A Survey on the Importance of Prices

[Colanth]

According to your description, I don't see any between option b and c.

Here's the difference between B and C...

B = The bakery does not have price tags.  You put the baked goods in your basket, have your items scanned for inventory purposes and leave the bakery without paying.  If you valued how the bakery was using society's limited resources, then at anytime you could go to their website, consider the alternative uses of your money (opportunity cost) and make a donation of any amount.  

C = The bakery has price tags.  You look at the prices and consider the alternative uses of your money (opportunity cost).  If you decide the baked goods are worth the money, then you'd put them in your basket, go to the check out and pay for them.

The difference you're missing is that C works in all cases.  Not perfectly, not most efficiently, but well.  (And it's been working for about 4,000 years now.)  B doesn't work with human beings.  Human beings don't think "is the bakery using society's limited resources well?", they think "does the bakery have bread, and can I get enough of it?"  When the bakery fails, because they got no donations, their former customers go to another bakery and repeat the process.  When society fails, and it will under plan B, people will kill each other for the remaining resources.

That's what you Utopian types never consider - how things actually work.  In theory, theory and practice are the same.  In practice, they're not.

[Plu]

Option B is actually being experimented with as we speak on the internet, with things like music and software that are free but accept donations. Unsurpisingly, these people have to rely on the generosity of a handful of people while most of the world just uses their stuff for free.

With internet piracy it's the same thing, except there it's even been done against the owner's will.

Most big companies don't seem interested in the model.

[Bibliofagus]

Glad you recognise that.
There appears to be a gulf between what is best the best value for society, and what is the best value for the individual.
How are you going to solve this?

In order to determine best value...we can either rely on actions...or we can rely on words.  Actions are spending/sacrifice/exchanging/trading.  How much you're personally willing to sacrifice for something reveals how much you value it.  

Words are voting...surveys...hypothetical situations.  People simply tell us what they value.  For example, people say they want a war on drugs and then congress guesses how much people value a war on drugs.  But how accurately can congress guess the true values of millions of unique individuals?  If you want to argue that their guesses are more accurate than our own actions...then there's really no need to allow people to shop for themselves.  In fact, we're destroying value by allowing people to shop for themselves.  Congress should simply decide how much of every single good/service should be supplied.

But the truth of the matter is, congress cannot accurately guess the true values of millions and millions of unique individuals in unique circumstances.  Therefore there's a huge gap between people's true values and the guesses of congress.  The result is that value is destroyed.  We end up with far more drug war and not enough healthcare.  We end up with far more war on terror and not enough education.  

So if we want to know exactly how much society truly values each and every public good...then we should give people the freedom to act.  Taxpayers should have the freedom to shop for themselves in the public sector.  They should have the freedom to decide for themselves how much they are personally willing to sacrifice for the public goods that they want more of.  

First of all: You didn't adress my question. It's about how short term individual value often is at odds with longer term value for society.

Secondly: 'Read my lips: No more taxes'... sound familiar? It's one of Bush jr.'s broken promises. It's what partly cost him re-election.
Now I have no trouble at all to think of a company that made some promises they didn't deliver.... So I'm unclear about the actual difference you refer to. Do you live in a country where advertisements are illegal?

[The Whit]

Glad you recognise that.
There appears to be a gulf between what is best the best value for society, and what is the best value for the individual.
How are you going to solve this?

In order to determine best value...we can either rely on actions...or we can rely on words.  Actions are spending/sacrifice/exchanging/trading.  How much you're personally willing to sacrifice for something reveals how much you value it.  

Words are voting...surveys...hypothetical situations.  People simply tell us what they value.  For example, people say they want a war on drugs and then congress guesses how much people value a war on drugs.  But how accurately can congress guess the true values of millions of unique individuals?  If you want to argue that their guesses are more accurate than our own actions...then there's really no need to allow people to shop for themselves.  In fact, we're destroying value by allowing people to shop for themselves.  Congress should simply decide how much of every single good/service should be supplied.

But the truth of the matter is, congress cannot accurately guess the true values of millions and millions of unique individuals in unique circumstances.  Therefore there's a huge gap between people's true values and the guesses of congress.  The result is that value is destroyed.  We end up with far more drug war and not enough healthcare.  We end up with far more war on terror and not enough education.  

So if we want to know exactly how much society truly values each and every public good...then we should give people the freedom to act.  Taxpayers should have the freedom to shop for themselves in the public sector.  They should have the freedom to decide for themselves how much they are personally willing to sacrifice for the public goods that they want more of.  

First of all: You didn't adress my question. It's about how short term individual value often is at odds with longer term value for society.

Secondly: 'Read my lips: No more taxes'... sound familiar? It's one of Bush jr.'s broken promises. It's what partly cost him re-election.
Now I have no trouble at all to think of a company that made some promises they didn't deliver.... So I'm unclear about the actual difference you refer to. Do you live in a country where advertisements are illegal?

If a society is just a bunch of people living together, how is it against the society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests?

Are you talking about "Dubya's" career as governor of Texas or President?  Because he got re-elected to both.

[Bibliofagus]

Oops. That should be Bush sr.

[The Whit]

You gunna answer my question?

If a society is just a bunch of people living together, how is it against the society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests?

[Colanth]

If a society is just a bunch of people living together, how is it against the society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests?

It's in the best interests of each individual to not waste resources (including money and effort) for someone else's benefit.  It's in the best interest of the society as a whole to spend resources on common goals, including some that won't benefit all the individuals.

[The Whit]

It's in the best interests of each individual to not waste resources (including money and effort) for someone else's benefit.

Really?  That's how you look at it?  Helping other people is "waste"?

[Plu]

If a society is just a bunch of people living together, how is it against the society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests?

Imagine my interest was the torture and slaughter of others in my society. It's not hard to see how it can be against society's interests to let everyone pursue their own.

There's no problems with letting everyone pursue their own interests as long as those interests don't involve interfering with other people trying to do the same. Pretty much all the time, they do, and a bit of regulation is needed to fix that.

[The Whit]

Imagine my interest was the torture and slaughter of others in my society.

Then I'd imagine it would be in my and everyone else's interests to stop you wouldn't it?

[Plu]

And that would then be against my interests again. You asked how it was against society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests. This is why. Some people's interest are in the disruption and destruction of society.

The destruction of society is obviously against the interests of society, but it can easily be a personal interest of any of its members.

[The Whit]

When it's you vs society who do you think is going to win?  When a town hunts you down for murder, what do you do?

[Xerographica]

And that would then be against my interests again. You asked how it was against society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests. This is why. Some people's interest are in the disruption and destruction of society.

The destruction of society is obviously against the interests of society, but it can easily be a personal interest of any of its members.

Therefore, it's in the interests of society to have 100% of our resources allocated to the war on terror?  

What you fail to grasp is that willingness to pay is the only way to gauge the intensity of people's preferences.  Without this information it's impossible to provide the optimal supply of any good/service.

[Plu]

When it's you vs society who do you think is going to win?  When a town hunts you down for murder, what do you do?

I do not understand the relevance of these questions. You asked "how could" and I answered "like this", and now there's all these pointless questions coming like you're somehow trying to make my answer turn out wrong or something.

Personal interest can be against the interest of society. Period. What that means and whether it's a good or a bad thing or what we should do with the knowledge is a different discussion, but that doesn't change the fact that it's true.

[Bibliofagus]

You gunna answer my question?

If a society is just a bunch of people living together, how is it against the society's interests for every individual to pursue their own interests?

If a car is an airplane, how could it not fly?