Wait, before you answer, read on. And, my dear reader, this is a very long post. I really hope you will find it as enlightening to read as it was to me when I was thinking about it and writing it.
It seems to me that there is a lot of sloppy thinking and communication around the topic of values, not to mention an excessive dose of disingenuousness. So I’d like to try and shed some light on the topic. Light that I hope can help those of you who are truly interested in understanding values better, and that may help those of you who enjoy relieving people of their unearned pretensions in matters moral.
Let me start with my conclusion. Many people and institutions are dishonest with themselves and others when it comes to identifying and articulating their values. Why? Because they define and express their values in times of abundance. In good times, we are all for everything good. But then watch what happens when times are tough. People and companies (groups of people) start throwing those “values” overboard as fast as they can.
No my friends. Those nice things you say in times of abundance, that saccharine corporate values statement, they are not, necessarily, your real values. Those are the values of fantasyland. Your real values are the ones you keep when times are tough.
Let’s think about why.
To start with, let’s analyze the language a bit. When people say they value X, they do not simply mean that they like X. “I value X” is actually shorthand for “X is one of the most important things to me, more so than almost anything else.” We all know that if a person says “I value X” it makes sense to ask “how much?” or “do you value it more than Y?” Those followup questions could not make sense if value statements were not relative and quantifiable. This is a critical point: value statements are relative and quantifiable.
Let’s deal with the easier case of material value first. We all place value on certain goods. We can express that value in terms of the quantity of some other good that we will exchange for the first. Say a fine fellow fancies a certain beer. In pre-monetary times, he might offer the brewer two goats and a night with his wife in exchange for the beer. What he is saying is that he values the beer more than the two goats and the night with his wife. He is quantifying the value of the beer (to him) in terms relative to some other good (goats and his wife). Now that we have money, we express the value of material in financial terms. This allows us to have a common unit of value which makes trade easier but the concept of value is the same. Our values must always exist relative to some other good and must be quantifiable.
Non-material values operate the same way. Let’s say a lovely lass claims to value love. We can ask her how much she values love and whether she values it more than she values honesty. We may not have as precise a system of measurement for such values as we do for material values, but people can certainly tell you that they value something a little or a lot. They could even give you a number on a scale of, say, 1 to 10. In fact, if this lovely lass told you that she valued love and you asked her how much and whether she valued it more than honesty and she told you that she did not know, you would likely question whether, in fact, she truly values love. Why? Because values are relative and quantifiable.
[By the way, there are crossovers between the worlds of material and non-material values. What do I mean? Well, that people often trade a material good for a non-material good or vice versa. A guy can choose to take a job that doesn’t pay so well in order to live closer to his girlfriend (trading money for love). Or, he might choose to lie in order to avoid paying a fine (trading honesty for money). This shows that the objects we value can all be compared to each other regardless of whether they are material or non-material in nature.]
Note: Before continuing, this would be a good time to grab a snack, take a bathroom break or just go do something nice for someone.
The next step is to address this issue of scarcity and abundance. I argue that values cannot exist without scarcity. They can only exist – and it only makes sense to conceive of them – in a world where one must trade off certain goods for others. Imagine that a person had an infinite amount of money. Literally infinite. Say he told you that he wanted a hot dog. Do you think it would make sense to ask him how much he would pay for it? Paying $1 would be no different to him than paying $1000 or $1 billion! So does it even make sense to wonder how much value he places on that hot dog?! [Note: I assume that we’re talking about a healthy person without the neurosis of being pathologically cheap and unable to spend money.] What would “value” mean to such a person? Clearly it could mean nothing other than the fact that he likes hot dogs and wants one. But that is not what we mean when we use the word “value.” The word may be the same but the concept is entirely different.
BTW, if you’re struggling with the above example, it might help to take it even further. Imagine a planet where everything is in infinite supply. There are an infinite number of hot dogs. There are an infinite number of beautiful men and women. There are an infinite number of Ferraris, etc. It would be silly to ask someone how much value they placed on X. They couldn’t possibly understand such a question. Hot dogs would be free because there would be an infinite supply of them and, in any case, the guy who made them would have an infinite amount of money so he wouldn’t need to charge you.
Non-material values operate the same way. Imagine if you never had to make tradeoffs. Time was infinite so you could help your sick friend, go to your daughter’s ballet recital and volunteer at the soup kitchen… Your money supply was infinite so you could give handouts to all in need, give jobs to all in need, keep poor performers on the payroll, and help your kid pay for college… Sure, you could still distinguish between things you considered good and things you considered bad. But within the good category, could there be any distinction? If you could have honesty and love and friendship and and and and, what would it mean when you said you “valued” something? And is that what we mean when we say the word? I think not.
Values can only exist in a world of scarcity. And while you may not need to actually experience scarcity in order to have values, your values are those things that you would still maintain after trading off whatever you needed to in order to cope with such scarcity.
This brings me to one last wrinkle. As much as the concept of value has been either confused or obfuscated, the term “values” has been as well. People and companies refer to their “values.” What does this mean? Well it doesn’t mean the entire list of things on which they place a value. People place a value on everything. It may be a positive value, it may be a negative value. It may be a high value, it may be a low value. But people value everything. No. When people or companies refer to their “values” they mean something like a short -list of their most valued things. [I hate using the word “thing.”]
But while membership on this short-list is binary (something is either in or out), the list itself is continuous. How do people make the cut? Moreover, even items on the short-list are subject to being traded off for each other. If you keep forcing people to make tradeoffs, they will eventually land on only one remaining value. That is what they value more than anything (save, perhaps for their life but more on that later). This short-list itself is not such a clear concept given that the rules for membership are unclear and that the items on the list are actually in competition with one another (at least in theory).
So I’d like to propose something here. Above, I’ve tried to construct a reasoned argument. Now I’d like to just offer a personal preference. I think it makes sense to select those items for the short-list without which you would not be you. Or, perhaps, ask yourself what you would die for. If you’re a company, ask under what conditions you would choose to go out of business rather than face the alternatives. Those items belong on your list of values. True, it does not get you out of the problem of potentially having to make a Sophie’s choice among items on the list. But, at least, it helps you understand and articulate why you made the cut between, say, items 5 and 6 rather than between 6 and 7.
Alright, enough about values since I value my sleep and it’s nearly 2am!
Let me just end by expressing my reason for thinking and writing about values today. I think in some important sense, we are what we do. And we do what we most value. Expressions of value are, therefore, expressions of identity. We use them to inspire and motivate ourselves and others. So values are important. When the word “values” is thrown around with either recklessness or cynicism, the concept of “values” loses its moral force. And we are all the worse for it.
I truly hope that we will each have an honest conversation with ourselves about our values. Such conversations and the prerequisite introspection are healthy tools for understanding, defining and manifesting our selves. We should do this as individuals and as members of families, societies, companies and other social institutions. And let us be ever vigilant to ensure that the concept of values is not abused by those who seek the public relations gains that can be accrued by claiming to hold certain values without the genuine commitment to adhere to those values in moments of scarcity.
