With all dues pect (and I think it's clear I respect you) , this is yet another case of taking a non_normative view of economicsl We can not conern ourselves with whether another party is doing better against us, until such time as we are not doing better against our past.
Do I live better than those who preceeded me under thse same circumstances? The answer is, almost without exception, yes. It may be popular to decry how one or another advtantage which is enjoyed by one population is not enjoyed by another. But the question should always be, not "Am I doing better than the Other Guy? But 'Am I doing better than one might expect (given my invariant circumstances)?
To ask more than that does diservice to the entire concept of progress.
unfortunately humans don't think like this. when asked if they would rather make $50k while everyone else makes $25k or 100K while everyone else makes $200k (the costs of goods and services being the same) people overwhelmingly choose the former. why? status is zero-sum. mate-pairing relies on looking good compared to the next person, not on absolute scales of standard of living.
> when asked if they would rather make $50k while everyone else makes $25k or 100K while everyone else makes $200k (the costs of goods and services being the same) people overwhelmingly choose the former. why?
I'd like to see the cite, because most behavioral economics research that I've seen is crap.
But, even if that's true, so what? It's dumb to act as if pi = 4 even if "everyone" wants it to be.
Yes, I realize that you're not arging that we should act as if envy is better than greed, you're just saying that people think that it is. So, what do we do about that?
Do I live better than those who preceeded me under thse same circumstances? The answer is, almost without exception, yes. It may be popular to decry how one or another advtantage which is enjoyed by one population is not enjoyed by another. But the question should always be, not "Am I doing better than the Other Guy? But 'Am I doing better than one might expect (given my invariant circumstances)?
To ask more than that does diservice to the entire concept of progress.