There is no difference between the two players in the ordinal order of the cells in the matrix. At this point, we should caution the reader about the necessary subtlety of the rule-outcome distinction in the political context. Therefore, the "reform" of the ground rules (of the constitution, broadly defined) is internally contradictory.
More importantly, the state does not exist as an organic entity independent of the individuals in the polity. In the simple trading process analyzed earlier, we showed that neither application is involved. In the abstracted model of the perfectly competitive economy, each participant remains completely unaware that he is involved in social interaction.
The activity of the judges is analogous to the activity of scientists. Individual members, like scientists, express their belief in the validity or invalidity of the statement in question. We have entitled this chapter “The Myth of Benevolence” because of the implications of the paradigm.
The remaining sections of this chapter discuss various lines of defense of the Homo Economicus construct in the constitutional context. In this case, the numbers in the cells of the matrix represent the monetary returns (in dollars) for the players. Economists have only recently become interested in the welfare properties of the political bidding process, under the heading 14.
Individual Private Choice I. Introduction
From this basic construct, it is relatively easy to move back one stage in the individual's decision-making process and drop the income constraints by including leisure, or the desired use of time, as a good with its own shadow price. We can then model the individual as choosing a whole behavioral profile, limited by time, talent, and initial gifts. The individual can choose a life plan, a set of actions, that he hopes will make his experiences “interesting.”
He is not the same person who was faced with the choice att0, and this fact will be taken into account when the initial choice att0 is made. Att1 the individual will be a 'product' of choices made previously att0and over the entire series of periods t11,t12. Within relevant limits, the individual constructs himself as an acting and choosing entity through the actions taken in periods before those in which choices are now confronted.2. The individual has a personal, personal history, and this history will have shaped both the preferences and constraints that interact to determine choice behavior in each period t0.
In both cases, the person who chooses does so in the knowledge that his choice behavior at one time may affect his potential choice actions at other times. The individual’s att1will be predicted to be some continuity in the person faced with the choices att0; the individual ''constructs'' the voter att1and so on, as well as the set of options, within limits. Despite the expected continuity of being, the individual knows that the person who will confront the choices int1 will be different.
Such a construction will be partial at best, and the chooser will know that a living person must exhibit a will and personality, a set of preferences that are “all his own.” A new person, emergent only int1, may find that in of his power to destroy or seriously alter all plans which may be carefully reflected in forward-looking decisions att0. As a permanent conscious being, the individual may be reluctant to limit his freedom of action. There are two distinct but related ways in which an individual may attempt to achieve this purpose.
Within certain ranges of possible choice behavior, an individual can try to pre-commit the choice of a future period by introducing binding rules or restrictions. An individual may pre-commit to choices that, from a long-term perspective, seem more worthwhile than a pattern of purely situational responses. But even if choice remains strictly "individualistic," choice can be social, as shown in market relations.
Individual Public Choice I. Introduction
How "should" the utility of future generations be weighed in making current-period decisions. We have not updated the revenue flow that the government expects to receive as a result of the imposition of a tax or an increase in the tax rate. To the extent that inflation creates any inefficiency in the economy, the full equilibrium appears to be clearly non-optimal.
In the Samaritan's dilemma, much of the problem with the modern welfare state is explained. A tightening strategy regarding eligibility for transfers would increase the ranks of the self-reliant in the long run. Indeed, even the father's shotgun presence is not normally interpreted to completely remove the moral obligations attached to marriage (and sometimes not to diminish those obligations altogether).
In other words, we need to trace how political agents are constrained in sharing the pie. It must be shown that the effect of the political process on the distribution is in the direction of equality. Buchanan, ``The Political Economy of Franchising in the Welfare State,'' in Capitalism and Liberty: Problems and Prospects, ed.
We can think of the majority as having a monopoly right in selling the minority's factor services. In this case, transfers will fall, even though the relative share of the poorest in the total pie has decreased. Specifically, the level of transfers will respond perversely to changes in the level of income of the poorest.
What is required is an investigation of the way in which changes in the rules by which individuals interact change the pattern of distributional outcomes. But a constitutional decision to include some transfer operations in the general rules of the game cannot be assumed. Unanimous agreement on some proposed change in the rules must be at least conceptually possible.
The position of nominal property owners in the status quo may be similar on the other side of the question. The nature of the rule changes ensures that all persons in the political community will be included similarly, at least in one sense of the term.
