Full Transcript for Markets Without Limits with Jason Brennan & Peter Jaworski

it that you're hoping to get out of the conversation today? 00:04:12.710 --> 00:04:19.350 Well, first of all, I'm really interested to see how they answer all the questions because they're pretty wide ranging and touch on a lot of different parts of the readings that we did. 00:04:19.939 --> 00:04:29.740 But more than that, I'm interested to see just how they approach answering these questions, how they sort of break the questions down and think through them because I think as philosophers that's what they're particularly good at. 00:04:29.740 --> 00:04:31.779 So I'm hoping to learn from them how to do that. 00:04:31.779 --> 00:04:32.899 Well, great. 00:04:32.899 --> 00:04:34.180 And what about you, Jake? 00:04:34.660 --> 00:04:36.660 I'm pretty much interested in seeing the same things. 00:04:36.660 --> 00:04:45.540 I think there's quite a few questions about how the philosophy in the article we read translates over to a real life context. 00:04:45.920 --> 00:04:52.480 I'm kind of interested to see when you stress test it in various ways, how it Ends up looking at the end. 00:04:52.639 --> 00:04:53.920 So I'm really excited for that. 00:04:54.720 --> 00:04:56.920 Yeah, I'm interested in all of that as well. 00:04:56.920 --> 00:04:58.240 I'm also interested in. 00:04:58.240 --> 00:05:03.360 Hopefully we'll have time for them to discuss any changes between the first and second edition of the book. 00:05:03.360 --> 00:05:06.160 You guys only read the second edition? 00:05:03.360 --> 00:05:06.160 I've actually read both. 00:05:06.160 --> 00:05:12.639 And so I did notice some changes in the first three chapters that we actually read in preparation for this podcast. 00:05:13.170 --> 00:05:23.329 But I'm hoping that we have a little bit of a chance to find out why they thought that it was time for a second edition and what they wanted to emphasize in the second edition over the first. 00:05:23.490 --> 00:05:25.569 So hopefully we can talk about that as well. 00:05:26.050 --> 00:05:31.410 Anything else from either one of you that you want to discuss before we join the rest of the group? 00:05:31.970 --> 00:05:32.730 I think I'm good. 00:05:32.730 --> 00:05:34.610 I'm excited to get this episode started. 00:05:35.170 --> 00:05:36.170 Yeah, same for me. 00:05:36.170 --> 00:05:37.250 I'm just really excited. 00:05:37.490 --> 00:05:37.889 Great. 00:05:38.050 --> 00:05:39.329 All right, let's join the others. 00:05:43.970 --> 00:05:44.759 Welcome, guys. 00:05:45.069 --> 00:05:46.110 Thanks for joining us today. 00:05:46.350 --> 00:05:46.910 Yeah, thank you. 00:05:46.910 --> 00:05:47.550 Yeah, our pleasure. 00:05:47.550 --> 00:05:48.269 Yeah, thank you. 00:05:48.670 --> 00:05:49.629 And you know what? 00:05:48.670 --> 00:05:49.629 This is. 00:05:49.629 --> 00:05:56.829 This is kind of like a full circle moment for the podcast because Peter was the inaugural guest on the podcast. 00:05:56.910 --> 00:05:58.029 Talking about plasma. 00:05:58.029 --> 00:05:59.230

Talking about bloody well pay them. 00:05:59.310 --> 00:06:00.069 I still remember. 00:06:00.069 --> 00:06:00.430 Yes. 00:06:00.430 --> 00:06:02.189 Yeah. Yeah. So good to have you back. 00:06:02.269 --> 00:06:06.509 That was in the middle of COVID and who thought we'd still be going strong at this point. 00:06:06.670 --> 00:06:12.189 Yeah, I remember I had little plushies representing the different blood components. 00:06:12.269 --> 00:06:13.350 You had visual aids. 00:06:13.350 --> 00:06:14.269 I still remember it. 00:06:16.680 --> 00:06:18.120 Well, it's good to have you back. 00:06:18.279 --> 00:06:19.800 Good to have Jason here today. 00:06:20.040 --> 00:06:31.480 Before I turn it over to our hosts for today, which are Jake Ross and Joe Keys, I am just gonna invite you guys to talk a little bit about the main theme of the book. 00:06:32.199 --> 00:06:39.560 What prompted you to do it, why you felt a book like this was needed, and importantly, why you thought a second edition of the book was needed. 00:06:39.959 --> 00:06:41.560 Yeah, I'll start with the second edition. 00:06:41.639 --> 00:06:46.899 You know, the main reason there's a second edition is because the editor at Routledge suggested we write a second ed sometimes. 00:06:46.899 --> 00:06:48.100 No more exciting than that. 00:06:48.339 --> 00:06:50.139 I mean, the book had a lot of uptake. 00:06:50.139 --> 00:06:55.779 Lots of people wrote responses, so there was an opportunity to respond to some of those responses. 00:06:55.779 --> 00:07:01.300 And, like, you know, some of these things were worth talking about, even if they were mistaken because we could clarify our thesis. 00:07:01.300 --> 00:07:03.699 Some of them had some good challenges that were worth overcoming. 00:07:03.939 --> 00:07:06.180 A lot of the new material wasn't actually new. 00:07:06.180 --> 00:07:10.860 It was like, we wrote, like, an extra 150 pages that didn't go into the first edition. 00:07:10.860 --> 00:07:12.259 And then we decided to use that. 00:07:12.579 --> 00:07:17.620 There's some things we even reserved because we thought, like, you know, maybe it doesn't need to go here, but someone will bring out this challenge. 00:07:17.620 --> 00:07:18.420 No one ever did. 00:07:18.420 --> 00:07:21.180 And we just decided to publish, like, our view on, say, blackmail. 00:07:21.180 --> 00:07:30.740 And for instance, as far as the book itself, it was just this interesting thing where we saw all of these books which are permitted to be sold about the question of what the limits of the markets are. 00:07:30.740 --> 00:07:35.779 Are there certain things that should and should not be for sale? 00:07:31.899 --> 00:07:42.779 And Peter and I just noticed that a weird thing where many of the times when people were complaining about what is being bought and sold, the fact that it was being bought and sold was incidental to their argument. 00:07:42.779 --> 00:07:44.100 It wasn't even about the money. 00:07:44.259 --> 00:07:46.220 You know, it would be like the metaphor we have in the book. 00:07:46.220 --> 00:07:49.459 Like, imagine people write a book called, like, the Limits of Hat Wearing. 00:07:49.540 --> 00:07:52.740 And they're like, you can't wear a hat while you're enslaving somebody. 00:07:52.740 --> 00:07:56.500 And you can't wear a hat while you're committing rape, and you can't wear a hat while you're committing murder. 00:07:56.500 --> 00:07:58.300 And everyone's like, hats are horrible. 00:07:58.300 --> 00:08:00.339 And you're just like, you're not even talking about the hat. 00:08:00.339 --> 00:08:04.500 And we noticed that, like, half of the things that people were putting in these books were like that. 00:08:04.660 --> 00:08:07.139 It's kind of silly and they didn't notice it, but that's what they were doing. 00:08:07.529 --> 00:08:10.490 But then we also found, like, there was this one challenge that would survive. 00:08:10.490 --> 00:08:19.209 The idea that, like, markets express depravity, profanity and so on, and that there's an inherent meaning to market exchange that's negative. 00:08:19.449 --> 00:08:20.290 And we thought that was. 00:08:20.290 --> 00:08:22.569 That was an interesting question, and we wanted to take that on. 00:08:22.649 --> 00:08:28.490 So after we wrote the paper that turned into the article in Ethics, an editor at Routledge suggests we turn it into entire book. 00:08:28.490 --> 00:08:30.329 And lo and behold, that's what we got. 00:08:30.490 --> 00:08:31.009 You know, so. 00:08:31.009 --> 00:08:32.809 But the basic thesis is really quite simple. 00:08:32.809 --> 00:08:33.210 It's. 00:08:33.619 --> 00:08:36.339 Money does not usually create evil where there was none. 00:08:36.339 --> 00:08:46.178 If you can do something and possess something for free, there's going to be some way to exchange it for money that is not morally wrong in some common interesting way, not some weird way. 00:08:46.418 --> 00:08:51.859 So then it turns out that most of the complaints that people have about commodification are actually complaints about something else. 00:08:51.859 --> 00:08:58.979 About the business ethics of a particular organization, about the possession of the thing in the first place, about the way it's being sold, not the fact that it's being sold. 00:08:59.289 --> 00:09:01.529 So in a sense, our book is Very deflationary. 00:09:01.690 --> 00:09:04.690 It's to say that this whole debate kind of rests on mistakes. 00:09:04.690 --> 00:09:06.850 For the most part, they're talking about something else. 00:09:06.850 --> 00:09:10.330 Most of the time, it's not a libertarian book or a classical liberal book. 00:09:10.330 --> 00:09:14.649 We don't make any views about how much the market should be regulated, what the role of the state is. 00:09:14.649 --> 00:09:17.250 We're not defending capitalism in any major way. 00:09:17.250 --> 00:09:21.450 We're just saying that this particular question has been dealt with incorrectly by

others. 00:09:22.169 --> 00:09:26.230 Yeah, if I can add a little bit of color to that, too, because Jay covers it really well. 00:09:26.230 --> 00:09:35.470 But part of the reason why I wanted a second edition is because in the process of writing that book, and also for other reasons, I became really interested in plasma. 00:09:35.470 --> 00:09:39.870 So we now have like a chunk of the book dedicated to talking about plasma. 00:09:39.870 --> 00:09:51.029 And actually the issues in the book that we wrote that really moved me the most were the issues of kidneys, were the issues where we're trying to figure out ways to save more lives in the medical space. 00:09:51.029 --> 00:09:53.269 So here's a different way of thinking about our thesis. 00:09:53.269 --> 00:09:57.639 Our thesis is like, if you can do it for free, there's some way to do it for money. 00:09:57.879 --> 00:10:11.159 But a different kind of question that our book sort of answers is, is there a way to encourage the production of priceless goods using one of the best tools we have available to us, namely money? 00:10:08.840 --> 00:10:11.159 Right. 00:10:11.559 --> 00:10:12.919 That's like a different question. 00:10:13.080 --> 00:10:18.320 It's a different way of thinking about the sort of mission that we give ourselves in the book. 00:10:18.320 --> 00:10:27.460 But it's also really important because at least in the space of, like, medical kinds of contexts, we can save a lot more lives if we use this incredible tool. 00:10:27.460 --> 00:10:29.980 But people have all these objections to the use of this tool. 00:10:29.980 --> 00:10:44.059 And so Jay and I were trying to figure out, like, do these objections, do they stand, and are they powerful enough to keep us from using this tool to try to save more lives or to try to improve people's lives? 00:10:44.700 --> 00:10:49.820 I am going to turn it over to Joe and Jake, who are going to run the show from here. 00:10:49.899 --> 00:10:51.309 So take it away, guys. 00:10:51.950 --> 00:10:53.750 Hi, I'm Joe. Thank you guys for being here. 00:10:53.750 --> 00:10:54.830 We really appreciate it. 00:10:55.309 --> 00:10:59.230 My first question, we'll just dive right in is on the burden of proof. 00:10:59.549 --> 00:11:05.909 So in your opening, you emphasized the prosperity of the markets have created, and you've summed that up well by the quote you used from McCloskey. 00:11:05.909 --> 00:11:07.389 Once upon a time, we were all poor. 00:11:07.389 --> 00:11:10.509 Then capitalism flourished, and now, as a result, we're rich. 00:11:10.750 --> 00:11:14.429 But a richer society need not be a better one, at least from a moral perspective. 00:11:14.669 --> 00:11:18.029 For example, people may be wealthy, but exceptionally solipsistic and unloving. 00:11:18.450 --> 00:11:26.129 So one might reasonably think that this hypothetical world is worse than one where people tend to be of modest means but wonderfully kind and virtuous. 00:11:26.450 --> 00:11:33.970 So why should the burden fall on the critics to show what's morally wrong with a particular market rather than on its defenders to make a moral case for it? 00:11:34.370 --> 00:11:35.610 I honestly think it's. 00:11:35.610 --> 00:11:36.929 The answer to this is really boring. 00:11:37.169 --> 00:11:39.809 It's their job to defend it because it's their job to defend it. 00:11:39.809 --> 00:11:45.809 If you're writing a paper saying that something is wrong for a particular reason, you bear the burden of proof because you're the one writing the paper. 00:11:46.659 --> 00:11:52.299 So a bunch of other people, independently of us, wrote books and papers arguing that certain markets are wrong. 00:11:52.299 --> 00:11:56.899 And they gave arguments for why they're wrong about, like, why this is the kind of thing that should not be for sale. 00:11:57.139 --> 00:11:58.659 Many of these books were widely read. 00:11:58.659 --> 00:11:59.860 Many of them are bestsellers. 00:11:59.860 --> 00:12:04.700 Some of the people in question will demand$50,000 to come give a speech about why something should not be for sale. 00:12:04.700 --> 00:12:06.340 You can probably guess who I'm talking about. 00:12:06.580 --> 00:12:08.259 I'm not making that number up, by the way. 00:12:08.820 --> 00:12:10.100 I know for a fact that's the number. 00:12:10.659 --> 00:12:12.980 So they have the burden of proof because it's their paper. 00:12:13.350 --> 00:12:15.750 And so what we can come back and say is, like, you've written these things. 00:12:15.750 --> 00:12:17.190 Your argument's not very good. 00:12:17.190 --> 00:12:18.470 It has holes and gaps. 00:12:18.789 --> 00:12:21.990 Here's what the fundamental flaw is, and here's the real challenge that you have. 00:12:22.309 --> 00:12:25.149 So in a sense, it's like they have the burden of proof because they started it. 00:12:25.149 --> 00:12:30.950 If we'd written the first book, like, if we had started it, we could say something like, you know, we have a burden. 00:12:30.950 --> 00:12:38.149 But in a sense, there is, like, a deeper philosophical way of thinking about this, which is, you know, some of you, I know someone here has, like, a philosophy background. 00:12:38.149 --> 00:12:40.870 There's this kind of question of what's called closure rules in ethics. 00:12:41.389 --> 00:12:54.230 And the question is, are things, generally speaking, wrong by default and have to be shown to be good and permissible, or are things presumed to be permissible by default and shown to be wrong? 00:12:50.590 --> 00:13:01.190 So I think the majority view is that the default view for most actions is that they are permissible unless there's something special about them that makes them wrong? 00:12:57.629 --> 00:13:05.470 So I do think that just in general, in philosophy, the assumption is if you're saying something is wrong, you bear the burden of proof. 00:13:05.470 --> 00:13:09.389 If you're like, it's probably permissible absent an

