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Reverse Jevons Paradox

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Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#51

Post by fluoridation »

alan-crowe wrote: post #42
jihadjihad wrote: post #29

I can’t tell if this is a troll post or not, but either way, the concept the author seems to be looking for is called the “Law of Demand” [0]. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_demand

Not a troll. As recently as the 1870s, when Jevons, Menger, and Walras pioneered the Marginal Revolution in economics, this was a deep new insight about elasticity . Imagine yourself a shop keeper, hoping to boost the money coming in at the till. If you increase prices by 10%, you will get more? Right? That depends on the elasticity of demand. If the elasticity is two, the drop in demand is twice the increase in pric…

>Back in 1865, it was obvious to every-one that the increased efficiency of steam engines would lead to a reduced demand for coal. Jevons pointed out that increased efficiency makes steam power cheaper.

Well, in that case you're talking about an entirely different phenomenon. Jevons's paradox (as defined by this post) happens when the cost of a resource decreases and the spend on that resource increases. You're talking about what happens to the spend on resource A when the cost of resource B decreases. Whether it rises or falls, it won't be Jevons's paradox.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#52

Post by mpenick »

I liked this footnote. A simple, intuitive explanation.

> If you pay $1.00 to press a button, and pressing the button pays you $0.99, you > will press the button zero times. If you get $1.01 instead, you will press the > button all the time.

One thought: If it only gives you $0.01 profit you'll (have to) push it more than if it gave you $1000 profit. There's a saturation point.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#53

Post by cubefox »

pdpi wrote: post #43
jihadjihad wrote: post #29

I can’t tell if this is a troll post or not, but either way, the concept the author seems to be looking for is called the “Law of Demand” [0]. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_demand

No, the concept the author is talking about is the Jevons paradox, just like the title says. The law of demand frames demand as a function of price and utility — demand is monotonically non-decreasing with utility (the more useful it is, the more people want it), and monotonically non-increasing with price (the pricier it is, the less people want it), but e.g. Giffen goods and Veblen goods break the "monotonically no…

> I would argue it's just that the paradox works both ways, rather than calling it a "reverse", but that's me.

No you are right, it's the same paradox, not some distinct reverse form. If more x can cause more y, then it's logically equivalent that less x can cause less y.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#54

Post by bonoboTP »

elil17 wrote: post #47

I think that this person does not know what the Jevons Paradox is. The Jevons Paradox is that increasing the efficiency with which a resource is used may increase the total amount of that resource that is used. Consuming more because costs went down isn't the Jevons paradox - it's spending more because costs went down. So if you give all your coders a great test harness and they run more tests because it takes up les…

Jevons Paradox has become a meme lately because it can be used effectively in a particular type of online argument to sound smart and checkmate the other. But as you say, the popular use is nothing mysterious, just microeconomics. At a certain level of technological development, supply and demand curves meet at a point and it yields a price. If technology develops and makes production more efficient, that crossover point moves, and now more demand can be met. The popular meme idea of scoffing at road construction because it will just make more people drive misanthropically ignores that driving isn't purely emissions but it also gets people to places where they want to go, like visiting family and friends or allows them to live at a different place from where they work if that's more affordable or more to their liking. The road capacity led to more cars on the road, but also to more real demand being met. Now of course, there can be such a thing as totally frivolous additional usage, though one needs a specific value system to judge it whether a trip was virtuous or sinful.

Meanwhile real Jevons is a very particular effect that doesn't show up on all road graphs and doesn't simply mean that opening up more lanes will attract more traffic.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#55

Post by bonoboTP »

I thought this would be about the actual reverse effect, namely that if something gets too cheap, people don't want it anymore. Which would have been also an interesting article, regarding status symbols and luxury items.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#56

Post by fluoridation »

bonoboTP wrote: post #54
elil17 wrote: post #47

I think that this person does not know what the Jevons Paradox is. The Jevons Paradox is that increasing the efficiency with which a resource is used may increase the total amount of that resource that is used. Consuming more because costs went down isn't the Jevons paradox - it's spending more because costs went down. So if you give all your coders a great test harness and they run more tests because it takes up les…

Jevons Paradox has become a meme lately because it can be used effectively in a particular type of online argument to sound smart and checkmate the other. But as you say, the popular use is nothing mysterious, just microeconomics. At a certain level of technological development, supply and demand curves meet at a point and it yields a price. If technology develops and makes production more efficient, that crossover p…

>The popular meme idea of scoffing at road construction because it will just make more people drive misanthropically ignores that driving isn't purely emissions but it also gets people to places where they want to go, like visiting family and friends or allows them to live at a different place from where they work if that's more affordable or more to their liking.

