The Political Compass Test Isn't Very Good, Is It?

You may have seen the political compass test that's been doing the rounds - it looks to find where we are on the spectrum regarding whether we are to the left or right economically, and whether socially we lean more towards authoritarian or liberal. As you can see from the image above, the horizontal line is economically left or right and the vertical line is socially authoritarian or libertarian (meaning socially liberal), with the x and y coordinates (horizontal and vertical respectively) indicating where you fall on that spectrum after you’ve answered all the questions. Incidentally, it would have been better to have been labelled Authoritarian vs. Liberal, & Socialist vs. Economic Libertarian, but we’ll leave that and accept it as it is.

Alas, even aside from that slight quibble, whoever wrote the questions for the political compass test gives the impression that they are not very well informed. I will give a quick run down of the questions (in italic), including my answers/comments in bold (the choices are Strongly disagree , Disagree, Agree and Strongly agree), and also where the questions clearly needed revising.

If economic globalisation is inevitable, it should primarily serve humanity rather than the interests of trans-national corporations.  Daft Question

Trans-national corporations are made up of human beings, who by definition are also part of humanity.

I'd always support my country, whether it was right or wrong.   Strongly disagree

No one chooses his or her country of birth, so it's foolish to be proud of it.  Daft question

It's not the case of being proud or not proud - one can be proud of some things without being a fool or an extreme nationalist. For example, I'm proud of my country's literature, films and music, and many of its places.

Our race has many superior qualities, compared with other races.  Daft question

Daft by being loaded to the point of being meaningless. Every race/nation/culture (whatever you want to call it) has qualities that others do not have.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend.   Strongly disagree

Military action that defies international law is sometimes justified.   Agree

There is now a worrying fusion of information and entertainment.   Hmm …I don't really know what that question precisely means.

People are ultimately divided more by class than by nationality.   Sloppy question

I think the subtleties behind that are too involved to be a simple case of agreeing or disagreeing.

Controlling inflation is more important than controlling unemployment.   Sloppy question

Sloppy for reasons no one surely needs explaining.

Because corporations cannot be trusted to voluntarily protect the environment, they require regulation.   Agree

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is a fundamentally good idea.   Agree

It's a sad reflection on our society that something as basic as drinking water is now a bottled, branded consumer product.  Disagree

Land shouldn't be a commodity to be bought and sold.   Strongly disagree

It is regrettable that many personal fortunes are made by people who simply manipulate money and contribute nothing to their society.   Sloppy question

If it were the case then it would be regrettable. However, in the vast majority of cases the biggest indication that your job is contributing to society is if someone is willing to pay you to do it. Crime is an exception, but I get the feeling the questioner thinks some non-criminal jobs contribute nothing to society, which is pretty much always false.

Protectionism is sometimes necessary in trade.   Strongly disagree

The only social responsibility of a company should be to deliver a profit to its shareholders.   Sloppy question

Technically that's the main purpose of a business - to deliver a profit (delivering a profit shows the company is running well and contributing value to society). However, while that's true, it is *desirable* that companies should be socially responsible.

The rich are too highly taxed.   Agree

I agree if the question is about what is most economically efficient in terms of growth. However, once we factor in what is best for the rich in terms of their behaviour, things get more involved (I'll do a blog on this at some point).

Those with the ability to pay should have the right to higher standards of medical care.   Strongly agree (although Sloppy question)

If by which we are supposed to mean, the right to purchase private health care - but surely hardly anyone denies this.

Governments should penalise businesses that mislead the public.   Agree (although Sloppy question).

It all depends on how they mislead the public - and that is the important point that is never considered.

A genuine free market requires restrictions on the ability of predator multinationals to create monopolies.   Agree

The freer the market, the freer the people.   Agree

At least, the conditions that engender freedom in society are likely to engender a freer market too.

Abortion, when the woman's life is not threatened, should always be illegal.   Strongly disagree

All authority should be questioned.   Strongly agree

An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.   Strongly disagree

I'm assuming the questioner doesn't really understand this principle. In the Old Testament an eye for an eye does not mean if you do me wrong to the value of X then I am encouraged to reciprocate also the value of X. What it actually means is if you do me wrong to the value of X, the very most I can do to reciprocate is match the value of X. It's not an encouragement to take an eye for an eye - it's an instruction that the very most you should take is an eye for an eye. Jesus, of course, came up with something better (Matthew 5:38-48).