objection that's just the starting point. 00:13:09.590 --> 00:13:13.350 So I think there's two independent reasons why they bear the burden of proof, and we are. 00:13:13.669 --> 00:13:15.710 We are coming back to them and saying, like, yeah, your. 00:13:15.710 --> 00:13:16.710 Your argument doesn't work. 00:13:16.710 --> 00:13:19.750 Here's why, and here's what you would have to do to make your argument succeed. 00:13:20.230 --> 00:13:21.830 Yeah, I agree with that. 00:13:22.070 --> 00:13:29.750 I mean, you might add something like, you know, people are going to do things and other people are going to want to interfere with the things that they want to do. 00:13:30.149 --> 00:13:32.870 And I think the burden might be on the people who want to interfere. 00:13:33.429 --> 00:13:43.950 If you want to tell me that I can't use this resource, that I have money or whatever else it is you want to step in and you want to say, oh, you can't use that over here, then maybe the burden is on you. 00:13:43.950 --> 00:13:48.549 The default is sort of, I'm free to do whatever I want, you're free to do whatever you want. 00:13:49.029 --> 00:13:53.669 As soon as you want to step in, then you got to tell me a story like, how come. 00:13:54.070 --> 00:13:59.350 How come I can't do what I want to do with the stuff that I happen to have? 00:13:56.149 --> 00:14:01.669 And you can have lots of really good reasons, but the burden, I think, in general, is on you. 00:14:01.750 --> 00:14:10.340 But this kind of burden that I just mentioned doesn't really matter because the book, the way that we've tried to write it, is we just accept the premises of the other side. 00:14:10.899 --> 00:14:15.379 So we're not suggesting that, like, the burden is in fact, on them, although I think maybe we do. 00:14:15.379 --> 00:14:15.620 Right. 00:14:15.620 --> 00:14:15.940 But. 00:14:16.019 --> 00:14:23.460 But it doesn't even matter because we just take whatever arguments, whatever moral point of view they happen to have, we try to accept that as much as possible. 00:14:23.539 --> 00:14:34.580 And then to show that even on those premises, the conclusion that, like, we need to stop people from exchanging things voluntarily or however you want to describe it, it doesn't follow from those premises. 00:14:35.379 --> 00:14:47.139 I understand that this is not the reason that you were suggesting that they had the burden, but I think Peter Singer has argued that, at least in the context of organs, that it's because the stakes are so high. 00:14:47.139 --> 00:14:47.500 Right. 00:14:47.500 --> 00:15:00.220 Because people are dying for lack of an intervention, that the moral burden is on the people who would prevent that intervention to argue that it overcomes the moral cost of deaths. 00:15:00.220 --> 00:15:02.779 Is that persuasive to you, or would 00:15:02.779 --> 00:15:04.779 you push back on that? 00:15:02.779 --> 00:15:04.779 I mean, I think that. 00:15:04.860 --> 00:15:06.620 Yeah, Kim, I think the answer is. 00:15:06.620 --> 00:15:08.059 I think the answer is yes. 00:15:08.059 --> 00:15:08.500 Yeah. 00:15:08.500 --> 00:15:16.019 I think, especially if we have good reason to believe, as I think we do, that the use of money would encourage people to donate kidneys more often. 00:15:16.019 --> 00:15:18.299 Or to donate plasma more often and so on. 00:15:18.700 --> 00:15:30.309 If the evidence suggests that, you know, using this tool would increase the number of people who would receive a kidney transplant and thereby save more lives, then the stakes are enormously high. 00:15:30.309 --> 00:15:34.990 And I think then, you know, the arguments that you want to raise against that need to meet that bar. 00:15:34.990 --> 00:15:37.029 They need to be similarly bad. 00:15:37.029 --> 00:15:51.830 One of the things, we'll talk about this, I'm sure, but one of the things that I find unusual about the corruption argument in particular is that they say, well, if we allow exchange of kidneys, then that'll corrupt, corrupt the way that we think about the human body or something like that. 00:15:52.149 --> 00:15:53.909 And I say, well, suppose that's true. 00:15:53.909 --> 00:15:59.870 And suppose that like it corrupts our attitudes by 5% or something like that, but like 10 people's lives are saved. 00:15:59.870 --> 00:16:02.509 It's like, how do we weigh the one against the other? 00:16:02.509 --> 00:16:12.509 It seems to me that like, even if you save just one life at the cost of like corrupting people by like 1% in some respect or something like that, it might be worth that exchange. 00:16:12.509 --> 00:16:21.950 So the argument on the other side needs to have a certain kind of like, it just needs to overcome the problem that, that like lives are good and we need to save as many as possible. 00:16:22.429 --> 00:16:23.429 I'm glad Peter said that. 00:16:23.429 --> 00:16:23.950 Cause it's. 00:16:24.029 --> 00:16:29.470 A lot of this book is funny and comical and we do silly things inside of it, but it really is a high stakes book in a sense. 00:16:29.960 --> 00:16:32.440 And the reality is in the way bioethics works. 00:16:32.440 --> 00:16:39.440 And if some bioethicist sees this and thinks I'm being very critical of them, I completely mean to be critical of you guys, like, you gotta stop, like there's something wrong with you. 00:16:39.440 --> 00:16:40.759 People change and be better. 00:16:40.759 --> 00:16:43.120 What can I say? 00:16:40.759 --> 00:16:45.639 But there's a lot of stuff that happens in bioethics where it's like, this person's gonna die. 00:16:45.639 --> 00:16:46.799 And they're like, yeah, the bioethicist. 00:16:46.799 --> 00:16:47.519 Like, yeah, but it's icky. 00:16:47.519 --> 00:16:49.159 And they're like, okay, I guess we'll just let them die. 00:16:49.159 --> 00:16:52.159 And it's like, you know, I'm not saying, I'm not a consequentialist. 00:16:52.159 --> 00:16:54.360 I'm not saying like the consequences always determine

everything. 00:16:54.360 --> 00:16:57.559 But man, you gotta make at least a complete argument, right? 00:16:57.559 --> 00:17:02.100 You need to really justify your opposition to this thing, especially when the stakes are that high. 00:17:02.340 --> 00:17:05.779 You know, like it's, it's almost like lazy writing and lazy argumentation. 00:17:06.339 --> 00:17:07.700 Thank you guys, that was really helpful. 00:17:07.700 --> 00:17:10.420 I'll pass it on to Jake, our other co host, to ask another question. 00:17:11.059 --> 00:17:11.940 Thank you so much. 00:17:12.180 --> 00:17:20.579 Actually, the last part of that answer provides a good segue into my question which focuses on the empirical evidence for the corruption argument. 00:17:21.059 --> 00:17:48.549 So when I was reading, my understanding of your response to the corruption objection is that it kind of leaves open the possibility that, like, if the people who are making that objection put in enough effort and really wanted to, like, build up their argument much more than they have so far, they maybe could marshal enough empirical evidence to show that some type of market or other really is corrupting if that evidence is actually out there. 00:17:48.950 --> 00:17:54.549 Of course, you seem pretty skeptical that any anti commodification critics have actually done that so far. 00:17:54.890 --> 00:18:12.529 But I guess I'm curious if, in your opinion, have any anti commodification critics ever made what you'd consider to be a genuine effort to produce the evidence that some market really is corrupting enough to make it morally wrong? 00:18:08.890 --> 00:18:25.940 I'm also curious if there's any types of market out there where you think maybe if the people making these anti commodification arguments put in enough time and effort, could they find some kind of good argument that the market's corrupting, or do you think it's just kind of empirically false? 00:18:26.019 --> 00:18:28.779 In all the relevant cases, I think 00:18:28.779 --> 00:18:32.460 many have tried to give good corruption arguments. 00:18:32.460 --> 00:18:32.740 Right. 00:18:32.740 --> 00:18:40.779 But you'll notice that across all of the people who Jay and I describe as anti commodification theorists, they repeatedly use similar kinds of cases. 00:18:40.779 --> 00:18:46.579 And the one that comes up over and over again is the Haifa Daycare center in Israel. 00:18:47.119 --> 00:18:54.799 For listeners who might not be familiar with this, the idea is that, you know, people kept showing up late to pick up their kids from the statecare center in Israel. 00:18:55.279 --> 00:19:04.559 And so a couple of economists, Yuri Izi is one of them, I forget the name of the second one, they suggested that they introduce a penalty, a fee, for people who are showing up late. 00:19:04.799 --> 00:19:05.599 And so they did. 00:19:05.599 --> 00:19:06.640 And here's what happened. 00:19:06.640 --> 00:19:11.119 It's a very surprising result is that actually

