Boyer & Petersen (B&P) outline how eight folk-economic beliefs result from five evolved domain-specific cognitive systems concerned with social exchange. We are excited by this proposal. A major challenge, though, is that each folk-economic belief can be explained using many different combinations of evolved cognitive systems (or at least systems in place from early childhood), including some the authors do not mention. To illustrate this, we offer alternative (and perhaps more parsimonious) explanations for several of the folk-economic beliefs (FEBs) they discuss.
FEBs 2 and 3 hold that immigrants steal jobs and abuse the welfare system. We suggest these beliefs could stem from the psychology of group ownership, which is already apparent in preschool-aged children (Eisenberg-Berg et al. Reference Eisenberg-Berg, Haake, Hand and Sadalla1979; Reference Eisenberg-Berg, Haake and Bartlett1981; Huh & Friedman Reference Huh and Friedman2017; also see Furby Reference Furby1980). When a resource is owned by a group, the members can typically access and use it, but other people cannot. Hence, if people conceptualize jobs and welfare as group resources, they might view immigrants as non-members who should be restricted from accessing these resources (Verkuyten & Martinovic Reference Verkuyten and Martinovic2017). The way people express their concerns about immigrants also supports this group ownership account. People often express these concerns by referring to themselves in terms of their collective identity and ownership (i.e., “we” and “ours” rather than “me” and “mine”), and by referring to immigrants as “stealing” these resources (Verkuyten & Martinovic Reference Verkuyten and Martinovic2017). Young children may have similar concerns about out-group members. For example, they believe that group members are more likely to steal from other groups than to steal from their own group (e.g., Baron & Dunham Reference Baron and Dunham2015; Rhodes Reference Rhodes2012).
The psychology of group ownership may also explain FEB 4, which holds that social welfare programs are abused by scroungers. A key aspect of the psychology of group ownership is that group members have limited access to resources when acting individually. Again, preschoolers show signs of understanding this (Huh & Friedman Reference Huh and Friedman2017), and when working to secure resources with others, they distribute resources by considering the relative contributions of all parties (e.g., Hamann et al. Reference Hamann, Warneken, Greenberg and Tomasello2011; Kanngiesser & Warneken Reference Kanngiesser and Warneken2012). So again, beliefs that scroungers abuse welfare programs could stem from concerns about individual group members taking more resources than entitled.
FEB 6 holds that the profit motive is detrimental to general welfare. We suggest this folk-economic belief could stem from people being realists about value – at least when not thinking carefully about market demands. Most of the time, people may feel that objects have true or real values, which depend not only on the labor used to create them (FEB 7), but also on many other properties. For example, assessments of value may depend on objects' physical features, usefulness, previous ownership, historical distinctiveness, and social value (e.g., Gelman Reference Gelman2013; Newman et al. Reference Newman, Diesendruck and Bloom2011; Frazier et al. Reference Frazier, Gelman, Wilson and Hood2009). Crucially, assessments of value do not just occur in monetary judgments. For instance, in gift economies, people attend to value when reciprocating gifts they have received (e.g., Mauss Reference Mauss and Halls1990). People's intuitions that objects have true values may lead them to connect profit motives with dishonesty and greed; sellers who maximize profits may be viewed as mischaracterizing the true value of objects, attempting to gain more than the objects are truly worth. Similar patterns of reasoning may explain historical hostilities against middleman minorities, who profit without appearing to add value to their wares (e.g., Sowell Reference Sowell2005). This account may also explain FEB 8, which holds that price-regulation has its intended effects, and directs the economy to desired results. Namely, people may assume that price regulation gives objects their true and fair value.
Some key questions remain about our alternative account for the folk-economic beliefs discussed by B&P. First, we have suggested that FEBs 2 to 4 might stem from an intuitive understanding of group ownership. However, we are uncertain whether this understanding reflects the outputs of a single, domain-specific ownership system, the outputs of communal sharing reasoning (Fiske Reference Fiske1992), or the combined output of two distinct systems, such as ownership and coalitional psychology. Second, although we have suggested that people use many cues to derive a sense of true object value, whether these assessments of value stem from a single domain-specific cognitive system is unclear. It is also unclear whether people are intuitive realists about value, or if they instead merely have difficulty coordinating multiple factors that determine it. Regardless, we do know that judgments of group ownership and object value are already present in young children. As such, the folk-economic beliefs we have discussed could stem from early emerging intuitions, which may conflict with later acquired understandings of economics.
Our claim, though, is not that our alternative accounts are more likely to be right than those offered by B&P. Instead, we only suggest that even if folk-economic beliefs do rest on the operation of domain-specific cognitive systems, much empirical work is needed, and it will be challenging to test empirically which folk-economic beliefs are explained by which systems.