Taxpayers should not be expected to prop up any theatres or museums that cannot survive on a commercial basis.   Agree

Generally I agree, although government funded projects in the arts and in history can be beneficial.

Schools should not make classroom attendance compulsory.   Strongly disagree

 

All people have their rights, but it is better for all of us that different sorts of people should keep to their own kind.   Strongly disagree

 

Good parents sometimes have to spank their children.   Disagree (although poorly phrased question).

I put disagree. Although generally I feel one ought to avoid smacking, I could not put 'agree' because there are times when perhaps a light but very infrequent smack does more good than harm. The question was a bad one though - much better to have asked about people’s preferences for regular smacking.

It's natural for children to keep some secrets from their parents.   Agree

Possessing marijuana for personal use should not be a criminal offence.   Disagree

Although I'm almost 50/50 on this, I can see the pros and cons, but there's just something about me that disfavours drug use just enough to not want to legalise them. Only just though (in the case of cannabis).

The prime function of schooling should be to equip the future generation to find jobs.   Daft question

The prime function of schooling is education, which does equip the future generation to find jobs, but does so much more too.

People with serious inheritable disabilities should not be allowed to reproduce.   Strongly disagree

 

The most important thing for children to learn is to accept discipline.  Daft question

Children need to learn so much, of which discipline is a key part. It's daft to try to separate those qualities into a hierarchy as they all play vital, but different roles.

There are no savage and civilised peoples; there are only different cultures.   Sloppy question by being a false dichotomy.

We are all a heady mix of savage and civilised, and we all belong to varying cultures.

Those who are able to work, and refuse the opportunity, should not expect society's support.   Disagree

We must support them, but help them to be more dynamic and get to the root of why they are refusing opportunities.

When you are troubled, it's better not to think about it, but to keep busy with more cheerful things.  Disagree

Psychological indicators suggest that in doing this those troubles come back stronger. Experience backs this up.

First-generation immigrants can never be fully integrated within their new country.   Strongly disagree

 

What's good for the most successful corporations is always, ultimately, good for all of us.   Sloppy question

Given that 'always' is far too general, choosing either agree or disagree paints an inaccurate representation of the view. For example, technically I'd have to say 'disagree' because what's good for the most successful corporations is not, of course, *always* good for all of us. But generally it is - however, choosing 'disagree' is supposed to give the impression that generally it isn't, which distorts things.

No broadcasting institution, however independent its content, should receive public funding.   Agree.

 

Our civil liberties are being excessively curbed in the name of counter-terrorism.   Disagree (that is, I disagree specifically in terms of counter-terrorism rather than as a general statement)

 

A significant advantage of a one-party state is that it avoids all the arguments that delay progress in a democratic political system.   Strongly disagree

Although the electronic age makes official surveillance easier, only wrongdoers need to be worried.   Disagree

The death penalty should be an option for the most serious crimes.   Disagree

In a civilised society, one must always have people above to be obeyed and people below to be commanded.  Agree

Well, yes to laws and regulations, if that's what is meant.

Abstract art that doesn't represent anything shouldn't be considered art at all.   Sloppy question

Ah, this question is presumably intended as being one to tease out the authoritarians who want a critical monopoly on what art is. However, this is sloppy questioning - I think a lot of so-called art involves cases of Emperor's New Clothes critiquing, but I wouldn't want to say what should and shouldn't be art outside of my own personal subjectivism. There are some things I don't consider art that others do, but we each reserve the right to our opinions.

In criminal justice, punishment should be more important than rehabilitation.   Strongly disagree

Obviously to agree with that would be barbarism. Read Dostoyevsky's House Of The Dead if you're not convinced.

It is a waste of time to try to rehabilitate some criminals.   Strongly disagree

(see above comment)

The businessperson and the manufacturer are more important than the writer and the artist.   Sloppy question

Important for what, and for whom? They need to say. For human progression why separate the businessperson and the manufacturer from the writer – they need each other at various inextricable levels. To ask who is more important is a bit like asking which blade on a pair of scissors is more important. A much better question would have been: Which is more important for human progression, living standards and well-being, business and manufacturing or art? To which the answer would be business and manufacturing.

Mothers may have careers, but their first duty is to be homemakers.   Agree

That is, once you become a mother then until your child is old enough your primary duty (along with the father) is to look after and care for him/her.

Multinational companies are unethically exploiting the plant genetic resources of developing countries.    Agree

Another sloppily blunt question, but no question that is true in several cases.