more people showed up later than before. 00:19:11.599 --> 00:19:16.539 And then when they removed the fine, which is what it was, people kept showing up late. 00:19:16.539 --> 00:19:17.019 Okay? 00:19:17.099 --> 00:19:20.500 And this example appears over and over again. 00:19:20.500 --> 00:19:31.140 And the conclusion that Michael Sandel gives it, the way that he interprets this finding is he says, well, prior to the introduction of the find, people thought about this using a moral framework. 00:19:31.140 --> 00:19:33.819 They were like, well, how morally bad is it if I show up late? 00:19:34.140 --> 00:19:38.539 I'm taking up these people's times, I really ought to pick up my kids on time. 00:19:38.859 --> 00:19:51.759 Then when the money was introduced, then people switched from thinking about this in this moral way, to instead doing a kind of cost benefit analysis and sort of being like, oh, what is the price of my showing up late? 00:19:46.839 --> 00:19:52.880 And then they were like, oh, okay, well, I'm willing to pay the price. 00:19:52.880 --> 00:19:54.559 And so then I show up late. 00:19:54.559 --> 00:19:58.599 So that's the way Sandel describes the results of that empirical study. 00:19:58.599 --> 00:20:05.240 Now, Jay and I think that, like, actually the results can be explained in a much different way in that specific instance. 00:20:05.240 --> 00:20:11.599 Like, the way to describe it is like, oh, you know, before the fine was introduced, I thought that my showing up late was a really big deal. 00:20:12.029 --> 00:20:12.789 Like, oh, no, they. 00:20:12.789 --> 00:20:13.109 They. 00:20:13.109 --> 00:20:14.430 I'm really putting people out. 00:20:14.589 --> 00:20:18.150 But then they introduced the fine, and importantly, the fine was like a tiny sum of money. 00:20:18.150 --> 00:20:19.109 I don't remember what it was. 00:20:19.109 --> 00:20:20.829 It was like five bucks or something like that. 00:20:21.390 --> 00:20:22.869 So Jay and I are like that. 00:20:22.869 --> 00:20:23.710 It was like two bucks. 00:20:23.950 --> 00:20:24.990 That's crazy, right? 00:20:25.390 --> 00:20:28.750 People with children are like, please keep the kids for two bucks. 00:20:28.750 --> 00:20:31.190 You know, so. 00:20:31.190 --> 00:20:35.549 So prior to the introduction of the fine, people were like, this is a really big deal. 00:20:35.630 --> 00:20:37.150 But then the fine is like two bucks. 00:20:37.640 --> 00:20:38.839 And then that's like, new information. 00:20:39.559 --> 00:20:44.759 And I go, oh, I thought this was a really big deal, but it turns out they think it's not a big deal at all. 00:20:44.920 --> 00:20:50.119 So I'm not changing frames from a moral frame to, like, some kind of market frame or whatever. 00:20:50.359 --> 00:20:52.200 I'm still within the moral frame. 00:20:52.200 --> 00:20:53.240 I'm just adjusting. 00:20:53.240 --> 00:20:59.400 One of the premises in my argument for why I ought to pick up my kids on time, Namely, I thought it

was a big deal. 00:20:59.400 --> 00:21:00.640 Now it turns out it's no big deal. 00:21:00.640 --> 00:21:04.359 And so I'm gonna show up late because they're telling me that they don't really care. 00:21:05.009 --> 00:21:05.970 It was like two bucks. 00:21:05.970 --> 00:21:07.410 And, oh, by the way, this is. 00:21:07.410 --> 00:21:09.490 This is a fun bit of trivia. 00:21:09.809 --> 00:21:12.529 We wrote the book back in, like, 2015, 2016. 00:21:13.009 --> 00:21:17.569 There was a podcast with Yuri Gneezy that came out, like, a year ago or two years ago. 00:21:17.890 --> 00:21:22.769 And Yuri Gnezy's own description of the empirical study that he did. 00:21:22.769 --> 00:21:32.539 I forget the name of the podcast was that actually it was the sum of money that made the difference, that if they had charged a much higher fine, people would not have shown up late. 00:21:32.700 --> 00:21:34.099 And this is like a separate piece. 00:21:34.099 --> 00:21:35.140 And then, Jay, you can go. 00:21:35.140 --> 00:21:36.859 But let me just add one other thing. 00:21:36.859 --> 00:21:39.500 There's a famous article in this space. 00:21:39.579 --> 00:21:42.140 It's about crowding out and corruption together. 00:21:42.539 --> 00:21:44.539 Just, like, pay enough or don't pay at all. 00:21:44.779 --> 00:21:52.220 So we get these, like, weird effects, like people showing up Late people donating less blood if you offer them five bucks than. 00:21:52.220 --> 00:21:53.579 Than compared to $0. 00:21:54.299 --> 00:22:00.420 Or like, people being unwilling to help you carry a couch into the apartment if you offer them $5. 00:22:00.579 --> 00:22:04.259 But, like, lots of people would be willing to do it if you offered them $0. 00:22:04.579 --> 00:22:12.500 Like, the thing is that, like, sometimes if you pay too little, then it changes things, but you got to just pay more, and then you get the effect that you want. 00:22:12.500 --> 00:22:13.740 Yeah, yeah. 00:22:13.740 --> 00:22:20.700 On the broader question, too, about, like, the empirics, you know, if this is just, again, the journal burden of proof, you're making a claim that something corrupts something else. 00:22:20.700 --> 00:22:21.700 Like taking English class. 00:22:21.700 --> 00:22:22.220 Like, here's something. 00:22:22.220 --> 00:22:25.220 I believe taking English classes corrupt your ability to write, makes you a worse writer. 00:22:25.720 --> 00:22:29.359 If I want to prove that claim, I have to, like, go and collect the evidence for it. 00:22:29.359 --> 00:22:32.680 Like, because I'm the one that asserted it's corrupting, then I bear that burden. 00:22:32.759 --> 00:22:34.079 And of course, it's an empirical claim. 00:22:34.079 --> 00:22:36.759 So, of course, you can imagine the evidence coming in a particular way. 00:22:36.839 --> 00:22:42.440 It just turns out that this has been studied in great depth, and the evidence, generally speaking, goes the other way. 00:22:42.599 --> 00:22:46.920 Though what I'd like to say is I think a pretty fair assessment of it is something like this. 00:22:46.920 --> 00:23:00.150 When you have, at least among Westerners, really personal and close relationships that are not mediated by money, then bringing money into that relationship often creates estrangement because money is a tool that's used between strangers. 00:23:00.309 --> 00:23:04.789 So for us Westerners, bring, like, if I'm like, hey, Peter, I want to talk to you about a paper I'm writing. 00:23:04.789 --> 00:23:06.230 Could you give me some comments on it? 00:23:06.230 --> 00:23:08.150 What if I give you, like, a hundred bucks to read it? 00:23:08.230 --> 00:23:11.309 He'd be like, that's weird that Brennan's offering me $100 to read this paper. 00:23:11.309 --> 00:23:14.710 I thought we were friends, right? 00:23:11.309 --> 00:23:18.390 So it is true that, like, money has this estrangement communication, like, when you have it in between people who are close. 00:23:18.470 --> 00:23:22.400 But when you take strangers and you introduce money, money has, like, the opposite effect. 00:23:22.400 --> 00:23:25.279 It actually makes people much nicer to each other because money communicates. 00:23:25.440 --> 00:23:28.039 I want to trade with you on mutually beneficial terms. 00:23:28.039 --> 00:23:29.799 I'm taking your interest seriously. 00:23:29.799 --> 00:23:31.680 I'm not trying to use you, Right? 00:23:31.680 --> 00:23:35.599 So I think that's a pretty good summary of, like, the effects that you actually see in the literature. 00:23:35.759 --> 00:23:40.920 But even then, that whole thing about it, communicating estrangement is a thing that's not universal in the world. 00:23:40.920 --> 00:23:45.039 It's special to contemporary Westerners, given their particular view of money. 00:23:45.440 --> 00:23:49.599 But again, it's just like, As a matter of fact, the empirics just don't support the corruption objection. 00:23:49.970 --> 00:23:51.049 You know, you gotta make your argument. 00:23:51.049 --> 00:23:55.329 And they all, like, cite one or two cases that are really ambiguous and they ignore evidence. 00:23:55.329 --> 00:23:55.690 They. 00:23:55.690 --> 00:24:06.049 A particular person we've argued with at great length had an exchange with Herbert Gintis in the Boston Review about this, and Gintis was just like, dude, like, I, I'm the guy who set out to prove that you were right. 00:24:06.049 --> 00:24:06.529 And the. 00:24:06.529 --> 00:24:10.250 I did study after study after study, and they kept coming on the opposite direction. 00:24:10.250 --> 00:24:11.329 So I changed my mind. 00:24:11.809 --> 00:24:15.089 What is your response to all of that? 00:24:11.809 --> 00:24:15.890 And then like, he's just like, I don't know, I guess I'll read the studies. 00:24:15.890 --> 00:24:18.380 And then, like, three weeks later, he goes and gives a talk at Brown and. 00:24:18.529 --> 00:24:20.289 And, like, has no response to it. 00:24:20.289 --> 00:24:24.369 We don't

know if he read the studies and thinks they're bunk or if he just knows his audience doesn't know better. 00:24:24.609 --> 00:24:26.170 So, yeah, of course it could turn out. 00:24:26.170 --> 00:24:27.970 New evidence comes in and we change our minds. 00:24:27.970 --> 00:24:28.970 That happens all the time. 00:24:28.970 --> 00:24:36.930 But I think the, the brunt of the, the weight of the evidence seems to be money creates estrangement between close people and creates closeness and trust between distant people. 00:24:37.569 --> 00:24:38.690 And by the way, just. 00:24:38.690 --> 00:24:42.049 Just as a caveat here, Jay's general point is exactly right. 00:24:42.049 --> 00:24:45.650 But the specific anecdote that he gave is incorrect. 00:24:46.460 --> 00:24:52.059 Because if Jay were to offer me a hundred bucks as between the two of us, it's like, I give Jay the middle finger all the time. 00:24:52.059 --> 00:24:53.859 Jay gives me the middle finger all the time. 00:24:53.859 --> 00:24:56.380 But that's because of our personal history. 00:24:56.380 --> 00:24:57.339 And like the personal. 00:24:57.740 --> 00:25:03.420 Because of this book, we give each other middle fingers, right? 00:24:59.859 --> 00:25:04.220 And it means something different as between the two of us. 00:25:04.299 --> 00:25:06.700 So if Jay were to offer me a hundred bucks to. 00:25:06.779 --> 00:25:07.339 To do. 00:25:07.339 --> 00:25:13.259 To give him comments on a paper that he's writing, I wouldn't see that as estrangement or like, creating distance at all. 00:25:13.259 --> 00:25:15.579 But that's unique as between the two of us. 00:25:15.930 --> 00:25:18.529 It would also be unique as between, like, a couple. 00:25:18.529 --> 00:25:21.569 And both of them are economics PhDs, let's say. 00:25:21.569 --> 00:25:21.930 Right? 00:25:22.250 --> 00:25:31.369 So the general point still stands, though, that, like, in general, money does communicate estrangement, as between people who are close with each other, but communicates something very different as between strangers. 00:25:31.930 --> 00:25:44.250 Peter, to go back to your point about Ganese's explanation on the podcast, I'm not surprised at all, because one of the things that annoys me about the use of that Israeli daycare study is it is in the original paper. 00:25:44.490 --> 00:25:50.490 The original paper has two possible explanations and the authors say they can't differentiate them. 00:25:50.490 --> 00:25:54.329 And one of them is the signaling effect of the money. 00:25:54.490 --> 00:26:04.650 And then in conversation, in communications with others, these come more and more towards, after subsequent studies have sort of confirmed that effect to say, yeah, I suspect that's the driver. 00:26:04.730 --> 00:26:06.809 So it doesn't surprise me. 00:26:07.049 --> 00:26:13.720 And the fact that there's an alternative explanation in the paper that these people never mention is just amazing to me. 00:26:13.960 --> 00:26:15.480 Yep, I

agree. 00:26:16.039 --> 00:26:17.079 That's really interesting. 00:26:17.640 --> 00:26:25.079 All right, so the next couple questions deal with inherent objections to commodification versus, like, incidental objections. 00:26:25.240 --> 00:26:28.039 And I think the next person is Angelica. 00:26:28.200 --> 00:26:29.799 Jay, can I. And Angelica. 00:26:29.799 --> 00:26:30.759 Sorry, can I interrupt? 00:26:30.839 --> 00:26:41.119 Just to make it clear that like, yes, in principle, if people came up with good corruption objections, Jay and I would be like, yes, you've shown us that we are wrong. 00:26:41.279 --> 00:26:43.279 And that's, that's important to emphasize. 00:26:43.279 --> 00:26:45.039 Our thesis is falsifiable. 00:26:45.759 --> 00:26:49.519 It's just that up to this point, I don't think we've seen enough. 00:26:50.400 --> 00:26:51.079 Definitely. 00:26:51.079 --> 00:26:52.480 Yeah, that totally makes sense. 00:26:53.279 --> 00:26:56.720 Yeah. Specifically, I was looking for more clarification, actually. 00:26:56.799 --> 00:27:03.119 So the distinction between inherent and incidental objections seems to do a lot of work in your argument. 00:27:03.609 --> 00:27:23.369 But when I look at how you treat exploitation, misallocation and semiotic Objections In Chapter 3, your examples of exploitation involve power imbalances, your examples of misallocation involve existing inequality, and your rebuttal to the organ sale case turns on a claim that our culture currently disregards the sanctity of life. 00:27:23.690 --> 00:27:28.650 So in each of these cases, background social conditions seem to be doing a lot of the work instead. 00:27:29.220 --> 00:27:35.299 So I guess my question is, is an inherent objection really a different kind of objection than an incidental one? 00:27:35.619 --> 00:27:36.740 Yeah, it's a good question. 00:27:37.059 --> 00:27:43.819 You know, the, the word, like even the word choice can be like misleading in a way because we don't want to say something like inherent objections are more serious than incidental ones. 00:27:43.819 --> 00:27:45.579 Incidental objections could be very, very serious. 00:27:45.579 --> 00:27:47.140 And inherent ones can be very minor. 00:27:47.299 --> 00:27:54.539 But it really just has to do with the idea of the whole knob turning metaphor, you know, so inherent objections are like, it really is the what that's being sold. 00:27:54.539 --> 00:27:55.980 And incidental objections are. 00:27:55.980 --> 00:27:57.299 It's the how it's being sold. 00:27:57.750 --> 00:27:59.910 And what's happened in this literature over and over again is key. 00:27:59.910 --> 00:28:02.230 People are confusing the how with the what. 00:28:02.549 --> 00:28:07.470 You know, like Sandel's, like, if you paid someone to, like, Peter and I actually tried this when we wrote our book. 00:28:07.470 --> 00:28:10.230 We were trying to get people let us like, pay them to like, name Their children. 00:28:10.630 --> 00:28:11.990 No one