People scoff at road construction (or rather, road widening) as a solution to congestion. I don't think anyone is under the impression that kilometers driven would go down as road bandwidth goes up.

>The road capacity led to more cars on the road, but also to more real demand being met.

No, not necessarily. Maybe some people who would have otherwise used public transport opt to drive instead. Making roads wider could literally make them less efficient, in terms of humans moved per hour per meter of width.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#57

Post by bonoboTP »

fluoridation wrote: post #56
bonoboTP wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jevons Paradox has become a meme lately because it can be used effectively in a particular type of online argument to sound smart and checkmate the other. But as you say, the popular use is nothing mysterious, just microeconomics. At a certain level of technological development, supply and demand curves meet at a point and it yields a price. If technology develops and makes production more efficient, that crossover p…

>The popular meme idea of scoffing at road construction because it will just make more people drive misanthropically ignores that driving isn't purely emissions but it also gets people to places where they want to go, like visiting family and friends or allows them to live at a different place from where they work if that's more affordable or more to their liking. People scoff at road construction (or rather, road wi…

> People scoff at road construction (or rather, road widening) as a solution to congestion. I don't think anyone is under the impression that kilometers driven would go down as road bandwidth goes up.

It is a solution to congestion because a part of the past congestion was that people were stuck at home and gave up on the trip overall, because it would take so long.

> Maybe some people who would have otherwise used public transport opt to drive instead.

Then presumably comfort increased. Also, add bus lanes.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#58

Post by fluoridation »

bonoboTP wrote: post #57
fluoridation wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The popular meme idea of scoffing at road construction because it will just make more people drive misanthropically ignores that driving isn't purely emissions but it also gets people to places where they want to go, like visiting family and friends or allows them to live at a different place from where they work if that's more affordable or more to their liking. People scoff at road construction (or rather, road wi…

> People scoff at road construction (or rather, road widening) as a solution to congestion. I don't think anyone is under the impression that kilometers driven would go down as road bandwidth goes up. It is a solution to congestion because a part of the past congestion was that people were stuck at home and gave up on the trip overall, because it would take so long. > Maybe some people who would have otherwise used p…

>a part of the past congestion was that people were stuck at home and gave up on the trip overall

That's not congestion. If someone opts not to make a trip, or uses a means of transport that doesn't use the road, such as a subway, then they didn't create road traffic. Congestion refers specifically to the failure of traffic to advance at an efficient speed along a thoroughfare.

>Then presumably comfort increased.

Again, "people scoff at road construction as a solution to congestion". Discomfort is not a component of congestion.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#59

Post by vired »

dguest wrote: post #27
nbernard wrote: post #9

> Jevons paradox happens when the cost of a resource goes down, but the total spend on that resource goes up. I would argue that is not Jevons paradox but standard supply and demand (and this "reverse Jevons paradox" too). Jevons paradox occurs when a more efficient use of a resource leads to an increase in its use (instead of a decrease as a first order analysis would suggest).

Supply and demand says when something is cheaper (or produced more efficiently), people will use more of it. But the critical part is that it doesn't say people will spend more on it. Jevon's paradox is a special case of supply and demand, where people actually end up spending more money because something is cheaper. It's interesting because consumption then grows in unpredictable ways: it can drive innovation even i…

> Jevon's paradox is a special case of supply and demand, where people actually end up spending more money because something is cheaper.

No, this isn't what Jevons says. Jevons isn't concerned about money being spent on something, just total consumption of it. Whether more money or less is spent on it depends on the price elasticity of demand. Inelastic demand will lead to less money spent despite more of the resource/service/whatever being consumed. Elastic demand will lead to more money spent.

Re: Reverse Jevons Paradox

#60

Post by [deleted] »

elil17 wrote: post #47

I think that this person does not know what the Jevons Paradox is. The Jevons Paradox is that increasing the efficiency with which a resource is used may increase the total amount of that resource that is used. Consuming more because costs went down isn't the Jevons paradox - it's spending more because costs went down. So if you give all your coders a great test harness and they run more tests because it takes up les…

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