I live in Alabama, where college football is the main religion. The two main denominations are the University of Alabama Crimson Tide and the Auburn University Tigers. They fought a legendary and ridiculously overwrought war. rivalry since 1893, except for the four-decade interval between 1907 and 1948 when they did not face each other because the two schools hated each other so much. Suffice it to say, Alabama fans (like me) don’t go out of their way to buy Auburn merchandise and vice versa.
Unless, of course, there’s money to be made.
In his classic study The economics of discriminationthe Nobel Prize-winning economist Gary Becker introduced the term “discrimination taste” to describe a person’s preference to avoid others based on arbitrary characteristics such as race and gender. I would like to explore the concept in a less morally and emotionally charged setting: eBay. Since around mid-February, I sold things on eBay for fun, (accounting) profit, and inspiration. Markets push me to overcome my morally harmless biases, and this is a case study in how markets push us to overcome our morally serious biases.
The search for pleasure, profit and a few lessons in economics curb my “taste for discrimination” towards people who don’t like the things and teams that I like. I notice things I wouldn’t otherwise and help people I wouldn’t otherwise have thought of. Up until a few weeks ago, I had purchased exactly one Auburn shirt in my life, when I visited to present some research in 2008. I have several Auburn shirts, jerseys and hats in my garage waiting for the right buyer . My taste for discrimination against the Auburn faithful – or at least my indifference to their desires – is curbed by my even stronger taste for a few extra dollars and a few classroom examples.
But what does morally insignificant discrimination of something insignificant like college sports fandom have to do with morally serious discrimination like racism? Morally, I don’t think they are comparable. Sports rivalries are all great fun, most of the time. Racism is bad. Logically, though, the economics of discriminating against people with bad degrees on their wall resembles the economics of discriminating on the basis of skin color, and just like I don’t discriminate against fans of Auburn when it’s expensive, racists don’t discriminate as much when it costs a lot.
Will the pursuit of profit change the hearts of racists? Not directly, although it encourages a kind of “exposure therapy” that risks eroding it. Does this excuse or justify racist discrimination? No, but efforts to change hearts and minds by passing laws and pointing guns have it ended badly. Perhaps the pursuit of profit is a vulgar and vulgar motive, and earning a few dollars will not restore a corrupt soul. However, for-profit free enterprise stifles the darkest angels of our nature by making it it is more costly to act on prejudices.
Art Carden is a Trust Fellow professor of economics and medical properties at Samford University, and he is, by his own admission, as Koched as they come: he has an award named in honor of Charles G. Koch in his office, he does a lot of work for and is affiliated with an array of Koch-related organizations, and he has applied for and received money from the Charles Koch Foundation to host events on campus.
