Incentives Are for Losers (with Adam Mastroianni)

Incentives matter, sure. But what should you do when following the incentives means quietly participating in something wrong? Psychologist Adam Mastroianni argues that obeying bad incentives--shading a headline for clicks, keeping the found wallet because no one's watching--is "loser behavior," a surrender of the hardest and most human task: figuring out right from wrong for yourself. In this wide-ranging EconTalk conversation, he and Russ Roberts explore Le Guin's "Omelas," the "big fish" you glimpse that could upend your whole life, and Charles Sumner's near-fatal courage. They wrestle with whether good incentives or good people matter more, why lavish academic salaries may attract exactly the wrong scholars, and the moral lessons of marriage.