The value of Breath

[Frustration he/him]

So I decided to calculate how much breath is worth.

Jewels said that her Breath got her family enough money to feed them for a year. Her family was composed of herself, her parents, and her five siblings, which totaled to eight people. What lasts eight people for one year, should last one person eight years, as finding the average cost of food for one person is significantly easier.

Assuming they were frugal and didn't eat extravigently that works out to roughly $39,000 USD per Breath. (Based on the average amount of money spent on food by the lowest quartile in 2021, which was $4,875)

Assuming they kept their standard of living as middle class(With roughly $7,600 per year in 2021) then a Breath is valued at $60,800 USD.

Now the real numbers would likely be quite a bit higher, as food used to cost more, however sources from those times aren't exactly giving me the data neccesary.

 

 

And just for fun I decided to calculate how much Susebron's trove of Breath is, which worked out to between 24.375 Million USD, and 3.04 Billion USD.

[alder24]

So there are billionaires already in Cosmere?

 

31 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Assuming they kept their standard of living as middle class(With roughly $7,600 per year in 2021) then a Breath is valued at $60,800 USD.

Are clothes, water, rent, taxes and other basic expenses included in this?

[Frustration he/him]

2 minutes ago, alder24 said:

So there are billionaires already in Cosmere?

Well, techincally you could say he's a government entity, but yeah, probably.

2 minutes ago, alder24 said:

Are clothes, water, rent, taxes and other basic expenses included in this?

 No, Jewles only mentioned food, not to mention that I have no idea what the expenses of those would be for a H'Hallandren family. I guessing they had some form of suplimental income, that wasn't enough to sustain them.

Edited January 5, 2023 by Frustration

[alder24]

2 minutes ago, Frustration said:

 No, Jewles only mentioned food, not to mention that I have no idea what the expenses of those would be for a H'Hallandren family. I guessing they had some form of suplimental income.

Let's assume they don't. Let's say they maintained living standards of average US middle class (let's make this a baseline for all costs). How much would they spend yearly on clothes, water, and rent of average size apartment (taxes included in rent for simplicity)? 

[Frustration he/him]

2 minutes ago, alder24 said:

Let's assume they don't. Let's say they maintained living standards of average US middle class (let's make this a baseline for all costs). How much would they spend yearly on clothes, water, and rent of average size apartment (taxes included in rent for simplicity)? 

Well, going by a monthly average cost of living to be at $5,111 USD per month that would put a single Breath at $490,656 USD.

And Susebron's trove at $24.5 Billion USD. 

[alder24]

4 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Well, going by a monthly average cost of living to be at $5,111 USD per month that would put a single Breath at $490,656 USD.

And Susebron's trove at $24.5 Billion USD. 

Perfect!

Edit: Every person on Nalthis is halfway to becoming a millionaire.

Edited January 5, 2023 by alder24

[Tamriel Wolfsbaine]

I have to say this totally reminds me of that JT movie "In Time".  Just another reason to love Nalthis and Biochroma more.  

[Treamayne]

That might not be the cost of breath on the street. The Priests overpay specifically for vibrant child breaths (nothing's too good for their gods).

Also consider that their food supplies are unlikely to be of similar cost to manufactured food items consumed by modern Americans. Example: Enough flour to bake bread all year is less expensive than buying 52 loaves of Wonder (assuming 1 loaf/week) - when the cost of manufactured bread includes labor, processing, packaging, warehousing, shipping, advertising, etc.

[Frustration he/him]

28 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

That might not be the cost of breath on the street. The Priests overpay specifically for vibrant child breaths (nothing's too good for their gods).

Well if you have someone willing to pay such a price, and they can continue to do so, that basically becomes the market value.

29 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

Also consider that their food supplies are unlikely to be of similar cost to manufactured food items consumed by modern Americans. Example: Enough flour to bake bread all year is less expensive than buying 52 loaves of Wonder (assuming 1 loaf/week) - when the cost of manufactured bread includes labor, processing, packaging, warehousing, shipping, advertising, etc.

This is true, and I did try to find the cost of goods at closer tech level societies, but I wasn't able to get any year round costs.

