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Yep, this is what is known as a Collective Action Problem (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_action_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_acti

Yep, this is what is known as a Collective Action Problem (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_action_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collective_action_problem): even if every individual would prefer if all businesses behaved ethically, the rational decision for each individual is to behave unethically. This is why I get frustrated with people who say we should influence businesses with our wallet, by choosing not to shop at stores who behave badly. However, my individual buying choice won't make any difference; for example, if I hate Walmart, my only two choices are to not shop there and not get the benefit of the cheaper prices, but still have Walmart around doing bad things, or I can shop there and get the better prices, and Walmart is still around doing bad things. My individual choice does not change whether Walmart is around or not, but it DOES have a big effect on how much money I save. There is no rational reason to pay more when there is no benefit. My individual spending is not even a blip on their bottom line. Of course, I would be willing to pay more if it meant the type of abuses that Walmart does would stop, but that is not the choice I am given.

scottLobster 4y ago
Yeah, it's also why I stopped feeling guilty about driving a ICE car and not choosing the more expensive renewable supplier option on my power bill. At the end of the day I'm not so rich that I can afford to make inefficient sacrifices. My kids' college funds still need filling, sourcing my power from coal/natural gas means thousands of dollars in those funds over the years that wouldn't otherwise be there. Or I can make a negligible dent in global carbon emissions and my kids can take on thousands extra in student loans. I'm happy to do my part when we're all (or at least most of us) playing the same game, but I have too many people directly relying on me to be an ineffective martyr. Back in 2016 I read a "human interest" story about some janitor who saved his pennies for months, keeping track with an excel spreadsheet, so he could make a multi-hundred dollar donation to Hillary Clinton's campaign. The article was clearly trying to frame this as some noble sacrifice from someone who doesn't have much to begin with, I just saw a poor person getting fleeced by an aristocrat, and she lost anyway.
- godelski 4y ago
  I think something difficult about this is that a big component depends on how much we weigh future outcomes. Obviously too much future weight is not good because we do a lot of harm now ("for the greater good" utilitarian philosophy has done extraordinary damage to our world) but also hyper focusing on the now too does substantial harm (existential threats like climate change can be traced to these effects). It also depends how we weigh collective actions vs individual. I do not think there is a correct answer here, at least one we can measure or define in a meaningful way, despite how much passion we have for certain views. But I also agree with your main message, that it is hard to encourage collective action if we are not willing to first go after the main contributors to the problem. Individuals who contribute to the problem several magnitudes above the median individual (e.g. independently, Gates and Musk both produced more emissions than the median American, in a single week, purely do to their aviation admissions). We get mad at those who are above the law, and it is unsurprising that we would be mad at those who are above our moral codes. How can we have collective action while we let hundreds or thousands of people like this persist in their actions?
  - Robotbeat 4y ago
    This sounds incredibly nihilistic. I don’t think it’s helpful to eschew personal action with the idea that we have to do collective action for any of it to matter. Personal action is contagious and helps create the impetus for collective action. Heck, democracy as an institution relies on individuals making small actions (votes) that make no difference individually but collectively determine who runs the city, state, and country. So this is ultimately a sort of nihilistic argument, maybe a sort of rationale for not taking action.
