I think status is not always zero sum. It is possible to increase the total pie by raising the overall level of trust / behavior in a society. A society where everyone loves and respects everyone else is a society where everyone is higher status than a society where everyone hates and fears everyone else.
There is an aspect of advertising to enhance brand recognition which is not-quite-zero-sum in this sense. Making consumers more confident in one product does not necessarily make them less confident in others.
The “money is the root of all evil” is a misquote of the Bible verse that used to be translated as “the love of money is the root of all evil.” Modern translations tend to say “the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” Compare, e.g., the KJV vs. the NRSVUE and ESV. You also have to consider the fact that the Bible was written before modern capitalism.
Though you have to consider factory farming and the like. Perhaps the love of money has been good for humans overall.
Desire for more money and love of money are not the same thing. But then the point of the saying becomes too subtle for me. I agree with Huemer that we can name some disgusting examples of crime that are not motivated by love of money even indirectly. So at the very least, the saying seems exaggerated, and more likely just wrong.
Interesting. One initial thought I had is that having lots of money gives one power too. If you have a billion dollars, you have the power to get hundreds of people together working for you building unicycles or whatever you want.
But there is a key difference, in that the unicycle builders would be doing so voluntarily.
Interestingly, though, from the point of the view of the billionaire, his wealth is not necessarily less powerful than, say, being dictator of Lesotho. But from the point of view of the workers, there is a big difference.
In some sense … money is a kind of power that only lets you use “carrots” whereas raw power allows one to use sticks as well
Great piece! I’d like to add one thought: You write: „Plausibly, power-seeking is not just a zero-sum game but a negative-sum game: when one person acquires power over another, the harm to the latter person is greater than the benefit for the former. This is because for each person, the power to control his own life is more important than the power to control others. Thus, when A acquires power over B’s life and B loses power over B’s own life, there is a net loss.“
-„This example of the „negative sum game“ is a welcome enhancement of the categories I‘ve used so far (teaching negotiation). It‘s a negative version of a „asymmetrical value game“ rather than a „negative sum game“ - where both lose (as in a war). So far I only used the positive version of the „asymmetric value game“ - one person has expertise and helps a friend - the friend wins a lot and the cost to the expert is minimal.“
I believe status and power are more nuanced than inherently evil—they're two-sided coins. While the blog post rightly points out the zero-sum aspect of status, where one's gain can feel like another's loss, there’s also a positive-sum side. For example, when I build a successful business, I may raise my status, but not by diminishing anyone else's. The same applies to a scientist who makes a meaningful discovery; their elevated status comes from their contribution.
In his Everything is Bullshit Substack, David Pinsof highlights an interesting paradox: everyone seeks to elevate their status, yet as a society, we tend to scorn status-seeking behavior.
Power, too, isn’t inherently corrupting. It can amplify positive outcomes. A successful entrepreneur may have enough influence to raise funds for a charitable cause or get traction on a new venture that benefits others. In such cases, power becomes a tool for enabling good, not perpetuating harm.
And your new employees gain status by moving from unemployed to employed, or from one job to a better one. Good point. This relates to another commenter's idea distinguishing between voluntary and involuntary contexts for status and power.
Should we agree power is necessarily negative sum? Suppose we face some kind of multiperson coordination game, where transaction costs mean we're very unlikely to hit on one of the good equilibria ourselves. Maybe we're drivers in an area with no established rules of the road. We might want someone to have power over us to establish and enforce some rules (eg, drive on the right side of the road).
I'm not saying in practice power is usually used in these sorts of prosocial ways. I'm just trying to figure out whether you think there's a kind of armchair a priori argument that power is negative sum, or if you think it's contingent on facts about how people tend to use it.
I don't think it undermines your point directly, but the example seems poor. For things like driving on the right, there is a strong tendency for people to do what everyone else is doing, and as long as that is pretty clear there is no problem requiring a powerful individual to intervene. Using a prisoners' dilemma rather than a coordination game might make the point better, but again, ways of avoiding PDs could be imitated instead of enforced. The commenter above makes a point about voluntary economic power, perhaps that is a better approach to illustrate your point.
The example was in my head because I was listening to a podcast about driverless cars today, and the point was made that it would be much harder to deploy them someplace like India, because there are such weak norms of the road that it's just much harder to predict what drivers will do. I'm certainly not wedded to the example, but I mean to imagine a case where things start out pretty chaotic, and there isn't any clear "what everyone else is doing" to imitate.
I'm definitely quibbling here, but aren't there any powerful individuals in India? Either they don’t care about the traffic situation, or it is a stickier problem than the example suggests.
Isn’t money just power through a social entitlement? And how many people really seek out money for its own sake vs. to buy things, have respect/status, and influence?
Another possibility is that power and status are a lot older than money.
Just a few centuries ago, most people were serfs who never held money in their lives. They paid taxes in goods and bartered with their neighbors.
The advent of the mass use of money coincided with the end of the feudalism and the corresponding social changes. So people who disliked that social upheaval might have drawn a connection between the social upheaval and the use of money.
This seems like a valid point but exaggerated. Money trade goes back to Roman Empire times at least, and i doubt it was only the aristocrats who bought things in a market with money. But i know very little about the ancient Roman way of life, maybe everyone in Rome was part of some aristocrat's household, and every transaction was between two aristocrats but carried out by their servants or slaves.
