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30 sats \ 5 replies \ @Undisciplined 8 Dec \ parent \ on: MONEY CLASS OF THE DAY: Intrinsic Value vs Subjective Value...and Music! econ
Of course, but I brought it up because there are no money prices in that hypothetical, but things clearly have economic value there.
I understand that. I think he is missing something somewhere and I just cannot put my finger on it. I tried explaining value a couple of different ways to no avail. Maybe you will be luckier than I was. I didn’t think the subjective theory of value was such a convoluted concept.
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If he were talking about willingness to pay and the marginal unit, I'd agree with him, but that would be a less provocative point than he wants to make.
Most people would agree that if you're producing stuff that no one is willing to pay for, then it's of no economic value.
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I’m not quite sure that is the point he is trying to make. I tried the willingness to trade argument and was denied. I thought that that would be proof enough, but, nope. Did you try the marginal unit argument with him?
I cannot understand the argument he is trying to make about music qua music. You always have to invest at least time and money for an instrument to produce music. Is it just that with digital reproduction makes it difficult to get paid for creating music? People are willing to pay for it and derive more from the music than the money they spend. That is self-evident.
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The idea is that abundant things, like air or ideas, have no economic value because they are not scarce.
My defense of that idea would be that economic action is about relieving felt dissatisfaction (Mises' great definition). Since we cannot lack things that are abundant, they cannot be economically valuable.
I did try to explain the point about marginal units vs the entire stock, but he didn't bite.
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Yeah, no dissatisfaction with the situation of free goods, therefore no economic action on the part of the actors.
I don’t know why he doesn’t bite on the marginal explainations. After all, it was the subjectivist, marginalist revolution Menger, et al did.
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