中文摘要
社会学家早已表明,道德信念是维系市场安排的关键。然而令人惊讶的是,很少有研究考察不同群体如何对习以为常的市场实践的公平性作出不同的评估。本文利用三项调查研究,考察美国人对基于风险的定价(risk-based pricing)的道德信念;这是一种定价制度,其中被预测为成本较高的消费者会被收取更高的价格。在保险和消费贷款两个市场中,我们发现了一种模式:无论经济自利或意识形态如何,高收入个体始终比低收入个体更有可能接受将价格与个人行为挂钩的道德正当性。为解释这一模式,我们提出一个新的理论视角,称之为“选择性共情”(selective empathy)——即在评估定价安排时,个体会不成比例地将其共情投向交换双方中的一方,或站在公司的视角,或站在顾客的视角。我们发现,富裕个体比低收入个体更倾向于对公司产生共情,而更不倾向于对高风险消费者产生共情。这些发现将基于风险的定价呈现为一种阶级化的经济理性形式。此外,它们还凸显了情感在亲资本态度中的作用。
Abstract
Sociologists have long shown that moral beliefs are key to sustaining market arrangements. Yet surprisingly little research has examined how groups may assess the fairness of taken-for-granted market practices differently. In this article, we draw on three survey studies to examine Americans’ moral beliefs about risk-based pricing, a pricing institution in which consumers who are predicted to be costly are charged more. In markets for both insurance and consumer loans, we uncover a pattern in which higher-income individuals are consistently more likely than lower-income individuals to accept the moral legitimacy of tethering prices to a person’s behavior, irrespective of economic self-interest or ideology. To explain this pattern, we introduce a novel theoretical lens we term “selective empathy”—that is, in evaluating pricing arrangements, individuals disproportionately direct their empathy to one exchange partner or the other, taking the perspective of either the company or the customer. We find that wealthier individuals are more likely than lower-income individuals to empathize with companies—and less likely to empathize with high-risk consumers. These findings cast risk-based pricing as a classed form of economic rationality. Moreover, they bring attention to the role of affect in pro-capital attitudes.