[Treamayne]

1 hour ago, Frustration said:

Well if you have someone willing to pay such a price, and they can continue to do so, that basically becomes the market value.

Normally, I would agree. In this specific circumstance, however, The Court of the Gods is only buying about 25 breaths per week and only from children. I would think that a random adult would not get a similar price outside of the Court and could not sell to the Court. Also, a random adult is unlikely to pay that much outside the court for a breath for which they may not even know the providence (adult/child, healthy/sick, etc.).

It's absolutely a good baseline, but I'm just suggesting we consider it's more like gems - collectors pay a premium for exceptional quality - but that doesn't set the current market value for just a normal gem. Too bad we don't know how much money Dedelin sent to Lemex as a way to calculate what he might have paid for the breaths Vivenna "acquired."

Edit: The more I think about it, the more I think the gem comparison might be an angle. Instead of a gem's 4Cs (Cut, Clarity, Color, Carat) a breath might be measured by Age, Vitality, and possibly other criteria - with the culmination of those attributes determining buy and sell prices.

Edited January 6, 2023 by Treamayne
Expansion

[TheFrugalWizard he/him]

What if you calculated it a different way?

It mentions that Vasher had enough Breaths in the prologue to see colors perfectly. We'll say he has around 600 Breaths total, being conservative. Also, I couldn't find the quote, but it mentions that that amount of Breaths could have fed a peasant family for 50 years.  

In 2022, the average household spent $5,080 on food, with 2.5 average people per household. Multiply that by the 50 years it mentions gives a total of $254,000 spent on food over the 50 year span. Therefore 600 Breaths is roughly equal to $254,000. Divide that number by 600 gives you a grand total of...

$423 per breath. 

Using the first example to calculate, $5,080 divided by the average 2.5 people per household comes to $2032 dollars per person per year. Multiply that by eight gives you around $16,300 for Jewel's whole family for the year, thus the Breath would be worth about that much.

I'm curious to know if I've missed something, or if this is simply a discrepancy.

 

[alder24]

10 minutes ago, TheFrugalWizard said:

It mentions that Vasher had enough Breaths in the prologue to see colors perfectly. We'll say he has around 600 Breaths total, being conservative

1000 at least. He got them from Vahr who had 1000 Breaths - 4th Heightening.

17 minutes ago, TheFrugalWizard said:

Also, I couldn't find the quote, but it mentions that that amount of Breaths could have fed a peasant family for 50 years.  

Actually that was 50 Breaths - 50 years of food for a peasant family. The same calculation as Jewels' trade 1 Breath for feeding the family of 8 for a year. ch 5:

Quote

The priest, Bebid, looked about ner vous ly. He had enough of a Breath aura to indicate that he’d reached the First Heightening. It was where most people—those who could afford to buy Breath—stopped. That much Breath would extend their lifespan by a good de cade or so and give them an increased life sense. It would also let them see Breath auras and distinguish other Awakeners, and—in a pinch—let them do a little Awakening themselves. A decent trade for spending enough money to feed a peasant family for fifty years.

 

[TheFrugalWizard he/him]

Okay, thanks for pointing that out. I had remembered seeing something like that, but I must have missed it.

[Nightstar The Bright]

We simply can’t calculate it accurately, this is because we don’t know how much they need. 

Take the regular Roman peasant in our world. They used far less then the average American (poor person) does. Those Romans bought clothing only it fell off of their backs and was completely unusable. The average person today, even if he’s poor, needs a lot more then those Roman peasants. We simply don’t know the standard of living for an average Hallandren family.

[alder24]

2 hours ago, Nightstar The Bright said:

Take the regular Roman peasant in our world. They used far less then the average American (poor person) does. Those Romans bought clothing only it fell off of their backs and was completely unusable. The average person today, even if he’s poor, needs a lot more then those Roman peasants. We simply don’t know the standard of living for an average Hallandren family.

