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Are you the "big catch" in small Walden Pond? Or just another perch in Lake Erie? Do you park your Chevette next to everyone else's Saab? "The Two World Study," a survey by David Hemenway '66, Ph.D. '74, senior lecturer on political economy at the School of Public Health, and his colleague Sara Solnick '86, M.P.M. '90, may provide answers-by measuring people's concern with their relative position in society, as opposed to their absolute well-being.

A sample question: "If prices are identical in both World A (in which your yearly income is $50,000, while others earn $25,000) and World B (in which your yearly income is $100,000, while others earn $200,000), in which world would you prefer to live?"

Through such hypothetical offers of two worlds, the researchers explored preferences in income, intelligence, education, attractiveness, vacation time, supervisory praise, and consumer commodities. Their 12-question survey, distributed last year to 257 staff and faculty members and students at the School of Public Health, contrasted the "positional" world, where you'd have twice as much as others (World A above), with the "absolute" world, where you'd have twice as much as in the positional world-but less than everyone else (World B above). In the case of income, 48 percent of respondents rejected the prospect of everyone, including themselves, becoming richer if this meant a fall in their own relative standing.

"Economists are behavioral psychologists," explains Hemenway, "but they think more is better; they want to make everyone richer. They should pause. More's not necessarily better." Take the time Hemenway's son Brett, then five, went to a party for friend Sam. "After the party, I asked, `Was it fun?' And he said, `It wasn't fair.'" Turns out Sam's uncle and aunt gave out little gifts to all the children; Brett got three and Sam got five. "I asked whether he'd have preferred they'd given the kids just one each," recalls Hemenway, "and his response was `Yes.' To him, it was about fairness. In economic policy, that's huge."

People seem happier when their bosses praise them more often than their peers, even if the praise is infrequent. "Talk is cheap," says Hemenway. "We want to hear it once, and never hear the boss say it to anyone else." Positional concerns loom large for things-like money-that are crucial or useful in attaining other objectives. They have less salience for "goods," like vacation time, which are desirable per se. Eighty-five percent of the respondents chose to maximize their weeks of vacation, even if others had more.

Hemenway suggests that you'd expect visible things ("observables" like cars, clothes, summer homes) to be judged positionally rather than absolutely. "Clothespins don't matter" he says, "cars do." Though solid gold clothespins might please the launderer in both function and feel (much the way stylish undergarments can make their wearer feel good all day long), cars are a far more accessible index of social standing.

Understanding positional concerns could eventually lead to policy prescriptions in areas like funding for public education. It seems that people don't want to spend money to make other people's kids smart, thereby helping their own children's competitors. "People want to keep their money in their own school districts," says Solnick. "They don't want to share."

Hemenway adds, "If everyone's IQ got higher, you'd think people would get happier, but it seems we'd prefer to be smarter than others. I'd rather be the smart one in a dumb school than at the bottom of the class." When choosing for one's child rather than oneself, position generally matters more.

Similarly, Solnick explains that if physical appearances are positional goods, those who have cosmetic surgery raise the standard for everyone else. If cosmetic surgery could make everyone better-looking on an absolute scale, says Hemenway, it's not clear that people would be happier; it seems we want to be better-looking compared to others. Including cosmetic surgery in insurance contracts might force everyone to spend money merely to remain in the same relative position. Picture an accelerating treadmill: everyone running at the same rate, nobody getting ahead.

Hemenway and Solnick wonder whether it's ultimately ever possible to help someone without hurting others. They hope to survey people outside the United States and to see how answers might vary over time in response to hypothetical situations customized for people from all walks of life. Indeed, positional thinking is ubiquitous; it had a place even amid the solitude of Walden Pond. As Thoreau wrote: "Love your life, poor as it is. You may perhaps have some pleasant, thrilling, glorious hours, even in a poorhouse. The setting sun is reflected from the windows of the almshouse as brightly as from the rich man's abode."

katrina roberts

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