5 ms·

That is the definition of an economy.

by eftychis 4y ago

throwaway290 4y ago
That's a weird definition of economy you have, but you do you.
- stuxnet79 4y ago
  It is hardly a "weird" definition. Economics and "the economy" as a whole fundamentally deal with scarcity. Figuring out the most appropriate use of a good or service given that its scarce and has a multitude of "other" uses is the core problem that capitalism tries to solve.
  - powerapple 4y ago
    That's the definition of value storage. The economy works on greeds, realization of greeds, and creation of new greeds. Scarcity would lead to the greed of owning it.
    - peteradio 4y ago
      Intro economics class our teacher posed a question "Would economics exist if everyone had a magic wand that could get them whatever they wanted?" I said "ya, cause someone would magic other peoples wands away then there would be an economy to restore peoples wands or grant wishes on behalf of people." Apparently that wasn't the answer they were looking for, but he said I might have some point. I think people just like messing with other people and that is inalienable.
      - powerapple 4y ago
        In developed world, we already have all the goods we want and need, we spend a lot money on services. It is kind of like the world your teacher described :)
        throwaway290 4y ago
        Ultimately though resource scarcity and more importantly scarcity mentality is still here.
  - throwaway290 4y ago
    Do you assume scarcity of resources is required for there to be a scarcity of products and especially services? You may still want to have someone cook you dinner without there being a scarcity of food. There is still art and stuff, live performances you may want to see. But no scarcity of resources, no need to fight for survival, the motivation to always optimize for profit at the expense of everything else
imtringued 4y ago
In theoretical microeconomics people's marginal utility per unit of effort is so low at some point that the marginal cost of additional effort exceeds the marginal utility and they stop working. The expectation that every individual is trying to swallow the economy whole is actually impossible and the only reason why any individual would even consider pursuing that path is because for some reason the marginal cost of effort to obtain more utility is zero. In other words there is infinite demand for freebies but not infinite demand for things that require effort. There is no such thing as a cost of zero, someone else will have to pay for it. It turns out the government offers a lot of free services that scale up with how much property you own and other people without property have to pay taxes to pay for those services.

That is the definition of an economy.

throwaway290 4y ago

That's a weird definition of economy you have, but you do you.

stuxnet79 4y ago
It is hardly a "weird" definition. Economics and "the economy" as a whole fundamentally deal with scarcity. Figuring out the most appropriate use of a good or service given that its scarce and has a multitude of "other" uses is the core problem that capitalism tries to solve.
- powerapple 4y ago
  That's the definition of value storage. The economy works on greeds, realization of greeds, and creation of new greeds. Scarcity would lead to the greed of owning it.
  - peteradio 4y ago
    Intro economics class our teacher posed a question "Would economics exist if everyone had a magic wand that could get them whatever they wanted?" I said "ya, cause someone would magic other peoples wands away then there would be an economy to restore peoples wands or grant wishes on behalf of people." Apparently that wasn't the answer they were looking for, but he said I might have some point. I think people just like messing with other people and that is inalienable.
    - powerapple 4y ago
      In developed world, we already have all the goods we want and need, we spend a lot money on services. It is kind of like the world your teacher described :)
      - throwaway290 4y ago
        Ultimately though resource scarcity and more importantly scarcity mentality is still here.
- throwaway290 4y ago
  Do you assume scarcity of resources is required for there to be a scarcity of products and especially services? You may still want to have someone cook you dinner without there being a scarcity of food. There is still art and stuff, live performances you may want to see. But no scarcity of resources, no need to fight for survival, the motivation to always optimize for profit at the expense of everything else

imtringued 4y ago

In theoretical microeconomics people's marginal utility per unit of effort is so low at some point that the marginal cost of additional effort exceeds the marginal utility and they stop working. The expectation that every individual is trying to swallow the economy whole is actually impossible and the only reason why any individual would even consider pursuing that path is because for some reason the marginal cost of effort to obtain more utility is zero. In other words there is infinite demand for freebies but not infinite demand for things that require effort. There is no such thing as a cost of zero, someone else will have to pay for it. It turns out the government offers a lot of free services that scale up with how much property you own and other people without property have to pay taxes to pay for those services.