Options-exchange founders worked unpaid out of felt obligation to the exchange community

Evidence

“We… never thought of even asking for reimbursement [of expenses involved in creating the options exchange],” says Gorky Eisen of the Board of Trade. “This was part of the concept that was inculcated into all of us: `You owe it to your community.’ We had all done very nicely, thank you … and we felt that we had an obligation to the exchange and this is how you pay your obligations.” (Eisen, interviewed by Millo10) Of course, avowals of altruism sometimes mask self-interest, but for a rational egoist to embark on a project like the creation of the International Monetary Market or the Chicago Board Options Exchange, in a context in which all others are rational egoists, is implausible. — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera, 677

Categorization

• CANDY: A compact anecdote about the moral culture inside the founding generation of options exchanges.
• XREF: connects to: Traders made costly unremunerated commitments to build the exchange, resembling collective action. — Donald MacKenzie & Yuval Millo, Constructing a Market, Performing Theory, 69; Building financial derivatives exchanges demanded large unpaid, personally costly commitments from organizers — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera: How Financial…, 671; Creating the CBOE required costly unpaid collective effort by exchange members — Donald MacKenzie & Yuval Millo, Constructing a Market, Performing Theory, 69 (+1 more)