The present post
continues with commentary on Steve Pinker’s interview concerning his new book
on The Better Angels of Our Nature.
Throughout the
entire interview, I kept thinking of Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s work, especially
chapter 1 of Democracy: The God that Failed – “On Time Preference, Government, and the Process of Decivilization.”
Hoppe and Pinker deal with related topics, though they contradicted or
complimented each other in various ways. As it turns out, both authors cite the
German sociologist Norbert Elias concerning his two volumes on The Civilizing Process – Volume I on The History of Manners and Volume II on State
Formation and Civilization.
In Hoppe’s
treatment, the “process of civilization” is initiated by savings-investment,
which generates a tendency toward a fall in the rate of time preference. His discussion is based on the following:
The saver exchanges
present (consumer) goods for future (capital) goods with the expectation that
these will help produce a larger supply of present goods in the future. If he
expected otherwise he would not save. If these expectations prove correct, and
if everything else
remains the same, the
marginal utility of present goods relative to that of future ones will fall.
His time-preference rate will be lower.
Moreover,
Higher wage rates
imply a rising supply of present goods for previous nonsavers. Thus, even those
individuals who were previously nonsavers will see their personal
time-preference rates fall.
Hoppe provides further reasons relating
to improved health and accumulation of knowledge. Block, Barnett, and Salerno
have criticized Hoppe in their RAE
article “The relationship between wealth orincome and time preference is empirical, not apodictic.” To say the least, I am
skeptical of time-preference theory and, among those in the Austrian School, have views more like those of Jörg Guido Hülsmann.
Hoppe continues by distinguishing
criminal from legitimized violence. Regarding crime, he makes the following observation:
The impact of crime
is twofold. On the one hand, criminal activity reduces the supply of the goods
of the victimized appropriator-producer~exchanger, thereby raising his effective time-preference rate (his time
preference schedule being given). On the other hand, insofar as individuals
perceive a risk of future victimization they will accordingly reallocate their
resources. They will build walls and fences, install locks and alarm systems,
design or buy weapons, and purchase protection and insurance services. The
existence of crime thus implies a setback in the process toward a fall in the
rate of time preference as far its actual victims are concerned, and it leads to
expenditures-by actual and potential
victims-which would be considered wasteful without the existence of crime.
Therefore,
crime or a change in its rate has the same type of effect on time preference as
the occurrence or a changed frequency of "natural" disasters.
Regarding legitimized violence, he says
Because of their
legitimacy, … government violations of property rights affect individual time
preferences systematically differently and much more profoundly than does
crime. Like crime, government interference with private-property rights reduces
someone's supply of present goods and thus raises his effective
time-preference rate. Yet government offenses-unlike crime-simultaneously raise
the time-preference degree
of actual and potential victims because they also imply a reduction in the supply of future
goods (a reduced rate of return on
investment).
To enter a full discussion of where
Hoppe and Pinker disagree would take a long while, let alone where I may
disagree with both authors. I should say that I think increased wealth may
directly contribute to reducing crime, both for reasons described by Hoppe
(investing in defensive goods and services) and for reasons of providing better
incentives to use “economic means” to acquire additional wealth. Regardless, it
is important to understand the internalization of nonviolent behavior, how it
contributes to the extent and intensity of social cooperation, and how it
ultimately contributes to better social outcomes. On that note, one may wish to
read further - see especially the paper by Stringham on economic freedom and homicide.