You mean Roman Plebeian? What's your source on "wearing clothes until it falls from their back?" Anyway, interesting information form Wikipedia:

Quote

Financial status[edit]

Plebeians who resided in urban areas had to often deal with job insecurity, low pay, unemployment and high prices[34] along with underemployment.[37] A standard workday lasted for 6 hours although the length of the hours varied as Romans divided the day into 12 daytime hours and 12 nightime hours; with the hours being determined based on the seasons. Cicero wrote in the late republican period that he estimated the average laborer working in the city of Rome earned 6 1/2 denarii a day which was 5 times what a provincial worker would make. By middle of the 1st century CE this number was higher because of inflation but however the high cost of living in the city of Rome kept the value of real wages down.[33]

On the value of Denarius:

Quote

By the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire (c. 27 BC), a common soldier or unskilled laborer would be paid 1 denarius/day (with no tax deductions), around 300% inflation compared to the early period. Using the cost of bread as a baseline, this pay equates to around US$20 in 2013 terms.[17]

Assuming the payment of 1 denarius a day, which by this calculator is worth 26.36$ today, times 365 days, times 8 family members is equal to 76971.20 USD. That's the cost of one Breath, assuming those numbers are approximately correct.

[Treamayne]

4 hours ago, alder24 said:

times 8 family members

Why would you multiply by 8 family members, if you are calculating wage? The $20/$26.36 was based on a loaf of bread, but a loaf of bread feeds more than one person in a day. So, it would either not multiply by any number of family members (one source of income feeding 8 people) or it would multiply by some fraction of 8 (if you assume two or three loaves of bread to feed a family of 8 for a day). 

[alder24]

56 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

Why would you multiply by 8 family members, if you are calculating wage? The $20/$26.36 was based on a loaf of bread, but a loaf of bread feeds more than one person in a day. So, it would either not multiply by any number of family members (one source of income feeding 8 people) or it would multiply by some fraction of 8 (if you assume two or three loaves of bread to feed a family of 8 for a day). 

Right, kids won't be working. My reasoning was that a Roman Plebeian can survive daily by being paid 1 denarius a day, which is worth ~26$ today, thus he would spend that denarius on food and necessary commodities. The value of 1 denarius was estimated by knowing the prices of wheat and bread, 1 denarius isn't equal to 1 loaf of bread, looking at the source:

Quote

By the time of Caesar, a legionary made 10 asses[16 asses = 1 denarius since 141BC] a day but wheat cost 12 asses a modius [8.73 L]. Allowing for local variations all of these prices remained somewhat proportionate to the wages. During the early Empire a modius would sell for two denarii in Rome but could be had for half that price in the rural parts of Italy and only 8 asses (half a denarius) in the breadbasket of Egypt. Baked bread sold for a dupondius a loaf in the expensive cities like Rome and Pompeii and half that (one as) in more rural towns. By this time the legionary was earning nearly a denarius a day but the Praetorian Guard (at Rome) were paid more partially for their honored position and partly to offset the expense of living in the City. Comparing today's prices for bread at the supermarket might suggest an as was worth a bit over a dollar US placing the denarius at about $20.

You can buy 8-16 breads with 1 denarius. Yes, you can feed a few people with that, but you can't survive on bread alone - thus I assumed that with 1 denarius a person can buy everything needed to be fed healthy for a day. 1 denarius was a pay for the poorest class of workers, a common soldier or unskilled laborer, that's why I assumed you won't be able to feed a family of 8 with that alone. It's a simple assumption to avoid digging into the prices of meat or vegetables during the times of Caesar or something like that. But sure, that's the highest value of the Breaths, with the lowest being 9621.40$ (1 denarius a day is enough to feed a family of 8 alone). In the more middle ground, it might be like 2 or 3 denarii a day for a family of that size. 

[+hwiles]

On 1/5/2023 at 4:49 PM, Frustration said:

So I decided to calculate how much breath is worth.

Jewels said that her Breath got her family enough money to feed them for a year. Her family was composed of herself, her parents, and her five siblings, which totaled to eight people. What lasts eight people for one year, should last one person eight years, as finding the average cost of food for one person is significantly easier.

Assuming they were frugal and didn't eat extravigently that works out to roughly $39,000 USD per Breath. (Based on the average amount of money spent on food by the lowest quartile in 2021, which was $4,875)

Assuming they kept their standard of living as middle class(With roughly $7,600 per year in 2021) then a Breath is valued at $60,800 USD.