would take us up on it. 00:28:11.990 --> 00:28:15.549 You know, like, we'll pay you 500 bucks if you name our your kid either Jason or Peter. 00:28:15.549 --> 00:28:18.910 And no one would do it, right? 00:28:15.549 --> 00:28:18.910 But Sandel is complaining. 00:28:18.910 --> 00:28:22.470 Like, what if somebody takes money and names their kid Pepsi Jones, right? 00:28:22.470 --> 00:28:24.190 Or PepsiCo Jones, I think was his example. 00:28:24.190 --> 00:28:32.420 And we're like, well, you know, are you complaining about the fact that somebody is naming someone for money, or are you complaining about the specific name? 00:28:29.299 --> 00:28:33.259 And it sounds like your objection is the name is humiliating. 00:28:33.339 --> 00:28:34.460 And then you're like, that's true. 00:28:34.460 --> 00:28:37.500 But that means, like, you really shouldn't Name your kid PepsiCo Jones for free either. 00:28:37.500 --> 00:28:38.019 Which I agree. 00:28:38.019 --> 00:28:39.259 I think that would be a stupid name. 00:28:39.740 --> 00:28:41.980 So that's really all the question is. 00:28:41.980 --> 00:28:51.180 We're asking, like, is this something like, you have an objection that this thing cannot be bought and sold any particular way at all, or is your objection to the particular way it's being sold or who's selling it? 00:28:51.680 --> 00:28:53.400 So, for instance, right now, I'm a guitarist. 00:28:53.400 --> 00:28:56.319 I think you probably saw my splash screen, had me playing guitar. 00:28:56.319 --> 00:29:00.240 There's a company called Fender, which is like, the biggest guitar manufacturer on earth. 00:29:00.240 --> 00:29:04.799 And I have, like, for Fender products, like, you know, a couple hundred feet in front of me in my other side of my house. 00:29:04.880 --> 00:29:05.839 Not a couple hundred feet. 00:29:05.839 --> 00:29:06.599 My house isn't that big. 00:29:06.599 --> 00:29:11.680 But anyways, like, right now, Fender has been acting like a total jerk and suing everybody over these really trivial things. 00:29:11.680 --> 00:29:13.440 And people are saying we should boycott Fender. 00:29:13.599 --> 00:29:17.440 So somebody said, like, fender guitars are not the kind of thing that should be bought and sold. 00:29:17.440 --> 00:29:18.240 We go, hold on. 00:29:18.690 --> 00:29:25.529 You're totally fine with buying and selling Stratocasters and Telecasters and, you know, deluxe reverb amplifiers? 00:29:22.329 --> 00:29:26.569 In principle, you're just saying these guys are acting like jerks right now. 00:29:26.569 --> 00:29:27.970 You shouldn't do business with them right now. 00:29:27.970 --> 00:29:30.289 Someone else could make the same product and it would be fine. 00:29:30.289 --> 00:29:32.690 You're not objecting to guitars, per se. 00:29:32.690 --> 00:29:34.690 You're objecting to this particular company. 00:29:34.930 --> 00:29:37.730 And so this is really just a clarifying device to some people. 00:29:37.730 --> 00:29:49.369 Right up front, we're

asking, are you worried about the particular company selling it the particular way they're selling it, or are you really trying to say this is the kind of thing that should not be bought and sold? 00:29:45.690 --> 00:29:49.369 The other people, they started this debate. 00:29:49.369 --> 00:29:50.250 We're coming into it. 00:29:50.250 --> 00:29:51.450 We're the second people to come in. 00:29:51.450 --> 00:29:56.529 Like, they started the debate and they said, no, there are just certain things that should not be bought and sold, period. 00:29:56.529 --> 00:29:59.329 They're not the kind of thing that is permissible to sell. 00:29:59.490 --> 00:30:00.730 And then over and over when you 00:30:00.730 --> 00:30:01.970 go, no, you're just. 00:30:01.970 --> 00:30:06.450 You're just complaining this company sucks, or you're complaining about this particular way of writing the contract. 00:30:06.609 --> 00:30:13.890 And we think with very simple tweaks, maybe with certain simple regulations, you can overcome all your objections to the market and it could be bought and sold. 00:30:14.329 --> 00:30:14.529 Right. 00:30:14.529 --> 00:30:18.490 So you haven't discharged your own argumentative burden, given what you set you. 00:30:18.490 --> 00:30:22.490 The critic said you were trying to do it turns out you didn't actually succeed in that. 00:30:22.490 --> 00:30:29.289 So the inherent, incidental thing is just to give them the categories they need to understand what mistake they're making. 00:30:29.450 --> 00:30:30.569 That's really all it's for. 00:30:31.130 --> 00:30:36.250 Yeah. Part of the mission in our book, too, is to leave a space for business ethics. 00:30:36.569 --> 00:30:43.210 Like, some of these complaints about the sale of things is not like, it's bad to buy and sell this thing in particular. 00:30:43.910 --> 00:30:46.230 Rather, there's, like, ways to do it that are bad. 00:30:46.789 --> 00:30:51.509 And business ethics is, like, about, like, here's a better way to buy and sell stuff. 00:30:51.509 --> 00:30:52.069 Here's. 00:30:52.069 --> 00:30:54.190 Here's a bad way to buy and sell stuff. 00:30:54.190 --> 00:31:01.109 And not all of those things are gonna be captured by the thought that, like, you shouldn't, or you should purchase this thing or another thing. 00:31:01.349 --> 00:31:03.750 Inherent just tells us that, like, it's the market. 00:31:03.750 --> 00:31:11.990 To go back to the analogy that Jay said at the opening of the podcast, consider the example of, like, you wanna write a book about the moral limits of wearing a hat. 00:31:12.410 --> 00:31:18.170 Well, you need to identify the kinds of cases where it's the hat that is the problem and not something else. 00:31:18.410 --> 00:31:20.329 That's all we mean by inherent. 00:31:20.650 --> 00:31:28.569 And in this context, I guess it's worth pointing out a different distinction that we do not make, which is the one between inherent and intrinsic. 00:31:28.569 --> 00:31:28.970 Right. 00:31:28.970 --> 00:31:34.369 So our complaint is like, the way the world is, the way that markets operate, the, you know, the. 00:31:34.369 --> 00:31:38.250 The cultural context within which they operate, that's all inherent to the market. 00:31:38.250 --> 00:31:42.839 But we're not saying that that's true in all possible worlds, which would be intrinsic. 00:31:43.480 --> 00:31:45.240 Thank you so much for that clarification. 00:31:45.559 --> 00:31:46.039 You bet. 00:31:46.039 --> 00:31:47.079 Thanks so much for the question. 00:31:47.559 --> 00:31:47.920 Thanks. 00:31:47.920 --> 00:31:51.240 I'll go ahead and pass it over to Tyler now, who has a question along similar lines. 00:31:51.640 --> 00:31:57.079 Thanks, Joe. I think my question is maybe a more specific case related to Angelica's. 00:31:57.319 --> 00:32:07.480 So you distinguish the wrongness of an activity from the wrongness that's introduced by a market and acknowledge that markets can make some bad actions worse. 00:32:08.109 --> 00:32:22.509 So, for example, in dog breeding, some people object to the actual act of breeding dogs, whether or not money changes hands, citing concerns such as animal welfare and the opportunity cost of breeding new dogs while shelter animals go unadopted. 00:32:22.829 --> 00:32:29.950 But some others object that the profit motive drives overbreeding puppy mills and treating animals as inventory. 00:32:30.430 --> 00:32:34.589 So here the objection locates the wrongness in the market, not in the act itself. 00:32:35.200 --> 00:32:40.480 So how do you separate those objections when the profit motive is what critics say produces the harm? 00:32:41.039 --> 00:32:45.960 Yeah, I think those cases are, in a sense, simpler than people are letting on, because it's true. 00:32:45.960 --> 00:32:54.240 I mean, Peter and I teach classes on business ethics, and we talk at great length about how, you know, giving someone an incentive to do something can lead to bad effects. 00:32:54.319 --> 00:32:56.960 It can do it inside of markets, it can do outside of markets. 00:32:57.039 --> 00:32:58.640 People shouldn't do wrong things. 00:32:58.640 --> 00:33:01.440 And when you reward bad behavior, you tend to get more of it. 00:33:01.930 --> 00:33:02.089 Right. 00:33:02.089 --> 00:33:04.410 And profit is one way of rewarding bad behavior. 00:33:04.650 --> 00:33:08.250 So if it's something that's bad to do, we don't want to reward doing that thing. 00:33:08.250 --> 00:33:13.369 Generally speaking, we can construct thought experiments in which rewarding people for bad behavior leads to less of it. 00:33:13.369 --> 00:33:16.730 And there's some interesting empirical questions about whether that actually obtains in the real world. 00:33:16.730 --> 00:33:20.089 But generally speaking, if something's bad, you don't want to reward people for doing it. 00:33:20.089 --> 00:33:22.329 Money can reward people for doing the bad thing. 00:33:22.490 --> 00:33:23.289 So we completely agree.

