Kevin_Kennedy
Defend Liberty
- Aug 27, 2008
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Here's my understanding of Bastiat's broken window scenario:
- boy breaks shopkeeper's window
- shopkeeper pays glazier to repair window
and the effects:
- the glazier has received payment in excess of his costs, making him happy the window was broken
- the shopkeeper has his window back, but is unhappy because he had to pay for it
Overall, the effect on society is a cost in the glazier's labor in materials, along with a transfer payment from shopkeeper to glazier. While the glazier is pleased the window was broken, society as a whole has been harmed by the experience.
Apparently, there was a school of thought Bastiat identified with one "M. F. Chamans" that held that such a broken window scenario would actually improve society. Chamans would see the glazier's enrichment, while failing to note that the shopkeeper's impoverishment exceeded it. Chamans went so far as to say that society might be enriched by the burning (and subsequent rebuilding) of Paris. Such a view may have had its adherents, but was never popular enough to actually result in the burning of Paris.
The parable is illustrative, but to the modern mind, the conclusion (that breaking windows is bad for society as a whole) seems fairly intuitive. I believe I agree with Bastiat here, and perhaps his point was quite insightful when it was made, but such considerations are so much a part of the modern economic perspective that I don't see any additional insight to be gleaned from Bastiat's parable.
I'm sure there are some few people out there who would indeed advocate for the breaking of windows, but I am not one of them.
The point being that the "Broken Window Fallacy" can be applied to any number of things. A further look into the fallacy comes from Henry Hazlitt in his book Economics In One Lesson. I'd suggest reading that, and you can find it for free online just by Googling it, if you're interested.