When I’ve discussed with people on Facebook my view that the lockdowns should end, people often respond that surely we can wait a few more weeks for a haircut. This happens even though I mentioned nothing about others or me wanting a haircut.
The people who make this response would not be contenders for the ideological Turing Test award. They put words in my mouth that I didn’t even say.
But it’s happened so much that it made me realize that if I were teaching again, I would put a little different emphasis on a pillar of economic wisdom that I teach the first day. The pillar is “Both sides gain from exchange.” When I teach it, I tend to emphasize consumers’ gains from exchange rather than producers’ gains. Of course, I mention both, but I emphasize consumers. The reason is that I take it for granted that the vast majority of people already understand that the person selling them something gains from the exchange. The one exception is the example I use of sweat shops, where I focus on the producers’ (the Third World workers’) gains from exchange.
So, for those who have found my Pillars of Economic Wisdom worth teaching, I would recommend that you emphasize consumers and producers. Indeed, I would use the ending of the lockdowns as examples. Many of us recognize that the biggest losses from the lockdowns were not to us as consumers but to the producers. That’s why I gave hunks of money to two local hairdressers whom I didn’t even meet and will probably never get a haircut from.
READER COMMENTS
Jon Murphy
Jun 15 2020 at 8:21pm
Good suggestion. I will do exactly that
Colin McGlynn
Jun 15 2020 at 9:48pm
I’m afraid that you have also failed the Ideological Turing Test. The claim of those that want to continue the lock down is not that you and the businesses that you wish to patronize would not both benefit from the exchange. Rather the claim is that the externalities of that exchange swamp the benefits to both of you.
robc
Jun 16 2020 at 8:19am
Externalities require a 3rd party.
David Henderson
Jun 16 2020 at 8:40am
Actually I didn’t fail the ideological Turing Test because I didn’t enter the contest. The test is about whether one can state the view of the person you’re arguing with so well that someone can’t tell that you disagree with that view.
You’re right about the argument many people make for the lockdowns. I didn’t even address that. I was simply reporting the fact that people misstated my objection to the lockdowns.
Phil H
Jun 16 2020 at 2:47am
I think what people are responding to is the relatively surprising discovery that you can take away *a lot* of the things that people used to do (including haircuts) and life is still… fine.
For me this has been rammed home by the closing of borders. I live in China, and would fly to see family in the UK every year or so. Now I can’t, and indeed, most flights simply aren’t operating. And things are… fine. There are almost zero flights between China and the USA right now, and things are… fine. A lot of the consumption consumption we were doing, and a lot of the behaviours we were engaged in (regular haircuts, sports events, trans-Pacific flights) have proved to be surprisingly foregoable or replaceable.
This is an interesting and comment-worthy phenomenon, hence the specific kind of replies that DH mentions. It makes me as a consumer wonder if I was in fact gaining from those exchanges.
Shane L
Jun 16 2020 at 4:53am
That’s interesting Phil. There was a strange phenomenon in London back in 2014, where a strike halting the underground trains caused commuters to search for other ways to get to work, but about 5% of these changed their commutes permanently. The strike forced them to experiment with buses or other kinds of transport and some found that those other kinds were actually preferable.
Personally, I have been surprised to discover that my beard trimmer does a fine job giving me a short haircut! I gave myself the shortest haircut I’ve ever had, which feels quite nice these summer months. I think I will try this again, even if the barbers open back up. I’ve also discovered interesting places to explore in my neighbourhood as the government briefly prohibited travel for exercise outside a tiny radius – places I will revisit.
Thus, it is remarkable how an interruption to normal life can lead to some benefits, despite the very visible damage.
Mark Z
Jun 16 2020 at 5:47am
Perhaps variation in experience explains some of the variation in attitudes toward public health interventions, since my sentiment is more or less the opposite (seems to be a general theme). I didn’t fully appreciate just how much my life depended coffee shops, bookstores, bars, and restaurants (and publicly accessible restrooms, often necessary for even outdoor activities like walks and bike rides). I would say I in retrospect I underestimated the subjective cost of lockdowns prior to implementation. But then I’m young, so that may be part of the difference as well.
