preview

Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much

Decent Essays
Open Document

In Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much, Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir introduce us to key concepts of scarcity and its varied effects on our lives. They argue that scarcity does only affect us as individuals, but also social programs, organizations, and businesses. For example, School is one of the largest social organizations we have been involved with. We can make connections between some of the aspects in the book and school. Like how we lack time when it comes to deadlines. I had to go through nine periods in one day, that could possibly mean nine different assignments. How could I manage to do these assignments on time and still have enough free time? Well, I had to make a choice on what was more important, my grades …show more content…

If I do the work when it’s due, then I don’t have to worry about running out of time. And if anything, I would have space opened in my schedule for things that might turn up unexpectedly. Kind of like the surgeons and the operating rooms situation in chapter nine. In this scenario the hospital had to solve the urgent problems and put off the non urgent ones, no matter how important. Until an adviser came up with the solution to leave one room unused. In this example, the authors suggest that we should always leave at least half an hour of free time, so that way we do not have to move things around in our schedules. As we focus on the work that needs to be done, we may notice that we have to make trade-offs. Focusing on something that matters to us, makes us less able to think about other things we care about. Like Sendhil and Eldar stated, “looking back at how our time or money was spent during moments of scarcity, we are bound to be disappointed.” Because while we are too busy with the assignment, we end up thinking about what could have been done that day. Luckily, this could be avoided if we learn how to balance our schedule and

Get Access