Value Types

To bring value-clarity to a topic, we first must understand value itself. There are several types of value that we will cover at Clearest Value:

• Individual value
• Societal value
• Cultural value
• Economic value
• Intrinsic value

Understanding each of these value types is critical to identifying true value.

Indvidual Value

This one is pretty obvious, individual value refers to the value that an individual places on something. Importantly, this type of value is invented by, and is specific to, each individual.

• A parent typically places higher value on their child than a stranger does.
• A voter typically places higher value on politics than a non-voter does.
• An investor typically places higher value on their personal investment portfolio than the perfomance of the broader market.

These are all examples of individual value, where individuals have created/invented/assigned value to something, according to their own individual judgement.

Societal Value

Societal value is the value that society collectively places on something. This type of value is often used to coerce the individual:

• “It’s who you know, not what you know.”
• “What do you do for a living?”

These are examples of societal value judgements. The first example asserts that society values connections over knowledge. The second is a common question new aquantances use, which suggests a society that values work as the defining aspect of the individual.

The reason that those examples are coervive is because neither of those examples are true representations of societal value.

Societal value on a topic cannot be known with certainty, because it is derived from the individual value of each individual in society.

Nobody tallied the votes on what individuals think about, “It’s who you know, not what you know.” When someone asserts a societal value, they do so as an attempt to force your individual value judgement into alignment with theirs. Coercion.

Cultural Value

Cultural value is identical to societal value with one caveat, instead of the coercion applying to all of society, it applies to a particular subset of individuals.

Economic Value

Most of us have an idea of what economic value is. Put simply, it is the value of something denominated in some form of money. In a large and free market, economic value is a way of determining the individual value someone else places on something.

If I put an heirloom up for sale on the Internet, and I believe it is worth $10,000, but I only receive bids at $1,000, then my individual value assigned to this heirloom is greater than the economic value.

This disparity between an individual value assessment and economic value is a strong signal when assessing the correctness of an individual value assessment that we will use frequently.

Intrinsic Value

The simplest way to explain intrinsic value is to say that it is the true value.

To conceptualize this, let’s consider an example, consider the Sun. Imagine that the Sun were for sale. Individuals would place bids on the Sun according to their individual value assessments, and the highest bid would be the Sun’s economic value, but the Sun has intrinsic value, and that has no relationship to anyone’s individual value judgements. It warms the Earth. It brings light to the world.

Wrap-Up

This post is quite dense, but it is necessary to build this framework of understanding so that we can explore the value of everything together. Bookmark this post and refer back to it as needed!