Preferences dressed up as beliefs

This discussion at OB got me thinking about preferences masquerading as beliefs. Let me explain what I mean. I am sure most of us have heard the following argument in favor of employer health insurance mandates: mandates are good not just for the employees but for employers as well, because workers with coverage are more productive and therefore businesses providing coverage do better in the marketplace.

There are two curious things about this argument. First, if used in order to convince people who don't already agree (for whatever reason) that employer mandates are desirable, it is a terrible rhetorical strategy (that's because the statement is 1) false and 2) patronizing towards the very audience you're claiming you want to persuade). Second, it seems to be used mostly by people who think employer mandates should be instituted for normative reasons; even if they were shown that mandates are bad for business owners, they'd still want them as policy.

Political debate is rife with arguments like that, and they're used equally often by the left and the right. (The Laffer curve comes to mind here.)

Here's my main point: arguments like the one above can't really be used as a means of persuasion, but rather are a very elaborate way of preaching to the choir. But then there's another puzzle. As preaching to the choir goes, this seems an inefficiently elaborate way of doing it. If all you're doing is signaling that you prefer employer mandates to other people who prefer employer mandates, why not just say you prefer employer mandates and leave it at that? The effect of saying either thing is the same: you're showing people with different preferences that you're not one of them. Why then the need to dress up your normative preference as a positive belief? I see two possible explanations, the applicability of each depending on how much people who use arguments like that know about their own preferences. Both explanations involve two-dimensional signaling: you're signaling not just your preference, but some other quality as well.

First scenario: Suppose you're aware that your policy preference is a normative one. Now every once in a while in your social interactions you will have to signal that preference in order to locate like-minded people. But doing it each and every time by just saying "I think x is great policy" would soon get pretty boring. Instead, you might try and invent new and clever arguments for why everyone should believe that x is great policy. By doing that, not only are you showing that you support x but also that you're a very clever person. And since, by construction, you're not using those arguments to persuade non-believers, they don't have to actually work; all they have to do is appear clever.

Second scenario: Suppose that you're not aware of the fact that your policy preference is normative. Instead, you honestly believe that employer mandates are good for employers, and you try to convince them of that fact--even though your argument can't possibly work on them. Why would you do that? Answer: to signal not only the direction of your preference but its strength as well. That is, you're signaling which policy you prefer, and that you're deceiving yourself about the true reasons why you prefer it. Since self-deception can generate certain forgone benefits, this signal is costly and therefore more credible than just talk. Note that, for this to work, the listeners can't be aware that that's what's going on. Instead, they'd have to be programmed to perceive delusional arguments as inherently more trustworthy.

Even though it sounds more convoluted, I prefer the second explanation; here's why. If you know what your preferences are but express them as cleverly stated beliefs, then, on top of your preferences and your intelligence, you also inadvertently signal a certain degree of cynicism. Groups don't like cynics (even, or perhaps especially, the highly intelligent ones) because on average they're less trustworthy than non-cynics. So the inadvertent signaling of cynicism would probably defeat the message of group loyalty.

Addendum: One example of usage of the "businesses that insure their employees do better in the marketplace" argument is by San Francisco Supervisor Tom Ammiano.