Many things (e.g., learning a martial art, playing a musical instrument) yield positive utility only after a long period of training experienced as negative utility.

In many cases, the positive utility is received only by others, such as one’s children or grandchildren.

The core principle here that *utility is often displaced over time and persons.*

Investment and entrepreneurship both rely on this principle. It is not an exception to a more basic rule of personal utility. Rather, it is the general case and is central to functional cultures.

Any system of ethics that does not handle this principle well is a bad system.

Utilitarianism does not handle this principle well. You can stretch utilitarianism to cover the principle, but only by adding epicycles. The natural application of utilitarianism will tend to discount displaced utility because it’s easy to mistake for absent utility.