You're demanding gifts be made, and how is that ethical?
This question sounds like it's meant to be rhetorical, as if demanding gifts be made is obviously not ethical. But there are quite widely accepted moral systems (utilitarianism, for instance) that do demand that gifts be made in certain cases -- sufficiently wealthy people are morally obligated to donate some of their wealth to charity, for instance.
I'm not saying that in the case under discussion Greenspan had an obligation to pay women as much as men were being paid (it's a complex issue and I'm not sure what I think about it yet), but I do think that simply pointing out that Greenspan had no economic incentive to pay them that much is a pretty unconvincing response to CellBioGuy's moral contention.
sufficiently wealthy people are morally obligated to donate some of their wealth to charity, for instance.
Yes, under utilitarianism, but I've already pointed out that any such imperative would be vastly exceeded by other imperatives.
I'm also not sure whether it works under deontological systems. One way to universalize such a claim is that you should pay people as much as they could earn under any state of affairs, but naturally that leads to you never making money and going broke as it's equivalent to demanding you give away all gains from trade: 'John...
LW readers have unusual views on many subjects. Efficient Market Hypothesis notwithstanding, many of these are probably alien to most people in finance. So it's plausible they might have implications that are not yet fully integrated into current asset prices. And if you rightfully believe something that most people do not believe, you should be able to make money off that.
Here's an example for a different group. Feminists believe that women are paid less than men for no good economic reason. If this is the case, feminists should invest in companies that hire many women, and short those which hire few women, to take advantage of the cheaper labour costs. And I can think of examples for groups like Socialists, Neoreactionaries, etc. - cases where their positive beliefs have strong implications for economic predictions. But I struggle to think of such ones for LessWrong, which is why I am asking you. Can you think of any unusual LW-type beliefs that have strong economic implications (say over the next 1-3 years)?
Wei Dai has previously commented on a similar phenomena, but I'm interested in a wider class of phenomena.