it is completely non-quantifiable.
Not so. Studies have found that the universal quantifier of beauty seems to be facial symmetry. Broad-faced or fine-featured, white or black, fat or thin, whatever your ethnic and cultural norms are -- if it's symmetric, it's more likely to be considered attractive.
It would actually be quite easy to quantify that and maybe declare a few median BMI ratios, then tax on a per standard deviation basis.
Posted by: anony-mouse on September 9, 2006 10:53 PMBeauty isn't particularly liquid or fungible
...however, it can be used to generate income just like many other body characteristics and talents, which are also not distributed equitably and often account for the income disparities we are evidently obliged to 'solve'.
Posted by: anony-mouse on September 9, 2006 10:55 PMBeauty isn't real but Dollars are.
Yet somehow, men still get chubbers when presented with female beauty, particularly if it's unadorned with clothing. Utility is gotten from numerous places, beauty included.
Posted by: Robert Prather on September 9, 2006 11:03 PMBeing an early adopter, I gave up on DeLong years ago.
Posted by: Mark on September 9, 2006 11:22 PMJane is frustrated that she is not getting better answers to her argument. Let me suggest two reasons:
1) The beauty tax concept is completely impractical. The concept is subjective, and even if it were not, implementation would be impossibly complicated. Because there is no practical side to your proposal, it is hard for people to get interested it. Proposing a tax on height might be a better means of stimulating discussion.
2) Your metaphor is extremely poor. The acid story would be a good metaphor for someone proposing taking the wealthy and making them the poorest people in the world by destroying (not transfering) their assets. If you wanted a beauty metaphor, you could have talked about confiscating Cindy Crawford's cosmetics and giving them to ugly people. Instead you chose a poor metaphor, seemingly selected for its inflamatory nature. When you do so, you will probably receive less serious responses.
Note that none of the ideas above are original to me. I got them from reading other comments on your own site. So I also disagree with your view that you have received any substantive criticism.
Tom
Posted by: Tom G. on September 9, 2006 11:25 PM"Apparently I'm the only person on the web who cares about non-monetary endowments."
Do you care about them, other than as a debating point?
What conclusions have you come to on them?
Tom
Posted by: Tom G. on September 9, 2006 11:27 PMIf you are willing to reduce positionality, then you should be willing to reduce positionality wherever it rears its ugly head.
Why? I don't see that it's obviously inconsistant to prefer wealth equality over beauty equality. Particularly since one can be achieved with redistributive economic policy and the other only with disfigurement.
The great thing about money (it's raison d'etre, in fact) is that it's easily measured and transfered to other people, and it's the measure that we use to set values on all of the other stuff that's not so easily measured.
Like, for instance, beauty. In fact, one could say that the value of Cindy Crawford's wealth from her modeling and associated enterprises is the value which society assigns to her attractiveness. By taking some of that money and giving it to ugly people, we may not be able to make them pretty, but we can compensate for their unfortunate draw in the genetic lottery.
Which isn't to say that it's a good idea. In fact, I think it's a terrible one. But even so, it's a bit rich to ask "what's so special about money?"
Posted by: TWAndrews on September 9, 2006 11:30 PMParticularly since one can be achieved with redistributive economic policy and the other only with disfigurement.
How different are those, really?
In any case, beauty is actually taxed indirectly (in most cases), when it produces income for everyone from actors to models to porn stars to hookers.
Posted by: TallDave on September 10, 2006 12:04 AMCan beauty be taxed with the same ease as wealth? No. Jane never argued that it could nor has she argued that beauty should be taxed. Instead, she was responding to DeLong's argument that wealth should be taxed because the wealthy enjoy lording their wealth over the poor. That is, DeLong argued that wealth should be taxed even if the tax did not improve the poor's lot. The tax was useful, according to DeLong, because it served to punish the wealthy for being spiteful of the poor. Jane was responding only to this argument.
