The phenomenon of the op is still at least related to the tragedy of the commons since they both involve a glib suggestion of personal change to a larger problem, and the solutions are both unrealistic but for different ways.
Not quite. What I was trying to say is that it is not only about individual action.
Even if every individual was conscientiously reducing CO2 in their personal life, you’d still have a big problem if national energy policy was entirely to burn fossil fuels, permit (even subsidize) industrial processes and forms of transport with the largest carbon footprint, and do nothing to support energy efficiency.
I would call it the scalability problem.
It sounds a lot like “oh, you want the government to have more revenue? Then you should pay more taxes and leave us alone, problem solved.”
It’s in the same school, though a slightly different branch, to claiming that climate change isn’t real because John Kerry flew on a private plane.
It seems worth throwing this in:
[Edited to add: Sorry this wasn’t supposed to be a reply to Cheesesteak in particular. Is there any way to keep a reply while altering who it is a reply to?]
It is not a Tragedy of the Commons. The defining and pernicious aspect of a Tragedy of the Commons is where an action by an individual improves their situation but worsens the situation overall, such that selfish actions send the situation into a downward spiral for all.
The OP example does not have this characteristic. An individual getting a better job so they can afford to see a Dr does not diminish the position overall. If anything the opposite.
But the opposite position of TotC is that if you make an effort to conserve resources or minimize consumption, then someone else will just consume it to their benefit and your detriment. If you decide to have 10 less goats grazing on the common pasture, then Bob can add 10 goats and things are just as bad - your self-sacrifice does not improve anything.
Similarly, if you take a job with medical coverage, and the number such jobs are limited - then the next person looking for a job will get one without coverage. If you decide to buy an electric vehicle, then unless oil production goes down, that means Bob can drive to the store or the beach more often.
Worse than that, TotC says that if you don’t hurry up and take everything, someone else will, so the economic incentive is to take everything, now, instead of planning for tomorrow. If you leave a few fish or deer or geese to breed for next season, then Bob can get more by taking the ones you left behind. It’s the same with OPEC or other cartels. They all agree to a certain price and production level, but the one who cheats comes out ahead by selling more, at the expense of the ones who stick to the bargain. If too many cheat, then the higher price that was agreed on, no longer holds.
It’s a Zero Sun Game in the short run for these situations if the pool of resources - pasture, oil price/production, number of jobs - is effectively constant. In the short run, all are. What happens will over time change the pool. If nobody wants to jobs that don’t provide health insurance, over time some employers will add insurance to their benefits. If people are desperate for any job, over time some employers will cut benefits to cut costs. As long as people buy their oil, producers will not reduce production unless they have to and carbon emmissions will stay constant. As long as there’s free grass out there, people adjust to maximize their goatage.
This reminds me when there is a concert and they advertize that there are few tickets left, so be quick to get yours!
Jobs that provide health insurance in this example aren’t a fixed resource, they’re a matter of policy and culture. Other places work differently and show there’s no specific shared resource that is being depleted. It’s a touch more complex than that as medical resources are not infinite, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t a tragedy of the commons problem. Jobs with insurance isn’t like fish or oil, we can create more by policy, and one person having one isn’t taking one away from someone else. And as much as our system may resemble that, changing that policy is what’s under discussion in that example.
On a pedantic note, the author who popularized the idea of the “tragedy of the commons,” Garrett Hardin, was mistaken in his conception. Historically, “the commons” was carefully and collectively regulated and managed by the participants and producers who shared the commons. What Hardin was talking about was open, unregulated access to a resource. We might consider Indian/First Nations buffalo hunts as an example of the commons and the slaughter of the buffalo nearly to extinction by white hunters as an example. The Newfoundland fishery is another example: the inshore fishery was regulated by families and communities, and was destroyed by large fishers with no connection to the community.
From Wikipedia, “tragedy of the commons,” Political scientist Elinor Ostrom, who was awarded 2009’s Nobel Memorial Prize for her work on the issue, and others revisited Hardin’s work in 1999. They found the tragedy of the commons not as prevalent or as difficult to solve as Hardin maintained, since locals have often come up with solutions to the commons problem themselves
The best example of the concept of tragedy of the commons I saw a mention of was the 1800’s whaling industry. There were a certain number of whales, the demand for their oil was high, They were being taken faster than they replaced themselves. They were being chased by mutiple countries, so there was no concerted effort or economic reason not to hunt them to extinction. The rule of thumb was “if you don’t, someone else will.” So get all that you possibly can as fast as you can, devil take the hindmost, and there’s nothing you can do about the future.
This is opposite to my point. Over the long term, policy, economic climate, demand, etc. may change the number of jobs with health insurance (or the proportion). In the short run, things don’t change enough to make a difference. there’s a fixed number of jobs with and without health care. Each job you take is one less for someone else. Over the long term, then yes, things may change enough to be statistically significant.
Even if it is possible (and even commonplace) to put in place the co-operation and control necessary to avoid a TotC, that does not invalidate the concept. To say otherwise is rather like saying falling from heights is not a problem because you can put a safety barrier in the way. The steps required to avoid the problem validate the idea it was a problem.
This isn’t the oppsite of a TotC, it is an example of a TotC.
You miss the point. The defining characteristic of a TotC situation is that the Commons has a level of production that is sustainable but that level of production will reduce overall if an individual takes an amount that puts the total take from the Commons over what is sustainable. Your example does not involve this. A person taking a job with medical coverage does not reduce the overall number of jobs with medical coverage. That is why the OP situation is not a TotC.
You seem to be confusing a far more simple principle - namely that if I take something you can’t have it - with a TotC. Yes, it is true that if I take something from the Commons you can’t have it. But that is not the defining characteristic of a TotC, which is about effects on overall production.
If there is a piece of cheese and you take it I can’t have it. This is not a TotC because even if we agreed to share the cheese moderately, it would not produce more cheese.
Well of course, I was just pointing out the view from the opposite side. You said “The defining and pernicious aspect of a Tragedy of the Commons is where an action by an individual improves their situation…” Then the opposite side of that is the action by an individual to try to mitigate the tragedy, who only hurts themselves and benefits others without fixing the problem. Yes, still TotC.
Yes, that’s why I originally said it was more like a Zero-Sum Game. If I take a job with benefits, then it’s not available to you. If I win then you lose. The proportion such jobs may change in the longer term, but not appreciably in the short term absent significant social change, irrelevant to my action.
But yes, the resource (total number of jobs) does not erode due to someone taking a job. It simply is not available. So yes, technically not TotC.
This may be a matter of definition, terminology, and history, and again, my point was in regard to Hardin’s original article that popularized the idea of the tragedy of the commons. In his use, and that of many others, the “tragedy” is held to be a consequence of human nature, and that is demonstrably untrue.
I vaguely recall I saw TotC first discussed in an article in Scientific American(?) which mentioned that some south Sahara area countries could get a better estimate of their rural population from satellite images, by measuring what area/distance around each village the goats or cattle had grazed away the grass cover. Also that livestock was the specific measure of wealth, so unlike perhaps other areas of the world, locals were far more reluctant to cut back on their personal herd.