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I'd be interested to hear examples of professions where you think we want risk-averse people involved in inherently risky activities without skin in the game. A

by aston 13y ago

I'd be interested to hear examples of professions where you think we want risk-averse people involved in inherently risky activities without skin in the game. Are these activities beneficial to society?

draz 13y ago
Medicine :-)
- phaet0n 13y ago
  Doctors do have "skin in the game". They face rigorous scrutiny for their medical actions.
  - draz 13y ago
    well, sortta, and mostly in the US where malpractice lawsuits are an issue
    - gahahaha 13y ago
      But doesn't doctors insure themselves against such suits, so the end result is just higher prices?
tlb 13y ago
Medicine. Startup founders. Car designers. Airline pilots. Of course, all these guys have some skin in the game now. I'd argue that in all these professions, artificially increasing the penalties for failure wouldn't make the world better.
- zzleeper 13y ago
  No one is advocating for increasing those penalties. Taleb is just stating that there be some penalties, which kinda makes sense: You feel safer if the pilot is in the airplane with you, and has his life at risk as much as yours, than e.g. if he was just remote-controlling the plane from his office
  - nostrademons 13y ago
    OTOH, you feel safer if the 911 dispatcher is sitting in a far-away call-center and not freaking out because she's at the scene with you, and you feel safer if the surgeon is a dispassionate expert at their field and not the patient's mother. You'd feel better being represented by a lawyer who is not on trial with you than one who is. I think a lot of this depends upon whether the task calls for a rational or emotional response. For tasks that require a rational response, having "skin in the game" can cloud your judgment and make you perform worse than if you were a dispassionate observer. For tasks that require an emotional investment, you want the person's risks and incentives to be aligned with yours. (For example, you want a product designer to actually use the products they design, and you want a teacher to care about your kids as much as you care about them.)
    - graeme 13y ago
      You didn't really respond to OP's point. They said some skin in the game is sufficient. A surgeon faces large legal risks for a botched surgery. A lawyer is likewise legally responsible for his actions. Doctors and lawyers are two of the professions with the most skin in the game! I don't know enough about 9/11 dispatchers to say if they face liability.
- aston 13y ago
  Are you willing to make the inverse (and I think more interesting) argument, that reducing their respective skin in the game would indeed make the world better?
  - tlb 13y ago
    Not generally. US society has the penalties for failure tuned about right. Each profession's rules are the result of plenty of public policy debate that's much more nuanced than Taleb's.
    - biehl 13y ago
      How exactly has US society tuned the penalty for pilots that crash (fatally) with their airplanes?
- utopkara 13y ago
  If you're wondering what medicine would become without skin in the game, look no further that chiropractors and the "medical arts clinic"s popping up in every corner.
- ckuehne 13y ago
  I think you are confused what skin in the game means. Pilotes and startup founders are among the professions with most skin in the game. If they crash their plane/company they die/go brankrupt (or at least lose time and money) with it. That pilotes die in case of a plane crash is probably the main reason why air travel is so safe. On the other hand doctors have, compared to their patients, no skin in the game. If the patients health gets worse or the patient dies the doctor stays unharmed. This is partially the reason for overtreatment in medicine (the other one being the asymmetry between the rewards for positive/negative effects of treatment vs. no-treatment.)
  - vinutheraj 13y ago
    > That pilotes die in case of a plane crash is probably the main reason why air travel is so safe. Then what about driving ? By the same logic, car accidents should be much less. Flights are much safer due to the amount of research done in air-travel safety, in general, and also after every accident. And also because in roads you have too many cars interacting together at the same time, where any one person's small mistake can cause an accident, which is not the case with aeroplanes.
    - ckuehne 13y ago
      "Flights are much safer due to the amount of research done in air-travel safety, in general, and also after every accident." Yes, of course. But why? Why is the amount of safety research so much higher after a plane crashes compared to when a patient dies? Why are simple checklists common practice for pilotes but not for doctors even though they could save many lives [1]. As for car travel. It seems to be inherently more dangerous for the reasons you mention. But lets introduce a principal-agent problem [2] for car driving. Assume that for example taxi drivers would steer the vehicle from a save place say as a drone. Would you want to drive with such a taxi? [1] Gigerenzer: Risk Savvy - How to make good decisions. [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal–agent_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal–agent_problem

by aston 13y ago

draz 13y ago

Medicine :-)

phaet0n 13y ago
Doctors do have "skin in the game". They face rigorous scrutiny for their medical actions.
- draz 13y ago
  well, sortta, and mostly in the US where malpractice lawsuits are an issue
  - gahahaha 13y ago
    But doesn't doctors insure themselves against such suits, so the end result is just higher prices?

