Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Ананд - чемпион!



После основных партий счет был равным: 6-6, затем гроссмейстеры сыграли тай-брейк, который выиграл Ананд: 2½-1½ . Он сохранил звание чемпиона мира.

Браво, Виши! Браво, пятикратный!
http://crestbook.com/node/1695

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Сергей Егишянц о возможной новой операции денежной накачки (LTRO) в Европе

...агентство Egan Jones в третий раз за 2 месяца снизило рейтинг Испании (на 2 ступени). Нарастают проблемы в Ирландии: спад цен на жильё снова ускорился (15.5% за последние 12 месяцев, а за 3 года – уже на 40%), осложнив положение ипотечников и грозя новыми убытками. Суммируя всё это, агентство Fitch констатирует возросшую вероятность новой операции денежной накачки (LTRO) от ЕЦБ.
http://www.itinvest.ru/analytics/reviews/world-markets/6634/

Сергей Егишянц о почти неизбежной "внезапной смерти" ВУЗов США

...в Штатах назревают серьёзные проблемы на рынке студенческих кредитов, о пузыре на котором мы уже писали не раз – напомним лишь, что в последние годы, когда государство стало выдавать немалую часть денег по этому разделу, займы получали все, кому не лень, включая пожилых людей, которых никак нельзя было отнести к студентам. Bloomberg разместило обзор президента Emeritus of Franklin & Marshall College Ричарда Нидлера, где говорится, что почти треть исследованных университетов и колледжей имеет отрицательный капитал (их обязательства выше активов), причём у половины из них недостача превышает 10 млн. долларов, а у лидера дыра достигла 400 млн.: это означает, что при почти неизбежном сжатии рынка студенческих займов поступление денег (платы за обучение) в эти вузы резко уменьшится – что может вызвать их "внезапную смерть", подобную краху Lehman Brothers в 2008 году. Вот так-то!
http://www.itinvest.ru/analytics/reviews/world-markets/6634/

Ананд - Гельфанд. Матч за первенство мира. 2012. День 12



"Основное время" закончилось вничью.

Monday, May 28, 2012

Лого авиационной промышленности Израиля (ЮМОР)

Посмотрите внимательно на логотип авиационной промышленности Израиля.

На иврите:
http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/התעשיה_האוירית_לישראל

На английском:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Aerospace_Industries

А теперь ответье на вопрос, при чём тут мощность множеcтва A (или модуль aka абсолютная величина A)?

Мощность множества, или кардинальное число множества, — это обобщение понятия количества (числа) элементов множества, которое имеет смысл для всех множеств, включая бесконечные...

Следуя Кантору, мощность множества называется кардинальным числом. Мощность множества A обозначается через |A|.
http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Мощность_множества

А ларчик просто отрывается, это никакой не модуль или мощность это так написано IAI, почему-то без черточек сверху и снизу, что и вводит в заблужение.

IAI = Israel Aerospace Industries = Авиационная промышленность Израиля = התעשייה האוירית לישראל בע"מ

Запрещённая имя директории в Windows (ЮМОР)

Найдено на просторах интернета


Снег в Сахаре (ЮМОР)

Найдено на просторах интернета.


Чаплин и двойники (ЮМОР)

Найдено на просторах интернета.


Sunday, May 27, 2012

Defense News: США предоставят Израилю беспрецедентный пакет оборонной помощи (Russian, Hebrew. Russian)

http://txt.newsru.co.il/arch/finance/23may2012/dn_103.html
http://www.globes.co.il/news/article.aspx?did=1000751199
http://www.defensenews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2012305200001

Психологи большого города

По наводке блога Дневник кризиса.
Форматирование моё.

...Если мы убираем эмоциональную сторону, то никакого смысла жениться нет. Особенно если представить себе городскую бикарьерную семью, когда и муж, и жена работают, у них нет детей и нет идеи, что ребенку нужны оба из родителей. Сегодня все домашние заботы — на аутсорсинге: с детьми сидит няня, дом убирает домработница, едим в ресторанах. Раньше такого даже представить было нельзя! В жизни семьи требовалось участие каждого ее члена, нужны были как минимум двое, чтобы существовать комфортно...

