Post-Scarcity Status Games
“Top hats and designer handbags are costly symbols of economic capabilities” - But what if we all had no relative economic advantage?
While exploring the question of how influence and introductory networks work (still ongoing - please reach out if you have ideas or insights!!!) I was suggested a really interesting article, “Luxury Beliefs are Status Symbols.”
While only tangentially related to introduction networks, it got me thinking about how people signal significance and value to one another in different contexts. That, I decided, *was* directly related to how people evaluate whether or not they would like to meet someone.
Which brings me back to society - victorian landed gentry, monarchs of excess, A list celebrities, and the wealthy all have attitudes and behaviors which signify their belonging to an upper-crust.
Has there always been a hierarchy in society? From my reading of history, it seems that at least since the start of agricultural society there has been some way to split the members of a society into those of greater or lesser influence and “importance.”
Generally, it seems that the kinds of things these people participate in are hobbies and activities which require a great deal of money and time to appropriately enjoy, like horse-back riding or golf. It’s expensive to keep a stable or spend a whole day doing little but drink and swing. You need some leisure time to be able to learn art history.
It was my assumption that an elevation of taste and class would be a feature of any society with a low requirement for labor. Ultra wealthy societies spend very little time on menial or dangerous labor - outsourcing it to poorer societies or migrants from poorer societies.
If that is the case, and the “poorer societies” are replaced by robots what would happen? It’s good to be worried about the effects of AI on society, but what changes in our social fabric might lead to equal treatment and new opportunities?
Well, we wouldn’t be able to evaluate each other based on our productive output for one - we all would produce very little directly. Even if we assume that we won’t reach post-scarcity, just a serious decrease in necessary labor hours to meet our productive needs, leisure may take a front seat to the organization of our lives.
That makes me think status games are coming back in a big way - but if they aren’t tied to consumption, what would that look like?
Just like people today can mimic a preppy look and be more or less indistinguishable from old money - old money sets itself aside still with specialized knowledge and taste.
If I can “flex” on you because I know a Rothko by name - then I have established cultural superiority in that instance. You can’t buy that, and faking it is really hard.