Re:Against Overuse of the Gini Coefficient
by imtringued on Friday July 30, 2021 @07:21AM
(#28006760)
>While zero-sum games are rare in economics, this is a (sub-)zero-sum game.
A lot of the positive sum games only reward society collectively if it is cooperative and punishes society if it is competitive.
Pretty much every time there is a balance A = B people in a competitive society will try to increase A without increasing B because that is where they derive their individual benefit. Subsequently someone else will have to decrease their A because B stayed the same and A = B is always true for the entire economy therefore A must stay the same and we get a zero sum game that didn't have to be one. This generally happens when A is considered good and B is considered bad by society.
Here are some examples: income = spending, savings = investments, deposits = debts, produced goods = consumed goods, benefit of externality = cost of externality
Just try to convince people that both A and B are equally important. You'll fail every single time.
A lot of the positive sum games only reward society collectively if it is cooperative and punishes society if it is competitive.
Pretty much every time there is a balance A = B people in a competitive society will try to increase A without increasing B because that is where they derive their individual benefit. Subsequently someone else will have to decrease their A because B stayed the same and A = B is always true for the entire economy therefore A must stay the same and we get a zero sum game that didn't have to be one. This generally happens when A is considered good and B is considered bad by society.
Here are some examples: income = spending, savings = investments, deposits = debts, produced goods = consumed goods, benefit of externality = cost of externality
Just try to convince people that both A and B are equally important. You'll fail every single time.