To say the least, the test of the hypothesis highlighted in
the article
is contrived and unconvincing. The point is well taken,
viz, markets
diminish moral capacity, but if someone classifies a mouse
as
equivalent to vermin, as many people do, absolutely nothing
has been demonstrated except that some people don't think
mice are anything but needless pests in the grand scheme
of things.
What would be interesting is a social science study carried
out by
actual social scientists --rather than by sob-sister
Lefties pretending
to be social scientists. There are plenty of human examples
from the
market of unethical values and conduct to use as evidence.
Names
like Madoff, Ichann, and Kenneth Lay come to mind.
Besides, who designed a "morally neutral" experiment which
necessarily
resulted in the deaths of X number of mice that otherwise
could have
been saved ? It would have cost nothing, or very little,
to have
saved the mice that ended up being killed. Unless, like the
"immoral"
subjects in the experiment, the experimenters themselves
actually
regard mice as vermin or pests, in any case, not worth
much.
Full disclosure: Personally I don't really care what
happens to mice.
I would not pay one dime to save a mouse; what for ? But
it is
very possible to strongly object to hypocrisy and bad
"science."
I thought very highly of Science 2.0 until reading this
nonsense.
Whomever gave this story publication approval should be
ashamed
of themselves.
My humble opinion
Billy
----------------------------------------------------
Science 2.0
Capitalism Kills Morality - And So
Does Socialism, Say Economists
By News Account
Created May 10 2013 - 1:32pm
Do you support unions, a minimum
wage, dislike business and hate child labor and then tell
all of your friends on your iPhone?
People rationalize moral standards when it comes to their
own lives, say economists writing in Science. It's
easy to lament child labor and exploitation of the work
force but if you are not willing to pay $2,000 for a phone,
you are part of the problem and Tweeting about social issues
on that phone helps precisely no one but corporate
shareholders.
Markets are not about social justice, note Professors Armin
Falk from the University of Bonn and Nora Szech from the
University of Bamberg, and so markets reduce moral concerns.
They have found that, in comparison to non-market decisions,
moral standards are significantly lower if people
participate in markets. You're not more ethical if you buy
one product, you are slightly less ethical if you buy
anything at all.
"Our results show that market
participants violate their own moral standards," says Falk.
In different experiments, several hundred people were
confronted with the moral decision between receiving a
monetary amount and killing a mouse versus saving the life
of a mouse and foregoing the monetary amount. In other
words, they could kill a mouse or get paid.
The economists ironically invoke some moral superiority in
their market choice to use the mice at all. The animals
involved in the study were "surplus mice" raised in
laboratories - outside Germany, no German mice were harmed,
they want us to know. Since the mice were no longer needed
for research purposes, they would all have been killed.
Hundreds of young mice that would otherwise all have died
were saved, they note, which has to make 100 million dead
laboratory mice per year a little jealous. If a person
decided to save a mouse, the experimenters bought the animal
to keep it in the lab.
"To study immoral outcomes, we
studied whether people are willing to harm a third party in
exchange to receiving money. Harming others in an
intentional and unjustified way is typically considered
unethical," says Falk.
And a lot of people were.
Simple bilateral markets
affect moral decisions
A subgroup of people decided between
life and money in a non-market decision context (the
individual condition). This condition allowed for eliciting
moral standards held by individuals and was compared to two
market conditions in which either only one buyer and one
seller (bilateral market) or a larger number of buyers and
sellers (multilateral market) could trade with each other.
If a market offer was accepted a trade was completed,
resulting in the death of a mouse.
Compared to the individual condition, a significantly higher
number of subjects were willing to accept the killing of a
mouse in both market conditions.
Conclusion: markets result in an erosion of moral values.
"In markets, people face several mechanisms that may lower
their feelings of guilt and responsibility," explains Szech.
In market situations, people focus on competition and
profits rather than on moral concerns. Guilt can be shared
with other traders. In addition, people see that others
violate moral norms as well.
"If I don't buy or sell,
someone else will."
In addition, in markets with many
buyers and sellers, subjects may justify their behavior by
stressing that their impact on outcomes is negligible. "This
logic is a general characteristic of markets," says Falk.
Excuses or justifications appeal to the saying, "If I don't
buy or sell now, someone else will."
For morally neutral goods, however, such effects are of
minor importance. Szech notes "For goods without moral
relevance, differences in decisions between the individual
and the market conditions are small. The reason is simply
that in such cases the need to share guilt or excuse
behavior is absent."
Citation: Armin Falk and Nora Szech, 'Morals and Markets', Science
10 May 2013
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