Wealth for better, wealth for worse

Economist have a knee-jerk appreciation for “wealth creation.” There’s nothing shameful in that, of course, and, for mathematical reasons, it’s really the only way to go. Wealth can be measured, and so can time, so changes in wealth over time can be measured, and, hand-in-glove, results of certain policies (be they political, technological, or whatever) can be assessed.

Of course, here in Saipan we prefer to simply complain and blame everyone (Japan, Korea, Uncle Sam, this airline, that airline, those businesses, these investors…does the list ever end?) for our economic situation, which just goes to show you that legitimate analysis isn’t universally popular. But that doesn’t make legitimate analysis any less legitimate than thinking the earth is flat detracts from the globe’s spherical inclinations.

Our emotional approach to such things is out of synch with the science of economics. But that isn’t to say that a little bit deference to human nature wouldn’t be useful when contemplating the Dismal Science. Which brings me back to the wealth creation angle. Is “more” always “better”?

Economics doesn’t say. “Better” or “worse” is a judgement outside of the strict bounds of the field. Nor does economics say that starving is “bad,” or that jumping off buildings is “stupid.” For most of us, though, we’d be pretty safe saying that, yes, more wealth is good, and, to us, preferable than having less wealth. If this wasn’t the case, we’d give away all our possessions and live like boonie dogs.

But let’s consider this theoretical case: Some television watching cretin buys a newer, bigger, big screen TV, so he can watch his four hour per day average of the boob tube. He’ll be able to vegetate in style, now, maybe with stereophonic noise and all that neat stuff.

To an economist, such a purchase is a wealth creating event. We can all follow that logic. The television store valued the cretin’s money more than it valued the TV, the cretin valued the TV more than he valued the money it takes to buy it, so both parties are “better off” when they trade the TV for the money.

But is the world any better off for it? How about the cretin’s kids, who can’t read or write because dear old Dad is a slack jawed couch potato who never taught them these essentials? How about the nation at large, which has this cretin as a full fledged voter-citizen, with a head jammed full of vulgar nonsense courtesy of the electronic media? Television is family lobotomy, using images instead of knives…so do we consider more of it “better” or “wealth creating”? It has dumbed down the electorate so much that most sensible folks have lost hope, understanding that there’s a solid plurality of fools. Many of the sharper crayons in the box simply have refused the dignify the electoral process at all with their participation. Is that progress?

Wealth, when it’s linked to vulgarity, can be an ugly thing indeed. Yet trade in vulgar goods and vulgar services for vulgar people is counted every bit as much in economics as higher order commerce is.

Which might–just might–explain the antipathy some leftie intellectuals have towards free markets.

Consider this: If you dropped a million dollars into a trailer park, the results would inevitably wind up being offensive–an eyesore of Winnebagos, a cacophony of boom-boxes, and an epidemic of crack abuse.

So it’s not hard to understand why there is a school of thought that wants to keep the unwashed safely at bay, beyond smelling distance. It’s not a big enough issue to stand the ivory tower of economics on its head, but it is probably an element that does sway the tower a bit.