eli5 When countries swap prisoners how are they sure the other country will actually do it?
In: 4538
It’s short term vs long term gain.
Let’s say I’ve got a bunch of apples, and you’ve got a bunch of bananas.
I don’t want to eat *only* bananas, and you don’t want to eat *only* apples. That’s boring.
So we make an agreement. I’ll give you a banana, and you give me an apple. We both get something we want.
Ah, but you’ve got a sneaky plan. You accept my banana, but refuse to give me an apple. Now you’ve still got all the apples, and you got a banana for free! So smart.
So you eat your banana, feeling proud. But now it’s back to apples. Again and again. Eventually, you get bored of apples. But I’m not trading with you again after what happened last time.
So you ask the guy who owns all the oranges if they want to trade. But they heard about what happened and aren’t interested. Why would they volunteer to be taken advantage of? Pineapple guy, same thing. Nobody is willing to trade with you anymore.
The rest of us, meanwhile, are happily trading. We all enjoy a diet with a ton of variety and you’re stuck outside with a bunch of apples, all because you got greedy and chose short term happiness over long term.
Basically, there’s a popular idea amongst charlatans and morons that deals are supposed to be something that you “win”; you deceive or coerce the other side into taking something of lesser value while giving you something amazing. But if that’s how you operate, you’ll generally find pretty quickly that the only people that will be willing to continue doing deals with you are other charlatans and morons.
A proper deal is something where both sides win and come out better than they were before. And if you’re coming out better than you were before, why would you want to break that deal?
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