This insight helps us make sense in secular changes in the expression of gender variance. The phenomenon of [increases in transgender identification](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/01/health/transgender-population.html) that some commentators characterize as [_social contagion_](https://youthtranscriticalprofessionals.org/tag/social-contagion/) could also be seen as an entirely _rational_ response to incentives: as being trans becomes less costly—whether due to increased social acceptance, improvements in surgical or hormone-administration technology, or any other reason—we _should_ see more gender-dysphoric people doing something about it on the margin.
Perhaps demand is sufficiently inelastic such that the intrinsic-identity model is a good approximation. But analyses of where Society's flirtation with [the transgender tipping point](https://newrepublic.com/article/118451/what-transgender-tipping-point-really-means) is heading should take into account the extent to which, in our present state of information, we _don't know_ what the demand curve for sex changes looks like.
This insight helps us make sense in secular changes in the expression of gender variance. The phenomenon of [increases in transgender identification](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/01/health/transgender-population.html) that some commentators characterize as [_social contagion_](https://youthtranscriticalprofessionals.org/tag/social-contagion/) could also be seen as an entirely _rational_ response to incentives: as being trans becomes less costly—whether due to increased social acceptance, improvements in surgical or hormone-administration technology, or any other reason—we _should_ see more gender-dysphoric people doing something about it on the margin.
Perhaps demand is sufficiently inelastic such that the intrinsic-identity model is a good approximation. But analyses of where Society's flirtation with [the transgender tipping point](https://newrepublic.com/article/118451/what-transgender-tipping-point-really-means) is heading should take into account the extent to which, in our present state of information, we _don't know_ what the demand curve for sex changes looks like.