Category: Choices

The Dirty Refrigerator

~ purplesage41 ~ 1 Comment

Long ago, when I was teaching introductory economics, (  would begi the study about how we make choices about how to use our limited resources of time and money. Eventually we would get to more complicated questions, but I would begin with the dirty refrigerator problem. The inspiration for this example came from two weddings and thfee friends.

My youngest daughter was getting married on Saturday. It was Tuesday, and my daughter’s future in-laws were arriving in about 12 hours. They were planning to host a rehearsal dinner at my house and I was madly getting the house ready. Then I got a distress call from work. My colleague was supposed to give a speech in Myrtle Beach, but he had called in sick.  They asked if he could send the speech and they would read it . Apparently, he hadn’t written one. To save our Institute’s reputation, I agreed to write a speech for him, but I had procrastinated too long with my least favorite household task, cleaning the refrigerator. Three of my friends asked how they could help.  Everything is clean, I said, except the refrigerator. They busied themselves with reading expiration dates and filling the trash bag and scrubbing while I retreated to my home office  and wrote the speech.

          .Fast forward to my middle daughter’s wedding. I had left the refrigerator till last once again. The wedding was on Saturday. On Thursday evening. the groom was waving his arms in a fit of Italian exuberance and accidentally knocked his bride off a low wall, leaving her with a sprained ankle. The two of them were scheduled to go to the baker to sample some cakes before finalizing the order.  He wanted her to rest up and hoped that “Doctor Mom” could do that with him. Once again, I had procrastinated on cleaning the refrigerator and the as my three friends came to the rescue.  The only price I paid was years of teasing thereafter.

Back in the classroom, I invited their suggestions. Clean it now? Clean it later? Leave it dirty? Beg or pay for someone to do it for you? Swap it for a different favor?  It was agreed that the new refrigerator was not a good solution, but the other options were worth considering, weighing the costs and benefits of each.

A second family refrigerator even made me expand the possibilities.  My mother was moving from her mobile home to assisted living, and my sister had come to town to help me get ready to sell her home.  She opted, to my great relief, to tackle the refrigerator, Our mother had many great qualities, but housekeeping was never one of them. My sister’s husband  was career army., She had learned housekeeping as an army wife. When she finished after about three hours it could have gone on a showroom floor. My housekeeping standards lay in between. So the question was not binary, to clean or not to clean, but whom to charge with the task and how clean do you want it to be,

Even a simple question of cleaning the refrigerator is nonbinary (more than one option), contextual), and has a range of options about how clean and how much time or money or return favors are you willing to spend?

I am thinking a lot these days about nonbinary choices as well as the contexts in which they occur. If you have any good stories, please share

Trust but Verify

~ purplesage41 ~ Leave a comment

Or in an Arabic saying, Trust Allah but tie up your camel.  In a world of hackers, scammers, shooters, liars, and broken promises, in whom can we trust? Our national motto is “IN God we trust, but some of us need to have an actual person in whom to trust as well as institutions that we can trust.

The word used for faith in Saint Paul’s dictum “Faith, hope, love, these abound; but the greatest of these is love.”  If faith is a matter of factual belief, then it is most helpful to me. I do believe the earth revolves around the sun and smoking can cause cancer, but I do not believe that the myths of any of the major religions are true in the same literal sense. I trust science because that approach to knowledge has created major safeguards to avoid any false propositions to be confirmed.  Science doesn’t give us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, but it does pretty well at offering truth and nothing but. I more or less trust science. 

The opposite of faith in either meaning, belief or trust, is doubt. When we no longer trust the systems and institutions that have served us well in the past, we tend to retreat to what theologian Paul Tillich described as a limited defensible fortress. His fortress was one of ideas, but it can also include people and institutions.

