One of the examples that comes up in the Robin Hanson podcast concerns dating. If the point is to signal to the person that you are healthy, wealthy, and intelligent, why not just bring your health records, your bank statement, and your SAT scores?
One hypothesis, which may be implicit in what Robin is saying, is that you would not want to date someone who went for those sorts of signals. Somebody who will hook up with you based on such simple information could just as easily cheat on you or dump you when someone else comes along and provides similar information. We want to go out with people who are “discerning,” which in this context means that they signal a habit of processing other people’s expensive signals. That in turn makes it more likely that they will be loyal, which is a quality that Robin thinks we often need to signal.
So you have what I might call co-operative signaling. You signal to me that you are looking for “deep” signs of my health, intelligence, or whatever. I take that as a signal that you are into long-term relationships. So I then go through the rituals of dating and signaling.
The issue is whether one can tell this story in the job market. If you are an employer who gives an intelligence test rather than looking for a Harvard degree, you may very well hire more efficiently. But to me as a potential employee, that means that you might replace me quickly and easily with someone else who does well on the intelligence test. Instead, if you require an expensive signal, that might make me confident that you are more loyal. So the co-operative signaling arrangement is that you signal that you make long-term investments in employees by using a Harvard degree as a hiring criterion rather than intelligence test, and I in turn signal by getting a Harvard degree.
This model explains why an expensive signal (the Harvard degree) persists in a world where cheaper signals are available. Employers who use cheap signals are (perceived to be) less likely to be loyal to employees, so they lose the opportunity to hire employees who value loyalty.
By the way, I am not such a fan of the signaling story, so I may not necessarily be putting it in the best light.
UPDATE: In a comment, Robin Hanson points out that this story will not work unless the “good” firms have some comparative advantage in using the signal. To make it work, I could posit the following:1. One firm, call it McKinsey, is a desirable employer because it adds a lot to the worker’s human capital.
2. The Harvard MBA is a noisy signal, and McKinsey, with its Harvard MBA’s on staff, is best able to tell the good Harvard MBA’s from the bad. (this is the crucial step for addressing Robin’s comment.)
3. While an intelligence test is more cost-effective a signal than a Harvard MBA, the combination of McKinsey’s inside knowledge and the Harvard MBA is more cost-effective than the test.
4. Workers are not sure whether they are top quality or not by McKinsey’s standards. They have a probability p of being top quality, but they have to graduate Harvard (or come close to graduating) before learning whether they measure up. (I think I need this step. Otherwise, inferior students would never try for a Harvard MBA, and the signal would not be noisy.)
In equilibrium, the top quality workers go to Harvard and on to McKinsey. Lesser-quality workers try Harvard and fail to measure up, or else they go straight to inferior firms. The inferior firms never get to see any of the top quality workers.
READER COMMENTS
Dan
May 26 2008 at 8:18pm
What would you propose as a model for this behavior?
aaron
May 27 2008 at 6:18am
I just opened a book that I bought a couple of years call The Origin of Mind. I only got as far as the introduction and overview, but realized why I bought it. It looks very promising and looks like it has some very interesting thought on how we select mates.
Robin Hanson
May 27 2008 at 7:48am
I don’t see this story working. You need it to be easier for the long term types to look at the Harvard degree vs. the IQ test, but that doesn’t seem to be.
On dating the sheer time spent dating could be more of a signal of long-term interests. The analogy for jobs would be a long interview process.
Someone from the otherside
May 27 2008 at 9:26am
I don’t buy your McK/Harvard MBA story and I do have recent first hand experience with the situation at hand (however I’m not a MBA but have an MA in Econ).
Now, all consultancies pride themselves on being able to sort the wheat from the chaff so that point may be valid. The way they do it is however not entirely what you imply. In fact, some use written aptitude tests which you may subsume under IQ tests, even (think of it as revolving around judgement in situations with incomplete information. If you want details, google it, there are some of them to be found).
But the MBA degree measures something else. Mainly the ability to persist doing something (stressful maybe) which cannot be measured in an interview or IQ test. So in order to make a successful decision you actually need BOTH signals.
So far I would follow. But I really don’t buy the end. The lesser firms getting none of the good applicats would imply that top notch companies are top notch by all metrics (or that there is just one metric the MBAs are judging by) which likely is not the case. Secondly, since people can’t be sure that they will make it into the top company, they will apply at a number of different companies. At this point, the lesser companies may still be able to offer them a better package (higher salary, more vacation, what have you).
Mr. Econotarian
May 27 2008 at 3:12pm
“If the point is to signal to the person that you are healthy, wealthy, and intelligent, why not just bring your health records, your bank statement, and your SAT scores?”
Because bringing those to the date would signal that you are not socially well-adjusted 🙂 Thus, the use of “inferior” signaling techniques.
At the same time, I have met some women who wouldn’t mind looking at your bank statement on a date…
Chuck
May 27 2008 at 4:19pm
Humans are primates, and we don’t socialize and mate like robots, we socialize and mate like primates.
Dan Weber
May 27 2008 at 4:58pm
we socialize and mate like primates.
Ah, college!
Heather
May 27 2008 at 6:25pm
The major problem with this signaling model is that it tries to simplify things too far. When you are looking for an employee, their way of thinking about a problem, the way they interact with others, their work ethic, their tolerance for difficult situations, as well as their intelligence and their trustworthiness are all important considerations. Personality and interpersonal communication are incredibly difficult to quantify, but they are critical in many areas of employment, necessitating more information than just an IQ test or the college degree.
These same issues also apply to dating. When I am looking for a partner, the most important things are common values and complimentary personality type, making the suggested material irrelevant.
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