Making peace with the establishment is an important aspect of maturity.  Daft question

Could they really not think of better questions than this?

Astrology accurately explains many things.   Strongly disagree

The one accurate thing astrology explains is that anyone who subscribes to it is gullible and uneducated about astronomy.

You cannot be moral without being religious.   Strongly disagree

Charity is better than social security as a means of helping the genuinely disadvantaged.  Disagree

Charity is great, but less reliable (I’m presuming the questioner does not mean government aid).

Some people are naturally unlucky.   Agree

I don't subscribe to luck generally, except to say that one's place of birth can be considered on a scale of lucky (England, for example) or unlucky (Somalia, for example) in terms of how your life will likely play out.

It is important that my child's school instils religious values.  Sloppy question

It's important my child learns facts about what religious people believe.

 Sex outside marriage is usually immoral.   Disagree

In the Christian sense, chastity is encouraged, but in terms of how the survey is framing the question, it would not be considered immoral.

A same sex couple in a stable, loving relationship should not be excluded from the possibility of child adoption.   Agree

 

Pornography, depicting consenting adults, should be legal for the adult population.   Agree

I don't like it, but making it illegal is a bit much.

What goes on in a private bedroom between consenting adults is no business of the state.   Strongly agree

No one can feel naturally homosexual.   Strongly disagree

 

These days openness about sex has gone too far.   Sloppy question

In some cases yes, in some no.

The End

FINAL COMMENT: Alas, could have been an interesting and pretty informative survey if the questions weren’t composed so sloppily.

 

 

 

The Unique Beauty Of Capitalism's Success Story

Think of a murmuration of starling birds preparing to roost, and a shot of Manhattan. Both are stunning images, and they are both the result of what's known in complex systems theory as self-organising structures, where each individual is contributing to the whole in looking after its own interests. The starlings are using basic rules determining how each individual of the flock responds to its neighbours. The most notable thing is that one doesn’t need any governing central planning principle to underpin the system – all that’s needed is the procedures for each bird to look after itself, and those beautiful flight patterns emerge in collective form. 

 

The starling murmuration tells us plenty about how we went from primitive hunter gatherers to citizens of places like Manhattan in just a few millennia, and how once the wheels of industry were in motion the acceleration of our progress exponentiated. The primary driving force of this has been trade, and the value created (signalled by prices and behaviour) in a supply and demand market

 

Think back to what the first transactions might have looked like. Once upon a time, a hunter-gatherer trades a piece of meat for some fur. The trade is beneficial to both parties because each gets something they value more than the thing they parted with. Nowadays, in this far more sophisticated age, each day involves millions of transactions, where value is created because for the buyers the price they pay is valued less than the item they are purchasing, and for the sellers the income they receive is valued more than the item they are selling.

 

This is the primary process that has led to our being much more advanced and prosperous humans in such a relatively short time: it is one of the most stupendous self-organising mechanisms the world has ever seen - so complex that it cannot possibly be controlled from on high, yet so efficient that it has been the driving force that has lifted tens of millions out of poverty, constructed things like the city of Manhattan, engendered an interconnected world of travel and information-sharing, brought us a rich variety of goods and services from a multitude of diverse cultures, paid for health care, education, social services, defence, armed forces, emergency services, medicine, science, the arts, roads, technological advances, and countless other illuminations on the vast circuit board of human progression.

 

It's always worth bearing that in mind when you have a downer on capitalism. The reality is, it almost resembles a miracle how through the local activity of individuals looking after their own local interests the wider results produce things as wonderful as Manhattan, worldwide travel and the Internet.

 

The way that trade and competition brings about self-interest for the good of humankind, where prices near-perfectly match supply and demand and create so much value and advancement, is one of the most uniquely beautiful things the human story has ever witnessed. What's particularly remarkable about it is that there is almost nothing else in the world quite so efficient - even biological evolution has no mechanism quite as spectacularly efficient as this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Myth That We're Running Out Of Resources

In response to my last blog on the fallacy of destroying the planet there have been a few misapprehensions floating around. Consequently, I feel compelled to tell you that we are not running out of resources. It's a myth, and quite a big one, as most people (apart from most geology experts and most economists) seem to believe it. For that reason I'm not surprised the above blog post turned out to be quite contentious.

The fallacy of depleting resources is usually comprised of a misunderstanding of the word 'resources' and the word 'reserves'. Usually when people tell us we're depleting the earth's resources at a precarious rate they are confusing reserves with resources.