RPLong
Jun 16 2020 at 7:31am
Would I be wrong to guess that you don’t have young children at home?
Pretty much all I do all day is work, exercise, play my guitar, and read EconLog. A lockdown doesn’t adversely impact my life very much. My daughter, though, has had her entire social system destroyed. She loved to go to school, but schools were shut down. She loved to go to her ballet class, but the ballet school was shut down and her Spring recital canceled. She couldn’t go to the zoo, the park, the swimming pool, or even across town to visit her cousins. She’s had to spend weeks playing by herself or relying on her two adult parents to try to give her the kind of social interaction that kids naturally give each other.
We’re not dead, there is food on the table, clothes on our backs, and plenty of Netflix to watch. But a young child needs so much more than that. The mass shutdown of everything has really driven this home for me.
David Henderson
Jun 16 2020 at 8:44am
Well said, RPLong.
Actually, Jonathan Lipow and I address that point in our op/ed in today’s Wall Street Journal.
We write:
Phil H
Jun 16 2020 at 10:52am
You would indeed be wrong.
My kids actually adapted fine – they’re both a bit introverted, like me. And of course, they’ve been back at school for a month now.
RPLong
Jun 16 2020 at 1:17pm
That’s great, I’m so glad they were able to adapt. Interesting that your children are back in school now. It’s still an open question for us whether schools will be open when the Fall semester begins. Being able to go back to school and see other kids would do wonders for my daughter.
Jon Murphy
Jun 16 2020 at 8:07am
You indeed were. Just because you can do away with something and be “fine” does not imply that you were not benefitting from that thing. Life is full of small pleasures. Any given one removed may not have more than a marginal effect on your life, but added together they can; no one raindrop causes a flood.
Economists think on the margin (also one of David’s pillars). From any given change, we make marginal choices. When a change happens, we process that new information and knowledge and make choices on the margin. We cut out what is now less valuable.
On a personal note, just “fine” may be well enough for you. But I am not happy about my life being just “fine.” I want things to be good and to be getting better. My father worked hard so I could lead a life better than just “fine.” And I will do the same for my future children. To me, Hell is not found in the fires below but in making do and muddling through when there’s nowhere else to turn.
robc
Jun 16 2020 at 8:23am
I am nearly 51. This is the first time in my life I have gone 6 months without seeing my parents in person (it will probably be 8, at best, before it happens). It helped that for 38 of those years we lived in the same city. But that wouldn’t have mattered, I would have seen then in April without COVID.
That is not…fine.
Thomas Hutcheson
Jun 16 2020 at 9:59am
Good point and I wish it were made more prominent in, for example, discussion of US trade policy which probably harms poorer foreign producers more than it harms richer US consumers.
But it is important, too, not to overgeneralize. Both producers and consumers benefit from exchanges that produce externalities (exchanges that lead to the net release of CO2 into the atmosphere, for example), but at the margin, not more than others are harmed.
Alan Goldhammer
Jun 16 2020 at 5:05pm
Of course we have been doing this but it’s not going to be enough. Even as our Maryland county is opening up we and a lot of our friends won’t be going out to restaurants any time soon. Movie theaters are out of the question. I see a lot of these places closing by the end of the year as they cannot survive with limited patronage. Performing arts in our area are closed for the remainder of this calendar year and our Vocal Arts DC of which I am a patron has cancelled the entire season. I estimate that probably 1/3 of those with significant disposable income won’t be spending on such activities as they are closed or because of health concerns.
David’s comments are well meaning but unless the public has confidence that public health concerns are being addressed there will just be a lot of “personal lock downs.” We are trying to figure out a safe way to have our west coast daughter come safely back for a visit. It’s not clear to me that this can be done right now. this is where the real sadness is.
Mark Brady
Jun 16 2020 at 8:08pm
David writes, “When I teach it, I tend to emphasize consumers’ gains from exchange rather than producers’ gains. Of course, I mention both, but I emphasize consumers.”
Might one reason for this emphasis derive from the insight that the end of production is consumption?
Comments are closed.