tlb 13y ago

Medicine. Startup founders. Car designers. Airline pilots. Of course, all these guys have some skin in the game now. I'd argue that in all these professions, artificially increasing the penalties for failure wouldn't make the world better.

zzleeper 13y ago
No one is advocating for increasing those penalties. Taleb is just stating that there be some penalties, which kinda makes sense: You feel safer if the pilot is in the airplane with you, and has his life at risk as much as yours, than e.g. if he was just remote-controlling the plane from his office
- nostrademons 13y ago
  OTOH, you feel safer if the 911 dispatcher is sitting in a far-away call-center and not freaking out because she's at the scene with you, and you feel safer if the surgeon is a dispassionate expert at their field and not the patient's mother. You'd feel better being represented by a lawyer who is not on trial with you than one who is. I think a lot of this depends upon whether the task calls for a rational or emotional response. For tasks that require a rational response, having "skin in the game" can cloud your judgment and make you perform worse than if you were a dispassionate observer. For tasks that require an emotional investment, you want the person's risks and incentives to be aligned with yours. (For example, you want a product designer to actually use the products they design, and you want a teacher to care about your kids as much as you care about them.)
  - graeme 13y ago
    You didn't really respond to OP's point. They said some skin in the game is sufficient. A surgeon faces large legal risks for a botched surgery. A lawyer is likewise legally responsible for his actions. Doctors and lawyers are two of the professions with the most skin in the game! I don't know enough about 9/11 dispatchers to say if they face liability.
aston 13y ago
Are you willing to make the inverse (and I think more interesting) argument, that reducing their respective skin in the game would indeed make the world better?
- tlb 13y ago
  Not generally. US society has the penalties for failure tuned about right. Each profession's rules are the result of plenty of public policy debate that's much more nuanced than Taleb's.
  - biehl 13y ago
    How exactly has US society tuned the penalty for pilots that crash (fatally) with their airplanes?
utopkara 13y ago
If you're wondering what medicine would become without skin in the game, look no further that chiropractors and the "medical arts clinic"s popping up in every corner.
ckuehne 13y ago
I think you are confused what skin in the game means. Pilotes and startup founders are among the professions with most skin in the game. If they crash their plane/company they die/go brankrupt (or at least lose time and money) with it. That pilotes die in case of a plane crash is probably the main reason why air travel is so safe. On the other hand doctors have, compared to their patients, no skin in the game. If the patients health gets worse or the patient dies the doctor stays unharmed. This is partially the reason for overtreatment in medicine (the other one being the asymmetry between the rewards for positive/negative effects of treatment vs. no-treatment.)
- vinutheraj 13y ago
  > That pilotes die in case of a plane crash is probably the main reason why air travel is so safe. Then what about driving ? By the same logic, car accidents should be much less. Flights are much safer due to the amount of research done in air-travel safety, in general, and also after every accident. And also because in roads you have too many cars interacting together at the same time, where any one person's small mistake can cause an accident, which is not the case with aeroplanes.
  - ckuehne 13y ago
    "Flights are much safer due to the amount of research done in air-travel safety, in general, and also after every accident." Yes, of course. But why? Why is the amount of safety research so much higher after a plane crashes compared to when a patient dies? Why are simple checklists common practice for pilotes but not for doctors even though they could save many lives [1]. As for car travel. It seems to be inherently more dangerous for the reasons you mention. But lets introduce a principal-agent problem [2] for car driving. Assume that for example taxi drivers would steer the vehicle from a save place say as a drone. Would you want to drive with such a taxi? [1] Gigerenzer: Risk Savvy - How to make good decisions. [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal–agent_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal–agent_problem