Here's the difference. Reserves are the materials that have been planned for use in the coming decades, consistent with current mining technology at current prices. Depleting our reserves is quite normal. Resources on the other hand are of a much greater quantity - they are all the potential reserves that haven't been factored into the forecast of reserves. And those, we are not going to run out of. One of the reasons potential reserves remain as resources is because beyond a few decades we don't know how much we'll depend on them or what future our innovations will do for us in terms of our being weaned off current dependencies.

People who warn us that unless we are careful we are going to run out of resources are misunderstanding both numbers and resources, namely regarding what we've planned to use and what we actually have the potential to use. To give you an analogy. My wages give me an indication of what I have to spend each month. If I have a particularly expensive month, that doesn't mean I'm always going to be short of money, because future pay days will be forthcoming. My wages this month is my reserve, and my future potential earnings are my resources.

I did some research on this matter a few months ago, consulting the works of several experts in this field - and they all said the same. They are the source of much of what I've said above. People with a green agenda, like George Monbiot and the Green Party, tell us differently - they tell us that we are in dire straits. What do you think is more likely: that the experts have got it wrong, or that amateur, agenda-driven green people have not grasped the difference between reserves and resources? Please note, I am not aiming this point at people who are merely green-conscious - for they are often caring people without a hidden agenda or a self-serving ideological drive.

Anyway, let's suppose you're still not sure who to believe. There is, as it happens, an economic way to test who is right out of the experts vs. the greens, and that is with the world's best mechanism for measuring the supply and demand levels of resources. I'm talking about prices. Prices are the key. If there were precarious times ahead with scarcer quantities of  paper, oil, gas, manganese, copper, zinc, bauxite, tin and chromium - you wouldn't find prices continuing to drop, you'd find them increasing, particularly if demand increases. But the reason they continue to fall is twofold - in part because supplies are not scarce, but also because newer technology reduces the demand. Remember too, all supply and demand markets are transitory - we don't continue indefinitely to rely on the same resources with the same level of demand. As I pointed out in this Blog post:

Because of the limitation of the earth’s resources, supply-side initiatives in the free market engender innovation, which creates value, but also brings about a change in the way we use the earth’s resources. For example, we used to burn a lot more coal than we do now. Currently the technology for electricity, gas, and solar energy has weaned us off coal dependency, which means we use less of it. Another example is paper. We used to use a lot more paper. Currently the technology for digital interfaces (laptops, mobile phones, iPads) has weaned us off much of our paper dependency (with much more still to come), which means….. you guessed it…. we use less of it. So when we see economic growth, and increased prosperity, as well as people continually being lifted out of poverty because of it - that growth is not defined as a calibration of any single resource we consume - it is the value created consistent with how the market most efficiently allocates the ever-changing use of varying resources.

When resources do actually become genuinely scarce (remember, 'resources', not reserves), the prices rise, which provides a signal to consumers that they should use less of them, and to manufacturers that they should look to alternate technologies. Or if possible, that suppliers should find ways to produce more of the scare resources. Thankfully, as far as I know, there isn't a single known resource in the world that we are predicted to run out of - not just because we have so much in terms of potential supplies, but also because there isn't a single resource that we are going to have to depend on for longer than our capacity to wean ourselves off it.

One last thing, all this doesn't mean we have to deny that bad things are happening and that people are misusing our planet in all sorts of cruel, careless and wasteful ways. But what we must never do is what it is easiest to do - to look at incidents of bad things happening and make that the entire argument. Of course if you only focus on the bad then pretty much everything is negative. But it just won't do.

What's always needed is a proper cost-benefit analysis that factors in everything - that is, all aspects of human progression, and all aspects of human retrogression (or to the best of our ability). The moment a balanced view is attempted, things change a great deal - and I must admit, I find it bizarre, given the incredible progression-explosion that has occurred, that people find it so easy to focus so much on the costs.

Don Boudreaux has a neat illustration for this progression explosion - what he calls "The Hockey Stick of Human Prosperity"- so named because if you graphed the living standards and life expectancy of humankind over the last few millennia, they would mostly be flat until the exponential advances that occurred in the aforementioned progression-explosion in the past two hundred years.

