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This is the most frustrating kind of article: "I think this thing is bad and will spend several paragraphs explaining why, but will explicitly refuse to tell yo

by blep_ 4y ago

This is the most frustrating kind of article: "I think this thing is bad and will spend several paragraphs explaining why, but will explicitly refuse to tell you what it is." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy > In economics, the lump of labour fallacy is the misconception that there is a fixed amount of work—a lump of labour—to be done within an economy which can be distributed to create more or fewer jobs.

goodSteveramos 4y ago
Economics is a strange field. True statements are “fallacies” and fallacies like the rational actor model are axioms.
- notahacker 4y ago
  Are you seriously arguing the lump of labour fallacy is actually a true statement, and the amount of work to be done in the economy is fixed?
  - marcosdumay 4y ago
    Hum... There is a couple thousands of words article at the top explaining why what you say is meaningless propaganda. But TLDR, only you care about the lump of labor fallacy, the people you are talking with never used it.
    - notahacker 4y ago
      The article contained a couple of thousand words, but neither it, nor Sydney Chapman, nor the person I replied to provided a single actual argument for why the lump of labour fallacy is not a fallacy. The article contains no statements about why the lump of labour fallacy is incorrect, not even any about why it might not be applicable to his proposals, but two statements that readers don't need to know what it is, they should take his word for it that it's bad (hmm... what was that about meaningless propaganda?!) Do you believe the quantity of work that there is to be done in an economy is fixed and the work readily substitutable, so if HN dropped down to 10 hour weeks the result would be unemployed factory workers all finding jobs writing backend code, not less software development work being done (and probably 10 hour work week devs buying less stuff from factories)? Unless you do, the lump of labour fallacy is a fallacy.
      - marcosdumay 4y ago
        Ok, keep beating that strawmen. Just a few more hits and it will be dead for sure.
        notahacker 4y ago
        How sad you also can't explain why the lump of labour fallacy isn't a fallacy. Maybe save the snark until you have at least a high school level understanding of the subject matter?
        marcosdumay 4y ago
        Are you really insisting on somebody explaining how your strawmen isn't alive? Of course it's dead.
        notahacker 4y ago
        I'm quite insistent that the best way to explain why something that economists believe is a fallacy isn't a fallacy is to explain why it isn't fallacy, yes. Sorry kid, you haven't killed a field of economic study by saying "straw man" and "propaganda". The only thing that's dead was my hope that you had enough understanding of the topic to at least attempt adult discussion. I'll leave you to have the last word. It's obvious this matters to you more than understanding.
        marcosdumay 4y ago
        > a field of economic study Oh, sorry. You believe the lump of labor fallacy created a field of economic study?! Really?
        notahacker 4y ago
        Nope. I do recommend reading how the thread started before replying next time. (hint: somebody mentioned the lump of labour fallacy, and somebody else replied by insisting that economics was a strange field full of fallacies that were actually true statements. He didn't offer any arguments for why economists were wrong to think the lump of labour fallacy was a fallacy, but to be fair to him, this might be because he was too bored to participate in debate rather than because he was desperate to continue the argument despite having no clue what he was arguing about...)
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  The rational actor model is not a fallacy, nor is it axiomatic in economics.
- pjscott 4y ago
  The lump-of-labor thing was called a fallacy by someone arguing that the amount of labor to be done in society is not fixed: if you happen to have people with a bunch of time on their hands, they can usually find something useful to do that would not otherwise get done. And as for the rational actor model, everyone knows that it's not true; the reason people use it is that its predictions are often surprisingly close to the truth. ("All models are wrong, but some are useful.")
- SantalBlush 4y ago
  People on HN like to make things up about the field of economics, and then complain as a group about those things they just made up.
notahacker 4y ago
The bit where he references Sydney Chapman's obscure theory as being of critical importance and then doesn't actually tell you what it actually stated is even more annoying. This paper - funnily enough written by the article author - does attempt to tell you what Chapman argued. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1125543#:~:text=Sidney%20Chapman's%20theory%20of%20the%20hours%20of%20labour,,authoritative%20by%20the%20leading%20economists%20of%20the%20day https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1125543#.... Assuming his paraphrase is accurate, Chapman argued that workers would act against their interests by picking higher pay over shorter hours, and employers would respond in kind by poaching employees from rivals by offering higher salaries for longer hours. It's also implied that this is somehow also against the corporation's long term interest but without a proper explanation of why; but perhaps the original writing offered a less muddled concept of the "optimal" amount of working hours (for whom, on what basis?) than the paraphrase. That provides some theoretical justification for state limits on reducing working hours in the interests of preserving employee health, something which happened in many industries a year after Chapman made his argument (a bunch of industries where people worked an average of 57 hours saw a mandatory 48 hour maximum working week; though I suspect arguments that UK mining and manufacturing workers didn't have much choice over schedules was a larger factor in that decision than the assumption they were working those hours out of greed) But I'm not sure this theory which doesn't have a whole lot of empirical support particularly conflicts with what mainstream economists believe[1] or gives us any reason to support the author's contention that the "optimal" maximum working week is 35 hours. [1]few economists will argue for the benefits of a 57 hour work week, and other theories in labour economics acknowledge certain scenarios in which workers will become overly fixated on the size of their pay package over longer term considerations
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  My reading of the article is that there are two main claims in it: 1 - There exists an optimum amount of working hours that maximize the society's wealth. 2 - A competitive labor market will maximize the hours worked, completely ignoring the optimal value. He cites Javon (from the famous "paradox" that the "lump of labor fallacy" fallacy misinterprets) for item 1, but does not supply a reference.

