ROBINSON, FRIDAY AND ALEXANDRIA – A FABLE

 

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.