Economists and rationalists got something important dead wrong.
They sorted it out in an oft-repeated experiment called the Ultimatum Game. It's an exceedingly simple game and experiment. People play in pairs. They are told they are to split some money -- say $10. One person is assigned the role of deciding how to split the loot. 50/50? 60/40? 90/10? All for me and none for you (the Trump move)?
The second decides if he or she will take the offer. If he accepts the offer, they split the money according to the rule proposed. If she declines the offer, neither get anything.
Economists argued for a long time that rational people take ALL OFFERS (other than 100/0). That is, if I offer to take $9 and leave you $1, then you are being offered a choice between $1 and nothing, and rationally choose the dollar. If I offer to take $9.99 and leave you one penny, you are being offered a penny -- or not -- and take the penny.
The problem with this sort of rational analysis is that it may be that rational people take the penny (or the dollar) but real-life people DO NOT. In thousands of runs of this experiment, real life people tend to reject offers in which they are treated very unfairly. In fact, the data from these thousands of experiments show that people tend to reject offers in which they are being offered less than 20% of the original prize. Make an offer of 75/25 and most of us take it begrudgingly, but offer 85/15 and most of us reject the 15, preferring nothing at all to allowing you to take 85.
Why is this relevant right now? Because the Democratic establishment is counting on Progressives to be rational, and take something over nothing. Take Hillary over Trump or Cruz, because 25 is better than 0. Some Progressives are of course irrational -- many or most people are irrational -- so they may reject the offer because they are too angry to think clearly or because they are confused. BUT THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY ESTABLISHMENT IS WRONG TO THINK ALL PROGRESSIVES ARE IRRATIONAL. Many are smart human beings who understand that they have to take 25 begrudgingly, but should reject 15 because the level of unfairness would not be tolerable and should not be incentivized. That is, many Progressives who are balking at a vote for HRC are not confused about Cruz or Trump being the 0 and Hillary being better, but they are thinking that Hillary is the 15 that should be rejected in order to discipline the DNC into behaving more fairly and not the 25 that should be taken begrudgingly.
The lesson is clear: the DNC *must" find a way to make Hillary the 25 (the choice that we take begrudgingly even if we feel we have been treated unfairly) and not allow her to be seen as the 15 (the choice that is so unfair we would rather take 0 and thus punish the DNC into changing in the future). This will include substantial offers to Sanders and Progressives to write parts of the party platform.
I do understand that Obama got away with offering Hillary too little in 2008 and yet won, anyway. But had the economic crisis not hit us in September of 2008 closely following McCain's admission that economics was not his strong suit, the outcome of that election may well have been different. Obama should have offered more to Clinton supporters to earn their votes (his sense of entitlement was not right IMO). In fact, because Clinton supporters in 2008 played the part of DNC loyalists and supported Obama then, many of them consider it very unfair that Sanders supporters are being such poor team players now (and some of them are lousy team players). So Obama's selfishness then is hurting us now, as well. It is surely better to earn votes through consultative programs and doing good for your constituencies than through demands for loyalty oaths and dues-paying. Progressives are not soldiers sworn to die for the flag. They are people in need who expect politicians to try to do their jobs and serve the people fairly. The DNC can say correctly that they are the lesser of two evils, but remember the 80/20 rule: if you are the 15 instead of the 0, people who care about fairness (and liberals care more about fairness than others) will reject you. It is human nature to do so. If the DNC wants to win in November, it must be the 25.
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