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A comment on The Economics of Status (2006). Parent comment

Re:The Economics of Status (2006) by omalleyt on Monday March 06, 2017 @05:47AM (#13801853)
The idea of non-zero-sum games is that a regulator interested in public welfare would still let the two people you described play that "game," and then would be able to tax and redistribute in such a way that both "players" are still better off for having played.

With zero-sum games the habitual loser would eventually wise up and wish to stop playing

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Re:The Economics of Status (2006) by popra on Monday March 06, 2017 @05:56AM (#13801889)
Not sure I understand your point, in a zero-sum game the third party could still do some redistribution to keep the habitual loser "in the game"

Update: scratch the above, you're right. But in my experience the ones arguing that we're in a non zero-sum game also argue against redistribution.

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