In Denver, it took the relatively benign form of obliviousness and hyperbolic discounting. People spent money on themselves, voluntarily, acting as if they were more wealthy than they were, leaving them poorer still.
vs
It has less benign forms. Governments and other bandits look for wealth and take it.
What is the distinction between benign and less-benign? In both cases, valued resources are lost without any return in other valuable resources. These seem like very similar failure cases to me. In fact, they seem very nearly like two views of the same phenomenon—obliviousness and hyperbolic discounting makes it near-trivial for vendors (and time/attention sinks) to tax you very easily.
I’d like to expand a bit on
In Denver, it took the relatively benign form of obliviousness and hyperbolic discounting. People spent money on themselves, voluntarily, acting as if they were more wealthy than they were, leaving them poorer still.
vs
It has less benign forms. Governments and other bandits look for wealth and take it.
What is the distinction between benign and less-benign? In both cases, valued resources are lost without any return in other valuable resources. These seem like very similar failure cases to me. In fact, they seem very nearly like two views of the same phenomenon—obliviousness and hyperbolic discounting makes it near-trivial for vendors (and time/attention sinks) to tax you very easily.