I think status is not always zero sum. It is possible to increase the total pie by raising the overall level of trust / behavior in a society. A society where everyone loves and respects everyone else is a society where everyone is higher status than a society where everyone hates and fears everyone else.
There is an aspect of advertising to enhance brand recognition which is not-quite-zero-sum in this sense. Making consumers more confident in one product does not necessarily make them less confident in others.
Also reputation often conveys useful information. Seeking deserved status is more prosocial than seeking undeserved status.
The “money is the root of all evil” is a misquote of the Bible verse that used to be translated as “the love of money is the root of all evil.” Modern translations tend to say “the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” Compare, e.g., the KJV vs. the NRSVUE and ESV. You also have to consider the fact that the Bible was written before modern capitalism.
Though you have to consider factory farming and the like. Perhaps the love of money has been good for humans overall.
Desire for more money and love of money are not the same thing. But then the point of the saying becomes too subtle for me. I agree with Huemer that we can name some disgusting examples of crime that are not motivated by love of money even indirectly. So at the very least, the saying seems exaggerated, and more likely just wrong.
Interesting. One initial thought I had is that having lots of money gives one power too. If you have a billion dollars, you have the power to get hundreds of people together working for you building unicycles or whatever you want.
But there is a key difference, in that the unicycle builders would be doing so voluntarily.
Interestingly, though, from the point of the view of the billionaire, his wealth is not necessarily less powerful than, say, being dictator of Lesotho. But from the point of view of the workers, there is a big difference.
In some sense … money is a kind of power that only lets you use “carrots” whereas raw power allows one to use sticks as well
Different flavors… economic power vs. political power, power in a voluntary context vs. the alternative. Confirms my bias, anyhow.
Great piece! I’d like to add one thought: You write: „Plausibly, power-seeking is not just a zero-sum game but a negative-sum game: when one person acquires power over another, the harm to the latter person is greater than the benefit for the former. This is because for each person, the power to control his own life is more important than the power to control others. Thus, when A acquires power over B’s life and B loses power over B’s own life, there is a net loss.“
-„This example of the „negative sum game“ is a welcome enhancement of the categories I‘ve used so far (teaching negotiation). It‘s a negative version of a „asymmetrical value game“ rather than a „negative sum game“ - where both lose (as in a war). So far I only used the positive version of the „asymmetric value game“ - one person has expertise and helps a friend - the friend wins a lot and the cost to the expert is minimal.“
I believe status and power are more nuanced than inherently evil—they're two-sided coins. While the blog post rightly points out the zero-sum aspect of status, where one's gain can feel like another's loss, there’s also a positive-sum side. For example, when I build a successful business, I may raise my status, but not by diminishing anyone else's. The same applies to a scientist who makes a meaningful discovery; their elevated status comes from their contribution.
In his Everything is Bullshit Substack, David Pinsof highlights an interesting paradox: everyone seeks to elevate their status, yet as a society, we tend to scorn status-seeking behavior.
Power, too, isn’t inherently corrupting. It can amplify positive outcomes. A successful entrepreneur may have enough influence to raise funds for a charitable cause or get traction on a new venture that benefits others. In such cases, power becomes a tool for enabling good, not perpetuating harm.
And your new employees gain status by moving from unemployed to employed, or from one job to a better one. Good point. This relates to another commenter's idea distinguishing between voluntary and involuntary contexts for status and power.
Should we agree power is necessarily negative sum? Suppose we face some kind of multiperson coordination game, where transaction costs mean we're very unlikely to hit on one of the good equilibria ourselves. Maybe we're drivers in an area with no established rules of the road. We might want someone to have power over us to establish and enforce some rules (eg, drive on the right side of the road).
I'm not saying in practice power is usually used in these sorts of prosocial ways. I'm just trying to figure out whether you think there's a kind of armchair a priori argument that power is negative sum, or if you think it's contingent on facts about how people tend to use it.
I don't think it undermines your point directly, but the example seems poor. For things like driving on the right, there is a strong tendency for people to do what everyone else is doing, and as long as that is pretty clear there is no problem requiring a powerful individual to intervene. Using a prisoners' dilemma rather than a coordination game might make the point better, but again, ways of avoiding PDs could be imitated instead of enforced. The commenter above makes a point about voluntary economic power, perhaps that is a better approach to illustrate your point.
The example was in my head because I was listening to a podcast about driverless cars today, and the point was made that it would be much harder to deploy them someplace like India, because there are such weak norms of the road that it's just much harder to predict what drivers will do. I'm certainly not wedded to the example, but I mean to imagine a case where things start out pretty chaotic, and there isn't any clear "what everyone else is doing" to imitate.
I'm definitely quibbling here, but aren't there any powerful individuals in India? Either they don’t care about the traffic situation, or it is a stickier problem than the example suggests.
Isn’t money just power through a social entitlement? And how many people really seek out money for its own sake vs. to buy things, have respect/status, and influence?
Another possibility is that power and status are a lot older than money.
Just a few centuries ago, most people were serfs who never held money in their lives. They paid taxes in goods and bartered with their neighbors.
The advent of the mass use of money coincided with the end of the feudalism and the corresponding social changes. So people who disliked that social upheaval might have drawn a connection between the social upheaval and the use of money.
This seems like a valid point but exaggerated. Money trade goes back to Roman Empire times at least, and i doubt it was only the aristocrats who bought things in a market with money. But i know very little about the ancient Roman way of life, maybe everyone in Rome was part of some aristocrat's household, and every transaction was between two aristocrats but carried out by their servants or slaves.