...Сейчас, как и в Средние века, детство вообще исчезает как социальная категория. Рушится информационный барьер между поколениями. Если раньше, чтобы ребенок стал взрослым, ему надо было научиться читать, то теперь ему можно смотреть телевизор, залезать в интернет. То, что видит бабушка в телевизоре, видит и внучка. Ребенок — это теперь что такое? Непонятно, как его учить и чему, потому что исчезла идея, что ребенок нуждается в чем-то специальном. В Cредневековье, как только он овладевал речью, сразу же становился частью взрослого сообщества. Если посмотреть на картины, например, художника Питера Брейгеля, там крестьяне в трактире пьют, а рядом дети.

Вот и сегодня в пять и в тридцать пять лет одинаково одеваются, едят и проводят досуг. Появляются те самые «кидалты» — взрослые дети, о которых все говорят. У нас нет общекультурного представления, что такое воспитание ребенка в семье. У каждого начинается свое безумие: то ребенка одновременно учат чтению, танцам, арифметике и теннису, а то до шести лет в памперсы одевают. Проблема в том, что те принципы, которые помогали их родителям социально адаптироваться, с современными детьми не срабатывают. Больше нельзя сказать: «Смотри на меня и делай, как я». Как писал социолог Зигмунт Бауман: «Родители — это люди, которые дают мне карманные деньги».

Социализация детей сегодня проходит в интернете, а не школе, дворе или кружках. А взрослые не успевают за развитием всех этих технологий, не могут больше контролировать детей. Я знаю умственно отсталого мальчика в тяжелом состоянии, который легко находит себе мультики в ноутбуке. И, возможно, этот разрыв между поколениями будет только возрастать. Я считаю, что в этой ситуации важно сохранять эмоциональные способы общения, когда родители и дети одновременно переживают схожие чувства. Они вместе смотрят мультики, ходят в рестораны, катаются на лыжах. Это признак эмоционального контакта, и это очень важно. А вот воспитание с точки зрения «офицера и гражданина» разрушено совершенно. И, может, туда ему и дорога...

...Отношения людей, в том числе в семейной жизни, становятся более функциональными: человеку чаще всего нужен сексуальный партнер, компаньон для путешествий, похода в кино и т.п. Это то, что Зигмунт Бауман называл «жидкой современностью». Отношения становятся безличными...

В интернете создаются новые стандарты поведения: эмоционального, сексуального, новые типы красоты...
http://www.bg.ru/stories/10259/

Новая космическая гонка набирает обороты: Россия и Япония представили планы создания лунных баз

http://www.inopressa.ru/article/25May2012/dailymail/kosmos.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2149240/The-new-space-race-heats-Russia-plans-permanent-bases-moon.html

Ананд - Гельфанд. Матч за первенство мира. 2012. День 11

Friday, May 25, 2012

Firefox Копирование URL с русскими буквами в адресной строке

По наводке блога Привычка недумать.

К примеру если вы зашли на страницу http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/ФРС, копируете ссылку в буфер обмена, потом вставляете её, у вас получилось http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A4%D0%A0%D0%A1, то поменяв параметр
network.standard-url.escape-utf8
в Firefox на false, у вас получится-таки http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/ФРС.


UPDATE 30-05-2012:
Более простой способ.

.открываем нужную страницу, делаем небольшое изменение в адресной строке браузера (добавляем и тут же убираем какой-нибудь символ, например), копируем адрес в буфер обмена, ... (я примерно понимаю, почему это работает..
http://my-tribune.blogspot.com/2012/05/wiki.html?showComment=1338012607338#c74359746602159972

Если мы копируем ссылку без манипуляций то получим "ссылку с процентами" (вида http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A4%D0%A0%D0%A1), если изменим адресную строку - то получим читабельную ссылку (вида http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/ФРС)

END OF UPDATE

Ананд - Гельфанд. Матч за первенство мира. 2012. День 10



Счет в матче: 5-5.
http://crestbook.com/node/1695

Ананд - Гельфанд. Матч за первенство мира. 2012. День 9

Ананд - Гельфанд. Матч за первенство мира. 2012. День 8

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Ананд - Гельфанд. Матч за первенство мира. 2012. День 7



В седьмой партии Гельфанд испробовал новый вариант в славянской защите. Создавшееся сложное положение Ананд трактовал неудачно и ход за ходом ухудшал своё положение. Многочисленные размены привели к эндшпилю, в котором фигуры белых развили убийственную активность. На 38-м ходу перед лицом неизбежного мата чемпион мира сдался.
Счет в матче: 4-3 в пользу Гельфанда.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDtUWfTVjqg

Saturday, May 19, 2012

Экс-глава АМАНА детально разобрал вопрос об ударе по Ирану (Russian, Hebrew)



Экс-глава АМАНа Амос Ядлин детально разобрал вопрос о возможном ударе по ядерным объектам Ирана. В интервью программе "Встречи с прессой" на 2 канале ИТВ он отметил, что удар по-прежнему возможен.