00:33:23.289 --> 00:33:32.569 It's like, if this is a bad thing for people to do, like, slavery is a horrible thing, and having markets in slavery makes it worse because now you're industrializing it and making there more of that particular thing. 00:33:32.839 --> 00:33:34.200 Child pornography is a horrible thing. 00:33:34.200 --> 00:33:36.119 Having markets in it leads to there being more of it. 00:33:36.119 --> 00:33:37.000 We shouldn't have it. 00:33:37.240 --> 00:33:41.480 But again, notice that it wasn't like we had this thing that was morally innocuous. 00:33:41.480 --> 00:33:42.559 It was totally fine. 00:33:42.559 --> 00:33:44.960 And then we introduced money, and suddenly it became bad. 00:33:44.960 --> 00:33:48.720 Like, no one says slavery is totally fine as long as it's gift giving. 00:33:48.720 --> 00:33:50.720 Like, if the king gives me a gift of a slave, that's fine. 00:33:50.720 --> 00:33:52.279 If I give you a slave for Christmas, that's fine. 00:33:52.279 --> 00:33:55.079 But if I sell you the slave, that's where evil happened. 00:33:55.640 --> 00:33:57.599 So the people that we're arguing against, they're. 00:33:57.599 --> 00:34:06.009 They're trying to identify cases where you have a morally innocuous activity, and the introduction of money in exchange transforms it from morally innocuous into morally wrong. 00:34:06.490 --> 00:34:11.289 And so one of the reasons why, because we really a good way of putting our book, is we're just like, these people are confused. 00:34:11.449 --> 00:34:13.690 Like, they're always talking about Something else. 00:34:13.769 --> 00:34:16.329 And this kind of objection is to say, you're right. 00:34:16.329 --> 00:34:19.929 Like, of course making profit off of evil is a bad thing. 00:34:20.090 --> 00:34:23.090 Not just because evil is bad, but because making profit off of evil leads to more evil. 00:34:23.090 --> 00:34:24.170 You're absolutely right about that. 00:34:24.329 --> 00:34:28.530 But it wasn't like the money transformed it into something bad that was otherwise good. 00:34:28.530 --> 00:34:33.989 And that's what you, the critic, are trying to talk about when you're saying certain things should not be commodified, period. 00:34:34.630 --> 00:34:38.710 You're, you're trying to talk about cases where money transforms something from innocuous to bad. 00:34:39.750 --> 00:34:40.070 Yeah. 00:34:40.070 --> 00:34:42.550 The point about treating dogs is inventory. 00:34:42.710 --> 00:34:46.030 So we'll agree that that's a bad way to think about dogs. 00:34:46.030 --> 00:34:48.070 That's a bad way to treat the dogs. 00:34:48.550 --> 00:34:49.469 I, I don't know. 00:34:49.469 --> 00:34:52.789 I mean, we have, we have for profit companies that have employees. 00:34:53.030 --> 00:35:02.639 And there's a difference between companies that treat their employees like, I don't know, like robots in a production line or something like that, and companies that treat their employees well. 00:35:02.800 --> 00:35:06.360 And I don't see the difference between that and the case of dog breeding. 00:35:06.360 --> 00:35:15.039 It's not as though the fact that profit is involved or that there's a market or something like that that leads people to treat dogs as inventory. 00:35:15.039 --> 00:35:24.559 You can imagine a dog breeder that got into the business of dog breeding precisely because they love dogs so much and they don't think of them as inventory. 00:35:24.559 --> 00:35:31.760 And they think it would be really nice if more people had more access to more of these companions, more of these, like, friends. 00:35:32.719 --> 00:35:36.800 So I don't think there's anything about markets that make people treat dogs like inventory. 00:35:37.199 --> 00:35:46.800 We should also, like, bear in mind that, like, you know, is it a treatment effect or a selection effect, like, who's going into these industries? 00:35:43.840 --> 00:35:49.920 And maybe, maybe one thing that could be done is, you know, licensing and education or something like that. 00:35:50.239 --> 00:35:55.599 And you do your best to weed out the people who have the wrong attitudes towards stocks that has nothing to do with the market. 00:35:55.599 --> 00:36:00.289 It's just like, some people are nice and they have the right views about how to treat dogs. 00:36:00.289 --> 00:36:04.929 Other people are not nice and they have the wrong attitudes about dogs. 00:36:04.929 --> 00:36:05.250 Right. 00:36:05.250 --> 00:36:14.130 So is there a way to sort of produce a market in dog breeding that results in the good without all of the really nasty bads? 00:36:09.929 --> 00:36:14.530 And I think the answer is clearly, clearly, yes. 00:36:14.530 --> 00:36:25.340 I'd love to see an argument to show that it's not possible to have decent dog breeders, that everyone who gets into the business of dog breeding ends up treating the dogs inventory. 00:36:25.659 --> 00:36:30.539 But, like, I don't Know, that seems to me like a kind of hypothesis that I. I just don't believe. 00:36:31.019 --> 00:36:32.739 Yeah, and I want to add to that too. 00:36:32.739 --> 00:36:35.780 I mean, I haven't researched dog breeding at great length, though I do have a dog. 00:36:35.780 --> 00:36:37.579 I bought it from a breeder for a lot of money. 00:36:37.579 --> 00:36:38.659 I did not rescue a dog. 00:36:38.659 --> 00:36:39.820 I've never rescued a dog. 00:36:39.900 --> 00:36:43.659 But take like, actually, like, the question of, like, what about in people treating people's inventory? 00:36:43.820 --> 00:36:48.860 I used to teach a class on nonprofit management at Georgetown, and there's a surprising literature on. 00:36:49.099 --> 00:36:53.019 Nonprofits have a strong tendency to treat their people worse than for profits. 00:36:53.579 --> 00:36:55.579 They actually exploit the altruistic intention. 00:36:55.579 --> 00:36:59.659 So there's this thing where for profits are very much like, we understand this is an instrumental

relationship. 00:36:59.659 --> 00:37:01.460 We try to make it feel kind of family like. 00:37:01.460 --> 00:37:03.900 But at the end of the day, if we're asking you to do some work, we have to pay you. 00:37:03.980 --> 00:37:12.980 And nonprofits have a tendency to do things like, we're going to underpay you compared to the market and then we're going to overwork you because we have this noble mission. 00:37:12.980 --> 00:37:15.019 Shouldn't you just do more because it's noble? 00:37:15.099 --> 00:37:18.579 And there's this really high rate of like, employee burnout and mistreatment among. 00:37:18.579 --> 00:37:25.460 There's an entire empirical literature on this about employee burnout and mistreatment inside of nonprofits, precisely because the profit motive is not there. 00:37:25.780 --> 00:37:27.420 So that's the interesting thing about money. 00:37:27.420 --> 00:37:30.940 It's like, it's not this univocal thing where it always corrupts, it always makes things better. 00:37:30.940 --> 00:37:32.739 It's really very contextual. 00:37:33.300 --> 00:37:33.820 Thank you. 00:37:33.820 --> 00:37:34.579 Appreciate it. 00:37:34.820 --> 00:37:35.780 Thanks for that answer. 00:37:35.780 --> 00:37:39.699 So now I'm going to turn it over to Liz with a question about unequal access. 00:37:40.579 --> 00:37:42.500 Thanks, Jake. Hi, guys. 00:37:42.820 --> 00:37:48.739 So under your list of objections to commodification in chapter three, you listed misallocation as one. 00:37:49.400 --> 00:37:52.199 I'm interested to know your response to this objection. 00:37:52.199 --> 00:37:58.119 It seems like this kind of objection can be made against many markets, not only taboo ones. 00:37:58.519 --> 00:38:07.880 For example, wealthier parents can buy their children's way into top universities by paying for tutoring and test prep, while lower income families don't have access to this. 00:38:08.280 --> 00:38:14.280 How do you respond to the misallocation objection when it arises in ordinary markets like these? 00:38:14.889 --> 00:38:20.090 Is inequality simply an unfortunate byproduct of markets that we just have to accept? 00:38:21.050 --> 00:38:27.730 I would say, like, you know, the book is separating the issue of the morality of market exchange from the question of distributive justice. 00:38:27.730 --> 00:38:34.570 You'd say like, a good or a service could be sold, even like when the background of distribution of income makes things unfair. 00:38:34.809 --> 00:38:38.250 So there might be questions of like, should the government step in and remedy certain kinds of things? 00:38:38.489 --> 00:38:40.809 Should, like we're basically neutral and all that stuff. 00:38:40.809 --> 00:38:42.090 Like we don't take a stance on it. 00:38:42.760 --> 00:38:45.440 So, you know, I guess that's the best way of putting it. 00:38:45.440 --> 00:38:52.599 It's like there's these interesting questions about like, should there be more egalitarian distribution of income, more egalitarian

distribution of wealth, et cetera, et cetera. 00:38:52.840 --> 00:38:55.800 And our book is kind of like not taking a stance on that. 00:38:56.199 --> 00:38:56.599 No. 00:38:56.679 --> 00:39:05.639 So I guess like, I guess like this is putting like the question of markets allocate by willingness and ability to pay is not the same claim as justice requires us to leave ability to pay unequal. 00:39:05.880 --> 00:39:08.800 You know, and maybe another point is like, you know, poor, like food's a good analogy here. 00:39:08.800 --> 00:39:11.000 Like poor people lack purchasing power. 00:39:11.320 --> 00:39:13.639 We don't infer, therefore food should not be sold. 00:39:13.719 --> 00:39:16.920 We do things like food stamps, public provision of food and so on. 00:39:17.079 --> 00:39:22.679 So I think with many times when people are talking about these problems, it's like, should we have to just fix that problem directly? 00:39:22.679 --> 00:39:25.719 And even then, like take like university admissions. 00:39:25.800 --> 00:39:30.519 Certain universities make a public announcement and they go, we are going to only admit people on the basis of merit. 00:39:30.519 --> 00:39:32.000 And then none of them do that, right? 00:39:32.000 --> 00:39:32.599 They all lie. 00:39:32.599 --> 00:39:41.699 Like every, like, if you, any university you want to go to has in common the fact that its admissions people are liars, like I'm getting in trouble with them and the bioethicist now, then none of them actually stick to that. 00:39:41.699 --> 00:39:50.460 They all like buy and sell admission based upon like prestige networking, you know, how much your, your family has donated to the particular school and so on, right? 00:39:50.619 --> 00:39:57.980 So it's like this university has done something corrupt because you've made an announcement about what your values are and your VI and you violated those values. 00:39:58.059 --> 00:40:01.099 But that doesn't mean even then, like universities couldn't buy and sell access. 00:40:01.099 --> 00:40:04.940 You could imagine a university that's like, we've hired the best teachers in the world. 00:40:05.099 --> 00:40:06.659 We are so confident in our teachers. 00:40:06.659 --> 00:40:12.369 We don't think the quality of the students matters because our teachers are so good, we can take any student and make them brilliant. 00:40:12.449 --> 00:40:16.730 And the way we're going to allocate who gets to go to our school is not merit because we don't need to be selective. 00:40:16.730 --> 00:40:19.730 Like, you know, Harvard's teachers suck, so they have to be selective to help people. 00:40:19.730 --> 00:40:22.369 But where our teachers are good, so we're able to help anyone. 00:40:22.369 --> 00:40:28.050 We're just Going to be, like, the first few people, 50 people who sign up, you know, and they pay, or, you know, we found out there's a massive shortage. 00:40:28.050 --> 00:40:29.409 We can only take, like, a certain number of people. 00:40:29.409 --> 00:40:31.329 So we're going to do it on the basis of willingness to pay. 00:40:31.730 --> 00:40:33.650 I don't think there's anything evil about that. 00:40:33.650 --> 00:40:36.849 So it'd be evil if Harvard did it, because Harvard would be violating its word. 00:40:36.849 --> 00:40:37.969 That's what makes Harvard corrupt. 00:40:37.969 --> 00:40:39.809 They said they weren't going to do it, and they did it anyway. 00:40:39.989 --> 00:40:44.630 But if a company has, like, a different set of values and they're offering on the basis of bidding, that's not a problem. 00:40:44.949 --> 00:40:52.510 So I think sometimes with these things, it's like you're still pointing to the particular organization and saying you should not be allocating things this way given your professed values. 00:40:52.510 --> 00:40:54.150 But that doesn't mean someone else could have a different. 00:40:54.230 --> 00:40:55.469 Couldn't have a different set of values 00:40:55.469 --> 00:40:56.389 and do it a different way. 00:40:56.710 --> 00:40:57.190 Yeah. 00:40:57.349 --> 00:41:06.929 A different way of putting it, too, is that many of the problems that you identify, but correct me if I'm wrong, are problems of, like, unfair access or unequal access to subgood. 00:41:07.480 --> 00:41:10.000 The problem isn't that there's, like, a market in tutoring. 00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:10.840 Like, there's nothing. 00:41:10.920 --> 00:41:14.360 There's nothing the matter with people offering tutoring services. 00:41:14.440 --> 00:41:18.519 Maybe some of you tutor some of your friends or something like that and do it for money. 00:41:18.840 --> 00:41:20.199 There's nothing the matter with that. 00:41:20.199 --> 00:41:22.760 But some people don't have access to that tutoring. 00:41:23.239 --> 00:41:28.840 And then it turns out that they can't get into schools like uva, Right? 00:41:25.559 --> 00:41:28.840 Like prestigious schools like that. 00:41:29.320 --> 00:41:37.760 Well, okay, there's ways to fix unfair access and unequal access that don't involve, like, prohibiting tutoring or, like, private tutoring. 00:41:38.079 --> 00:41:39.199 The way to, like, fix it. 00:41:39.199 --> 00:41:40.239 Jay already said it. 00:41:40.239 --> 00:41:43.119 In the case of food, we go, here's some food stamps, right? 00:41:43.119 --> 00:41:54.000 Like, the problem with the fact that some people can't get access to food isn't that people isn't that there are grocery stores that charge prices for, like, bananas and carrots and cookies or whatever. 00:41:54.079 --> 00:41:54.960 That's not the problem. 00:41:55.280 --> 00:42:01.260 The problem is that some people don't have enough money to be able to access those carrots, bananas, some cookies or whatever, right? 00:42:01.340 --> 00:42:03.420 So the way you fix that is you go, here's some money. 00:42:03.420 --> 00:42:05.579 Now maybe we subsidize people, right? 00:42:05.659 --> 00:42:06.059 We. 00:42:06.139 --> 00:42:07.659 We do it with food

