Question

When wronged, many people feel a strong urge to take revenge. Would taking revenge simply be a matter of honoring the sunk cost of whatever injury they have already sustained?

Select one:

a. It depends. There are conditions under which taking revenge can be rational, e.g., prevent to be wronged again in the future.

b. None of the above

c. No. Being wronged does not account as the sunk cost.

d. Yes. Taking revenge for something that already happened is honouring the sunk cost

Please explain

Answer 1

Option A is correct

This question is related to the fallacy of sunk cost where economic agents continue to do the economic activity in which they have made irrecoverable investment thinking that because they have already invested heavily they cannot withdraw from the activity now. There are conditions under which honouring the sunk cost is necessary and conditions under which it is not. Revenge for example comes out of a past action of somebody who has given an injury in the past and it cannot be undone now. We believe that we can sometime honour this sunk cost by taking revenge so that if not us, others can be protected.