Then in that case, the focus on job activities is way too narrow. The answer to “which activities are executed within the economy?” is roughly “all of them, except those things which literally can’t be bought and sold, even on the black market.” And that is a very small and shrinking set. Every choice to do something for myself is also a choice not to hire someone else to do it, there’s no neutral opt-out decision, even if measures like GDP don’t accurately capture household production. Technically with modern medical technology I could even use money to outsource my breathing, eating, blood circulation, and blood filtration. Economics is a totalizing approach to explaining how we assign and distribute scarce resources across every choice we make.
So in that sense I’d say that “what the economy does” is provide options and incentivize people to take those options, in full generality.
The answer to “which activities are executed within the economy?” is roughly “all of them, except those things which literally can’t be bought and sold, even on the black market.”
Yes but I would like to have a conprehensive list of all activities people engage in. Rather than just abstracting it into “all of them”.
Sorry if that came off rude, it just seemed like a kind of question I would never expect anyone to ask. It’s not like there’s one ready-made somewhere, and it’s not like anyone could type one out. No matter how many examples anyone gives you, you’ll still be missing almost all of them and need the abstractions anyway. And if you have internet access and have lived a reasonable number of years as a human, you already have a sufficient basis to know that, and also to build on without such a list.
Then in that case, the focus on job activities is way too narrow. The answer to “which activities are executed within the economy?” is roughly “all of them, except those things which literally can’t be bought and sold, even on the black market.” And that is a very small and shrinking set. Every choice to do something for myself is also a choice not to hire someone else to do it, there’s no neutral opt-out decision, even if measures like GDP don’t accurately capture household production. Technically with modern medical technology I could even use money to outsource my breathing, eating, blood circulation, and blood filtration. Economics is a totalizing approach to explaining how we assign and distribute scarce resources across every choice we make.
So in that sense I’d say that “what the economy does” is provide options and incentivize people to take those options, in full generality.
Yes but I would like to have a conprehensive list of all activities people engage in. Rather than just abstracting it into “all of them”.
I’m starting to think I’m talking to an AI and not a human.
Why?
Sorry if that came off rude, it just seemed like a kind of question I would never expect anyone to ask. It’s not like there’s one ready-made somewhere, and it’s not like anyone could type one out. No matter how many examples anyone gives you, you’ll still be missing almost all of them and need the abstractions anyway. And if you have internet access and have lived a reasonable number of years as a human, you already have a sufficient basis to know that, and also to build on without such a list.
Wait, wouldn’t such a list be extremely long?
In theory yes, but I don’t expect anyone to be able to create a full list, so I expect to only end up with a few items on it.