Her comparison of wealth and beauty is apt. Both the wealthy and the beautiful are often thought to look down on those who are less well endowed. If it's wrong for the wealthy to be spiteful of the poor, it's also wrong for the lovely to be spiteful of the ugly. If you are willing to take away wealth only for the purpose of punishing spite, why not take away beauty for the same reason? That's her argument. Pointing out that wealth and beauty are different (one's easier to tax, or one might be more likely to have been obtained through illicit means, etc.) have nothing to do with the argument. DeLong wants to tax wealthy because they spite the poor. The beautiful spite the ugly. If we should try to reduce the first inequity, why not the second?
Besides, unless you've never been to jr. high school, you know that beauty can bestow power, influence, and position in ways that are far more effective than mere wealth. If we are going to use governmental authority to get even with groups we dislike (which is the sum total of DeLong's argument), I'd much rather go after those kids who made jr. high miserable for the rest of us. The rich never did anything to me. But I can remember the beautiful going out of their way to make it clear that my kind were unwelcome. (I don't think this would be good policy. I'm fairly confident I made others in jr. high uncomfortable and unwelcome, too.)
Posted by: David Walser on September 10, 2006 12:19 AMmaybe because some people actually care about equal opportunity and progressive economic redistribution and other people believe in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.
Posted by: mike on September 10, 2006 12:44 AMHer comparison of wealth and beauty is apt.
Her comparison is between a wealth tax and a beauty tax.
DeLong wants to tax wealthy because they spite the poor. The beautiful spite the ugly. If we should try to reduce the first inequity, why not the second?
Because you can't. Her argument is only logical if she is comparing something that exists with something that exists.
Posted by: Jangle At on September 10, 2006 12:59 AM"maybe because some people actually care about equal opportunity and progressive economic redistribution and other people believe in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer."
True. To a point.
The rich get richer because they do things to succeed: Get an education. Invest for retirement. Work longer hours, etc.
The poor get poorer because they do things to keep them poor: Have children out of wedlock they can't afford, drop out of school, commit crime.
So you drop out of school, start smoking crack, and start committing crimes..and now you want MY hard-earned money in income redistribution cause you're poor?
I'm sorry, but i don't think so, fool.
Posted by: virtbob on September 10, 2006 1:05 AM"we should try to reduce the first inequity, why not the second?"
Because you can't
Don't be silly -- of course you can. Reducing the number of physically beautiful people in the world is much easier than reducing the number of rich people is.
Posted by: Dan on September 10, 2006 1:13 AMHer comparison is between a wealth tax and a beauty tax.
Its quite clear that she is comparing the unequal distribution of wealth and beauty - she doesn't even mention a beauty tax beyond making a point.
The original poster had it quite correct.
Posted by: Chris on September 10, 2006 1:19 AMReducing the number of physically beautiful people in the world is much easier than reducing the number of rich people is.
How do you propose to do this in proportional and ethical manner?
Posted by: Jangle At on September 10, 2006 1:37 AM"Beauty is not a currency that effectuates the exchange of the excess value of labor that has been coopted by the ruling class. Beauty isn't real but Dollars are." --Terry
Terry, I believe the argument was WEALTH not just DOLLARS per se. I assume you know the difference.
Posted by: rocker419 on September 10, 2006 1:43 AMA few posts ago, someone mentioned the rich get richer because they do things to succeed, like education... I think this concept is hugely overrated. In fact, one reason that liberal professorial types like Brad Delong are often in favor of taxation and income redistribution is that they have tons of education, but little money to show for it, and are bitter. Since many of them were brought up in homes that (incorrectly) drummed into them that book smarts and advanced degrees will inevitably lead to wealth, they look around themselves at some point, and realizing that their brother-in-law's hardware store generates 10 times the income they they make, say "how unfair!" To be blunt, I am talking about myself a lot here. I begrudge true visionaries like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, and Sam Walton their wealth not at all (because they are clearly bright and hard-working), but it is much more painful to realize the number of people out there with IQs of 105 who are in the top 2% of the income bracket because they are very entrepreneurial and good with people. I can see how this sounds very snobbish to some, but the values that your parents poured into you with all their heart and soul go down hard when they come up against reality. This may sound loony and naive, but I have come to believe that perhaps a better way to equalize "equality of opportunity" is that schools and vocational counselors should speak much more bluntly, honestly, and often with kids/young adults about how much money you will make in various career paths, and what personal characteristics (like extrovertedness) correlate with future income, and the very real ways in which money makes life easier and more enjoyable. Instead, such topics are treated as taboo, which causes profound differences in the advice that some young people get about such matters starting off their lives.
