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Test Question........

Guest

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Would you rather earn $50,000 a year while other people make $25,000, or would you rather earn $100,000 a year while other people get $250,000? Assume for the moment that prices of goods and services will stay the same.
 

Baja Big Dog

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Im the guy making the 250K, and I dont care what you "little people" make!!!:beer








Yea right....:p
 

Guest

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It turns out, the majority of people would choose the first option, even though that meant earning half of what they could otherwise have!

In this interesting article at Los Angeles Times, Michael Shermer explores why people make irrational decisions when it comes to money (hint: blame evolution). Apparently, monkeys also behave in the same ways:

Human as it sounds, loss aversion appears to be a trait we’ve inherited genetically because it is found in other primates, such as capuchin monkeys. In a 2006 experiment, these small primates were given 12 tokens that they were allowed to trade with the experimenters for either apple slices or grapes. In a preliminary trial, the monkeys were given the opportunity to trade tokens with one experimenter for a grape and with another experimenter for apple slices. One capuchin monkey in the experiment, for example, traded seven tokens for grapes and five tokens for apple slices. A baseline like this was established for each monkey so that the scientists knew each monkey’s preferences.

The experimenters then changed the conditions. In a second trial, the monkeys were given additional tokens to trade for food, only to discover that the price of one of the food items had doubled. According to the law of supply and demand, the monkeys should now purchase more of the relatively cheap food and less of the relatively expensive food, and that is precisely what they did. So far, so rational. But in another trial in which the experimental conditions were manipulated in such a way that the monkeys had a choice of a 50% chance of a bonus or a 50% chance of a loss, the monkeys were twice as averse to the loss as they were motivated by the gain.

Remarkable! Monkeys show the same sensitivity to changes in supply and demand and prices as people do, as well as displaying one of the most powerful effects in all of human behavior: loss aversion. It is extremely unlikely that this common trait would have evolved independently and in parallel between multiple primate species at different times and different places around the world. Instead, there is an early evolutionary origin for such preferences and biases, and these traits evolved in a common ancestor to monkeys, apes and humans and was then passed down through the generations.

link to article
 

Riodog

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I guess that makes you the great, great, great grandson of Cheeta. So what are you tgrying to tell us Cheeta VII?
Rio
 

snake321

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Do we have to travel to the Planet of the Apes to get this dough???
 

Nord

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I would rather win the Lotto.........
 

Angry Inch

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I'm not buying it. When the average persons income jumps 1000%, so will the price of goods and sevices due to inflation.
 
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