Bob should suggest that the neighbour should write down the maximum amount she’s willing to pay for Alice to stop playing her music (without Alice watching), Alice should write down the minimum amount she’s willing to accept to stop playing music (without the neighbour watching), and if the latter amount equals or exceeds the former the neighbour should give the arithmetic mean of the two to Alice and Alice should stop playing and learn to live with it or buy headphones or go live somewhere else, otherwise Alice will keep playing and the neighbour should learn to live with it or buy earplugs or go live somewhere else. (This reduces to the “politeness” thing when both write down “zero”.)
Why should it be the neighbour who should pay Alice to not play rather than Alice who should pay the neighbour to play? Because the rules as they exist now (and were accepted by the neighbour when she came to live here) do allow Alice to play, that’s why.
You are working from an assumption of equal income / wealth. May I ask, are you a libertarian economist? :-) This is what I find almost baffling about that—the idea that price offered for a product reflects merely how much people like it. And not how much they actually afford...
Why should it be the neighbour who should pay Alice to not play rather than Alice who should pay the neighbour to play? Because the rules as they exist now (and were accepted by the neighbour when she came to live here) do allow Alice to play, that’s why.
I mean, because Bob is Alice’s friend, not the neighbour’s.
Bob should suggest that the neighbour should write down the maximum amount she’s willing to pay for Alice to stop playing her music (without Alice watching), Alice should write down the minimum amount she’s willing to accept to stop playing music (without the neighbour watching), and if the latter amount equals or exceeds the former the neighbour should give the arithmetic mean of the two to Alice and Alice should stop playing and learn to live with it or buy headphones or go live somewhere else, otherwise Alice will keep playing and the neighbour should learn to live with it or buy earplugs or go live somewhere else. (This reduces to the “politeness” thing when both write down “zero”.)
Why should it be the neighbour who should pay Alice to not play rather than Alice who should pay the neighbour to play? Because the rules as they exist now (and were accepted by the neighbour when she came to live here) do allow Alice to play, that’s why.
You are working from an assumption of equal income / wealth. May I ask, are you a libertarian economist? :-) This is what I find almost baffling about that—the idea that price offered for a product reflects merely how much people like it. And not how much they actually afford...
Good point, but they are neighbours, so that’s most likely at least in the ballpark of being correct.
No, I was just assuming that Bob was one. :-)
This is a good solution when marginal money has roughly equal utility to Alice and Bob, but suffers otherwise.
Similar situations were discussed here:
http://lesswrong.com/lw/jje/decision_auctions_aka_how_to_fairly_assign_chores/afc5
I mean, because Bob is Alice’s friend, not the neighbour’s.