Comment by jonnathanson | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jonnathanson | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Hypothetical problem... Let's imagine a universe in which milk is a rare commodity, and milkshakes are worth their weight in gold. In this world, right now in 2017, 1 milkshake trades for $100 USD. You have a milkshake, and I have a milkshake. So we each hold the equivalent of $100. I drink your milkshake, effectively stealing $100 from you.

Fast forward to the year 2020. Milkshakes are now worth $1,000,000 USD. Have I deprived you of $100, or have I deprived you of $1,000,000? (Note that we can't seem to use retroactive NPV analysis in 2017, since in 2017 we had no way of accurately predicting how milkshakes would be priced in 2020.)

On the one hand, I appear to have imposed a severe opportunity cost on you. On the other hand, I haven't taken the world's only milkshake from you. So what I've literally stolen from you in 2017 is the present value of the milkshake, $100.

IANAL, and I will confess that I have no idea how a court of law would evaluate this case. But in economic terms, it certainly feels as though I've deprived you of more than $100. So what have I actually taken from you?

[EDIT: This post was meant to pose a question. It was not meant as a frank disagreement with the parent post per se. I've cleaned up the wording a bit to try to make it clearer.]

You stole $100 from me. If the value of milkshakes went down to 0 in 2020, would you say you deprived me of nothing?

This is basically like the people talking about the guy who spent thousands of bitcoins on pizza as if he lost shitloads of money by buying that pizza. Of course he didn't.

In the scenario I've presented, I think you're correct. This is because milkshakes are liquid (both literally and figuratively), and because they are replaceable.

If we add the condition that milkshakes are not replaceable, does that change the outcome? I'll stfu now if this is derailing things.

It does not. Again, suppose BTC had gone to $2. Would you then say that they only stole $2?

I think you're right, but I do like pishpash's solution of converting to currency value at the time of theft and then applying some sort of interest calculation. This divorces the damages of the theft from the hypothetical asset value of milkshakes over time.

Sure, but the appropriate amount, in my mind would have been $100 plus prevailing interest, not some in-kind distribution. Suppose there is only one milkshake in the world and it got destroyed, how would you ever repay the claim except by converting to currency value?

Sure, but the appropriate amount, in my mind would have been $100 plus prevailing interest

Bankruptcy laws determine that. Maybe x% a year? Creditors took them to court and at that moment the court takes over. You should have bought more bitcoins at $400 if you believed in it.

So essentially we set damages at t0 currency value of the milkshake, plus interest over N years. Seems reasonable.

If milkshakes were illiquid, and could only be bought and sold every N years, that would seem to peg damages to asset value instead of currency value. Or am I wrong?

Assumptions: milkshakes are fungible (I can buy a functionally equivalent milkshake), I have the wealth to acquire a replacement milkshake without significantly shifting the balance of my assets.

Under those assumptions, you have deprived me of the exchange value of my milkshake at the time it becomes known to me that you have misappropriated it. This is my moral judgment, not a legal opinion.

[Edit: I did not take your response as a frank disagreement, and anyway, even if it were, there's nothing wrong about disagreeing with me. I'm not an ethicist, just an opinionated rando.]

I'm inclined to agree under that assumption. [Edit: same!]

Reply on news.ycombinator.com