Posted by: Patrick on September 10, 2006 2:18 AMAre you familiar with the children's book, "Rainbow Fish"?
It is supposedly a charming about sharing and has become a modern classic. In truth it is a beautifully illustrated metaphor for this precise argument.
The beautiful vain fish must give away all of its sparkly scales to make the jealous townsfish like him again. Once they are all equally beautiful they live happily ever after.
It's horrid, really. I refused to read it to my children. Perhaps it would be put to better use at a university level.
"I was really hoping I would get a better answer to that question than "that's ridiculous!" Apparently I'm the only person on the web who cares about non-monetary endowments."
Okay, let’s have a serious discussion. If you are dumb and ugly, who is to blame?
I think you should blame your parents. In an age of DNA-testing, prenatal diagnosis, external fertilisation and cloning your parents have done a bad job. In the near future, if your daughter doesn’t look like Cindy Crawford, then maybe because you choose not to clone Cindy. The more options we get, the more trickier the moral and legal problems. Think of a pregnant mother who is sticking needles in her womb (ouch!) not to abort it just to make her child worse of. That’s something we would all condemn and punish by law. So why shouldn’t we punish parents who intentionally give birth to a low-IQ or ugly baby? Parents have the choice to get better eggs and sperm! (BTW, isn't the wish to have a child that is akin to yourself just racism?:-)
Since the child is a self-owner and parents are like escrow agents, they have no right to damage it and should be held responsible for any kind of negligence.
If we would enact laws which really protect the interests of the child, we could solve the problem at the base. Now, am I serious?
Jane,
I wouldn't worry much about DeLong's irrational cohorts. He bans all disagreement at his site so that they can have a comfortable place to retreat to after trying out their shrill nonsense at more civilized sites such as this.
Posted by: Randy on September 10, 2006 5:41 AMOf all the comments above, I think Patrick's is best. And as to DeLong deleting comments, if any blogger deletes my comment, I simply never go there again.
Posted by: F. Fain on September 10, 2006 6:20 AMThe evil of Envy is this: a desire for "equality through destruction."
DeLong's desire to punish the rich through taxes is the same kind of destructive envy that Bolsheviks had in their desire to destroy the rich houses of the upper class, the same envy many Nazis had of Jews, the same envy Palestinians have of Israelis which they showed in destroying the greenhouses of Gaza -- instead of using them to produce wealth.
In this desire to destroy, envy of money has had many rationalizations, but envy of the beautiful not so much (Snow White's "evil" step-mother wanting to destroy her beauty is a myth against envy of the young lovelies.)
Before coming to Slovakia 15 years ago, I discussed the differences between Russian Dreams and American Dreams, with similar farmers who live next to a neighbor owning a prize cow.
The American Dream is to get a BETTER cow.
The Russian Dream is that the neighbor's COW DIES.
DeLong is a "Russian Dreamer," wanting the destruction of the wealth of his neighbor.
I liked Patrick's comment too; but y81 had an even more important point:
"(ii) with suck-up students, who treat every observation as brilliant, before they get their diplomas and head off to Wall Street to skew the income distribution and sneer at the idiotic lib/lab professors who gave them A's (beieve me, I know)."
Many such suck-up students, had they been born in Russia, would have become commies in order to be successful. In the 89-92 transitions, they'd become company owners/ entrepreneurs -- to be successful. If it was necessary, or useful, to bribe politicians, avoid paying taxes, commit fraud, betray business partners, kill owners of rival banks (7 or 8 were murdered) -- many successful rich folk are willing to do whatever it takes to become successful.
[Capitalism works best because such suck-ups must compete with profitable bottom lines, and most often (not always) the most profit creating folk get promotions. The most successful suck-ups learn how to make their divisions profitable.]
Most wealth throughout the world is controlled by wealthy folk who DID NOT earn it through only honest, peaceful means.
I think the reality of this injustice is the biggest Libertarian problem.