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Boyer & Petersen (B&P) outline how eight folk-economic beliefs result from five evolved domain-specific cognitive systems concerned with social exchange. We are excited by this proposal. A major challenge, though, is that each folk-economic belief can be explained using many different combinations of evolved cognitive systems (or at least systems in place from early childhood), including some the authors do not mention. To illustrate this, we offer alternative (and perhaps more parsimonious) explanations for several of the folk-economic beliefs (FEBs) they discuss.
FEBs 2 and 3 hold that immigrants steal jobs and abuse the welfare system. We suggest these beliefs could stem from the psychology of group ownership, which is already apparent in preschool-aged children (Eisenberg-Berg et al. Reference Eisenberg-Berg, Haake, Hand and Sadalla1979; Reference Eisenberg-Berg, Haake and Bartlett1981; Huh & Friedman Reference Huh and Friedman2017; also see Furby Reference Furby1980). When a resource is owned by a group, the members can typically access and use it, but other people cannot. Hence, if people conceptualize jobs and welfare as group resources, they might view immigrants as non-members who should be restricted from accessing these resources (Verkuyten & Martinovic Reference Verkuyten and Martinovic2017). The way people express their concerns about immigrants also supports this group ownership account. People often express these concerns by referring to themselves in terms of their collective identity and ownership (i.e., “we” and “ours” rather than “me” and “mine”), and by referring to immigrants as “stealing” these resources (Verkuyten & Martinovic Reference Verkuyten and Martinovic2017). Young children may have similar concerns about out-group members. For example, they believe that group members are more likely to steal from other groups than to steal from their own group (e.g., Baron & Dunham Reference Baron and Dunham2015; Rhodes Reference Rhodes2012).
The psychology of group ownership may also explain FEB 4, which holds that social welfare programs are abused by scroungers. A key aspect of the psychology of group ownership is that group members have limited access to resources when acting individually. Again, preschoolers show signs of understanding this (Huh & Friedman Reference Huh and Friedman2017), and when working to secure resources with others, they distribute resources by considering the relative contributions of all parties (e.g., Hamann et al. Reference Hamann, Warneken, Greenberg and Tomasello2011; Kanngiesser & Warneken Reference Kanngiesser and Warneken2012). So again, beliefs that scroungers abuse welfare programs could stem from concerns about individual group members taking more resources than entitled.
FEB 6 holds that the profit motive is detrimental to general welfare. We suggest this folk-economic belief could stem from people being realists about value – at least when not thinking carefully about market demands. Most of the time, people may feel that objects have true or real values, which depend not only on the labor used to create them (FEB 7), but also on many other properties. For example, assessments of value may depend on objects' physical features, usefulness, previous ownership, historical distinctiveness, and social value (e.g., Gelman Reference Gelman2013; Newman et al. Reference Newman, Diesendruck and Bloom2011; Frazier et al. Reference Frazier, Gelman, Wilson and Hood2009). Crucially, assessments of value do not just occur in monetary judgments. For instance, in gift economies, people attend to value when reciprocating gifts they have received (e.g., Mauss Reference Mauss and Halls1990). People's intuitions that objects have true values may lead them to connect profit motives with dishonesty and greed; sellers who maximize profits may be viewed as mischaracterizing the true value of objects, attempting to gain more than the objects are truly worth. Similar patterns of reasoning may explain historical hostilities against middleman minorities, who profit without appearing to add value to their wares (e.g., Sowell Reference Sowell2005). This account may also explain FEB 8, which holds that price-regulation has its intended effects, and directs the economy to desired results. Namely, people may assume that price regulation gives objects their true and fair value.
Some key questions remain about our alternative account for the folk-economic beliefs discussed by B&P. First, we have suggested that FEBs 2 to 4 might stem from an intuitive understanding of group ownership. However, we are uncertain whether this understanding reflects the outputs of a single, domain-specific ownership system, the outputs of communal sharing reasoning (Fiske Reference Fiske1992), or the combined output of two distinct systems, such as ownership and coalitional psychology. Second, although we have suggested that people use many cues to derive a sense of true object value, whether these assessments of value stem from a single domain-specific cognitive system is unclear. It is also unclear whether people are intuitive realists about value, or if they instead merely have difficulty coordinating multiple factors that determine it. Regardless, we do know that judgments of group ownership and object value are already present in young children. As such, the folk-economic beliefs we have discussed could stem from early emerging intuitions, which may conflict with later acquired understandings of economics.
Our claim, though, is not that our alternative accounts are more likely to be right than those offered by B&P. Instead, we only suggest that even if folk-economic beliefs do rest on the operation of domain-specific cognitive systems, much empirical work is needed, and it will be challenging to test empirically which folk-economic beliefs are explained by which systems.