It is vital to emphasise just how good the hockey stick illustration is in conveying two important things - not just in conveying the benefits of becoming advanced at the point in human history at which the hockey stick's heel and toe curves upwards, but in conveying just how comparably bereft human beings were for so many centuries when they were without the things we take for granted. One can see the astonishing progression-explosion not just by how much we've reaped the benefits of capitalism, industry, science and technology in the past two centuries, but by the absence of these things in every century that pre-dated the Industrial Revolution, and in all the present day countries that lack the qualities of free enterprise, and a basic political structure, stable government, rule of law, and the conditions and technological capabilities to lift them out of poverty as quickly as we'd like.

What The Pope Doesn't Get

I wasn't going to write a Blog post on the Pope's latest perorations - but a few people have asked for my views on it, so I had a quick look at his thoughts. Where he’s going wrong can be summed up in one of his most strident statements:

“The idea of infinite or unlimited growth, which proves so attractive to economists, financiers and experts in technology  is based on the lie that there is an infinite supply of the earth’s goods, and this leads to the planet being squeezed dry beyond every limit.”

Oh dear – alas, the head of an institution as grand and powerful as the Catholic Church ought to be much better informed on the basics of economics. The Pope’s argument would be okay if the predicates were correct (ditto every other anti-progress person who continually spouts green-bytes). That is, if the free market system was based on the error that we rely on an infinite supply of the earth’s resources, and that to run out of certain resources is going to put us all to hell in a hand cart, then yes the Pope’s encyclical would be right on the mark.

But the truth is, Pope Francis starts with an assumption that turns reality upside down, so his analysis is frivolous. People who understand economics don’t of course think that the earth’s goods we consume are based on an infinite supply of resources. Quite the contrary - the subject of economics is built on the reality that in a supply and demand market, resources are finite and need allocating in the most efficient way.

Because of the limitation of the earth’s resources, supply-side initiatives in the free market engender innovation, which creates value, but also brings about a change in the way we use the earth’s resources. For example, we used to burn a lot more coal than we do now. Currently the technology for electricity, gas, and solar energy has weaned us off coal dependency, which means we use less of it.

Another example is paper. We used to use a lot more paper. Currently the technology for digital interfaces (laptops, mobile phones, iPads) has weaned us off much of our paper dependency (with much more still to come), which means….. you guessed it…. we use less of it.

So when we see economic growth, and increased prosperity, as well as people continually being lifted out of poverty because of it - that growth is not defined as a calibration of any single resource we consume - it is the value created consistent with how the market most efficiently allocates the ever-changing use of varying resources.

Pope Francis has lots of good qualities – it’s such a shame his understanding of the basics of economics and human progress is meagre, and his pontificating so lacklustre here.

What Nobody Is Talking About In This Beheading Tragedy

Nicholas Salvador detained over woman's beheading

This case is terribly sad, and at the same time it also presents us with an intriguing consideration of the human mind and the nature of mental illness.

Nicholas Salvador beheaded an elderly lady, believing her to be the human incarnation of a malevolent demon figure. He has now been declared insane on grounds of suffering from paranoid schizophrenia, and obviously we all agree he was mistaken about the old lady's demon status. But if you think about it, the mistake is predominantly in the projection of demonic forces, not in the morality of the act.

That is to say, the reason we recoil in horror at what happened is not because we think a malevolent demon figure is benign and undeserving of death, it is because we are upset at her death and because we don't actually think the old lady was demonic. If any of us thought we were face to face with a demonic figure capable of wreaking havoc on men, women and children, we'd be the first to call for its execution (a practice not uncommon in several American States, lest we forget).

So while Nicholas Salvador's mental illness led him to the tragic mistake of killing what he thought was a malevolent demon, thinking he is actually killing a malevolent demon does demonstrate that an element of cogent sanity is very much present in his act - which, as I said at the start, presents us with an interesting consideration of the nature of sanity and insanity.

The Fixed Pizza Fallacy

I love it when I happen to come across a perfect illustration like the one above that so neatly sums up why anti-austerity campaigners like Owen Jones, Russell Brand and Charlotte Church have everything still to learn. What we're seeing from them is something very similar to conspiracy theory, where economic growth and the concomitant inequality are seen as a bogey from which the government needs to rescue us.