While the destructive envy that DeLong explicitly advocates (punish the rich even if it doesn't help the poor) is the bigger problem, many who aren't so envious yet do hate the injustice will support mild punishment/ taxes on all the rich, in order to at least punish the guilty rich some, even if the innocent rich are also punished.
The justice system has two errors: let guilty wrongly go free, let innocent wrongly be punished. Taxing/ punishing the rich avoids letting the {unprovably} guilty rich avoid all justice, at the cost of higher taxes on the innocent.
Posted by: Tom Grey - Liberty Dad on September 10, 2006 7:16 AMI think beauty is taxed already. As a commenter pointed out,go to a club in Vegas,or a bar,for that matter,and watch how often a pretty,let alone beautiful, woman is approached by guys she wants nothing whatever to do with.That unwanted attention,which arises from her "positional" advantage,fills the characteristics of a tax by being undesired and a diminishment of the time she has to focus her talents where she wishes.
Posted by: TJM on September 10, 2006 7:17 AMWhat about forcing all women to wear a full body covering, let's call it a "burqa" and not allow them to associate with men and force all men to wear long beards and not associate with women except their own family and then only in the home. Wouldn't that be more effective than throwing acid in Cindy Crawford's face? It would explain why the left-wing is so tolerant of radical Islam.
Posted by: DeliLama on September 10, 2006 7:20 AMWith respect to non-monetary endowments, apparently you can't even discuss those on DeLong's site. Here was my comment to that effect that got nuked. It seemed both directly on topic and non-inflammatory, but perhaps it hit a nerve?
----------------
Exclusive? As in Harvard and Yale...and UC Berkeley? How much of the appeal of such institutions has to do with the fact that one won't be mingling with the 'the greasy, hairy polloi'? Sure, a few students may be from families with modest incomes (though most are not) but none will be of ordinary intelligence.
Obviously, the status differences between universities is a big deal (witness the US News rankings phenomenon). Surely it leads to feelings of superiority and spite among the elect who attend (and teach) at high-ranked institutions and feelings of inferiority and envy among those who don't measure up. And these feelings don't end when the 'conspicuous consumption of education' is finished after a few years but rather tend to form the basis of lifelong feelings of superiority/spite or inferiority/envy.
And we could abolish the exclusivity and inequality in higher education (at least among public institutions) quite simply by replacing the high-stakes competitive admissions with a lottery. Sound far-fetched? It isn't -- Malcolm Gladwell describes a process almost exactly like that when he applied to universities in Ontario:
http://www.newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/articles/051010crat_atlarge
Why worry about income generated spite and envy when there are other forms that are more powerful and more readily addressed? Would DeLong support a lottery for admissions to all California universities to eliminate the status inequality and the long-lasting spite and envy that result?
Chris writes (and others have similar arguments:
"Its quite clear that she is comparing the unequal distribution of wealth and beauty - she doesn't even mention a beauty tax beyond making a point."
Jane is asking why people are not engaging her in this dicussion. One answer is that we have no practical idea of what to do beauty inequality. Neither Jane nor any of her defenders here has provided even the most rudimentary sketch of a practical plan. Observations that there are some objective indicators that correlate with beauty hardly qualify.
A second answer is that the phrase "beauty tax" might cover non-monetary actions (e.g. acid) to rectify the inequality - in which the concept goes to the heart of her postings.
Tom
Posted by: Tom G. on September 10, 2006 8:29 AMTom Grey,
Excellent post. But the biggest problem with punishing the rich is that actions taken to do so punish the working class more than the rich.
Posted by: Randy on September 10, 2006 8:36 AMBeauty is not a currency that effectuates the exchange of the excess value of labor that has been coopted by the ruling class.
I think one difference between money power and beauty power is that money can be used to gain influence to acquire more money.
Trophy wives weep and the nightclubs of Manhattan empty as aspiring supermodels return to Eastern Europe. Brad and Angeline abandon their posts as Hollywood Heavyweights and commence to clerk at Abercrombie (which rethinks its policy of only hiring hot salespeople).
