Thursday, August 28, 2008
Distributive justice quotation of the day
From Will and Ariel Durant's The Lessons of History:
Every advance in the complexity of the economy puts an added premium upon superior ability, and intensifies the concentration of wealth, responsibility, and power.
There is a lot to argue over in that sweeping generality, but I'm fairly sure I disagree with it as a matter of historical fact. Holding everything else constant, though, it might be true.
4 Comments:
By 
Dawnfire82, at
Thu Aug 28, 07:44:00 PM:
Did they just skip the entirety of the Middle Ages with that book, or what? How about the French Revolution? Or, for that matter, the Russian Revolution?
By TigerHawk, at
Thu Aug 28, 08:29:00 PM:
No, but that was roughly my reaction.
By Georg Felis, at
Thu Aug 28, 11:13:00 PM:
*grabs pencil and scribbles*
In addition, it goes without saying that this increase in complexity, also increases the size of the economy by a much larger amount, allowing both a concentration of wealth at the top and an expansion of wealth at the bottom simultaneously.
There you go, fixed it. Much better now.
By Assistant Village Idiot, at
Thu Aug 28, 11:47:00 PM:
georgfelis. Clever. I liked that.
The break point is between the first and second parts. The Durants seem to conclude that because the first part is likely true, the second part must naturally follow. But what is it that makes an economy more complex if not a greater number of players leading to a greater number of variables? The complexity of what any one person must deal with increases linearly - so yes, there is an advantage to better thinking. But the whole ball of wax is increasing in complexity at a geometric rate (or more), which creates niches for many.
It's pretty easy to see if you reduce the idea to the simplest hunter-gatherer economy, and then add inter-tribal trade to it. Yes, the smart guys have an advantage, but there are now more opportunities even for the guys who aren't that smart.
