When it comes to reforming health care in the United States, Whole Foods CEO John Mackey says the "best solution" is for Americans to eat better and change their lifestyle.
I've never heard anyone talk about this, maybe it's well known, but it seems to me that comparison through competition is an incredibly dubious proposition. Outside of games, which are a whole different thing, establishing competitions based on real world outcomes, like productivity or profits, will quite obviously alter the behavior that's being compared. Meeting the criteria becomes the goal, not actually doing the thing the criteria was implemented to measure. So capitalists talk about how, in order to be competitive in the market, you'll need to constantly innovate to have the best product, and keep your prices low enough to not lose customers, but of course, since the comparative metric we use to determine the outcome of economic competition is profitability, finding a way around these obligations, which are a drain on profits, is where all of the innovative effort goes. Same for your experience, even competing with your own stores prior sales, the very act of implementing comparative metrics to establish a competitive structure, even with yourself, immediately has an effect on how people behave, which kills any possibility of comparing the thing you set out to compare. It would be like trying to study animals in there natural habitat by just moving in with them, you just being there would radically alter the thing you were trying to observe.
Yup, plays right into the trope of :capitalist: taking 95% of the pie and engineering society to fight each other for the last slice. :capitalist-laugh:
The British government was concerned about the number of venomous cobras in Delhi.[3] The government therefore offered a bounty for every dead cobra. Initially, this was a successful strategy; large numbers of snakes were killed for the reward. Eventually, however, enterprising people began to breed cobras for the income. When the government became aware of this, the reward program was scrapped. When cobra breeders set their now-worthless snakes free, the wild cobra population further increased.
establishing competitions based on real world outcomes, like productivity or profits, will quite obviously alter the behavior that’s being compared. Meeting the criteria becomes the goal, not actually doing the thing the criteria was implemented to measure.
I've never heard anyone talk about this, maybe it's well known, but it seems to me that comparison through competition is an incredibly dubious proposition. Outside of games, which are a whole different thing, establishing competitions based on real world outcomes, like productivity or profits, will quite obviously alter the behavior that's being compared. Meeting the criteria becomes the goal, not actually doing the thing the criteria was implemented to measure. So capitalists talk about how, in order to be competitive in the market, you'll need to constantly innovate to have the best product, and keep your prices low enough to not lose customers, but of course, since the comparative metric we use to determine the outcome of economic competition is profitability, finding a way around these obligations, which are a drain on profits, is where all of the innovative effort goes. Same for your experience, even competing with your own stores prior sales, the very act of implementing comparative metrics to establish a competitive structure, even with yourself, immediately has an effect on how people behave, which kills any possibility of comparing the thing you set out to compare. It would be like trying to study animals in there natural habitat by just moving in with them, you just being there would radically alter the thing you were trying to observe.
Does that make any sense?
Yup, plays right into the trope of :capitalist: taking 95% of the pie and engineering society to fight each other for the last slice. :capitalist-laugh:
Somewhat similar and humorous. Cobra Effect.
Yeah, profit is primary and purpose is ancillary
You mean Campbell's law or maybe Goodhart's law?