Patrick --
. . . "book smarts and advanced degrees will inevitably lead to wealth . . ."? If this is actually the advice you got, it was indeed misguided. The advice I got was, "Book smarts and advanced degrees will maximize *your* wealth potential," which in my case was perfectly sound as I've always been rather a geek. In any case, since you apparently have an IQ considerably above 105, I have to ask: at what age did you first observe that America is a land of opportunity for the hard-working, the pretty, the personable, the lucky, and the merely clever as well as for the highly educated? If you didn't figure that out until you were already in grad school, I think the advice to paper yourself with advanced degrees was probably sound in your case as well.
Nonetheless, I fully agree with your main point that speaking frankly to junior high kids about what they can do to maximize their wealth (assuming that's their goal) would be highly desirable. There's no substitute for the establishment of realistic goals at an early age, as my own misadventures in academia will attest.
And I also agree with your point that academics tend to think that if society were rational and just, then wealth and power would correlate much more strongly with intelligence and education than they do. The outrage they must suffer upon observing the circumstances of a Sam Walton has a lot of explanatory power.
Posted by: Another Patrick on September 10, 2006 10:16 AM«DeLong is a "Russian Dreamer," wanting the destruction of the wealth of his neighbor.»
And I think that this is a thoroughly dishonest paraphrase of what DeLong's position is, because he has stated precisely the opposite many times.
His argument (as I understand it) is that (some of) the rich make themselves happier by making those poorer than themselves feel unhappier by flaunting their wealth to them.
If this is his argument, than the rich don't want to merely destroy the happiness of their poorer neighbours, just, as he writes, transfer a chunk of it to themselves.
DeLong does not ascribe sadistic attitudes to the rich, merely rapacious ones.
His argument (as I understand it) is that (some of) the rich make themselves happier by making those poorer than themselves feel unhappier by flaunting their wealth to them.
....
DeLong does not ascribe sadistic attitudes to the rich, merely rapacious ones.
One of the ill effects of thinking about happiness as if it were money is that you may end up talking gibberish like this. Of course gaining happiness by means of inflicting unhappiness on others is the very definition of sadism.
Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on September 10, 2006 10:50 AM«Of course gaining happiness by means of inflicting unhappiness on others is the very definition of sadism.»
So the CEO who increases his profit-related bonus by firing workers is a sadist? Not quite, even if the workers may feel like that. But he still has transferred utility and income to himself from them. His goal however is to increase his income and utility, not to make the workers more miserable.
But the argument I thought was dishonest was:
«The American Dream is to get a BETTER cow. The Russian Dream is that the neighbor's COW DIES. DeLong is a "Russian Dreamer," wanting the destruction of the wealth of his neighbor.»
In that the poorer neighbor wants to make the richer one worse off with no gain to himself other than the enjoyment of the loss.
In DeLong's argument the richer neighbor makes himself happier by flaunting the prize cow even if this makes the poorer neighbor unhappier. The happiness of the rich neighbor is not that the poorer neighbor is made worse off, but that he is better off already.
Completely different! DeLong for example makes no argument that the poor would or should enjoy making the rich worse off; but rather that (some of) the rich enjoy the existing difference with the poor because it allows them to feel better about their wealth.
I think Mao had all the Chinese (including the women--what a sad perversion of nature) dressing in proper Communist attire, a bland uniform, the same for all.
Of course, the women would after a bit, wear colored dresses underneath their bland uniforms because a woman's desire to be pretty is not to be blocked by a petty tyrant--one wonders about the burqas, and if Arab women are immune to the desire to be pretty.
I rather doubt it.
Posted by: Tennwriter on September 10, 2006 11:47 AMSo the CEO who increases his profit-related bonus by firing workers is a sadist?
Only if he does it because he likes making the fired workers unhappy, not just because he likes having the bonus. And, sure enough:
I wrote that one reason that America's rich today live the expensive and ostentatious lifestyles they do (rather than spending much more money on charity, or philanthropy) is that it is a way of making other people feel small and unhappy...
Really, DeLong does quite enough weaseling on his own account these days to need the help of any proxy weasels.
Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on September 10, 2006 11:49 AMI believe the argument was WEALTH not just DOLLARS per se. I assume you know the difference.