Now the real numbers would likely be quite a bit higher, as food used to cost more, however sources from those times aren't exactly giving me the data neccesary.

 

 

And just for fun I decided to calculate how much Susebron's trove of Breath is, which worked out to between 24.375 Million USD, and 3.04 Billion USD.

Similar to what a couple folks have already noted, I think you've identified what is more-or-less the market cap price for "premium" Breath, not the open free-market trade value (IE: the God King pays the most because Breath donations from children is a core pillar of Nalthian governance, economics, and religion and anyone who isn't the God King would generally pay much less). That said, you've still made an astute observation in my view.

 

I would offer the opinion that, since trading Breath is fundamentally unregulated in the sense that anyone who can speak the words while in possession of Breath can do it, the typical free market price of Breath shall always default to the lowest locally accepted figure. It's painfully difficult to estimate what the "true" economic cost to an individual is for being a drab on Nalthis, which means that people who are selling their Breath in the open market are, realistically, probably not making any objective considerations as to the cost to themselves for selling their innate Breath (IE: they just need the money right now and they either don't realize or don't care that they are definitely getting a raw deal trading under these conditions).

So, in my head at least, the question becomes: what single lump sum amount of money would the most desperate subpopulation of a society (bottom 10% of wage earning adults) be willing to trade an object which >99% of said population cannot ever "use" (most people just don't have enough Breath to do anything useful with it except keep it in their body to reinforce themselves), 100% of them possess naturally by birth, and which is correlated with sickness and depression if surrendered?

Economics is not my forte, but my understanding is that in the US, the individual poverty threshold is currently set as earning <$15K/year and approximately 10% of citizens are considered to be impoverished. Now, this may feel cold, harsh, and sterile, but...it only takes 9 months to make a new child with their own virgin Breath from Endowment...so, at most I would expect the Breath of an impoverished adult to trade for:

9months/12months*$15K=$11K

However, taking into account that money-in-hand today is more useful to a desparate man than money-in-hand tomorrow, we can probably haggle even lower. How much lower? What an evil question.

For personal morality reasons, I do not want to see the price of Breath fall below $5K/unit, so I'm gonna stop now,  you monster. =]

[Tamriel Wolfsbaine]

On 1/10/2024 at 10:36 AM, hwiles said:

Similar to what a couple folks have already noted, I think you've identified what is more-or-less the market cap price for "premium" Breath, not the open free-market trade value (IE: the God King pays the most because Breath donations from children is a core pillar of Nalthian governance, economics, and religion and anyone who isn't the God King would generally pay much less). That said, you've still made an astute observation in my view.

 

I would offer the opinion that, since trading Breath is fundamentally unregulated in the sense that anyone who can speak the words while in possession of Breath can do it, the typical free market price of Breath shall always default to the lowest locally accepted figure. It's painfully difficult to estimate what the "true" economic cost to an individual is for being a drab on Nalthis, which means that people who are selling their Breath in the open market are, realistically, probably not making any objective considerations as to the cost to themselves for selling their innate Breath (IE: they just need the money right now and they either don't realize or don't care that they are definitely getting a raw deal trading under these conditions).

So, in my head at least, the question becomes: what single lump sum amount of money would the most desperate subpopulation of a society (bottom 10% of wage earning adults) be willing to trade an object which >99% of said population cannot ever "use" (most people just don't have enough Breath to do anything useful with it except keep it in their body to reinforce themselves), 100% of them possess naturally by birth, and which is correlated with sickness and depression if surrendered?

Economics is not my forte, but my understanding is that in the US, the individual poverty threshold is currently set as earning <$15K/year and approximately 10% of citizens are considered to be impoverished. Now, this may feel cold, harsh, and sterile, but...it only takes 9 months to make a new child with their own virgin Breath from Endowment...so, at most I would expect the Breath of an impoverished adult to trade for:

9months/12months*$15K=$11K

However, taking into account that money-in-hand today is more useful to a desparate man than money-in-hand tomorrow, we can probably haggle even lower. How much lower? What an evil question.

For personal morality reasons, I do not want to see the price of Breath fall below $5K/unit, so I'm gonna stop now,  you monster. =]

Absolutely. The value of a breath is however much the person who is selling a breath for is willing to sell it for. 

