The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Should Protect Fair Negotiations (not the poor)
Recently, President Obama appointed Richard Cordray to be the head of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, created in the wake of the financial crisis to protect consumers. What exactly does it mean to ‘protect consumers’?
To some, the goal of the agency is to protect the poor, by regulating companies that provide “payday loans” to [...]
The Moral Foundations of ThinkProgress, Alternet, Daily Kos, & the NY Times
Over the past couple years, Jon Haidt has had press articles from various liberal leaning press organizations, including these articles from ThinkProgress, Alternet, Daily Kos, and the New York Times.
One of the great things about doing internet research is that web servers automatically collect information that makes it very easy to do cross-sample validation. This information can also be used [...]
Equity trumps Equality in arguments about taxation
It is more effective to advocate for progressive taxation using arguments about equity or deservingness rather than arguments about how unequal American society has become.
I have written about this before, using different data, but with renewed attention being paid to rising inequality, leading liberals to continue to push for rising taxes for the rich, [...]
Hypermoral Debt Ceiling Quotes
In an attempt to popularize psychological theories such as idealistic evil and the dark side of moral conviction, I sometimes use the term hypermoral to describe why ostensibly good people (e.g. non-psychopaths), can be led to do terrible things for ostensibly moral reasons. Research suggests that much of the violence that exists in the world [...]
Libya as a moral war (except for libertarians)
Many people believe that war and violence are inherently immoral, and some psychologists have begun to explore the idea that celebrating heroism is an antidote to the problem of evil. In contrast, other psychologists have highlighted the dark side of moral conviction (Skitka & Mullen, 2002) and the notion of idealistic evil (Baumeister, 1997) to [...]
Oregon’s Medicaid Experiment vs. Motivated Reasoning
Recently, an unprecedented study was done in Oregon where (due to budgetary, not research reasons) a lottery was held to randomly decide which applicants for Medicaid would actually receive the opportunity to receive Medicaid. There has never been an opportunity to randomly assign people to have access to a program like Medicaid, and so this [...]
When Ingroup Love does not equal Outgroup Hate
Recently, Jon Haidt wrote a an opinion piece about the death of Bin Laden, which points out that people are expressing love for their ingroup, it does not necessarily translate to hate of other groups. As I’ve said before, few things in psychology are categorically one thing or the other, and certainly there is a [...]
Osama Bin Laden’s Death is a chance to escape Zero-Sum thinking
President Obama announced that Osama Bin Laden was killed recently and I’ve witnessed an array of emotions. Some view it in partisan terms, wondering if it will benefit Obama. Many are celebrating, which is understandable, but some people also understandably feel uncomfortable with the idea of celebrating death, even the death of someone responsible for [...]
Jon Kyl’s Moral Confabulation is something we all do.
Lately, Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart have been having fun with Jon Kyl’s bizarre response to an error he made on the senate floor in saying that 90% of what Planned Parenthood does is abortion. The real figure is 3% and his bizarre response was that his use of the 90% figure was “not intended [...]
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Last 30 Posts:
- January 25, 2012
Why doesn’t Ron Paul use the word ‘America’ much? - January 7, 2012
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Should Protect Fair Negotiations (not the poor) - December 11, 2011
The Experiential Economy - November 2, 2011
The Moral Foundations of ThinkProgress, Alternet, Daily Kos, & the NY Times - October 15, 2011
Liberals vs. Conservatives:innocent until proven guilty? - September 11, 2011
Does social psychology try too hard to be perceived as a “science”? - August 31, 2011
Equity trumps Equality in arguments about taxation - July 31, 2011
Hypermoral Debt Ceiling Quotes - July 17, 2011
Libya as a moral war (except for libertarians) - July 10, 2011
Oregon’s Medicaid Experiment vs. Motivated Reasoning - June 18, 2011
Relative vs. Absolute Good Choices for Liberals, Conservatives, and Libertarians - May 23, 2011
Personality profiles of readers vs. non-readers and saving your local bookstore. - May 9, 2011
When Ingroup Love does not equal Outgroup Hate - May 2, 2011
Osama Bin Laden’s Death is a chance to escape Zero-Sum thinking - April 23, 2011
Liberals place more value on being funny than conservatives and libertarians. - April 21, 2011
Jon Kyl’s Moral Confabulation is something we all do. - March 30, 2011
Why should the US lead in Libya? Liberal-Conservative Value Differences. - March 24, 2011
Perceptions of Scarcity & Responsibility inform Budget Negotiations - February 27, 2011
Psychological Correlates of Feelings Toward Labor Unions among Liberals - February 22, 2011
Reagan was a Union Member – Visiting his Library as an exercise in Civil Politics - February 15, 2011
Psychology is generally Continuous, not Categorical - February 11, 2011
Are liberals more neurotic than conservatives? - February 10, 2011
Can liberal academics study conservative ideology? - January 17, 2011
Rush Limbaugh says Civility is the New Censorship - January 11, 2011
You can’t put out a Fire with Gasoline – A Reaction to reactions to the Giffords Shooting - December 29, 2010
Tony Washington’s NFL Story: How wrong is brother-sister incest? - December 18, 2010
Tony Hsieh, liberals, and libertarians prefer buying experiences to materialism – A Review of Delivering Happiness - December 7, 2010
The Case for Honesty as a Moral Foundation - December 2, 2010
The Definition of Moral Hazard and A Review of The Big Short - November 23, 2010
Does conflict avoidance underlie disproportionate liberal support of civility?
Civil Politics Posts
- Tom Edsall's Guide to What Each Side Gets Right January 23, 2012 Jonathan Haidt
- Keystone Pipeline's Unlikely Allies January 21, 2012 Bill Bishop
- Center Aisle Caucus brings bipartisan civility to congress October 26, 2011 Ravi Iyer
- 6 Structural Ideas to turn Partisans into Americans from The Atlantic August 5, 2011 Ravi Iyer
- 95% of Americans want civility in politics & 87% believe it's possible to get there July 21, 2011 Ravi Iyer
Why doesn’t Ron Paul use the word ‘America’ much?
A colleague of mine forwarded me this article in the New York Times, which compared the presidential candidates’ usages of various terms. Some words require more context, but what struck him (and me, after I saw it) in this graph is the fact that Ron Paul doesn’t use the words America or American very much, [...]