    - godelski 4y ago
      It's not nihilistic nor defeatist. It is saying that the playing field can't be this uneven and expect collective action. Which means there is a clear solution. Ensuring that no one is above the collective moral code.
godelski 4y ago
> This is why I get frustrated with people who say we should influence businesses with our wallet, by choosing not to shop at stores who behave badly. The reason I get upset with this is because the world is so complicated that it is really difficult to determine if something is ethical or not. Or rather, which options are the most ethical (the world is so complex that nothing is completely ethical, so I think we should make an analogy to harm reduction. There will almost always be harm and if we seek zero harm through purity testing, we give advantage to those that do the most harm). While I agree that we should vote with our wallets to put pressure on the market, it is clearly not enough. It never will be enough because we can't peer behind the curtain and no one really knows how to make a pencil[0]. If no one knows how to make a pencil, then it follows that no one knows if pencil making is ethical to begin with, let alone pencil usage. I think what we must do instead is be willing to have these complex and nuanced conversations without religious vigor and instead make sure our passion to advocate for or against a system is proportionate to the time we are willing to put in to learning about the complexities of said system. [0] https://fee.org/resources/i-pencil/ https://fee.org/resources/i-pencil/
AlbertCory 4y ago
> Of course, I would be willing to pay more if it meant the type of abuses that Walmart does would stop, but that is not the choice I am given. Are there no small, family-run businesses you could patronize, since you said you're willing to pay more?
- cortesoft 4y ago
  You are missing the point... if I shop at a small, more expensive, family run shop, it means I spend more on my shopping and Walmart still exists with all the problems that entails. Me choosing to shop somewhere else is not even a rounding error in Walmarts profits. My choice will not bring about any change, but it will hurt me. I said I was willing to make the sacrifice IF IT MEANT WALMART WASN'T AROUND ANY MORE. I am not willing to make the sacrifice if it doesn't do any good.
  - AlbertCory 4y ago
    I'm not missing any point, but you're missing one: I'm pointing out that you don't rule the world, and Walmart will exist whatever you do. Some people seem to like it. Your only other option is to lobby publicly for the changes you favor.
    - cortesoft 4y ago
      You are still missing my point. I know very well that Walmart will exist no matter where I shop; that is exactly my point. My individual decision will not change anything in regards to Walmarts existence or actions. My only choice is whether I get to enjoy the cheap prices Walmart offers; you say "some people seem to like it", and I am clearly agreeing... everyone likes cheaper prices! I hate the way Walmart treats its workers, but I love the cheap prices... so I either shop there and get the cheap prices or I pay more to shop somewhere else, but either way the workers are going to be treated the same way. Given that, why wouldn't I choose to shop there? If they are going to be abusing their workers no matter what I do, I might as well at least get cheap prices. And that is why "the free market" will never stop the types of abuses that Walmart commits. Your last sentence is EXACTLY WHAT I AM ARGUING FOR. I am saying if we want to change Walmarts behavior, we can ONLY do it through legislation; we can't "vote with our wallet" and expect Walmart to change its behavior. We have to vote with our actual vote. My argument is with people who think we shouldn't regulate businesses because we can use our wallet to change them; I am saying we can't use our wallet for all the reasons I laid out.