I was just re-listening to the scene where (SA spoilers) 

Spoiler

Dalinar was asking Kaladin what the worth of a man's life was. Priceless was the answer. Dalinar agreed and said he got a bargain. He got to keep 2700 men for just 1 priceless sword or whatever. Awesome scene and a good example of how placing a price on something like a breath is impossible. 

I think the court of the gods is willing to pay so much because they aren't simply trying to amass breaths for nothing. They want devoted followers who are willing to bring forth more and more breaths forever to sustain the Returned who fall in line. 

Its a smart system and $60,000 per breath is a cheap price to pay when you are that big and it is supporting your ability to control a region. 

The worth of a breath to someone being held up and robbed?  Well people want to stay not dead. So I imagine back alley exchanges for souls can be far cheaper.  

Families with long term goals in mind all the time could be passing breaths as inheritances for free.

This is another thing that I will be very interested to see how Nalthian governments choose to legislate into the ground. 

[Master Silver]

I'm just amazed that monarchs and powerful nobles don't line people up at sword point to achieve the 5th heightening. In the long run, that would likely be economical as you wouldn't need a court physician or a wine/taste tester for poison. If you reign 1,000 years it pays for itself. In fact, when the goal is not dying if you achieve the 5th heightening, why it isn't pursued with more vigor, I don't know. 

[Trusk'our he/him]

On 1/18/2024 at 12:25 PM, Master Silver said:

I'm just amazed that monarchs and powerful nobles don't line people up at sword point to achieve the 5th heightening. In the long run, that would likely be economical as you wouldn't need a court physician or a wine/taste tester for poison. If you reign 1,000 years it pays for itself. In fact, when the goal is not dying if you achieve the 5th heightening, why it isn't pursued with more vigor, I don't know. 

Well, for one, it would get people to rebel against you, possibly leading to your untimely demise. . . which sort of defeats the purpose of getting the Breaths in the first place.

It's also possible that many of the other regions around Nalthis have religious or cultural taboos against transferring Breath. After all (if I remember correctly), Awakening has only been a thing for about 400 years before the events of Warbreaker, which means that Hallandren may be the only nation on Nalthis up to this point to see the real potential of Breath.

Although, you have a point; it feels like there should be more people who hunt after Breaths with more vigor than we've seen on screen. Perhaps they do exist, but Hallandren authorities don't take kindly to this as they know of its existence (plus, it would be rather hard to hide the extra Breath from someone who was looking for it).

[Master Silver]

That is a great point about various religions prohibiting the transfer of breath. And I suppose we saw this in the book. Given the short amount of time, 400 years is about 20 generations. But, I imagine that if parents passed breath to the eldest child before they died, they would still likely have less than 50. And this would be if your family managed to stay middle class for 400 years. So even if a breath is between 15k and 20k, how many families actually increase wealth from generation to generation, someone always screws it up. 40 million dollars is what it would cost to stop aging. Your family would essentially need to save 100k a year for 400 years. Also, is there a point when a normal breath would wear out?

[Treamayne]

1 hour ago, Trusk'our said:

Awakening has only been a thing for about 400 years before the events of Warbreaker, which means that Hallandren may be the only nation on Nalthis up to this point to see the real potential of Breath.

The ManyWar kinda belies this point. It was fought by many/most nations about Awakening/Lifeless/Breath. Though the cultural taboo is possible (even probable), since I doubt Idrians were the only ones to Tabboo breath transfer after the ManyWar finally ended.

57 minutes ago, Master Silver said:

Your family would essentially need to save 100k a year for 400 years. Also, is there a point when a normal breath would wear out?

Keep in mind that breath "vibrance" decreases with age or illness:

Annotations and WoB:

Spoiler

Annotations to Ch 3:

Spoiler

But the Breaths of those who are aged aren’t as vigorous as those who are young. If Lightsong was given one of those to feed on, he’d survive for another week—but he wouldn’t feel as vibrant or alive as he does after feeding on the Child’s Breath.

The people of Hallandren are faithful. Even if Lightsong himself doesn’t believe, they do; and they want to provide the best for him. Hence, they use children. Old enough to know what they are doing, yet young enough to give a powerful, vibrant Breath to their god.