It's unsurprising people are so cautious about economic growth - our evolution primes us to be cautious by nature. Suppose you're a distant ancestor still making sense of the world - you will gain by false positives, but you are liable to lose a lot if you get things wrong. A rustling in the bushes may be the wind, but it may be a predator. It's less costly to assume it's a predator and find out it's the wind than to assume it's the wind and find out it's a predator. So over the years we have been primed for false positives - to sense potential dangers and ascribe them to something predatory, even when such things are not there. The anti-austerity crew are like people seeing a tiger in every rustling bush - except in this case they are seeing conspiracies against the poor in every instance of economic growth.

The big fallacy that's behind so much of the left's thinking is what's called the fixed pie fallacy - the mistaken assumption that wealth is like a pie, where if I have a slice of it, it leaves less for you. But as the pizza illustration shows, the economy isn't fixed. If the economic pizza is larger, then the slice sizes increase for everyone too, even the poorest people with the smallest pizza slices.

Anyone who actually cares about the incomes of the poor would favour faster economic growth, not lament the increase in inequality that is so often a product of increased economic growth. With a growing economy everyone's absolute gains increases, even if the gains at the top increase exponentially greater. To be averse to this means you should not to be praised for being caring, you should be reproached for being envious.

It’s ironic that the richest in society bear the brunt of the left’s opprobrium, because what makes the whole of the pizza grow is primarily the top entrepreneurs and investors (usually the wealthiest) - they are the ones doing the most to make life better for everyone else in absolute terms.

Instead of the faulty fixed pie metaphor, economic growth is a bit like knowledge. Knowledge is not pie-like, because it is not zero-sum. Jack can increase his knowledge without decreasing Jill's. In fact, the more Jack increases his knowledge, the more chance Jill has of increasing hers too. The same is true of wealth - it can keep expanding - and as recent history indicates, it probably will continue to do so.

Are We Seeing The Labour Party Sliding Into Oblivion?

Recent history demonstrates that in the future the Labour party is probably going to have to choose between being slightly economically right of centre and having a chance at winning an election again, or reverting back to its left wing roots and never winning an election again.

You have to consider why this is probably true. Labour has not won an election majority since the 1970s, except for when the slightly right of centre Tony Blair led them on three successive occasions. Even more so than anyone expected, Ed Miliband's shift to the left away from Blair's New Labour made them unelectable again. The upshot is, left wing parties don't win UK majorities anymore (the SNP exception to this in Scotland is too meagre in numbers to have any real bearing on the UK as a whole).

What about Labour's response then? Recently I suggested that people even further to the left than Ed Miliband would probably end up splitting off into another group, as it's clear from recent events that back to the centre-right is where this next Labour is heading under either Andy Burnham, Liz Kendall or Yvette Cooper.

This is a shame. While far left is very far from my position economically, the working classes won't have any proper representation under Burnham, Kendall or Cooper, because their job is not to make Labour socialist again, it is make them electorally popular again - and the only way they can do this is by vying for the centre-right ground.

That's why I predict a left wing split at some point in the near future - the socialist faction is going to demand some better representation, and short of moving to Scotland, they are not going to find it in this current Labour lot.

If there is a Labour split, then the party will surely gravitate towards a political void, just as the Liberal party did in the 1930s, leaving a very fractionated opposition to the Conservatives that is unlikely to budge them for decades to come.

The 19th century Liberal party rose to the fore due in no small part to the dynamic and forceful rise of industry against conservative land owners, and the 20th century Labour party rose to the fore due in no small part to the dynamic and forceful rise of the unions against what they saw as the capitalist pig.

 

But with so many more people educated about the extent to which the free market has been the biggest driver of human progression in the past two centuries, and how private enterprise is more efficient and innovative than public ownership, it seems to be the case that, apart from the relatively small number of socialists chomping at the bit, there is currently far less to grumble about, which, as recent history has shown, makes it nigh-on impossible to be a successful left wing opposition party. Incidentally, polls also suggest that less than 15% of the UK population consider themselves socialist, and 71% of people now consider themselves middle class.

The other thing to realise on the back of this is that, as is evidenced by London's success, most future prosperity will not come about through the hard sweat of manual labour, it will come through skills like those found in science, technology, financial and other service based industries, which continue to make Britain far more prosperous than in days gone by - perhaps explaining why so many people now feel like they belong in the middle classes.

That's even more reason to suspect that the divide will narrow, as people's absolute gains become ever more important than the relative inequalities. For that reason the age-old class conflicts of rich vs. poor and capitalists vs. the workers are gradually sliding into oblivion. Not wholly so - and not yet of course, as there are still plenty of societal wrongs to be put right, and still many people struggling on a daily basis - but I'm pretty certain that as we carry on my prediction will come to pass and we will see the end of the Labour party as we know it.