by blep_ 4y ago

goodSteveramos 4y ago

Economics is a strange field. True statements are “fallacies” and fallacies like the rational actor model are axioms.

notahacker 4y ago
Are you seriously arguing the lump of labour fallacy is actually a true statement, and the amount of work to be done in the economy is fixed?
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  Hum... There is a couple thousands of words article at the top explaining why what you say is meaningless propaganda. But TLDR, only you care about the lump of labor fallacy, the people you are talking with never used it.
  - notahacker 4y ago
    The article contained a couple of thousand words, but neither it, nor Sydney Chapman, nor the person I replied to provided a single actual argument for why the lump of labour fallacy is not a fallacy. The article contains no statements about why the lump of labour fallacy is incorrect, not even any about why it might not be applicable to his proposals, but two statements that readers don't need to know what it is, they should take his word for it that it's bad (hmm... what was that about meaningless propaganda?!) Do you believe the quantity of work that there is to be done in an economy is fixed and the work readily substitutable, so if HN dropped down to 10 hour weeks the result would be unemployed factory workers all finding jobs writing backend code, not less software development work being done (and probably 10 hour work week devs buying less stuff from factories)? Unless you do, the lump of labour fallacy is a fallacy.
    - marcosdumay 4y ago
      Ok, keep beating that strawmen. Just a few more hits and it will be dead for sure.
      - notahacker 4y ago
        How sad you also can't explain why the lump of labour fallacy isn't a fallacy. Maybe save the snark until you have at least a high school level understanding of the subject matter?
        marcosdumay 4y ago
        Are you really insisting on somebody explaining how your strawmen isn't alive? Of course it's dead.
        notahacker 4y ago
        I'm quite insistent that the best way to explain why something that economists believe is a fallacy isn't a fallacy is to explain why it isn't fallacy, yes. Sorry kid, you haven't killed a field of economic study by saying "straw man" and "propaganda". The only thing that's dead was my hope that you had enough understanding of the topic to at least attempt adult discussion. I'll leave you to have the last word. It's obvious this matters to you more than understanding.
        marcosdumay 4y ago
        > a field of economic study Oh, sorry. You believe the lump of labor fallacy created a field of economic study?! Really?
        notahacker 4y ago
        Nope. I do recommend reading how the thread started before replying next time. (hint: somebody mentioned the lump of labour fallacy, and somebody else replied by insisting that economics was a strange field full of fallacies that were actually true statements. He didn't offer any arguments for why economists were wrong to think the lump of labour fallacy was a fallacy, but to be fair to him, this might be because he was too bored to participate in debate rather than because he was desperate to continue the argument despite having no clue what he was arguing about...)
dragonwriter 4y ago
The rational actor model is not a fallacy, nor is it axiomatic in economics.
pjscott 4y ago
The lump-of-labor thing was called a fallacy by someone arguing that the amount of labor to be done in society is not fixed: if you happen to have people with a bunch of time on their hands, they can usually find something useful to do that would not otherwise get done. And as for the rational actor model, everyone knows that it's not true; the reason people use it is that its predictions are often surprisingly close to the truth. ("All models are wrong, but some are useful.")
SantalBlush 4y ago
People on HN like to make things up about the field of economics, and then complain as a group about those things they just made up.

notahacker 4y ago

The bit where he references Sydney Chapman's obscure theory as being of critical importance and then doesn't actually tell you what it actually stated is even more annoying. This paper - funnily enough written by the article author - does attempt to tell you what Chapman argued. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1125543#:~:text=Sidney%20Chapman's%20theory%20of%20the%20hours%20of%20labour,,authoritative%20by%20the%20leading%20economists%20of%20the%20day https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1125543#.... Assuming his paraphrase is accurate, Chapman argued that workers would act against their interests by picking higher pay over shorter hours, and employers would respond in kind by poaching employees from rivals by offering higher salaries for longer hours. It's also implied that this is somehow also against the corporation's long term interest but without a proper explanation of why; but perhaps the original writing offered a less muddled concept of the "optimal" amount of working hours (for whom, on what basis?) than the paraphrase. That provides some theoretical justification for state limits on reducing working hours in the interests of preserving employee health, something which happened in many industries a year after Chapman made his argument (a bunch of industries where people worked an average of 57 hours saw a mandatory 48 hour maximum working week; though I suspect arguments that UK mining and manufacturing workers didn't have much choice over schedules was a larger factor in that decision than the assumption they were working those hours out of greed) But I'm not sure this theory which doesn't have a whole lot of empirical support particularly conflicts with what mainstream economists believe[1] or gives us any reason to support the author's contention that the "optimal" maximum working week is 35 hours. [1]few economists will argue for the benefits of a 57 hour work week, and other theories in labour economics acknowledge certain scenarios in which workers will become overly fixated on the size of their pay package over longer term considerations

marcosdumay 4y ago
My reading of the article is that there are two main claims in it: 1 - There exists an optimum amount of working hours that maximize the society's wealth. 2 - A competitive labor market will maximize the hours worked, completely ignoring the optimal value. He cites Javon (from the famous "paradox" that the "lump of labor fallacy" fallacy misinterprets) for item 1, but does not supply a reference.