This exceptionally clear and easy-to-read analysis of the way monetary incentives have penetrated our lives is misnamed. It’s about what money shouldn’t buy, rather than what it can’t.
這份有關貨幣獎勵措施的分析已經滲透到我們的生活裡，這份分析非常清晰易讀，但卻還是被誤解了。這是有關於什麼東西是錢不應該買的，而不是不能買的
Michael Sandel gives many examples of the way that you can buy things that, until recently, were not put up for sale: places at a papal mass; an individual’s fertility; and even other people’s lives (the multi-billion dollar market in re-selling life insurance involves betting on how quickly people will die).
邁克爾•桑德爾提供了許多例子說明有那些東西是你可以買但直到最近，都還沒有被拿出來銷售的：比方是羅馬教皇彌撒的周遭地點，亦或是一個人的生育能力，甚至是其他人的生命（這項二次壽險的市場有數十億美元的潛力，是一場押注人會死的多快賭局）。
Sandel knows well the economists’ case for pricing anything and everything: it is the most efficient and least coercive way, they say, of allocating goods to those who want them most. Sandel accepts that with many commodities, the economists are right. But pricing items can produce effects opposite to those intended. He cites a study of a nursery in Israel where some parents were persistently late in picking up children. The owners of the nursery introduced a system of fines as a deterrent.
桑德爾對於以經濟學家的立場來做商品定價是再熟悉不過了。他們說，這是用最有效也是最不強制的方法來分配商品給那些最需要他們的人。桑德爾承認，對許多商品來說，經濟學家們是對的。但商品定價有時會產生與預期相反的效果。他引用了一項研究說明。在以色列有一間幼兒園，有些家長習慣很晚才來接孩子。業主的幼兒園便採取了罰款的措施，以收阻嚇作用。
The effect was to double the number of parents who were late. Sandel says this is because parents regarded the sum they had to pay as a fee for being able to leave their children for longer at the nursery. The constraint on behavior changed from “I do not want to be late and inconvenience other people” to “Can I afford to pay the fine?” The nursery responded to the explosion in late-arriving parents by scrapping the fine and going back to the “honor” system. But the ethic of responsibility had been damaged: the number of late pick-ups stayed at the higher level.
這項措施反而增加了兩倍晚來接孩子的家長。桑德爾說這是因為家長們把這項罰款當作是延長孩子停留在學校的保育費。這種行為限制的改變從不想遲到、不想幫人家添麻煩，轉變成我能夠付得起這多出來的保育費嗎? 這間幼兒園面對這些突然爆增的家長唯一的處理方式就是取消罰款機制，恢復”良知”機制。但是所有家長的責任感已經被損壞了。晚來的家長人數仍然不減。
Sandel argues that this sort of corrosion of decent behavior happens when money takes the place of moral values. He believes that the “marketization” of existence erodes the more important values which we ought to be trying to protect: dignity, freedom and social solidarity.
桑德爾指出，當金錢開始取代道德價值的時候，也就是道德行為開始腐蝕的情況發生時。他認為，“市場化”的存在削弱了更為重要的價值觀，我們應該試圖保護：尊嚴，自由和社會團結。
The problem is that he offers only half of the argument needed to sustain his case. He doesn’t explain the basis of the values he wants us to defend. He uses words such as “distasteful” to attack trades in the things he thinks should not be for sale – but those reactions are not, on their own, a reliable guide to morality.
但問題是他對他的論點只解釋一半。他沒有解釋他要我們捍衛的價值觀的基礎。他使用的詞，如“無法下嚥”來評論他認為不應該被銷售的東西 - 但這些東西本身在道德層面上並沒有一個可靠的指標。
Without a more detailed explanation of what values we should adopt, he has no comeback to the economist who says the only thing that went wrong with the nursery was the price for being late was set too low. The market has indeed started to colonize every area of social life, and Sandel is right to be worried by that. But without a persuasive case for adopting “non-market” values, neither he nor anyone else can hope to diminish the power of prices.
如果對於我們應該採取什麼樣的價值觀沒有一個更詳細的解釋，那麼對於某些說幼兒園唯一做錯的事就是晚到的罰款太輕的經濟學家來說，桑德爾並沒有辦法反駁。的確，市場已經開始影響生活中的每一個領域，桑德爾擔心是正確的。但是，如果在一個沒有說服力的情況下採用“非市場”的價值觀，無論是他還是任何人都別奢望價錢的影響力會消失。
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