In her new book, The Up Side of Down: Why Failing Well Is the Key to Success, Megan McArdle takes some time to discuss forager vs. farmer attitudes toward risk. Forager food sources tended to be more risky and variable, while farmer food sources are more reliable. So foragers emphasized food sharing more, and a tolerate attitude toward failure to find food. In contrast, farmers shared food less and held individuals responsible more for getting their food. We’ve even seen the same people switch from one attitude to the other as they switched from foraging to farming. Today some people and places tend more toward farmer values of strict personal responsibility, while other people and places tend more toward forager forgiveness.
Failure is also largely due to coincidence, it's remarkable that people even try given the low odds of success at launching a new business. You need lots of people to try before one succeeds, if the penalty for failure becomes too high few people will try and the economy and innovation will suffer.
More bang for your bailout buck was indeed the most sensible reason (though obviously it doesn't hurt bankers that they have friends in high places). Of course this changes once the banks start expecting bailouts.
One could argue that bailing out the big banks protected many (comparatively innocent) little guys, while bailing out a little guy (who often has some culpability for his own failure) doesn't do much to help anyone but that little guy. Or, less moralistically, bailing out the banks gives you more bang for your bail out buck because it helps all little guys systemically. That was the main argument I heard back in the heyday of TARP, in any event.
The last of the 19th century saw a persistent deflation, meaning mortgages became more oppressive http://en.wikipedia.org/wik... and an expansion into the Great Plains which required different farming practices. Eastern agriculture was beginning its decline as production moved west, while the South was adjusting to a free market economy and no slaves.
Maybe it wasn't more risky but the circumstances were just right (such as the fact that every state gets exactly two senators, whether it's Kansas or New York) for them to get a lot of support in the senate.
Farming wasn't better at first. People probably choose farming for strategic (to raise armies and live in walled settlements) or religious reasons, because it certainly didn't make life easier, longer or less risky back in the neolithic. It's even possible that initially only a small number of tribes chose farming and then forced all the others to do the same because farming tribes were more aggressive and could support armies.
Farmers work harder (so slackers are more noticeable) and when something went wrong it was more catastrophic (such as a lost crop) than when something went wrong in forager society. Farmers also have stricter laws (the concept of land ownership itself for example), greater inequality and higher population density which tends to bring out the worst in people and made them invent things like war and slavery in addition to very harsh laws and angry gods who purportedly were the source of those laws.
I don't think that's the sense in which Hanson maintains that fear made farmers: he means dynamically rather than historically. The post he links is at http://www.overcomingbias.c... where he writes:
A large robust literature makes it clear that inducing people to unconsciously think about death pushes them to more strongly obey and defend cultural norms, especially norms framed as disgust at animal-like behavior. Today, fear of death encourages folks to obey authorities, and be more loyal to their communities and spouses, all strong farmer norms.
Hanson thinks fear of death directly elicits farmer norms. I agree, but farmers had less to fear than foragers!
The scientific literature Hanson cites in the 2010 piece shows a tight relationship between fear of death and low self-esteem (read "status"). It would seem that, rather than natural conditions driving our forebears fear of death, the status deflation occurring with agriculture heightened the fear of death. (See "Status inflation and deflation: Prestige, the essence of status, permits broad alliances" - http://tinyurl.com/lxokdf7 )
[Note also that, for Sigmund Freud, at the core of both fear of death and loss of status/self-esteem is castration anxiety.]
I don't agree with the premise of her book...for individuals, failure costs time, money and energy. If you are going to fail, keep the costs as low as possible. bankruptcy is bad for your credit rating. Large companies and governments are better at coping with failure than people
And don't often have bankruptcies but long drawn out restructurings, but they do often have limited liability. One could argue bankruptcy avoidance is even more lenient in practice as it wouldn't improve creditors situation.
Well, I support both--sometimes forgiveness is the cheapest course, even after you take into account the moral hazard it creates. Most of the people who suffered from teaching the banks a lesson wouldn't have been bankers; they would have been ordinary folks whose livelihoods were wiped out, homes were taken, and retirement savings were destroyed in the financial contraction that followed the partial or total collapse of the US financial system.
