My experience as a marriage counselor taught me that for a discussion of a disagreement to be productive, the parties have to have a shared understanding of what is being debated. If a husband thinks a marital debate is about leaving the toliet seat up or not, and the wife thinks it is about why her husband never listens to, appreciates or loves her the way he should, expect fireworks and frustration. If you are in an argument that you think is about government debt and it’s going nowhere, it may be because the person you are debating isn’t really arguing about the current level of government debt. Rather, they are arguing about the size of government.
If you get into a debate that is ostensibly about the level of government debt, try the following tactic (or try it on yourself in your own mind): If your opponent says that government debt is too high and we therefore need to cut public spending, ask whether s/he has EVER favored under ANY economic conditions a nice, fat increase in public spending. If you are debating someone who says that government debt is no big deal and that we should be increasing public spending, ask if s/he has EVER favored under ANY economics conditions a big, fat cut in public spending. You are going to get a no answer most of the time; maybe almost all the time.
…Is that wrong? No, it’s just frustrating when you are arguing about one thing and the other person is arguing about something else (or, when BOTH of you are actually arguing about something other than what on the face of it you think you are arguing about). The solution?: Drop the charade and get down to business. How big government should be is an essential political argument for the members of a society to have, so why not just have it up front?
(I hope that the general point is appreciated instead of starting a politics discussion! I think these kind of proxy arguments are a very common failure mode in all areas of life.)
It’s entirely consistent to believe that the level of something is too high and has been too high for a long time, yet to not oppose it in principle.
The correct question to detect if that’s really their objection is not “have they ever thought that the level is too low”—the correct question is “would they ever under any circumstances think that the level is too low”. Of course, you’re not going to get as many “no” answers with that as with your original formulation.
--Keith Humphreys
(I hope that the general point is appreciated instead of starting a politics discussion! I think these kind of proxy arguments are a very common failure mode in all areas of life.)
I don’t think the conclusion follows.
It’s entirely consistent to believe that the level of something is too high and has been too high for a long time, yet to not oppose it in principle.
The correct question to detect if that’s really their objection is not “have they ever thought that the level is too low”—the correct question is “would they ever under any circumstances think that the level is too low”. Of course, you’re not going to get as many “no” answers with that as with your original formulation.
It may be consistent, but is it common? Especially in political debates?