Hal Varian: evaluation

Transcript context

…Now, as you know, some of your most frequently cited pieces are on the economics of envy, and these are from the mid-1970s. Now, you’ve lived for a while in Silicon Valley. How have your thoughts on envy changed since you wrote those articles? I think what’s interesting is, there are lots of cases where we’re seeking some sort of fair division. There is something that we agree is equitable, et cetera. If you look at that theory of fairness that I worked on — actually my thesis was on that topic — everything seemed to work out nicely if you just have a fixed pot of goods, and you wanted to divide them in a fair way. For example, an estate. There were a number of inheritors to an estate, and you wanted to make it both equitable and also efficient. So, that problem we can solve. The difficulty came when you brought production into it because people could contribute differently — different amounts to the production. Then, how much would they be compensated for their contributions? And there, there seems to be a great variety of views in the world. Different people seem to have different opinions on that, and it doesn’t work out as cleanly as the first story. Does the typical American envy more the billionaire or the next-door neighbor?…

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