Failure is also largely due to coincidence, it's remarkable that people even try given the low odds of success at launching a new business. You need lots of people to try before one succeeds, if the penalty for failure becomes too high few people will try and the economy and innovation will suffer.
More bang for your bailout buck was indeed the most sensible reason (though obviously it doesn't hurt bankers that they have friends in high places). Of course this changes once the banks start expecting bailouts.
One could argue that bailing out the big banks protected many (comparatively innocent) little guys, while bailing out a little guy (who often has some culpability for his own failure) doesn't do much to help anyone but that little guy. Or, less moralistically, bailing out the banks gives you more bang for your bail out buck because it helps all little guys systemically. That was the main argument I heard back in the heyday of TARP, in any event.
I looked at somethingsome of McCardles comments in public healthcare and it turns out she's an idiot.
The last of the 19th century saw a persistent deflation, meaning mortgages became more oppressive http://en.wikipedia.org/wik... and an expansion into the Great Plains which required different farming practices. Eastern agriculture was beginning its decline as production moved west, while the South was adjusting to a free market economy and no slaves.
Maybe it wasn't more risky but the circumstances were just right (such as the fact that every state gets exactly two senators, whether it's Kansas or New York) for them to get a lot of support in the senate.
Farming wasn't better at first. People probably choose farming for strategic (to raise armies and live in walled settlements) or religious reasons, because it certainly didn't make life easier, longer or less risky back in the neolithic. It's even possible that initially only a small number of tribes chose farming and then forced all the others to do the same because farming tribes were more aggressive and could support armies.
Farmers work harder (so slackers are more noticeable) and when something went wrong it was more catastrophic (such as a lost crop) than when something went wrong in forager society. Farmers also have stricter laws (the concept of land ownership itself for example), greater inequality and higher population density which tends to bring out the worst in people and made them invent things like war and slavery in addition to very harsh laws and angry gods who purportedly were the source of those laws.
I don't think that's the sense in which Hanson maintains that fear made farmers: he means dynamically rather than historically. The post he links is at http://www.overcomingbias.c... where he writes:
A large robust literature makes it clear that inducing people to unconsciously think about death pushes them to more strongly obey and defend cultural norms, especially norms framed as disgust at animal-like behavior. Today, fear of death encourages folks to obey authorities, and be more loyal to their communities and spouses, all strong farmer norms.
Hanson thinks fear of death directly elicits farmer norms. I agree, but farmers had less to fear than foragers!
The scientific literature Hanson cites in the 2010 piece shows a tight relationship between fear of death and low self-esteem (read "status"). It would seem that, rather than natural conditions driving our forebears fear of death, the status deflation occurring with agriculture heightened the fear of death. (See "Status inflation and deflation: Prestige, the essence of status, permits broad alliances" - http://tinyurl.com/lxokdf7 )
[Note also that, for Sigmund Freud, at the core of both fear of death and loss of status/self-esteem is castration anxiety.]
I don't agree with the premise of her book...for individuals, failure costs time, money and energy. If you are going to fail, keep the costs as low as possible. bankruptcy is bad for your credit rating. Large companies and governments are better at coping with failure than people
But did that make their farming more risky than was ancient farming?
Western farmers in the 1800s were facing much more rapid technological progress than farmers ever have before.
Foragers had more risk; to cut their risk, people turned to farming.
And don't often have bankruptcies but long drawn out restructurings, but they do often have limited liability. One could argue bankruptcy avoidance is even more lenient in practice as it wouldn't improve creditors situation.
Europe has big firms, but does not have lenient bankruptcy.
Well, I support both--sometimes forgiveness is the cheapest course, even after you take into account the moral hazard it creates. Most of the people who suffered from teaching the banks a lesson wouldn't have been bankers; they would have been ordinary folks whose livelihoods were wiped out, homes were taken, and retirement savings were destroyed in the financial contraction that followed the partial or total collapse of the US financial system.