Socialism Is Fine If You Keep It Away From Economic Policy

I often find myself having to write about where I think socialists are going wrong, but I've also spoken in the past about the relationship and the distinction between the socialist in the socio-personal economy and the socialist in the market economy, which does explain why many socialists think as they do, but also does at least attempt to find as much common ground as possible, and acknowledge the merit in the socialist aspiration. The main thing socialists are getting wrong is that in their attraction to the economic left many young people are confusing the socio-personal economy (our social behaviour) and the market economy (our financial behaviour) by lumping them together in a way that misses the important distinction.

When it comes to the evolutionary socialist in us - the one that assents to kinship, inter-personal bonds and shared-interest groups, the predominant force is the socio-personal economy, explaining our natural assent towards sharing, being generous and kind, and mutually assisting one another. This legacy has primed us for millennia, long before any such thing as a market economy of trade came into place. Consequently, on grounds of adhering to our socio-personal make-up, we are justifiably faithful to a socialistic framework in our ways of thinking. In other words, in terms of our social behaviour, most of us are socialist to a great degree.

That is not the same, though, as saying that because of our mindful social behaviour we can justify socialism on market economy grounds. As the history of hard left economics taking root in China and Russia shows, and as is still being shown today several EU countries, the market economy operates under a different arrangement to the socio-personal.

In the socio-personal world our affinity with friends and family is based on bonds of attachment, either blood-connection (relatives) or like-mindedness (beloveds, friends, and social groups). But the market economy extends way beyond these affinity rings, where success isn't just about familial bonds or connecting with like-minded people, it is about connecting with the rest of society too - the vast majority of people who are not like us. I may have little in common with the Indian chef who cooks my chicken biryani, or the garage mechanic who fixes my car, or the vet who cares for my auntie's cat, but what connects us is our ability to specialise in a market economy where goods and services create value, and where diversity augments that value through multiplicity.

The qualities of the affinity rings related to the socio-personal are not the sort of qualities that can be artificially engendered from on high in a top-down organisational hierarchy, which is why socialism in the market economy is futile as well as being empirically imprudent. The economy is too complex, and people's tastes and incentives are too multifarious to be governed from the top down. What's happening with the economic left is that they are trying to rivet on to their (our) socio-personal socialism a justifiable market socialism, which is a bit like trying to justify sleeping at work on the grounds that we sleep at night in our own homes.

There is a natural limit to manageable social groups, beyond which socio-personal factors like kindness, generosity and reciprocity start to peter out. That's just another way of saying that the ties you have with strangers are weaker than those with people close to you. You've probably heard of the Dunbar number - its Robin Dunbar's suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom folk can maintain stable social relationships. The Dunbar number maxes out at about 150, after which maintenance of that social circle becomes prohibitive. Socio-personal socialism remains at its strongest in those Dunbar groups, but becomes diluted as we add more and more people to the mix.

If there's one thing that causes a chasm between economic socialists and libertarians it's that economic socialists have never made the proper distinction between the socio-personal economy and the market economy. It is through knowing that distinction that one can then realise that an increased number of participants increases the range of goods and services available, that then increases the value created in society by increasing the number of customers willing to partake in the mutually beneficial exchanges. It is through the socio-personal economy that value is created amongst friends and loved ones, but it is through the free market economy that value is created in the wider society.

In that sense, trade is a bit like doing good things for strangers. To succeed in the market economy requires innovation and ingenuity, as well as good character and reputation. Just as in biology copulation mixes up combinations of genes so that heritable survival traits occur more frequently for natural selection to act on the genotype, similarly the market economy produces survivability in business and commerce, where less-good suppliers are out-competed by better ones. A socialism that extended beyond the socio-personal into the market economy would be bound to retard innovation and progress, just as trying to organise biological organisms from on high would inevitably be less successful than the mechanism of natural selection already working in nature.

The upshot is, socialism only works successfully in small groups, and the market economy is not a small group - ergo, socialism doesn't work in a market economy. The benefit of the market economy is that trading with strangers transcends the limitations of the Dunbar-esque socio-personal economy, bringing about huge mutual benefits, not just for both buyer and seller, but also to everyone in society too. To try to arrange such an economy in an attempt to mirror the socio-personal economy, as socialists try to do, is a bit like being in a field full of 30 million bees trying to make them all fly clockwise.