Actually, I have found that redistributionists tend not to understand this distinction. I've seen comments which seem based on the notion that the Walton heirs, like Scrooge McDuck, have a swimming pool full of cash. The most extreme is the resident Leftie at The American Mind who insisted that wealth is created only when the Treasury issues dollars and all transactions thereafter are zero sum exchanges.
Posted by: triticale on September 10, 2006 12:35 PMJane is asking why people are not engaging her in this dicussion. One answer is that we have no practical idea of what to do beauty inequality. Neither Jane nor any of her defenders here has provided even the most rudimentary sketch of a practical plan. Observations that there are some objective indicators that correlate with beauty hardly qualify.
Nightclub bouncers have been implementing ugliness taxes for years. All we'd have to do is get a committee of them to tell us how long a people would have to wait in line or how much they'd have to pay to get it, rank the results, reverse them, and assign values.
The IRS has, what, 200,000 employees, and there are probably another million in the private sector who work in tax return preparation and basic advice? Not to mention the tens of hours that individuals spend every year on taxes, and the entire tax avoidance industry. I'm not convinced of the impracticality of a beauty tax. We managed to create a tax system that tracks every dollar that moves in our economy just fine. That can't be more complex than measuring beauty.
Posted by: AT on September 10, 2006 2:49 PMFrom Blissex:
His argument (as I understand it) is that (some of) the rich make themselves happier by making those poorer than themselves feel unhappier by flaunting their wealth to them.
So like most of us, Blissex acknowledges that it is the *reaction* of the poor (feeling unhappy) that drives the "analysis" as much as the behavior of the rich (flaunting and enjoying feelings of spite).
Yet DeLong insisted that he was focusing only on the spiteful rich, and that the envy of the poor was not at issue. And critics noted that that made no sense.
From DeLong:
Surely public policy should weigh the spite-generated utility the rich gain from their conspicuous consumption as worth less than nothing, shouldn't it?
Or, responding to Jane G:
My point was that the rich are spiteful--that they enjoy the envy of the poor.
To which many said - hey, let them enjoy their spite - it's only if the poor (or someone else) care that there is even an issue, in which case, the question becomes, what do we do about envious poor people?
I suppose we could try to separate "acceptable" envy (generated by spiteful behavior) from "bad envy" (generated by, well, envy I guess) and orient public policy towards reducing feelings of "acceptable" envy. That should be a helpful and productive debate.
Nice to see Blissex is on board.
SIDEBAR: Since in DelOng's analysis the motivation of the rich person is so important, riddle me this:
Two men are driving down the street in red Ferraris, each accompanied by a jewel bedecked supermodel of notable non-monetary endowments.
Johnson, in Car A, is thinking "Gee, if only my grandfather and me sainted mum, God rest her, could see me now - they would be so proud of the way the life lessons they taught me have panned out. Oops, better gas it - I don't want to be late to the charity ball".
Smith, in Car B, is thinking "Whose the man, you working class minions? I'm hot, and your dirt! Breathe my exhaust and weep!"
In DeLongWorld, do we have a tax on Smith only, but not Johnson? Who conducts the tax audit?
Posted by: Tom Maguire on September 10, 2006 3:27 PMPatrick,
Unless you have specific data about Brad De Long that you do not mention in your post, your assertion of motives to Brad personally is unfair. Nonetheless, I agree with the general thrust of your argument (which I know I've heard elsewhere) as a bias of academia in the whole.
Posted by: Tom on September 10, 2006 5:29 PMThe question isn't about how practical it is to tax beauty, the question is: how can you be,in principle, against taxing beauty positionality if you're for taxing wealth positionaility? In principle, what is the difference? If the existence of an inequality is itself a justification (as opposed to the standard reasons for progressive taxation) for "correcting" the inequality, why is wealth the only inequality that the government should correct?
Posted by: Will on September 10, 2006 5:35 PMFor Milton Friedman it was Marlene Dietrich's legs:
http://www.freetochoose.net/1980_vol5_transcript.html
Posted by: Patrick R. Sullivan on September 10, 2006 5:49 PMUnless you have specific data about Brad De Long that you do not mention in your post, your assertion of motives to Brad personally is unfair.