I used to trust the rule of law and the legal system, but recent events have raised serious doubts about the ability and willingness of elected officials to enforce courts decisions. I used to trust financial systems, but they are no longer as well safeguarded as they once were. Right now, I trust the accuracy of election results, but I’m not sure that the elaborate safeguards that protect the election process can be trusted in the future. I have serious doubts about crypto and artificial intelligence and ensuring peace by always being over-prepared for war. I used to trust the full faith and credit of the United States Government, but that was before our national debt grew to be as big as our GDP and growing faster. I used to trust the evening news, but now I have to seek confirmation.

Trust breeds hope, even optimism.  Doubt creates fear, and pessimism.  What can we as individuals do to reverse the direction of living under a cloud of doubt, at sea without rudder or compass, and no land in sight?

My answer, at least a partial answer, comes from three great minds.  One is Ben Franklin, who at the signing of the Declaration of Independence said, “We must all hang together or we will all hang separately.”  The second is theologian Joanna Macy, who argues that neither optimism nor pessimism is the foundation of any strategy—optimists believe that everything will be all right, and pessimism believe we are doomed and powerless to stop it.  She calls us to active hope, to fight the good fight, knowing that what we seek to accomplish may not be accomplished in our lifetimes. (Especially mine. I am 84!) We a called to active hope, to pick out parts of the perceived doomsday machine and throw a monkey wrench into the works.  The third piece of wisdom comes from Margaret Mead, who said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. “

Together the sages Franklin, Macy and Mead call us into community, to find people we can trust and work with them to reclaim our democracy, our rule of law, and our country. And to do it is peaceably lest we become like those who lost or stole our trust (civil disobedience is fine,). Friends. Religious communities. Nonpartisan organizations. Women’s suffrage took 72 years. Civil rights came slowly and are being rapidly demolished  in many ways.

Finally, there is a matter of picking your fights—what issues and what tools.  Ask yourself what gifts you have and what issues you are passionate about. Those two questions may steer you in the direction of people, information sources, and communities that can get you out of the fug and on the path

My gifts are writing, speaking, and organizational leadership. My issues are protecting democracy. economic justice, and reproductive rights. I am careful about whom I trust, and I depend on several organized communities that share those goals and can offer me support and companionship. 

What are your gifts and issues? Do you have such communities? How can they help you use your gifts and passions to practice active hope?

House Hunters and the Way we Choose

~ purplesage41 ~ 1 Comment

I’m a fan of the various versions of the TV reality show House Hunters. No, I’m not looking, and no, I’m not into granite countertop and hardwood floors (okay, I have both) or other modern must-haves like farm sinks and stainless steel appliances (where would I put all my souvenir refrigerator magnets?).  I like the show because it illustrates the process of choice, and I’m an economist, so making good choices is what my vocation all about.

 I’m sure they probably consider more than three houses, but the format of the show is that they bring it down to the final three.  And for each one, the choice comes down to no more than three attributes.  Price and location dominate. Layout. Enough bedrooms. Entertaining space. Yard size.  Typically, it will be price and location and some third quality that might vary from house to house (#1 has a pool, #2 has a big yard, # 3 has enough bedrooms…). It is an exercise in what economist Herbert Simon called bounded rationality.  Too many houses, too many attributes, and they will spend another year or two in the crowded apartment.  Always, at the end of the show we revisit the house hunters in their new digs six weeks or six months later and they are satisfied with their choice. You have to wonder if they ever aired a show that ended up in buyers’ remorse.

It’s a useful exercise that any of us could replicate in buying a car, changing jobs, having a baby, getting married (not necessarily in that order), moving to a different town.  We start with a long list of attributes. One way is to make it a binary choice—change, move, quit, marry) or stay with the status quo?  Once we have opted for change, we are a branch down the decision tree.  What do we want in the new situation?  Which attributes matter more? Be near the city for her, or the job for him (or vice versa)? More indoor space or more outdoor space? Move-in ready or fixer upper?

If you have big decisions coming up, and especially if there is a partner involved with a different list of attributes, , I suggest a few episodes of House Hunters.. It can help you think through your decision-making process and wind up with a more satisfying outcome,