Should one distribute a good or service through
a market or queue, i.e., pay the price and go on with life or stand on a “first
come, first served” line, usually for a good amount of time? The former “prices” out people who cannot
afford it and at times that might include securing essential goods or
services.
The latter is open to “abuses,” such as “hiring
line standers, buying tickets from scalpers, or purchasing line-cutting
privileges directly from, say, an airline or an amusement park.”[1] They are abuses because they supplant the
ethic of instituting a queue in the first place. And by doing so, one drifts over to ethical
issues.
What
ethic? Well, queues are usually put in
place to offer a good or service at a below market price. A market price is that price that results in
the highest profit rate for the seller, given the product’s supply and demand. When the item is important, essential, or of
moral worth, then for whatever reason, the providers of the item might wish to
bypass the higher market price and offer it at a lower price.
Since that will offer the item at a higher
demand level, queuing is a way to distribute the item. In turn, queuing imposes a cost – buyers are
called upon to stand and wait. Michael
J. Sandel summarizes the ethical issue:
Markets and queues – paying and waiting – are
two different ways of allocating things, and each is appropriate to different
ways of allocating things, and each is appropriate to different
activities. The ethic of the queue,
“First come, first served,” has an egalitarian appeal. It bids us to ignore privilege, power, and
deep pockets – at least for certain purposes.
“Wait your turn,” we were admonished as children. “Don’t cut in line.”[2]
When’s the last time one waited in a
queue? At a ballpark – to enter a
stadium or to use a restroom at the park might come to mind – or anytime
readers go to the bank and wait their turn to do their business. These are so common that one gives them no
mind. But since standing in line is
uncomfortable or can even be costly in other ways, various practices such as
scalping have emerged and make the item more expensive.
This blogger recently noticed, while using a
Florida expressway, that he could use an express lane for a price that would be
charged to his Sunpass account to pay for the privilege. In another situation, one might ask of
oneself: what would happen if in
standing in a line, someone from behind offers the reader twenty dollars to exchange
spots on that line? Would the reader
make a deal or be tempted?
Or if selling a house is the issue, is one
obliged to accept the first offer made? Of
course, not; one is freely unrestrained to negotiate the highest price the
homeowner can get, even higher than the price the owner listed for the
property. From mostly custom, some items
lend themselves to such flexibility; some do not.
Then
there are the questionable occasions such as when one calls a business and is
told by a recording that the call will be answered in the order in which the
call was made as compared to other callers.
Is this simply a salutary message to offset the knowledge that the call
is really answered in an order of importance – its urgency or its source such
as from a more frequent customer to the business being called? Apparently, there is technology that allows
businesses to employ such preferences for favored or more affluent callers.
So,
in terms of ethics, how does one judge such practices? One can readily understand that not all
products are of equal moral standing. No
need to explain that a call concerning some consumer issue – the bought product
does not work as advertised – and a call crying out for help from someone
having a heart attack have different standings in terms of morality or ethics. The product, the timing, and other
circumstances make possible options an issue one should consider when passing
judgment or putting in place such practices.
And
in such considerations, one should keep in mind that there are other options. Included in such options, Sandel offers a
list: merit, lottery or chance, need,
urgency. But the market option holds prominence,
and that favored standing has become more in place as the natural rights view
of governance and politics has become more entrenched in American political
culture. The various schemes, such as
scalping, have become prominent since the mid-twentieth century, whereas before
World War II they were not even considered.
Or
as Sandel puts it: “The demise of the
queue in these domains [such as in national parks or amusement parks] may seem
a quaint concern. But these are not the
only places that markets have invaded.”[3] This and the last posting reviewed such
places. And beyond, for example, there are
other non-market practices such as bribing.
Perhaps considering bribes can be a topic for a
future posting. In any event, this visit
to Sandel’s concerns offers yet another realm of social implications resulting
from what this blog has offered as the consequences of the natural rights view
becoming prominent. It also points out
what federalist thinking might include: encouraged queuing – perhaps assisted
by modern technology – to distribute those products judged to be essential or as
representing who Americans are.
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