stamps. 00:42:07.900 --> 00:42:10.019 We can do that on the tutoring front, too. 00:42:10.019 --> 00:42:11.820 And many different countries have these things. 00:42:11.820 --> 00:42:12.380 You know, they. 00:42:12.380 --> 00:42:14.300 They still have a market in teachers. 00:42:14.539 --> 00:42:17.219 So like they offer a job and they pay people to do this. 00:42:17.219 --> 00:42:28.639 They have a market in like tuition or whatever, but then they also have, you know, they're like, they subsidize your ability to attend the school when you're, when you're a little kid or when you're even a bigger kid. 00:42:28.639 --> 00:42:29.000 Right. 00:42:29.320 --> 00:42:31.519 It doesn't mean that like we can't have the market. 00:42:31.519 --> 00:42:32.639 There's a better solution. 00:42:32.639 --> 00:42:38.639 If the problem is unequal access or unfair access, then, you know, beef up the welfare side of this. 00:42:38.639 --> 00:42:40.199 Right? 00:42:38.639 --> 00:42:40.199 Beef up the subsidy. 00:42:40.519 --> 00:42:49.159 And it's worth noticing too that if you imagine you magically eliminated these markets, the thing would still happen, the inequality would still happen, but it'd be distributed on the basis of networking. 00:42:49.159 --> 00:42:55.679 Like I happen to have a friend who's a math teacher and I asked them as a friend to like give my kid extra tutoring and they do it as like a favorite. 00:42:55.909 --> 00:42:57.349 You would still have inequality. 00:42:57.750 --> 00:43:04.869 So if you have a really strict egalitarian view, you're going to be complaining about lots of different behaviors and markets will just be one of them. 00:43:05.750 --> 00:43:13.710 I mean, you see those things like there are egalitarians who write honest articles that are like, I'm not sure if I should read to my kids, given my own professed values. 00:43:13.710 --> 00:43:15.190 It's not clear I'm allowed to read to them. 00:43:15.269 --> 00:43:18.909 And then the person I have in question, he was like, I think that's like a reductive of my view. 00:43:18.909 --> 00:43:19.750 It can't be that strong. 00:43:19.829 --> 00:43:20.230 Right? 00:43:20.230 --> 00:43:24.239 But it's again, the market is not introducing badness where there wasn't any. 00:43:24.320 --> 00:43:29.719 From that the point of view of that philosophy, it's just a particular way that the badness of inequality takes place. 00:43:29.719 --> 00:43:35.039 It would also be distributed on the basis of looks, networking, charisma and other stuff that I think is corrupt. 00:43:35.599 --> 00:43:38.159 I just wanted to follow up on Liz's question. 00:43:38.880 --> 00:43:55.340 Do most of the anti commodificationists worry as much about misallocation in non taboo markets as in taboo ones or no? 00:43:47.280 --> 00:43:58.260 And I guess if the answer is no, do they put forward an argument? 00:43:55.340 --> 00:44:10.500 I mean, I know that there are, there are arguments for why misallocation might matter more

in the case of taboo markets, but I'm not sure that all of the anti commodificationists actually carry that burden of making that argument. 00:44:10.500 --> 00:44:13.059 And I can think of some that I think have tried. 00:44:13.699 --> 00:44:14.820 I think that's right. 00:44:14.820 --> 00:44:15.300 Yeah. 00:44:15.789 --> 00:44:33.389 I haven't really done a history of the argument about the moral limits of markets, but I think it's roughly right to Say that a great deal of the focus originally was on taboo markets, on repugnant markets, on things that you can't buy and sell because those things are sacred or special or whatever, et cetera. 00:44:33.630 --> 00:44:41.670 But I think over time, like after Jay and I wrote this book and a few other people, yourself, Al Roth, a couple of others have contributed to this debate. 00:44:41.670 --> 00:44:44.199 I think it's shifting pretty significantly. 00:44:44.199 --> 00:44:47.360 And some of these other issues are taking more of the center stage. 00:44:47.760 --> 00:44:52.639 Something like misallocation of non tabular or non sacred goods or something like that. 00:44:52.960 --> 00:44:53.440 Yeah. 00:44:53.679 --> 00:45:01.679 And the thing that I wanted to add in answer to Liz's question was we should always ask compared to what? 00:44:58.440 --> 00:45:07.000 Because it's not really hard to kind of complain about every institution or every real world thing by comparing it to some ideal, Right. 00:45:07.000 --> 00:45:12.369 Jay has a really nice fallacy name for this, right? 00:45:09.679 --> 00:45:12.369 Let's all let him talk about that in a second. 00:45:12.369 --> 00:45:17.809 But you can't compare the market to some ideal that you've come up with in your head, Right. 00:45:17.809 --> 00:45:23.010 You've got to compare it to the real world kinds of institutions that would be the substitute for the market. 00:45:23.570 --> 00:45:34.849 And as Jay pointed out in his answer to your question, Liz, it's like these other ways of allocating goods, they come with their own special kinds of inequality, like it is. 00:45:35.409 --> 00:45:37.289 Jay pointed to networking as the way. 00:45:37.289 --> 00:45:45.320 You know, I was born in Poland, and in Poland, like you had to be a member of the political party to be able to go to like the special grocery store. 00:45:45.559 --> 00:45:51.480 And if you were like not just a member, but like some important person, whatever, there's like, we just get these. 00:45:51.960 --> 00:45:58.519 In many cases we get this alternative not based on the ability to pay, but based on your ability to network. 00:45:59.159 --> 00:46:06.920 Not based on your ability to pay or your ability to network, but like based on your family history or your family last name or something like that. 00:46:07.320 --> 00:46:09.400 So you substitute like one thing for another. 00:46:09.400 --> 00:46:13.800 So we always have to do this comparison to see whether or not we can get in. 00:46:13.880 --> 00:46:18.199 I guess in this context it would be like an ideally egalitarian society. 00:46:18.440 --> 00:46:21.480 But you've got to look at the real world and do the comparison. 00:46:21.880 --> 00:46:24.679 Jay, I've left the fallacy open to you if you want to discuss it. 00:46:25.079 --> 00:46:33.679 I mean, it's called the Nirvana fallacy, but I just in one book call it the Cohen fallacy to be mean to Jerry Cohen, because he based his career on it accidentally so. 00:46:33.760 --> 00:46:34.880 But we don't need to get into why. 00:46:35.840 --> 00:46:36.280 Thank you. 00:46:36.280 --> 00:46:41.360 I'll go ahead and pass it to Mia, who has a question on discretion and the Importance of that in your argument. 00:46:41.679 --> 00:46:42.280 Hi, y'. 00:46:42.280 --> 00:46:42.480 All. 00:46:42.559 --> 00:46:47.920 Yeah, I was just curious sort about Yalls view on the role that discretion plays in conditional offers. 00:46:48.320 --> 00:46:55.760 So in chapter two, you say that Professor Jaworski can't condition saving the drowning baby on getting paid because saving the baby is obligatory. 00:46:56.079 --> 00:46:58.719 He has no discretion, so there's nothing to sell. 00:46:59.409 --> 00:47:08.769 But suppose a scenario where I do have discretion in this hypothetical, I must rescue one of two people, can save only one, and may otherwise choose either. 00:47:08.849 --> 00:47:12.610 So no one's like my mom or my dad or a drowning baby. 00:47:12.849 --> 00:47:14.889 I'll rescue someone even if nobody pays. 00:47:14.889 --> 00:47:18.809 And accepting an offered reward would cause no delay in that scenario. 00:47:18.809 --> 00:47:22.849 Can payment determine who I rescue? 00:47:18.809 --> 00:47:25.170 What must be within my discretion before I can make a particular action conditional on payment? 00:47:25.960 --> 00:47:27.440 Oh, what a great question, Mia. 00:47:27.440 --> 00:47:28.559 Thank you for that, Jay. 00:47:28.559 --> 00:47:31.079 If you don't mind, I'll say a few words and then you can chime in. 00:47:31.400 --> 00:47:32.920 Just a bit of background on this objection. 00:47:32.920 --> 00:47:33.960 This comes from Mark Wells. 00:47:33.960 --> 00:47:38.719 He wrote this, I think, really great article that showed that our original thesis. 00:47:38.719 --> 00:47:41.320 If you can do it for free, you can do it for money. 00:47:41.559 --> 00:47:46.280 False prey to the set of things that it is obligatory for me to do. 00:47:46.679 --> 00:47:53.019 So if you think of, like, a market as a conditional thing, you know, quid pro quo, I'll do this if you give me that. 00:47:53.420 --> 00:47:56.059 Well, there's a set of things where, like, I gotta do it. 00:47:56.059 --> 00:48:00.219 And so I can't say I won't do it unless you give me this in return, right? 00:48:00.539 --> 00:48:05.099 So the thesis now is like, if you can do it for free and it's within your discretion, right, Then. 00:48:05.099 --> 00:48:06.699 Then you can do it for money.

