ROBINSON,
FRIDAY AND ALEXANDRIA – A FABLE
(About
the Effects of Income Equalization)
Herbert
Grubel, Emeritus Professor of Economics, Simon Fraser University
After Robinson was
shipwrecked on a deserted island, he fished the local reef and collected wild
corn in the forest to feed himself well enough to survive and be content with
his fate.
When Friday was shipwrecked
and joined him on the island, he and Robinson initially fished and collected
corn together and shared the bounty equally. However, after a while it became
clear that Robinson was relatively better at fishing and Friday was relatively
better at collecting corn. So, they decided that Robinson would do all the
fishing and Friday all the collecting.
Once a week they got
together and traded fish for corn. Most often the ratio was one fish for 10
ears of corn, but sometimes it was 1/5 or 1/20 when uncommon weather interfered
with harvesting. Whatever the ratio, both Robinson and Friday were satisfied
since they agreed freely on the ratio of the day.
Both men built their own
shelter. Robinson devoted much of his free time and energy to build and
maintain a strong and comfortable home. Friday spent little of his free time on
building a shelter, preferring to pursue his passions of watching birds and writing
poems. His shelter turned out much less secure and comfortable than Robinson’s.
Both men were happy with the way they arranged their lives.
Then one day a woman named
Alexandria was shipwrecked on the island. She was a professor at a university
located on another island in the archipelago. She had been in a small boat not
too distant from that island admiring the sunset when a sudden storm pushed her
boat into the open ocean and after a day at sea, she shipwrecked on Robinson’s
Island.
The two residents of the
island gave her food and she moved into Friday’s shelter. In return for these
benefits, she used her university background and taught them how to increase
their productivity. Robinson constructed a fish farm and Friday applied
scientific farming methods.
The changes increased the
supply of fish and corn and a higher standard of living for all. The three
lived in happy harmony, enjoying their personal freedoms while cooperating on
the important production of food.
One day a very heavy storm
hit the island. It flooded Friday’s somewhat flimsy shelter and made life
miserable for him and Alexandria. When they visited Robinson, they found him
dry and content in his well-built shelter.
After that visit Alexandria
remembered what she had learned from her university colleagues. It was unfair
that Robinson had a better shelter than the one in which she and Friday lived.
This thought brought Alexandria and Friday to visit Robinson where they argued that he had the moral
obligation to share his superior material wealth with them. He reluctantly
agreed and allowed them to take away the building material he had stored for
future repairs of his shelter - without getting any corn in return. He did so
for the sake of peace and harmony on the island.
Some time later, Alexandria
remembered another lesson she learned at the university. Ratios for the
exchange of fish and corn in the market were determined without proper regard
for their effect on the distribution of income. After some careful
soul-searching she concluded that recent ratios had led to an unfair
distribution of income and that as a woman she was in greater need than the
men.
To correct this problem,
she and Friday again visited Robinson, this time arguing that he was morally
and for the sake of peace and harmony obligated to accept a different way of
determining the ratio at which fish and corn were exchanged. It would
henceforth be decided after a vote among the three of them.
Robinson had no choice but
to accept this new way of setting the ratio. Alexandria and Friday were in the
majority and had the means to make life miserable for him if he did not accept
their decisions. As time went by, Alexandria and Friday adjusted the ratio
occasionally to create a fairer distribution of income.
As a result of this new
method for deciding the amount of corn Robinson received for his fish, his
living standard fell substantially. He resented this fact deeply and withdrew
from all unnecessary contacts with Friday and Alexandria, became depressed,
lost his zest for life and caught ever fewer fish.
Alexandria and Friday did
not know how to fish. Their backgrounds as professors and poets did not
prepare them for the job. Living standards for all three on the island
continued to decrease but while Robinson was depressed, the spirits of the
other were high because
they knew that no-one else had a higher income than they.
The end of life on
Robinson’s Island is lost in the fog of history. What could have happened to
the habitants is:
· They lived happily and in
harmony with subsistence levels of income until they died from old age.
· The meager diet caused them
to lose physical and mental strength, which made them die in a battle with
invaders from another island.
· Robinson, while still well-nourished
and strong, killed Friday and Alexandria in revenge for their unfair treatment.
He died of old age.
Note: Alexandria is a
caricature of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Member of Congress from New York.
Her firebrand communist rhetoric has made her a darling of the woke media.
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