Thursday, January 20, 2011
Are you guys more selfish or being true to the rationality hypothesis???
Repeated surveying over the past 30 years shows that younger people are overwhelming less empathetic than they used to be. (see here) If it is true, that younger people care less about community and more about themselves (my words not those in the article), then our social welfare function is changing in predictable ways. But do we really want to live in a world where we don't care about each other's welfare?
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Most basic economic models assume that the rational economic man is self interested, however many psychological tests show that humans do value things like equality and fairness (such as the famous bargaining game). I for one believe that government and economy work because there is an underlying assumption that everyone's welfare should be maximized through legislation and transactions. I take the results of this test with a grain of salt. They only studied students, while the scores may indicate less empathy than thirty years ago, this cannot accurately predict what happens after these people graduate and grow up.
ReplyDelete30 years ago, people were more willing to help others because there was an greater liklihood of reciprocation (I scratch your back you scratch mine) I think that society has moved away from that and engaged in more self-preservational activities. Empathy is a relative term in so far as people can only empathize with situations and people that are similar to their own experiences. Someone of privilege isnt likely to be able to understand the circumstances of someone who lives in a ghetto.
ReplyDeleteRelating to what Richard said, I believe that people are very self-interested and act as so. However, to maximize personal wellbeing, I believe there still is a very respectable amount of networking going on today.. People opening doors for others is more relevant than ever and it is true what they say, "it's not what you know, it's who you know". People are still scratching each other’s backs, but this notion may be more self-oriented than ever
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