Pro Arguments, Con Arguments and Status Quo Bias in Multi-Issue Decision Problems

The public faces a choice between two alternatives: the status quo and a comprehensive reform proposal that departs from the status quo in several dimensions. Deliberation over the problem takes the form of a public multi-issue debate. The reformists argue that the proposed reform satisfies desirable features lacked by the status quo. The status quo supporters counter-argue that some of these features are obtainable by a reform that departs from the status quo in a single dimension only. This modest reform is not a feasible alternative in the debate and is used by the status quo camp merely as an argument. This type of argument is familiar from real-life debates and usually viewed as a (possibly decisive) pro-status-quo argument. Two questions arise: First, how could an argument that is based on an irrelevant alternative such as the modest reform be considered relevant to the debate? And second, how could this argument be construed as favoring the status quo (perhaps even decisively so)? I analyze these questions using a model of multi-issue debates, in which alternatives are represented by a repertory of pro and con arguments. The main results are: (1) Con arguments are more effective than pro arguments in determining the debates resolution; (2) A status quo bias: certain con arguments against both the status quo and the comprehensive reform nevertheless decide in favor of the status quo.