Prisoner’s dilemma is a problem commonly featured in game theory. Each player is given an option to be either nice or nasty. Each combination of player plays multiple number of rounds. When tested against different strategies, it is found that the best performing strategies are :
- nice first ( they don’t start the provoking),
- retaliatory (when opponent is nasty they also resond nasty),
- forgiving (they don’t hold grudges),
- clear (their strategies are clear for opponent to interpret) and
- generous (when the opponent has been nasty, they do not retaliate 10℅ of the time )
This isn’t really about the current global economic situation, more about like human behaviour.
In the prisoner’s dilemma, aggressive options tend to do well only in the short term, so you could see ruthless billionaires as short-sighted, considering their reaping of the earth will end up destroying the ecosystems we live in.