Well, I point this out, because at the bottom of a lot of AnCap arguments, is this belief that once we hand people tools like bitcoin, they're going to realize the wisdom of low time preference living, and have a spiritual awakening about the importance of self-reliance and responsibly.
I think that's about the most hilariously wrong read of the malleability of human behavioral incentives, I see around these parts.
I think you’re straw-manning a bit there. Really what people are getting at is the changing of time preference broadly distributed across society. Both of our grandfathers likely bought craftsman tools that were meant to last a lifetime and we both likely buy cheap crap that we don’t care for or take care of.
There's quite a few studies on this. From what I saw, it suggests that both learned and long-cultural (genetic factors play a role).
Ref: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268122002438
Yes. People aren't going to want to hear this, but the reason there's so many bitcoin-libertarian-Austrian types talking about how wine people learn about bitcoin, they will awaken to the possibility of self-sufficiency and personal responsibility stems from a selection effect and echo chamber effect.
They will. But not as fast as we might think.
