Scarcity: Why having too little means so much

by Sendhil Mullainathan

The mind orients automatically, powerfully, toward unfulfilled needs.

It is very hard to fake scarcity. The scarcity dividend happens because scarcity imposes itself on us, capturing our attention against all else.

Scarcity alters how we look at things; it makes us choose differently. This creates benefits: we are more effective in the moment. But it also comes at a cost: our single-mindedness leads us to neglect things we actually value.

The things that distract us, that occupy our mind, need not come from outside us. We often generate them for ourselves, and these distractions can disrupt our attention more than a physical train. These trains of thought rumble

A taxed bandwidth leads to carelessness.