One might almost say spiteful.
Posted by: Paul Zrimsek on September 10, 2006 5:54 PMIf the existence of an inequality is itself a justification (as opposed to the standard reasons for progressive taxation) for "correcting" the inequality, why is wealth the only inequality that the government should correct?
Because ethical governmental means of correcting other inequalities are nonexistent until you define them. The argument is that if they, X, existence then so-and-so's premises for advocating an egregious rich/wealth tax imply that one is equally obliged to implement X. This is fine. You don't want to implement X, because taxing beauty, smarts, musical or artistic talent is abhorrent presto contradiction.
This is a fine argument, considering everything else that passes for logic these days, but the onus is on Jane to show that X exists before any reasonable discussion can proceed. Note as well that the contradiction doesn't actually follow from the logic. It might be the case that if we lived in a world in which a sound beauty tax can exist then we would tax beauty, thanking Jane for pointing out that this is something we should be doing. This situation should be contrasted with similar arguments for using government to fight a war on illegal drugs.
Posted by: Jangle At on September 10, 2006 6:54 PMJangle, why does someone have to actually advocate taxing beauty before it is valid to point out that the justification you're giving for taxing wealth could also justify taxing beauty? That's illogical.
Pointing out that this principle necessarily allows for some obviously undesirable policies is a perfectly valid way of showing that the principle is bad or at least needs further refinement. But it seems like the principle of "equality" advocated by the left is just a nice sounding cover for what they actually want, which is to soak the rich and successful. So it's not surprising that no one will actually address JG's argument.
Posted by: Will on September 10, 2006 7:30 PMWill,
I know that I do it to, but it's really best not to speculate on the "true" motivations of people whose ideologies one dislikes. Your theory, as I understand it, is that people like me secretly don't care about equality, we just hate the rich but we don't hate the beautiful so our hypocrisy is exposed. Does that really sound plausible to you?
If you offer me a practical application of Jane's argument, I'll be happy to respond. Since no one has provided one, I'll do my best. I could not think of anything around beauty, but I can imagine a different one. Parental education level is another source on inequality. I would favor colleges biasing towards applicants whose families had less education. Does that meet your test?
Tom
Posted by: Tom G. on September 10, 2006 10:24 PMTom G.
You seem to be saying that you cannot consider Jane's proposal to tax beauty until you understand the practicality of its implementation. For the thousandth time, Jane's not proposing a beauty tax. She's not arguing against a tax on wealth. She's saying that DeLong's justification for a tax on wealth -- that the wealthy spite the poor -- is just plain stupid. (Jane was too polite to use that term.) She illustrated her point by showing that DeLong's basis for taxing wealth could just as well be applied to beauty. That's it.
However, you seem to be willing to consider a tax on beauty, if we can only work out those details of how it might be implemented. This seems to say more about you than it does about Jane. DeLong argued in favor of a tax on the wealthy even if it would not help the poor. You both seem willing to use governmental power to reward those you like and punish those you don't. Isn't that the antithesis of classical liberalism?
Posted by: David Walser on September 11, 2006 12:27 AMIs anybody else having trouble getting to Brad's site lately? I wanted to check, but can't now.
"Surely public policy should weigh the spite-generated utility the rich gain from their conspicuous consumption as worth less than nothing, shouldn't it?"
There are certainly negative, envy-destructive feelings of the poor, generated by successful conspicous consumption. Poor including most Western world academics who are, absolutely, in the top quintile of the world in income.
Most socialists really are against conspicuous consumption.
But as I think of the Donald trading in his Ivana trophy wife for his other bimbo younger trophy life, er, wife, it occurs to me that another feeling many "poor" folk have is admiration-emulation. Since he could do, AND has done it ... I could do it, too.
With more work, and smarter work; or smarter sucking-up? [Sam Walton decided to suck-up to ... his customers, the poor, with minimal prices on minimal quality goods.]
Even beauty is enhanced, HUGELY, by the conspicuous publicity of the beautiful. Isn't that why fat people, who are almost all responsible for their conditions, are upset at discrimination against them? Yet isn't the world better off when most not-quite-beautiful people admire, and try to emulate, the beautiful ones?
