[Question] Is there a term /​ better way of phrasing the general case where an intervention helps certain individuals do better at zero-sum games but doesn’t provide any external value?

[freedomandutility]

Eg—Some people think that education /​ the cosmetics industry benefit some individuals but hurt other individuals at the same time because job markets /​ dating markets involve zero-sum games, so education /​ the cosmetic industry don’t provide any benefit to society overall. In other words, they change who succeeds but don’t cause more success.

I’d also like to find a term /​ nicer way of phrasing how individuals involved are incentivised to invest more resources to these things as others do the same, leading to a vicious cycle and increasing amounts of resources being dedicated to something that does not benefit society.

[jessicata]

Positional goods?

[freedomandutility]

That is perfect, exactly what I was looking for, thank you!

[greylag]

“Pareto efficiency“ - Pareto efficiency, or Pareto optimality, is an economic state where resources cannot be reallocated to make one individual better off without making at least one individual worse off (from https://​​www.investopedia.com/​​terms/​​p/​​pareto-efficiency.asp)

and “arms race”, if that counts as a nicer way, or some allusion to the Red Queen (https://​​en.wikipedia.org/​​wiki/​​Red_Queen%27s_race)

[freedomandutility]

These are also perfect, thank you!

[null]

Maybe rent seeking

[Dagon]

I think the two answers so far, Positional Goods and Arms Race, are pretty solid. But I’d like to challenge the underlying statement—there are no truly fixed-sum games in the real world. Utility is highly-dimensional and highly variable across time and individuals, and every legible interaction is actually a sub-game in a much more complex set of known and unknown future decisions.

[freedomandutility]

I think I agree with you, but I also think it’s very useful to think of games as fixed-sum when making decisions relating to them.

[Dagon]

It’s very often worth noticing these features in interpersonal, small-scale decisions. Whether you frame it as “look for the win-win”, “avoid zero-sum sub-games”, or “prefer kindness over winning”, it’s good advice.

I don’t know many cases where it’s useful on the general topics you give as examples (industries, education as a whole, dating).

I should probably admit that I actually do care about myself and those close to me more than strangers, and I acknowledge that there is some amount of zero-sum outcomes in our current perceptions of individual identity. The overall game of individual existence is a mix of many games, and winning some of the zero-sum components lets me get higher sums on other components.