Oh! I’ve been interpreting Christian’s comment differently from you. Christian, could you clarify whether “value the psychological factor of having debt at zero” means (1) “place zero value on the psychological consequences of having debt” (which I think is what rossry has been taking you to mean) or (2) “place positive value on the psychological consequences of having zero debt” (which is what I was taking you to mean)? Thanks!
I think probably you’re right, and in any case you’re right that section 5 is about the emotional disutility of volatility; I was misremembering it as having said something about the emotional disutility of being in debt. Sorry about that.
… And having written that, I see that adrusi has made the same point about ambiguity. I’ll leave this here anyway.
OK. Then I confirm that I agree with you: there surely is (for some people if not all) a psychological difference between having debt and having no debt, and it’s surely (for most of those people if not all) in favour of the latter, and Jacob’s article might have been improved by taking that into account.
But here’s a counterargument: he isn’t claiming to offer a complete analysis of debt and why one might choose to take it on or not; he’s pointing out one thing about debt, its “anti-investment” character, and looking in some detail at that. When I started writing this comment I wrote “would have been improved” at the end of the paragraph above, but the more I think about the point in this paragraph the less I believe that, hence the weaker language that stands there now.
Oh! I’ve been interpreting Christian’s comment differently from you. Christian, could you clarify whether “value the psychological factor of having debt at zero” means (1) “place zero value on the psychological consequences of having debt” (which I think is what rossry has been taking you to mean) or (2) “place positive value on the psychological consequences of having zero debt” (which is what I was taking you to mean)? Thanks!
I think probably you’re right, and in any case you’re right that section 5 is about the emotional disutility of volatility; I was misremembering it as having said something about the emotional disutility of being in debt. Sorry about that.
… And having written that, I see that adrusi has made the same point about ambiguity. I’ll leave this here anyway.
I meant (1).
OK. Then I confirm that I agree with you: there surely is (for some people if not all) a psychological difference between having debt and having no debt, and it’s surely (for most of those people if not all) in favour of the latter, and Jacob’s article might have been improved by taking that into account.
But here’s a counterargument: he isn’t claiming to offer a complete analysis of debt and why one might choose to take it on or not; he’s pointing out one thing about debt, its “anti-investment” character, and looking in some detail at that. When I started writing this comment I wrote “would have been improved” at the end of the paragraph above, but the more I think about the point in this paragraph the less I believe that, hence the weaker language that stands there now.