00:48:06.699 --> 00:48:08.940 And by the way, the set of those things is massive. 00:48:09.019 --> 00:48:14.139 Like, we think that, like, the case of, like, having this kind of obligation is gonna be the rare case. 00:48:14.139 --> 00:48:18.300 And now you're hooking onto that rare case and you've got a really nice. 00:48:18.519 --> 00:48:20.159 This thought experiment here. 00:48:20.159 --> 00:48:22.199 And I guess I. I want to ask you this. 00:48:22.199 --> 00:48:31.800 Like, suppose that you want to be a lifeguard, or you are a lifeguard, you have training or whatever, and you're choosing between two different, like, places to work. 00:48:32.119 --> 00:48:36.679 And at the one place there would be like, these two people or something who you'll save from drowning. 00:48:36.679 --> 00:48:41.360 And at the other place there will be these two other people who you will save by drowning. 00:48:41.360 --> 00:48:43.039 Suppose you know this ahead of time. 00:48:43.039 --> 00:48:50.769 And now it's like, though one place is offering you 15 bucks an hour to work there, the other place is offering you $16 per hour to work there. 00:48:51.250 --> 00:49:00.250 It seems to Me, like, you can be like, I'm going to go work at the place that pays me $16 per hour, but then you'll end up saving those two people rather than these two other people. 00:49:00.250 --> 00:49:00.570 Right. 00:49:00.570 --> 00:49:03.170 And I think that kind of answers your question. 00:49:03.170 --> 00:49:13.519 It seems to me that like as between two people and every consideration has been exhausted for why you should save one rather than the other. 00:49:13.519 --> 00:49:19.480 And it turns out that it's even Steven, then the fact that the one person is like, holds up a dollar. 00:49:19.480 --> 00:49:20.320 That might be. 00:49:20.800 --> 00:49:23.440 Yeah, I think that might be a reason. 00:49:23.840 --> 00:49:30.079 And even then I'd add, like, saying that you can do it for money is not the same thing as saying you can refuse to do it not for money. 00:49:30.480 --> 00:49:30.880 Right. 00:49:31.039 --> 00:49:32.320 So you can still take the payment. 00:49:32.320 --> 00:49:33.639 So. And we do that all the time. 00:49:33.639 --> 00:49:36.840 There are things like, like I got a teaching award at Georgetown. 00:49:36.840 --> 00:49:42.780 And I'm not bragging about that because honestly, I feel like, I feel like I half ass my teaching and other people quarter they're teaching. 00:49:42.780 --> 00:49:44.420 And so I don't think I'm like an exemplar. 00:49:44.420 --> 00:49:47.019 I think I'm falling derelict in my teaching duties. 00:49:47.099 --> 00:49:48.699 And then other people are doing worse. 00:49:48.699 --> 00:49:50.780 And by comparison I get like a stupid award. 00:49:51.019 --> 00:49:57.500 I can just testify from firsthand experience that Peter is not quarter assing or whatever you say. 00:49:57.978 --> 00:49:58.420 That's true. 00:49:58.420 --> 00:49:58.940 No, Peter. 00:49:59.260 --> 00:50:00.539 Peter's a great teacher. 00:50:00.699 --> 00:50:01.460 Yeah, Peter. 00:50:01.460 --> 00:50:02.900 Peter is an exemplary teacher. 00:50:02.900 --> 00:50:03.340 That's right. 00:50:03.340 --> 00:50:04.699 And he should be winning awards too. 00:50:04.699 --> 00:50:06.219 But it's all political bullshit. 00:50:06.219 --> 00:50:06.780 So anyways. 00:50:07.019 --> 00:50:10.860 But nevertheless, they gave me like a $10,000 bonus for this kind of thing. 00:50:11.300 --> 00:50:11.539 Right. 00:50:11.699 --> 00:50:14.340 So I, in a sense, I got paid for doing what I should do. 00:50:14.340 --> 00:50:16.659 Like I should come up with better teaching methods. 00:50:16.659 --> 00:50:21.059 And I got paid extra for doing it as a kind of reward for coming up with something they thought was cool. 00:50:21.380 --> 00:50:30.739 That would be different from me saying, like, I'm not going to bother come up with any good teaching methods unless you pay me even more because maybe I have an obligation to already do that, but I can get a payment after the fact. 00:50:30.900 --> 00:50:39.880 So even with like the case, like, there is this interesting question, like, can you, in that moment, you've got two people and they start bidding on, like, who you save, and then you decide to go with the highest bidder. 00:50:39.880 --> 00:50:43.480 Maybe there's an objection to you deciding on that basis. 00:50:43.800 --> 00:50:52.360 But then after you save somebody, if everyone's like, we're so happy you save people, like, you don't have to pay taxes for the rest of your life and you get free hamburgers at McDonald's whenever you want. 00:50:52.599 --> 00:50:54.920 They are, in a sense, paying you for your good behavior. 00:50:55.079 --> 00:50:56.079 Which behavior? 00:50:56.079 --> 00:50:57.079 That might have been obligatory. 00:50:57.320 --> 00:50:58.320 We do that all the time. 00:50:58.320 --> 00:51:01.079 Like, we actually thank people all the time for obligatory behavior. 00:51:01.239 --> 00:51:02.840 Like, thanks mom for being a good mom. 00:51:02.840 --> 00:51:04.070 Like, you know, we have Mother's Day. 00:51:04.070 --> 00:51:05.590 Even though, like, you're supposed to be a good mother. 00:51:05.590 --> 00:51:05.789 Right. 00:51:05.789 --> 00:51:06.230 We still. 00:51:06.230 --> 00:51:08.269 I still say thank you to my mom on Mother's Day. 00:51:08.429 --> 00:51:10.309 My kids still say thank you to me on Father's Day. 00:51:10.309 --> 00:51:13.389 I still say thank you to my wife on our anniversary and that kind of stuff. 00:51:13.630 --> 00:51:22.909 So you can still structure a payment even though there's a. Which is separate from the question of can you make the choice itself conditional upon the highest bidder. 00:51:23.550 --> 00:51:27.710 Yeah, I have to chime in and just say that Jay does not have ass. 00:51:27.710 --> 00:51:28.429 Is teaching. 00:51:28.840 --> 00:51:33.920 And I think Jay says what he says sometimes for the sake

of the comedy and the humor. 00:51:33.920 --> 00:51:36.519 And I think that was comedic and it was humorous. 00:51:37.000 --> 00:51:47.480 But having seen, like, the amount of thought that Jay puts into even the, like, meta questions about which bucket does this kind of teaching fall into? 00:51:44.878 --> 00:51:47.480 People don't really do that. 00:51:48.039 --> 00:51:52.920 Maybe, maybe because it's easier for Jay to do or think about teaching in those ways. 00:51:52.920 --> 00:51:54.519 He discusses it in that way. 00:51:54.519 --> 00:51:57.679 But, like, there's an enormous amount of work that Jay puts into his teaching. 00:51:57.679 --> 00:52:01.940 He totally deserved the Cross Georgetown University Teaching Award. 00:52:01.940 --> 00:52:04.099 He probably deserves it every other year. 00:52:04.260 --> 00:52:05.699 And he's a terrific teacher. 00:52:06.019 --> 00:52:06.820 Thanks, Peter. 00:52:07.139 --> 00:52:07.780 Thank you, guys. 00:52:07.780 --> 00:52:11.860 I wanted to jump in and ask a follow up question on that because I find it really interesting in the. 00:52:12.340 --> 00:52:13.539 About Jay's teaching. 00:52:13.539 --> 00:52:16.500 A follow up question about how good of a teacher he is. 00:52:16.500 --> 00:52:37.050 Okay. The putting it in terms of the lifeguards is interesting, but going back to Mia's original hypothetical, it seems like if there are two people drowning and somehow they could negotiate a price on who to save, that they would both, given that their life is at stake, they would both offer everything they have, quite literally. 00:52:37.449 --> 00:52:42.889 And so it seems like the only way you would make that decision is based on some background inequality. 00:52:43.530 --> 00:52:49.090 And so that seems to be problematic that the rich person in this scenario would always be the one who is saved. 00:52:49.090 --> 00:52:53.619 Given that you might think life shouldn't be determined on how much wealth you have. 00:52:53.619 --> 00:52:57.099 So does that enter your consideration? 00:52:53.619 --> 00:52:58.739 And how would that affect whether you think a market in this sort of thing could exist? 00:52:59.219 --> 00:53:00.300 I will report that. 00:53:00.300 --> 00:53:02.179 Like, I feel the pressure of this. 00:53:02.260 --> 00:53:02.739 Yeah. 00:53:03.539 --> 00:53:09.820 But we've stipulated that all other considerations have been taken account of. 00:53:09.820 --> 00:53:11.059 There's nothing else. 00:53:11.699 --> 00:53:11.980 Right. 00:53:11.980 --> 00:53:16.019 There's no Other basis for choosing the one person over the other. 00:53:16.570 --> 00:53:28.889 So then what we're comparing the situation to is something like, am I thereby morally obligated to flip a coin and like do it by chance? 00:53:25.050 --> 00:53:30.889 Or can I condition it in this way when it's within my discretion? 00:53:28.889 --> 00:53:30.889 Right. 00:53:30.889 --> 00:53:31.690 So that, that would be. 00:53:31.690 --> 00:53:36.369 And it still seems to me like you're not really obligated to flip a coin. 00:53:36.369 --> 00:53:44.539 In that case, you can then go ahead and use the money as the thing that decides because nothing else, nothing else will help you decide. 00:53:44.699 --> 00:53:45.980 Jay, do you think something different? 00:53:46.380 --> 00:53:51.099 Yeah, I'm thinking about this because I also agree, like it feels weird in the moment to take the bid. 00:53:51.579 --> 00:53:52.940 On the other hand, if there were. 00:53:53.179 --> 00:54:09.179 And it's something else, I think about the difference between the case of you're walking down the street and you see two people drowning versus imagine a company called Save Lives Co or something and they just have boats going around looking for people who are drowning and their aunt's constantly taking bids. 00:54:09.179 --> 00:54:15.170 There's something about having the industrialization of it where you are purposely putting yourself out there and like creating your. 00:54:15.170 --> 00:54:20.130 The fact that you're getting reward is the thing that's like saving lives in mass versus like a one time, one shot thing. 00:54:20.369 --> 00:54:23.610 But then we have all these other cases that are the same thing but are invisible. 00:54:23.610 --> 00:54:25.130 Like Peter brought up the lifeguard case. 00:54:25.130 --> 00:54:27.250 Like the better lifeguards go to places that pay more. 00:54:27.489 --> 00:54:30.530 There's stuff like that right now when I. I'll just use myself. 00:54:30.530 --> 00:54:36.929 When I was 20 and 21, I had a really crappy car that had like a horrible safety rating and went like 0 to 60 eventually. 00:54:37.170 --> 00:54:39.969 And now I have like a car that has a five star safety rating. 00:54:39.969 --> 00:54:46.630 And my kids, like when my son first drove, I got him like a car that was like the highest safety rating car in its like segment and so on. 00:54:46.789 --> 00:54:49.750 So I have access to way more safety now than I did when I was younger. 00:54:49.750 --> 00:54:52.150 Am I more valuable now than I was younger? 00:54:52.630 --> 00:54:53.429 Probably not. 00:54:53.510 --> 00:54:55.230 I just have more money now than I was younger. 00:54:55.230 --> 00:55:02.110 That's the reason why already when you look around the world, safety is allocated on the basis of money, right? 00:55:00.269 --> 00:55:02.110 Where are you? 00:55:02.110 --> 00:55:04.869 Like, I live in a much safer environment now than I did when I was 20. 00:55:05.429 --> 00:55:12.429 Money people, like when I, when I travel, you know, I get like ransom insurance and stuff comes with me and things like that. 00:55:12.429 --> 00:55:13.710 And evacuation insurance. 00:55:13.710 --> 00:55:18.150 Why money? 00:55:13.710 --> 00:55:21.630 So we already are allocating safety and these kinds of considerations in a rather invisible way on the basis of this thing. 00:55:21.869 --> 00:55:23.550 So I would say if you Think that the.

00:55:24.030 --> 00:55:27.630 I'm not sure if this actually works, but I would say like an interesting paper would be something like this. 00:55:27.869 --> 00:55:34.269 If you think it's okay that like rich people get to have five star safety rated cars and poor people can have like a three star car. 00:55:34.349 --> 00:55:38.420 If you think it's okay that like richer people can live in safer neighborhoods than poorer people. 00:55:38.420 --> 00:55:44.539 Well, like, I don't, I don't know if I really think that, by the way, but, but nevertheless, if you think like all these other things are okay, what about this one case? 00:55:44.539 --> 00:55:45.579 When you're making a decision there. 00:55:45.579 --> 00:55:49.780 Is there actually any difference between those cases? 00:55:47.219 --> 00:55:55.460 Because there seems like they're somewhat similar, in which case you'd have the same judgment about each, but then we'd have to make radical revisions about a lot of these things. 00:55:55.539 --> 00:56:01.619 And actually on the crime thing, I, I actually do think, like, the fact that poor people are exposed to more crime than rich people is a problem. 00:56:01.699 --> 00:56:03.300 I don't think it's a problem with the market. 00:56:03.780 --> 00:56:05.059 I think it's a problem with the state. 00:56:05.380 --> 00:56:10.420 Like, I think it genuinely calls into consideration the legitimacy of the state that like, that happens. 00:56:10.420 --> 00:56:12.780 I don't think it's a problem with the fact that people are paying for safety. 00:56:12.780 --> 00:56:14.340 Of course they're going to pay for safety if they can. 00:56:14.500 --> 00:56:16.980 But I think it calls into question, like if the state's doing its job. 00:56:17.380 --> 00:56:19.860 But that doesn't, that doesn't tell us about these other cases. 00:56:20.099 --> 00:56:21.380 So, yeah, it's a good question. 00:56:22.099 --> 00:56:22.900 That's interesting. 00:56:23.380 --> 00:56:28.099 All right, our last two questions deal with real world uncertainty and the role of law. 00:56:28.500 --> 00:56:30.340 So I'm going to turn it over to Virginia. 00:56:31.269 --> 00:56:38.750 Sorry, Virginia, before you start, can we ask both of the questions first and then get your answers? 00:56:35.150 --> 00:56:40.630 So Virginia and then Kate, and then we'll get a response from Peter and Jason. 00:56:41.429 --> 00:56:42.630 Thanks so much for being here. 00:56:42.630 --> 00:56:46.150 I kind of want to ask about what this moral argument leaves for lawmakers. 00:56:46.309 --> 00:57:00.739 You distinguish moral permissibility from legal permission, but the objections that you categorize are often echoed in legalization debates like organ markets and sex work, where the question on the table isn't whether an individual acts wrongly, but whether the state should be permitting the practice at all. 00:57:00.900 --> 00:57:10.260 And even though you favor regulation, considerations that go to whether a rule is administrable or enforceable or even worth writing don't obviously belong in any of the categories that are detailed in the book. 00:57:10.739 --> 00:57:15.500 So once this permissibility question is settled in your favor, what work is left for the state to be doing here? 00:57:15.500 --> 00:57:20.739 And could Those considerations justify legal restrictions that your permissibility argument doesn't settle. 00:57:20.739 --> 00:57:24.429 And in the end, how far should this argument take us in debates about legalization? 00:57:25.389 --> 00:57:30.510 My question goes to a little bit about the practicality and uncertainty with some of these markets. 00:57:30.670 --> 00:57:49.309 So markets exist to induce some sort of action on behalf of its participants, but are there instances in which society is sufficiently uncertain of the potential harms that a market would introduce that we might want to prohibit a market while nonetheless permitting the underlying action as a matter of personal choice? 00:57:46.190 --> 00:57:59.030 For example, we might want to encourage organ donation while also recognizing that organ markets may change what type of person donates, how many people donate, under what conditions, and depending on the market design who receives them. 00:57:59.269 --> 00:58:07.110 Are there instances in which we should proceed with caution and not actively induce the activity without going so far as to prohibit the activity? 00:58:07.909 --> 00:58:10.150 Wow. I'll say a few words, Jay, and then you. 00:58:10.150 --> 00:58:10.710 You respond. 00:58:10.710 --> 00:58:12.469 So to Virginia's question. 00:58:13.030 --> 00:58:17.349 And maybe, actually this partly helps to answer Kate's question too. 00:58:17.880 --> 00:58:19.639 Our book is about permissibility. 00:58:20.039 --> 00:58:21.480 That's essentially what it's about. 00:58:21.880 --> 00:58:28.039 Our book is an effort to put philosophers out of the business of writing about the moral limits of markets. 00:58:28.039 --> 00:58:32.599 Like, we are trying to say, here's what you can do from your armchair, okay? 00:58:30.199 --> 00:58:32.599 Ta da. 00:58:32.599 --> 00:58:33.079 The end. 00:58:33.478 --> 00:58:40.519 Now the remainder of all of this is like, okay, well, we've solved it, right? 00:58:36.280 --> 00:58:40.519 This is all that the philosophers can do. 00:58:40.920 --> 00:58:55.449 Now it's time for social scientists to go out there in the world, find the empirical facts, and discover when in fact we should allow the permissible and when in fact we shouldn't allow what we will grant is permissible. 00:58:55.530 --> 00:58:56.809 Yeah, yeah. 00:58:56.809 --> 00:58:57.769 I think it's a great way to put it. 00:58:57.769 --> 00:59:00.690 It's like, should we allow, like, legalize a market in something? 00:59:00.690 --> 00:59:03.010 You know, I'm very much an experimentalist about these things. 00:59:03.010 --> 00:59:05.369 Like, do something on a small scale, see what happens.

