The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce

sweet love vs. interest 115economist says that contributions to public goods—say, the British LifeboatService—is utility-based, in the sense that it is motivated altruistically, by adesire to make sure there are enough lifeboats. That is, the economic agentgives to the lifeboat fund not to cover the highly unlikely event that he himselfmight otherwise drown—pace Steven Pinker—but because many otherpeople will. He is public spirited, altruistic.Yet he is still a Max U fellow: he gets utility from contemplating theample provision of lifeboats. It’s like your mother Maxine U getting pleasurefrom your graduation. If she could get the graduation without spendinga dime on you, all the better, right? Such an attitude is an ethical improvementover screw-you individualism of a Steinerian or Randian or Pinkeriansort. But it seems to be empirically false. In 1993 Richard Sugden, for example,noted that a plain implication of Max U altruism is that a pound notegiven by Max U would be a perfect substitute for a pound given by anyoneelse, at least in Mr. U’s opinion. So Max U would of course free ride on otherpeople’s contributions to lifeboats. Every time. According to Sugden’sempirical work on the lifeboat fund, however, people in Britain do not sofree ride.Which is evident: there is such a fund, and it does very well in bequestsand in coins dropped into collection jars in pubs. Evidently British peoplefeel that free riding in such a case would be bad—which is not a sentimentthat would motivate a Max U-er. Sugden and others have shown repeatedlythat people do not view the contributions of others as fungible pound forpound with their own contributions. People take the view that there issomething ineluctably particular about their giving. So also in blood donationsand in going over the top at the Somme. Altruistic hedonism does notlook like a very good explanation of human solidarity and courage. 24You could reply that the lifeboat-givers or the blood donors or the votersdown at the polling place get utility from the sheer act of giving their moneyor time without recompense. The love for God, in the altruistic hedonistview, is no different from satisfying an itch or buying a rugby shirt. Thereforeeconomists studying the economics of religion, even if they are themselvesbelievers, sometimes stop their concerns at explaining churchattendance with the same tools one would use for explaining visits to themall. But it is merely a pointless renaming of love—or justice or faith orsome other virtue of steadfastness. As Lewis remarks, “one must be outsidethe world of love, of all loves, before one thus calculates.” 25