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I almost ignored this due to the sloganized, hard-to-understand title and the unreliability of the site. But the study actually seems pretty good, and the paper is well-written and open-access [1].

[1] https://spb.psychopen.eu/index.php/spb/article/view/11607

Whenever my RSS reader shows me an article from phys.org and the article is open access I decide if I want to post the phys.org article or the paper, this was a toughie. A common situation is that the phys.org headline is "Scientists come to some conclusion" and the title of the paper was "We measured something"; this one was a tough call, I bet it would have gotten <5 upvotes had I posted a link right to the paper.

Sometimes phys.org articles are absolutely great, sometimes they suck, sometimes they run articles off the AP wire or from a university press release. Their advertising is reprehensible, but I've looked at the alternatives and most of them are much worse, it's one reason why phys.org and related sites are on the list of top sites submitted to HN by people other than myself, not just the list of top sites I submit to HN. (I post enough that I really have to take stats ex-myself because for some sites, like coindesk, I post most of them)

I ended up clicking through because I saw your name!

So this is just Thrasymachus - "Justice is nothing other than the advantage of the stronger"?

We have not evolved far beyond the same problems that bedeviled Socrates and his interlocutors, have we?

Thinking about it now I'm surprised that Mancur Olsen doesn't get mentioned

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Logic_of_Collective_Action

as his theory is precisely about how when collective action is difficult people don't do it.

I'm reminded of the nixon quote: "When the president does it, that means it's not illegal."

It was aspirational then, but after 50 years of working to create the Unitary Executive it is now fact.

Only if we let it be fact. Surely there’s a line.

And thanks to our corrupt SCOTUS, it's been put into law! The president can now do whatever they want, as long as they claim it's for their job.

n=256 undergraduates playing “The Ultimatum Game.”

The headline (“fairness is what the powerful can get away with”) is a tad lofty given the methodology of the study.

Isn't the flip-side of this "The powerful do not do what they will be held accountable for"?

Yes, everyone does what they can get away with in a mixed-incentive game.

Surely this will replicate...

> He added, however, that it is important to remember the limitations of such studies: "We used point/money to represent the real-life costs associated with actions like campaigning or going on a protest march. Experiments like these are only meant to simulate aspects of the real world, not perfectly represent its complexity."

> Behavior may be different if participants had earned their points rather than simply received them, or both Proposers and Responder shared a common identity or wider goal.

> "Still," Dr. Gordon continues, "it is a reminder that we should be mindful of attempts to limit the ability to hold power to account. For example, through anti-protest, anti-strike, and voter suppression laws. In an era marked by growing global inequality, this study offers critical insights into the psychology of power, and the mechanisms that can promote more equitable societies."

I feel like fairness is what anyone can get away with and powerful people just tend to get away with more. Even the article seems to land on this conclusion.

>Even the article seems to land on this conclusion.

But the title landed in the next county because that's what the editor's job is in the modern era of clicks and eyeballs.

Yeah, that’s what I was alluding to. There had to be a slight, “you’re getting screwed,” angle to it.

I'd like to see add on study on 'Banality of Evil'.

Here "The willingness of those in power to act fairly depends on how easily others can collectively push back against unfair treatment, psychologists have found."

What about all the the middle managers that enable the powerful.

The more the middle layer of population supports the powerful, the less the 'masses' can revolt to enforce fairness.

All revolutions are actually started by the middle class which gets upset. The true lower class masses never have the resources to get off the ground.

A buffer class of courtiers. If you got rid of every powerful dictatorial elite with one magical bolt of lightning, the upper-middle class would have new ones chosen by the end of the day.

"Results suggest that the ease of collective action induces more egalitarian behavior by individuals in a position of power and makes those without power less willing to accept unfairness."

This is why capitalists dislike unions so much, becasue they know this. Together we are stronger.

> This is why capitalists dislike unions so much, beca[us]e they know this.

No, the reason why capitalists hate unions so much is that it is another layer of incredibly annoying bureaucrats that you have to get along with.

What you describe might rather be the reason why people who have dark triad traits don't like unions; these people often are not "convinced capitalists", but rather people who use capitalism (or whatever the current system is) to their advantage.

I'd argue that unions can help an area be more competitive.

Any carpenter or handyman could nail together a stage for a movie, but members of the Carpenters Local 213 in LA are experts at efficiently building that kind of temporary structure and they do it efficiently. What would be a difficult HR problem in most places is just "call the union hall" in Hollywood; it has some costs, but it has some benefits.

A distinction without a difference to anyone observing a "convinced capitalist" from the outside.

> No, the reason why capitalists hate unions so much is that it is another layer of incredibly annoying bureaucrats that you have to get along with.

I will never understand this perception. You think there is no bureaucracy in businesses? They want to be the sole bureaucrat is all, so getting rid of all other bureaucrats makes them more profit.

Bureaucracy is the administrative system governing any large institution, whether publicly owned or privately owned.

Capitalism favors dark triad traits. What capitalist doe snot use capitalism for their own advantage?

Corporate Psychopathy: The Dark Triad Traits in Business Leaders https://scribe.rip/psychologs-magazine/corporate-psychopathy...

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