00:59:05.610 --> 00:59:08.570 Scale up if it works, tweak if it doesn't work, or get rid of it. 00:59:08.650 --> 00:59:12.489 You know, so the question of whether something should be legal is different from the question of whether it's permissible. 00:59:12.489 --> 00:59:13.289 Like, you know, I think. 00:59:13.860 --> 00:59:20.340 I think it's probably permissible to have Gen Ed classes, but they probably should be illegal at this point because universities are too corrupt to do it correctly. 00:59:20.340 --> 00:59:21.619 That's a crazy view that I have. 00:59:22.099 --> 00:59:23.099 So, you know, there might be. 00:59:23.099 --> 00:59:24.099 There might be cases like that. 00:59:24.099 --> 00:59:31.219 So the question of, like, the optimal regulation, like, for something has to do with, given the values that are at stake, what sorts of laws would actually. 00:59:31.219 --> 00:59:31.619 What would. 00:59:31.619 --> 00:59:34.900 What laws can we write, how would people actually react to those laws? 00:59:34.900 --> 00:59:43.300 How would they game the system, whether it be rent seeking, would they comply with them or engage in malicious non compliance or gaming or things like that, or avoidance strategies? 00:59:43.849 --> 00:59:50.969 Will the power that we create with the goal of regulating this then be captured by the very people trying to regulate, to use, to fight their competitors and so on? 00:59:51.050 --> 00:59:52.929 These are all really complicated questions. 00:59:52.929 --> 00:59:56.809 And then that gives you an account of like what you think the optimal set of regulations are. 00:59:57.050 --> 01:00:02.650 And so for that reason, there might be cases where you might even have things where it's like, this is not permissible to buy and sell at all. 01:00:02.650 --> 01:00:08.570 It's not going to be permissible to have, but you still let it happen because it turns out attempts to control it or regulate it just utterly fail. 01:00:08.809 --> 01:00:15.070 And there might be cases where things are permissible, but you, you regulate them pretty heavily and there might be cases where it ends up being pretty laissez faire. 01:00:15.619 --> 01:00:18.539 So I think a good lawmaker, what should you do about this? 01:00:18.539 --> 01:00:25.699 Read the book, Understand that a lot of philosophers objections are mistaken, understand that the things that sounded good were actually complaints about something else. 01:00:25.780 --> 01:00:38.099 Pay attention to those other things and then learn good institutional economics and write good law, which is not pretty low bar because most people who are writing law, they don't do that stuff. 01:00:38.099 --> 01:00:40.420 They just do what sounds good rather than what actually works. 01:00:40.420 --> 01:00:46.369 So if you can really focus on the question of which laws work and actually produce the results you want to, then you are already at the top of the game. 01:00:46.929 --> 01:00:53.170 Yeah. And part of what Jay just said is a really clear, I think, a nice answer to your question too, Kate. 01:00:53.570 --> 01:00:57.489 So you already said it, but we can phrase it in the language that you used in your question. 01:00:57.489 --> 01:01:01.010 You asked about like what, what about markets under uncertainty? 01:01:01.170 --> 01:01:04.010 Like we don't know who's going to participate, we don't know what's going to happen. 01:01:04.010 --> 01:01:04.250 Right. 01:01:04.250 --> 01:01:05.409 What do we do in those cases? 01:01:05.809 --> 01:01:14.880 Jay is highlighting or pointing out the fact that there's uncertainty with respect to the rules, the regulations, the laws that we might pass two and we need to give both of those. 01:01:15.119 --> 01:01:20.840 We can't just go, hey, I'm uncertain about what this market will do. 01:01:20.840 --> 01:01:26.440 Therefore we're going to pass some ideal law that's going to result in everything that we want and none of the bad things. 01:01:26.440 --> 01:01:26.719 Right. 01:01:26.719 --> 01:01:28.159 That's not the right comparison. 01:01:28.559 --> 01:01:30.559 We've got uncertainties all over the place. 01:01:30.719 --> 01:01:40.079 There's uncertainties about what will happen with the market, but we also have uncertainties with respect to whatever rules we come up with in order to try to stop the bad and promote the good. 01:01:40.679 --> 01:01:41.159 So that. 01:01:41.159 --> 01:01:47.800 That doesn't answer the question as to whether in some specific instance we should introduce a prohibition, as Jay just said. 01:01:47.800 --> 01:01:48.119 Right. 01:01:48.599 --> 01:01:57.800 But it does highlight the fact that you can't compare markets to some ideal thing you gotta do, you know, second best stuff all over the place. 01:01:57.800 --> 01:02:00.400 You gotta be like, well, we live in a world of second best. 01:02:00.400 --> 01:02:04.519 We don't know the answer and we gotta compare realistic to realistic. 01:02:04.519 --> 01:02:07.039 Yeah, sometimes, by the way, Kate, that's gonna. 01:02:07.039 --> 01:02:08.289 I think that's gonna point to. 01:02:08.519 --> 01:02:12.440 I don't know in which instances, but sometimes I guess, like AI is a really good instance. 01:02:12.440 --> 01:02:14.880 Maybe it will point in the direction of. 01:02:14.880 --> 01:02:17.159 What do they call it, Pacing the frontier or whatever. 01:02:17.159 --> 01:02:17.480 Right. 01:02:17.800 --> 01:02:19.639 Which is in a way a kind of prohibition. 01:02:19.800 --> 01:02:20.199 Right. 01:02:20.519 --> 01:02:31.719 Although, by the way, just as a footnote, the guy in charge of the United States is like, all the companies are like, guys put some handcuffs on us, like to pace the frontier. 01:02:31.960 --> 01:02:35.820 And the guy in charge is like, no double down, no pacing. 01:02:35.820 --> 01:02:38.619 Let's go all the way to the frontier, the whole. 01:02:38.619 --> 01:02:39.420 The whole way. 01:02:39.420 --> 01:02:39.739 Right.

01:02:39.820 --> 01:02:43.179 But at any rate, we've got to compare second best to second best. 01:02:43.179 --> 01:02:45.659 And there's uncertainties on all sides. 01:02:46.059 --> 01:02:46.619 Thank you. 01:02:47.019 --> 01:02:51.900 Even on the point about regulation too, I think, because you brought this up, there's this question about optimal regulation. 01:02:51.900 --> 01:02:59.019 And sometimes it deals with the question about will you actually get the chance to be the one that regulates it? 01:02:56.340 --> 01:03:00.380 You know, so you could have an example of California keeps. 01:03:00.380 --> 01:03:06.679 Companies would rather do business in California and they ratchet up their environmental protection so much that the companies leave and go to China and then have. 01:03:06.679 --> 01:03:08.000 Are subject to much lower things. 01:03:08.000 --> 01:03:09.199 And there's even more pollution. 01:03:09.280 --> 01:03:11.679 The pollution just doesn't happen here, it happens over there. 01:03:11.920 --> 01:03:15.119 So that's like the kind of thing you have to take into consideration when you're thinking about a regulation. 01:03:15.440 --> 01:03:17.119 How will people actually respond? 01:03:17.440 --> 01:03:17.760 Right. 01:03:17.760 --> 01:03:19.119 And then what produces the world that. 01:03:19.119 --> 01:03:24.320 What sets of rules produce the world you want, given how people are, you know, that's the hardest question. 01:03:24.559 --> 01:03:26.400 There's a weird thing I should maybe share on this point. 01:03:26.400 --> 01:03:29.920 Like, philosophers think that ideal theory is where the action is. 01:03:29.920 --> 01:03:36.829 And ideal theory is like arithmetic and non ideal theory about, like making good rules for real people is like multivariable calculus. 01:03:36.829 --> 01:03:39.070 And for some reason in our field that's like less prestigious. 01:03:39.070 --> 01:03:40.469 Even though it's way harder. 01:03:40.550 --> 01:03:41.429 It's not weird. 01:03:41.510 --> 01:03:42.909 But that's just a problem with our field. 01:03:42.909 --> 01:03:44.789 That's not a problem with the thinking. 01:03:45.269 --> 01:03:46.710 Thanks for doing this, you guys. 01:03:46.710 --> 01:03:47.829 This has been a lot of fun. 01:03:48.550 --> 01:03:49.349 Our pleasure. 01:03:49.349 --> 01:03:50.389 Thanks for having me. 01:03:50.710 --> 01:03:53.269 What a set of really great questions too, by the way. 01:03:53.429 --> 01:03:54.869 Yeah, they're really good. 01:03:55.030 --> 01:03:56.349 They're working hard this year. 01:03:56.349 --> 01:03:59.190 Jake, Joe, do you guys want to say any last minute things? 01:04:00.030 --> 01:04:01.230 Thank you guys so much for being on. 01:04:01.230 --> 01:04:04.190 I've learned a lot from you guys on this talk. 01:04:04.190 --> 01:04:09.550 And Professor Brennan, I can say I've learned a lot from your papers on Apistocracy and other contexts. 01:04:09.869 --> 01:04:13.110 And Professor Jaworski, I'm gonna read up on your plasma stuff. 01:04:13.110 --> 01:04:14.190 So thank you guys for being here. 01:04:14.590 --> 01:04:15.668 Yeah, thank you so much. 01:04:15.668 --> 01:04:16.190 Thanks, Jeff. 01:04:16.190 --> 01:04:20.429 Yeah, I need to read up on Professor Brennan's stuff, but I've learned a lot. 01:04:20.429 --> 01:04:21.389 Nah, don't bother. 01:04:21.389 --> 01:04:22.909 Stick with the plasma, Jake. 01:04:22.909 --> 01:04:24.349 Stick with plan asbest. 01:04:24.510 --> 01:04:26.349 Peter will pay you to read his stuff instead of. 01:04:26.820 --> 01:04:27.619 Yeah, that's right. 01:04:29.059 --> 01:04:29.420 Great. 01:04:29.420 --> 01:04:30.420 Thanks a lot, guys. 01:04:31.059 --> 01:04:31.699 Thank you.