Stigler's reading is almost a complete inversion of what Mill is saying in the text from which Stigler quotes, and Stigler must surely have known that. Mill's point is that once population increase slows, then there is no point in struggling for wealth for its own sake. Rather what is needed is better distribution of wealth.
"I cannot, therefore, regard the stationary state of capital and wealth [low or zero economic growth] with the unaffected aversion so generally manifested towards it by political economists of the old school. I am inclined to believe that it would be, on the whole, a very considerable improvement on our present condition. I confess I am not charmed with the ideal of life held out by those who think that the normal state of human beings is that of struggling to get on; that the trampling, crushing, elbowing, and treading on each other's heels, which form the existing type of social life, are the most desirable lot of human kind, or anything but the disagreeable symptoms of one of the phases of industrial progress...…. it is not a kind of social perfection which philanthropists to come will feel any very eager desire to assist in realizing... the best state for human nature is that in which, while no one is poor, no one desires to be richer, nor has any reason to fear being thrust back by the efforts of others to push themselves forward."
Mill is here foreshadowing Keynes in Prospects for our Grandchildren and Weber also. Once we have escaped the Malthusian trap -- around 1880's when productivity grows faster than fertility, while fertility begins its long decline (hitting the replacement level when Keynes is writing) -- then growth is not so important. The protestant work ethic ceases to be a necessity, and simply becomes a iron cage that prevents us from leading happy, fulfilled lives. Stigler seems to arguing the very opposite: that Mill thinks we should pretend as if we are still living in the Malthusian era because, because it is good for our character.
Reading this, it struck me that a bunch of people are left out of consideration: Women, Children, The Sick, The mentally incompetent and the old. I hear a subtle voice saying Fuck Them All.
The Nazis had a solution for some of these folks. Women stayed home to breed more future soldiers and breeders. The mentally incompetent were euthanized. As for the sick, weren't some euthanized as they were incurable and a drain on the state?
For Stigler, and company, Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" is a tragedy. I simply cannot fathom people like that. What sort of trauma misshaped their mental processes to such a degree?
Where did the Donner Party come from? Deep and abiding ignorance of what they were attempting. No idea that they had better get their ass in gear and not bring an 80 year old with them who died on the trip and they spent several precious days burying and then being stupid and taking a short cut which added a week to their journey to the lake. William Bennett taking stupidity for heroism.
We have a cabin at Donner and have met a descendent of a survivor. She donated a doll carried by that survivor to the Sutter's Fort exhibit.
It was Holbo's piece that convinced me that the Internet could be a far better place than the New York Review of Books--just as smart and not at all ossified. Thanks for bringing back the memories.
Stigler's reading is almost a complete inversion of what Mill is saying in the text from which Stigler quotes, and Stigler must surely have known that. Mill's point is that once population increase slows, then there is no point in struggling for wealth for its own sake. Rather what is needed is better distribution of wealth.
"I cannot, therefore, regard the stationary state of capital and wealth [low or zero economic growth] with the unaffected aversion so generally manifested towards it by political economists of the old school. I am inclined to believe that it would be, on the whole, a very considerable improvement on our present condition. I confess I am not charmed with the ideal of life held out by those who think that the normal state of human beings is that of struggling to get on; that the trampling, crushing, elbowing, and treading on each other's heels, which form the existing type of social life, are the most desirable lot of human kind, or anything but the disagreeable symptoms of one of the phases of industrial progress...…. it is not a kind of social perfection which philanthropists to come will feel any very eager desire to assist in realizing... the best state for human nature is that in which, while no one is poor, no one desires to be richer, nor has any reason to fear being thrust back by the efforts of others to push themselves forward."
Mill is here foreshadowing Keynes in Prospects for our Grandchildren and Weber also. Once we have escaped the Malthusian trap -- around 1880's when productivity grows faster than fertility, while fertility begins its long decline (hitting the replacement level when Keynes is writing) -- then growth is not so important. The protestant work ethic ceases to be a necessity, and simply becomes a iron cage that prevents us from leading happy, fulfilled lives. Stigler seems to arguing the very opposite: that Mill thinks we should pretend as if we are still living in the Malthusian era because, because it is good for our character.
Yes indeedee... =B.
Worse still, Stigler seems to coming close to Carlyle's execrable argument about slavery -- which Mill vociferously rejected.
Thanks for the imvisible university.
Reading this, it struck me that a bunch of people are left out of consideration: Women, Children, The Sick, The mentally incompetent and the old. I hear a subtle voice saying Fuck Them All.
The Nazis had a solution for some of these folks. Women stayed home to breed more future soldiers and breeders. The mentally incompetent were euthanized. As for the sick, weren't some euthanized as they were incurable and a drain on the state?
For Stigler, and company, Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" is a tragedy. I simply cannot fathom people like that. What sort of trauma misshaped their mental processes to such a degree?
Where did the Donner Party come from? Deep and abiding ignorance of what they were attempting. No idea that they had better get their ass in gear and not bring an 80 year old with them who died on the trip and they spent several precious days burying and then being stupid and taking a short cut which added a week to their journey to the lake. William Bennett taking stupidity for heroism.
We have a cabin at Donner and have met a descendent of a survivor. She donated a doll carried by that survivor to the Sutter's Fort exhibit.
It was Holbo's piece that convinced me that the Internet could be a far better place than the New York Review of Books--just as smart and not at all ossified. Thanks for bringing back the memories.
I remember when Crooked Timber was a good read with John Holbo and others now long gone from the blog. Sad