Similarly, America is certainly better off with poor folk trying to get rich, motivated by admiring and wanting to emulate the successful. Just as competing makes better sports performance, it makes better economic performance.
Any "spite-generated utility" measurement should be offset by "motivation utility".
Posted by: Tom Grey - Liberty Dad on September 11, 2006 2:31 AMJane Galt, writing about throwing acid in Cindy Crawford's face is not the way to start a productive conversation so you shouldn't act surprised you didn't get one.
Posted by: James B. Shearer on September 11, 2006 4:41 AMDavid,
Let me try to clarify my understanding:
Jane's position: If you care about wealth inequality, why not care about other kinds of inequality?
My position: I would care about other kinds of inequality if I could see anything productive that could be done. In general, I can't so I don't spend much time thinking about it. I do kind of like my parental education idea. What do you think of that?
To clarify, I believe in some redistribution of income (as indeed most Americans do). I believe we could redistribute somewhat more than we do today (certainly 1990's levels of taxation) without significantly impacting incentives to work. I do not believe in destroying wealth or beauty for the sake of equality. Although one of Brad's comments gave that impression ("less than zero"), I am extremely dubious that he does either.
Your position: I favor income redistribution because I want to "to reward those you like and punish those you don't." Well, I don't dislike the rich, and like the poor. I favor redistribution on utilitarian grounds.
Tom
Posted by: Tom G. on September 11, 2006 7:10 AMAs for the practicality of a 'beauty tax', the Islamic world does it. It's called the burkha or chador. As well as some other more invasive techniques.
Posted by: Patrick R. Sullivan on September 11, 2006 9:11 AM"Really, DeLong does quite enough weaseling on his own account these days to need the help of any proxy weasels."
Sorry, but this does deserve repeating.
Posted by: Tom on September 11, 2006 11:24 AMMany seem to have misunderstood the motives behind DeLong's argument. DeLong is engaging in one of the oldest (probably the oldest) methods of political persuasion- demonization of the other.
DeLong already wishes to redistribute income to whatever level of equity he personally desires. It is a given that he believes the United States does not redistribute enough. Rather than rely solely on persuasion based on the positive merits of greater equality of income, he is now employing demonization of the high income groups. I doubt that he even really believes his own argument since he gives a completely free pass to the exact same character flaw in the poor.
For those who think Galt's analogy is a bad one, you are incorrect. Given that beauty inequality is unethically addressed by making the beautiful less so, I would ask, "What if it were not unethical?" We have defined confiscation of income and wealth as ethical. What is ethical is not set in stone, unfortunately. However, why is it not ethical today to tax the beautiful and use the funds for liposuction, cosmetic surgery, and other beauty enhancing goods and services? We could create panels that assign each person a beauty number (1 to 10, for example) and a corresponding tax to pay. For those who object that you would be forcing the beautiful but poor to pay, I would point out that property taxes often force the income poor to pay taxes, and I don't see how beauty cannot be considered a kind of property.
Posted by: Yancey Ward on September 11, 2006 11:48 AMMost likley because the TRUE "Left-Wingers" are debating the truly important issues of today.
I couldn't care less about beauty, Cindy Crawford or whatever it is you are trying to posit here. And no, alas, I am not ugly, so I have no jealosy issues, either.
Nope, MY blog is purely political and pertinenet. You might check it out?
Jewels
Posted by: Jewels on September 11, 2006 1:52 PMOh dear. I do so hate typos...I, of course, meant to say pertinent.
Jewels
Posted by: Jewels on September 11, 2006 1:54 PMActually, a "beauty tax" would NOT improve social welfare, because beauty is a relative quality - the total amount of "beauty" in the world is fixed. What CAN improve social welfare is subsidizing people who forgo their beauty. Suppose that Cindy Crawford is offered a highly productive job at a chemical plant. The pay is *very* good, but she is worried about getting acid splashed on her face. In a Coasean world, ugly people would "insure" her (or rather, compensate her) in case she gets disfigured. She would then choose to take the job, and social welfare would be improved.
Posted by: anon on September 12, 2006 4:46 AM