{"id":25397,"date":"2014-05-02T14:56:29","date_gmt":"2014-05-02T18:56:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=25397"},"modified":"2021-05-27T09:17:21","modified_gmt":"2021-05-27T13:17:21","slug":"pc-credentials-as-a-positional-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2014\/05\/02\/pc-credentials-as-a-positional-good\/","title":{"rendered":"PC “credentials” as a “positional good”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kristian Niemietz<\/a> agrees with much of the pro-free speech coverage in sp!ked<\/em>, but suggests that the real reason for politically correct attitudes are not quite as presented:<\/p>\n

Over the past few years, spiked online<\/em> magazine has consistently and robustly defended the principle of free speech against the censorship demands of the politically correct, whatever quarter they may come from. It is great, of course, that there is at least one magazine in which the phrase \u2018I believe in free speech<\/em>\u2019 is unlikely to be followed by a \u2018but<\/em>\u2026\u2019, and more likely to be followed by an \u2018even for<\/em>\u2026\u2019. But while I fully support the spiked<\/em> line, I also think the spiked authors sometimes misinterpret the intentions of the \u2018PC brigade\u2019, and would like to offer an alternative interpretation rooted in boring, old-fashioned textbook economics.<\/p>\n

Spiked<\/em> authors believe that PC is driven by a loathing for ordinary people. According to spiked, PC brigadiers view ordinary folks as extremely impressionable, easily excitable, and full of latent resentment. Exposure to the wrong opinions, even isolated words, could immediately awaken the lynch mob. PC, then, is about protecting \u2018the vulnerable\u2019 from the nasty tendencies of the majority population.<\/p>\n

But if PC was not really about protecting anyone, and really all about expressing one\u2019s own moral superiority, PC credentials would be akin to what economists call a \u2018positional good\u2019.<\/p>\n

A positional good is a good that people acquire to signalise where they stand in a social hierarchy; it is acquired in order to set oneself apart from others. Positional goods therefore have a peculiar property: the utility their consumers derive from them is inversely related to the number of people who can access them.<\/p>\n

Positionality is not a property of the good itself, it is a matter of the consumer\u2019s motivations. I may buy an exquisite variety of wine because I genuinely enjoy the taste, or acquire a degree from a reputable university because I genuinely appreciate what that university has to offer. But my motivation could also be to set myself apart from others, to present myself as more sophisticated or smarter. From merely observing that I consume the product, you could not tell my motivation. But you could tell it by observing how I respond once other people start drinking the same wine, or attending the same university.<\/p>\n

If I value those goods for their intrinsic qualities, their increasing popularity will not trouble me at all. After all, the enjoyment derived from wine or learning is not fixed, so your enjoyment does not subtract from my enjoyment. I may even invite others to join me \u2013 we can all<\/em> have more of it.<\/p>\n

But if you see me moaning that the winemakers\/the university have \u2018sold out\u2019, if you see me whinging about those ignoramuses who do not deserve the product because they (unlike me, of course) do not really appreciate it, you can safely conclude that for me, this good is a positional good. (Or was<\/em>, before everybody else discovered it.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kristian Niemietz agrees with much of the pro-free speech coverage in sp!ked, but suggests that the real reason for politically correct attitudes are not quite as presented: Over the past few years, spiked online magazine has consistently and robustly defended the principle of free speech against the censorship demands of the politically correct, whatever quarter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35193,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,28,131],"tags":[1420,351,1236,907,764],"class_list":["post-25397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","category-media","category-wine","tag-classism","tag-politicalcorrectness","tag-positionalgoods","tag-snobbery","tag-university"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/favicon.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-6BD","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25397"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25397\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66005,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25397\/revisions\/66005"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}