Note: this is more about how a Returned who has consumed the breath will be affected it's age and vigor - but may have implications for why every parent with Breath does not pass it to their child before they die. 

Quote

Questioner

I teach economics at Rutgers and in general I love the books but *inaudible* I like to tease him because he loves them, and say it doesn’t really make sense to have a fixed price for Breaths and it doesn’t make sense that if you give it away when you’re young, and his claim was that somewhere in the book it talks about how the Breath actually gets weaker as you get older.

Brandon Sanderson

So, dying Breaths can be much weaker, but not middle aged ones. So, you have a legitimate thing, my counter to you is, having listened to a ton of Freakonomics, economic people do not do what is logically economic, particularly in a closed system. You might find that Breaths sell for different things, or are treated differently, in other countries.

Questioner

In the Warbreaker world.

Brandon Sanderson

But I do think about these things.

Questioner

Oh no, it’s obvious you do. It’s pretty clear when you start looking at it, and that's not something...

Brandon Sanderson

Here’s the thing, there are fantasy writers who are actually economists, L.E. Modesit is the most famous one, and he-- I’ve been on panels where he’s complained about how writers, fantasy writers ignore economics, basic economics, all the time. So I try to listen at his feet a bit.

Calamity Philadelphia signing (Feb. 20, 2016)

 

As for Breath and Awakening in other countries, we already know that how Returned are treated varies by country - but so does Awakening:

Spoiler

Annotations to Ch 4:

Quote

I’d like someday to do a sequel to Warbreaker , in part because I want to show off all of the different ways people in Nalthis deal with the Returned. They’re treated in very strange ways some places. For instance, just across the mountains there’s a kingdom where when someone dies in a way that might be heroic, the corpse is immediately purchased by a nobleman hoping to hit the jackpot and get a Returned. You see, since Returned can heal people, keeping one around to act as an emergency insurance plan to restore your health is a great idea.

Annotations to Ch 14:

Quote

In some parts of this world, Returned aren’t worshipped, but instead seen as something akin to vampires. They draw in Breath to survive, and need a supply of people to feed off of. They tend to wear black, since it’s the most powerful color for draining to Awaken things.

WoB:

Quote

Dylan Huebner

Would it be effective/efficient to make Awakened machines? That is to say, could one make a crossbow or catapult that fires itself, or a wooden cog that perpetually turns?

Brandon Sanderson

There is a country that does that. 

Tor.com Q&A with Brandon Sanderson (Jan. 10, 2011)

 

Hope that helps.

Edited January 19 by Treamayne
SPAG

[Duxredux he/him]

Addressing the last few posts, you can totally poison someone at the lower Heightenings, that's how Lemex died. Breaths don't wear out too significantly at a higher level when stored in a person as that is how the God-Kings have accumulated so many Breaths over the centuries (without Peacegiver's treasure, 2 breaths a week for 300-400 years isn't enough to build up to the 10th Heightening). Inheritance practices when life extension and eventually immortality is what is passed down has a fundamental flaw, don't you think? Seems likely to create tension between the firstborn and their siblings.

As for a king threatening subjects to give up their Breath at sword point, why bother when you can work and tax them until they give up their Breath for economic reasons? You can't consistently threaten your workforce with physical violence, as killing them simply destroys the Breath, and it takes considerable manpower, time, and money to keep someone in an Awakener’s prison in addition to keeping them out of the labor pool. It takes time and money to force someone to give up their Breath through duress. Ah, but let them dream, let the poor aspire to greater things, take out loans for things like children's education, farming equipment, or a shop, and they'll gladly give up a piece of their soul. It's how they got Jewel's family's Breaths. They'll get a substantial portion of the costs back through taxes as the family reinvests the capital back into the city anyway and keeps them in the labor pool generating revenue and taxes. Let them fear for their lives and give their Breaths to support the war effort to protect their homes and their sons and daughters marching to war and you have how they collected Breath for the Manywar. The models we see in the Warbreaker work just fine.

If that sounds too heartless and coldly rational, I've been reading Pratchett with Lord Vetinari, studying supply chain management, and looking at agricultural business cycles.

Edited January 20 by Duxredux