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Women who stare at parking spots


Listening to the playground antics of the US government around the debt ceiling is very painful.  I still expect there will be a "last minute deal," but I also hope that the pathetic posturing that is bringing the US to the brink causes people to rethink the process.

On NPR this morning there were two interesting comments on the underlying psychology that is aiding and abetting the current process.

  1. Short term considerations overwhelmingly override long term ones.  The example was that if I ask you to give up an ice-cream cone next year, it is easy to say "yes".  If I swing by right now with the desert tray, you will have a hard time saying "no".  The debate around the debt ceiling is really about long-term concerns....but the (somewhat artificial) deadline of August 2nd is making it into a negotiation about the short term.
  2. Men are hyper-competitive without women present to moderate things.  Maybe not too surprising, but it leads to men acting in non-intuitive ways; I missed the exact reference on NPR, but there was an example of two cities in Eastern Europe which were quite similar except that one has a very high ratio of women on city counsel, and one has a high ratio of men.  The one with the women at the helm runs like a finely tuned machine, whereas the other is full of posturing, last-minute (and bad) decisions, higher debt, etc.
So, the lesson is pretty clear.
  1. Change the incentives for law makers from long-term abstract (the debt) to short-term concrete.  Either stop paying them, or even more severe, take away their preferred parking spots.  Of the two, the psychologist was sure that the parking spot would have the most impact.  Most law makers would have savings, so removing their pay is still a mid-to-long term play.  Losing your parking spot - tomorrow - is an immediate incentive.
  2. Get more women involved.  It is hard to imagine changing the ratio of law makers quickly, but it is easy to imagine moving the negotiating arena to a venue where more women are present.  Force every law maker to bring a female counerpart, for example.

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