Spurious Independence?

Yesterday, my father dropped me off in the morning at a local food event in Covington (another city in Cincinnati region) where I was volunteering and he and my mother picked me up at 8 pm when I was done. What I found interesting was how much it bothered me. I felt as though I was in junior high again! I got my driver's license as soon as I could at age 16 and while I didn't own a car until I was about 24-25; nonetheless, I've been pretty independent transportation-wise, certainly since college. Having parents drop me off and pick me up made me feel not grown up, and as though I was inconveniencing people, even though my parents indicated they were perfectly willing to do this for me. It's one of the advantages of the auto; owning and using a car makes us "independent." It's part of our training, at least in the US. One of our major rites of passage to adulthood is getting your driver's license. And, it's a big part of American culture- our independence.

But, as I thought about it, I decided that the independence I feel because I own a car and can drive anywhere I wish is a spurious or false independence, or at least, a superficial independence. As an economist I am well aware of how economically interdependent we humans are. Adam Smith, in the first book on economics, The Wealth of Nations, discussed how many people were involved in the production of the shirt worn by the common laborer. Today, virtually every "thing" we purchase has a supply chain and web of production that's huge. Autos, for example, are made with parts from countries all around the world. The gas I buy to put into the car comes from other countries, is shipped in ocean liners owned by people from many countries, ocean liners that were produced in yet other places by yet other people who ate food produced in many places by many people. The simplest of economic transactions, say buying a Barbie doll (made with parts from 18 countries) or having a cup of coffee in the morning is dependent on a huge, huge interdependent web of production. (I consider it quite amazing!)

The old version of Robinson Crusoe is a favorite of economists because it features a man shipwrecked on an island and totally dependent upon himself for everything. Robinson Crusoe is amazingly talented and skilled at many things, yet, still must make do with very little. The moral economists draw from this story is how much better off economically people are when they specialize and trade. The new, and frankly much more realistic, version of this story is the Tom Hanks character in movie Castaway. He barely manages to feed and shelter himself for a relatively short period of time. Human beings aren't made for independence! We are interdependent, inherently so.

It seems to me our choice is between being interdependent more upon our local community or upon strangers. In modern political economies, we've replaced the interdependence of people in communities (tribes, families, villages, neighborhoods- the local) with the interdependence of people in markets (today, many global in nature). Although there have been many benefits to this- I am an economist after all!- perhaps we have gone too far. We need to find a better balance.

One of the people I talked to yesterday about this offered to pick me up for another event. Again, I have to find a balance for myself- what's OK to ask for or accept and what's not. I may be able to bus to this next event. I also began checking out taxi services online though it's clear most are oriented to taking people to/from airports. The problem with the bus system in Cincinnati is that all bus rides radiate out from downtown so getting anywhere off the spokes is difficult.

We're also interdependent around autos and auto use because we drive on roads- together. (I'll have to discuss the amount of subsidies for roads that we don't consider when we're comparing cars to- say buses or trains- in another post.) The more people on the roads, the less "independence" we really have. During rush hours and often other times, the major roads in Cincinnati become giant, slow-moving parking lots, and anyone on them is immensely frustrated.
It's interesting. I've read the literature on what makes people happy (crosses over psychology, sociology and economics). What researchers have found is that people adapt pretty quickly to new circumstances. This is particularly true for new products we purchase. There's an initial surge in our happiness and then we get used to having the new whatever and we adjust back to our normal level of happiness. This is true for lottery winners and on the negative side- it turns out that humans also adapt to becoming paralyzed. After an initial burst of unhappiness, the person adapts and adjusts back to their baseline/normal level of happiness. Now, what I find interesting is that there are some things, mostly experiences, that human beings don't seem to adapt to. On the positive side, people are more likely to remain happier with a great travel experience than a great new car, and are more likely to be happy if they have close friends and this happiness from friends remains. On the negative side, one of the experiences that people seem unable to adapt to is traffic congestion and long commutes; they make people unhappy initially and that unhappiness continues!

Anyway, this carless thing is stirring up a lot of reflection on my part! Thanks for listening.