Wait, isn’t that an example of efficiency of scale being dependent on investment? You have to get a 1-foot rope and scissors, but once you have, you can create two 1⁄2 foot ropes? I think the “given a 1-foot rope” is doing more work than you realize, because when I try to apply your example to the world above, I keep getting hung up on “but in the imaginary world above, when we account for economy of scale, if you just needed one 1⁄2 foot rope, you would just create a 1⁄2 foot rope, and that would take you 1⁄2 the time as creating 1 foot of rope.” And for The David, I feel like “sure, but that doesn’t explain why someone wouldn’t just carve their own David if they wanted one”. I think I’m bypassing some of the issue here, but I’m not entirely sure what it is.
It does, however, bring up another interesting reason for trade (and this may be part of how investment can be independent from efficiency of scale): shared resources. If a pair of scissors does not scale according to how often I use them, and I only use them once per day, I can increase efficiency/decrease required investment by trading their use so others can use them when I’m not. This applies to the the David as such: utility gained from the David is not zero sum, multiple people can utility from it without decreasing the utility the others gain; therefore it does not make sense for everyone to carve their own. So any time a resource or product produces non-zero sum benefits if it exists, we have a reason for it’s use to be traded/trade to be involved in sharing it.
Applying this, if 5 people each carve a statue and put them in a sculpture garden in exchange for access to the garden, they can each enjoy five statues (alternatively, they could collaborate to build the statue in 1/5th the time and share in the enjoyment of it).
Not sure this is what you were getting at, but I think I’ve talked myself into thinking that when investment has independence from efficiency of scale it’s because of the non-zero sum nature of some shared resources.
Wait, isn’t that an example of efficiency of scale being dependent on investment? You have to get a 1-foot rope and scissors, but once you have, you can create two 1⁄2 foot ropes? I think the “given a 1-foot rope” is doing more work than you realize, because when I try to apply your example to the world above, I keep getting hung up on “but in the imaginary world above, when we account for economy of scale, if you just needed one 1⁄2 foot rope, you would just create a 1⁄2 foot rope, and that would take you 1⁄2 the time as creating 1 foot of rope.” And for The David, I feel like “sure, but that doesn’t explain why someone wouldn’t just carve their own David if they wanted one”. I think I’m bypassing some of the issue here, but I’m not entirely sure what it is.
It does, however, bring up another interesting reason for trade (and this may be part of how investment can be independent from efficiency of scale): shared resources. If a pair of scissors does not scale according to how often I use them, and I only use them once per day, I can increase efficiency/decrease required investment by trading their use so others can use them when I’m not. This applies to the the David as such: utility gained from the David is not zero sum, multiple people can utility from it without decreasing the utility the others gain; therefore it does not make sense for everyone to carve their own. So any time a resource or product produces non-zero sum benefits if it exists, we have a reason for it’s use to be traded/trade to be involved in sharing it.
Applying this, if 5 people each carve a statue and put them in a sculpture garden in exchange for access to the garden, they can each enjoy five statues (alternatively, they could collaborate to build the statue in 1/5th the time and share in the enjoyment of it).
Not sure this is what you were getting at, but I think I’ve talked myself into thinking that when investment has independence from efficiency of scale it’s because of the non-zero sum nature of some shared resources.