scottLobster 4y ago

Yeah, it's also why I stopped feeling guilty about driving a ICE car and not choosing the more expensive renewable supplier option on my power bill. At the end of the day I'm not so rich that I can afford to make inefficient sacrifices. My kids' college funds still need filling, sourcing my power from coal/natural gas means thousands of dollars in those funds over the years that wouldn't otherwise be there. Or I can make a negligible dent in global carbon emissions and my kids can take on thousands extra in student loans. I'm happy to do my part when we're all (or at least most of us) playing the same game, but I have too many people directly relying on me to be an ineffective martyr. Back in 2016 I read a "human interest" story about some janitor who saved his pennies for months, keeping track with an excel spreadsheet, so he could make a multi-hundred dollar donation to Hillary Clinton's campaign. The article was clearly trying to frame this as some noble sacrifice from someone who doesn't have much to begin with, I just saw a poor person getting fleeced by an aristocrat, and she lost anyway.

godelski 4y ago
I think something difficult about this is that a big component depends on how much we weigh future outcomes. Obviously too much future weight is not good because we do a lot of harm now ("for the greater good" utilitarian philosophy has done extraordinary damage to our world) but also hyper focusing on the now too does substantial harm (existential threats like climate change can be traced to these effects). It also depends how we weigh collective actions vs individual. I do not think there is a correct answer here, at least one we can measure or define in a meaningful way, despite how much passion we have for certain views. But I also agree with your main message, that it is hard to encourage collective action if we are not willing to first go after the main contributors to the problem. Individuals who contribute to the problem several magnitudes above the median individual (e.g. independently, Gates and Musk both produced more emissions than the median American, in a single week, purely do to their aviation admissions). We get mad at those who are above the law, and it is unsurprising that we would be mad at those who are above our moral codes. How can we have collective action while we let hundreds or thousands of people like this persist in their actions?
- Robotbeat 4y ago
  This sounds incredibly nihilistic. I don’t think it’s helpful to eschew personal action with the idea that we have to do collective action for any of it to matter. Personal action is contagious and helps create the impetus for collective action. Heck, democracy as an institution relies on individuals making small actions (votes) that make no difference individually but collectively determine who runs the city, state, and country. So this is ultimately a sort of nihilistic argument, maybe a sort of rationale for not taking action.
  - godelski 4y ago
    It's not nihilistic nor defeatist. It is saying that the playing field can't be this uneven and expect collective action. Which means there is a clear solution. Ensuring that no one is above the collective moral code.

godelski 4y ago

> This is why I get frustrated with people who say we should influence businesses with our wallet, by choosing not to shop at stores who behave badly. The reason I get upset with this is because the world is so complicated that it is really difficult to determine if something is ethical or not. Or rather, which options are the most ethical (the world is so complex that nothing is completely ethical, so I think we should make an analogy to harm reduction. There will almost always be harm and if we seek zero harm through purity testing, we give advantage to those that do the most harm). While I agree that we should vote with our wallets to put pressure on the market, it is clearly not enough. It never will be enough because we can't peer behind the curtain and no one really knows how to make a pencil[0]. If no one knows how to make a pencil, then it follows that no one knows if pencil making is ethical to begin with, let alone pencil usage. I think what we must do instead is be willing to have these complex and nuanced conversations without religious vigor and instead make sure our passion to advocate for or against a system is proportionate to the time we are willing to put in to learning about the complexities of said system. [0] https://fee.org/resources/i-pencil/ https://fee.org/resources/i-pencil/

AlbertCory 4y ago

> Of course, I would be willing to pay more if it meant the type of abuses that Walmart does would stop, but that is not the choice I am given. Are there no small, family-run businesses you could patronize, since you said you're willing to pay more?

cortesoft 4y ago
You are missing the point... if I shop at a small, more expensive, family run shop, it means I spend more on my shopping and Walmart still exists with all the problems that entails. Me choosing to shop somewhere else is not even a rounding error in Walmarts profits. My choice will not bring about any change, but it will hurt me. I said I was willing to make the sacrifice IF IT MEANT WALMART WASN'T AROUND ANY MORE. I am not willing to make the sacrifice if it doesn't do any good.
- AlbertCory 4y ago
  I'm not missing any point, but you're missing one: I'm pointing out that you don't rule the world, and Walmart will exist whatever you do. Some people seem to like it. Your only other option is to lobby publicly for the changes you favor.
  - cortesoft 4y ago
    You are still missing my point. I know very well that Walmart will exist no matter where I shop; that is exactly my point. My individual decision will not change anything in regards to Walmarts existence or actions. My only choice is whether I get to enjoy the cheap prices Walmart offers; you say "some people seem to like it", and I am clearly agreeing... everyone likes cheaper prices! I hate the way Walmart treats its workers, but I love the cheap prices... so I either shop there and get the cheap prices or I pay more to shop somewhere else, but either way the workers are going to be treated the same way. Given that, why wouldn't I choose to shop there? If they are going to be abusing their workers no matter what I do, I might as well at least get cheap prices. And that is why "the free market" will never stop the types of abuses that Walmart commits. Your last sentence is EXACTLY WHAT I AM ARGUING FOR. I am saying if we want to change Walmarts behavior, we can ONLY do it through legislation; we can't "vote with our wallet" and expect Walmart to change its behavior. We have to vote with our actual vote. My argument is with people who think we shouldn't regulate businesses because we can use our wallet to change them; I am saying we can't use our wallet for all the reasons I laid out.