By Christopher DeMarcus (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: October 16, 2013
The Fraser Institute explored neuroeconomics, income inequality, and social philosophy at its recent public policy seminar in Vancouver. The audience, made up of at least 200 undergrad and post-grad students from as far away as Prince George, piled into the Renaissance Hotel on October 18 to discuss economics and public policy.
While the focus was on economic policy, the audience was filled with a dynamic range of disciplines: nursing, business administration, sociology, political science, and environmental planning.
“Your brain itself is an economic system. Drug use interferes and damages your ability to be empathic and care about others,” explained keynote speaker and neuroscientist Paul Zak, who is the author of the recently published book The Moral Molecule. “Evolutionary history has shown that we’re meant to connect with each other.”
Zak has identified a scientific factor that regulates compassion in the brain: a hormone called oxytocin. He measures the amount of oxytocin in the blood stream of individuals after they have gone through a ritualistic or social event; a wedding, a religious ceremony, or community celebration. After the bonding event, Zak has participants play a computer game that tests their charitability. His studies have found a link between communal living and high levels of oxytocin.
“It’s Adam Smith’s moral argument of self-regulation,” Zak said. “Oxytocin creates a feedback loop that builds stronger bonds. Stronger trust in communities can release oxytocin. You can use the ‘L Word,’ it’s just biology.”
Zak’s push for stronger trust in society has earned him the nickname “Dr. Love.”
But better communities and and higher levels of trust don’t guarantee a perfect world.
“Psychopaths make up two per cent of the population, yet they make up 40 per cent of the prison population,” Zak explained. “It’s not that psychopaths’ brains don’t manufacture oxytocin; their brains don’t respond to it in the same way.”
On the classical economics front, the Fraser Institute’s vice president Jason Clemens had the daunting task of fitting his presentation on deficit spending, income inequality, and healthcare reform into 30 short minutes.
“One thing that many people don’t understand is that there is good and bad debt. Good debt is spending on things that we can use for the long term: infrastructure, bridges, and K-12 education. Bad debt is short-term assets,” he said. “Deficit spending is a structural problem over all. Nine out of 10 provinces are in deficit spending.”
Clemens talked at length about how the public incorrectly understands income inequality.
“15 to 16 per cent of the economy is underground. 12 to 25 per cent of self-employed income goes unreported. Instead of looking at the income data, we should look at the consumption data,” he said.
There was not enough time to address how personal debt like credit cards plays a role in consumption, but Clemens made it clear that he wanted to focus on the issue of lower income over the issue of inequality.
“What the evidence tells us is that if you don’t have a high school education and you are a single parent, you’re going to have a really hard time getting out of the lower income category. These are the people we need to focus on,” he explained before adding some final points about health care policy.
“Thinking about having only a U.S.-style or Canadian-style healthcare system is silly. We can look to adopt working components from other countries,” he said. “The character of federalism allows the provincial systems to test new ideas and see what works.”
Ravina Bains, also a Fraser Institute researcher, presented after Clemens on the need for dialogue between First Nations people and governments with regards to energy projects.
“There isn’t a single new oil and gas project that isn’t on First Nations’ land. One third of Canada’s First Nations population lives in BC, mostly in rural parts of the North. This population is the fastest growing in Canada, at a rate six times faster than the national average,” she said.
Bains expressed that creating a dialogue between First Nations people is essential to forming educational standards that can be mutually agreed upon between governments.
“Chevron [and other energy companies] will provide skills training and education as a partnership in these projects,” she explained before responding that the new energy development projects will provide one third of the heat for the province.
As much as public policy is about economics and neuroscience, it is also about culture and communications. Dr. Steven Globerman from the Center of International Business at Western Washington University was there to present research on the regulation of cultural industries in Canada.
“If Canadian content rules are there to support Canadian identity, shouldn’t Canadian identity be clearly defined?” asked Globerman. “51 per cent of broadcast content on Canadian TV is required to be Canadian. It’s extremely difficult to get straightforward reports, but we do know that $1.8 billion in tax credits is given to Canadian film makers. If you limit [programming choices for viewers], they are worse off.”
The conference was closed by professor Roberta Herzberg from Utah State University. Drawing from utilitarian philosophy, Herzberg pointed out the new problem of healthcare reform.
“Public policy has to deal with moral consequences, those problems become much more complex when they enter the social arena,” she said. “We are being hurt by our own success. The 95-year-old who is healthy and didn’t smoke is taking up 30 more years of healthcare than the 65-year-old smoker.”
Her point was not to keep people smoking, rather that public policy has moved deeper into the realm of moral philosophy as it struggles with new issues in palliative care, organ transplants, and preventative health.
For students, the speakers provided a massive amount of access to groundbreaking research and ideas. While the Fraser Institute generally focuses on economics inside of public policy, arguments from all spheres of knowledge were shared and respected.
