Yup, good point. I have no idea what “should” count as the “gold standard” for status.
If it had been the case that status was “really” a ranking, and therefore inherently zero sum,
then it could produce one of those cases where people would be better off if they were
consistently wrong about their actual status—if they consistently overestimated it.
However, since status is a vastly fuzzier thing than, for instance, height or weight,
it isn’t at all clear what counts as correctly estimating one’s status.
Yup, good point. I have no idea what “should” count as the “gold standard” for status. If it had been the case that status was “really” a ranking, and therefore inherently zero sum, then it could produce one of those cases where people would be better off if they were consistently wrong about their actual status—if they consistently overestimated it. However, since status is a vastly fuzzier thing than, for instance, height or weight, it isn’t at all clear what counts as correctly estimating one’s status.