Ниже есть продолжение.

По словам Ядлина, [есть] два [важных] вопроса... Первый: что опаснее: Иран с ядерной бомбой или же последствия удара по ядерным объектам Ирана? Второй: может ли удар по ядерным объектам Ирана помочь достичь желаемого результата, то есть полностью остановить иранскую ядерную программу.

Ядлин отмечает, что Израиль еще не находится на том перекрестке, на котором нужно будет выбрать путь, и прежде, чем настал момент выбора, нужно исчерпать все возможности, чтобы остановить Иран, не нанося удары. Экс-глава АМАНа согласился с премьер-министром Биньямином Нетаниягу в том, что Иран до сих пор тянул время, но при этом он не исключил, что на грядущих переговорах с "шестеркой" (США, Россия, Китай, Франция, Великобритания, Германия) в Багдаде Иран пойдет на компромисс. Это обусловлено экономическими трудностями в Иране, вызванными уже введенными санкциями.

Приемлемым для Израиля результатом переговоров, который лишит страну необходимости наносить ядерный удар, Ядлин назвал следующий: весь уран вывозится с территории Ирана и обогащается за его пределами. Иран получает лишь ядерное топливо для гражданских целей. Ядерный объект в Коме демонтируется. Другие ядерные объекты переводятся под жесткий контроль мирового сообщества. По словам экс-главы АМАНа, Иран может пойти на такое соглашение, поскольку последствия санкций уже весьма тяжелы.

Относительно удара по Ирану, Ядлин заявил, что он по-прежнему возможен. "Но не все возможное умно", – добавил он.

Ятом предложил анализировать три момента во времени: момент удара, день после удара и ситуацию через десять лет. Что касается дня после удара, вопрос в том, будет ли стратегическая цена, которую заплатит Израиль за удар, ниже, чем цена за ядерный Иран, которую придется заплатить в будущем. Ядлин отметил, что разделяю точку зрения, согласно которой удар обойдется Израилю дешевле, чем ядерный Иран через несколько лет.

Говоря о десятилетии спустя, Ядлин привел пример удара по ядерному реактору в Ираке, который наносит в том числе и он лично – в составе эскадрильи из 8 самолетов. Он отметил, что удар был эффективен лишь потому, что после этого против страны были введены санкции, и Саддаму Хусейну не продавали материалы, необходимые для возобновления ядерной программы. Что касается Ирана, отметил он, идеальный результат – это полная остановка ядерной программы страны, однако даже при таком раскладе, согласно прогнозам, Тегеран сможет вернуться к программе через 5 лет – у нынешнего режима достаточно решимости, в стране есть необходимые технологии и материалы. Именно поэтому критической и в день после возможного удара, и через 10 лет будет роль США. "Координация с США – самый важный элемент", – считает Ядлин. По его мнению, Обама сделает все необходимое, чтобы Иран не стал ядерной державой, не из желания спасти Израиль, а потому, что таковы стратегические интересы США. Если Иран станет ядерным, ядерными станут вслед за ним Саудовская Аравия и Турция, и США не могут допустить гонки ядерных вооружений на Ближнем Востоке.
http://cursorinfo.co.il/news/novosti/2012/05/19/yadlin/

[10.03.2010] Механика кризиса в Греции

Форматирование не сохранено. Статья полностью.

Тобаши

Сергей Голубицкий , опубликовано в журнале "Бизнес-журнал" №3 от 10 Марта 2010 года.

«Существуют ложь, вопиющая ложь и греческая статистика».
Популярная поговорка в кулуарах ЕЭС

В начале года Европа определилась с главной виновницей неприятностей, преследующих Евросоюз вместе с его робкой валютой. Это — Греция. Самое возмутительное: бесстыдница — не какой-то засланный казачок из бывших советских сатрапов, а старожил Евросоюза, прописанный в едином валютном пространстве чуть ли не с первого дня.

Ниже есть продолжение.

Как-то сразу, вдруг обнаружилось, что Греция годами водила доверчивую семью европейских народов за нос, пакостила в самом подбрюшье. Вместо реальных доходов, бережливой финансовой политики и надежного производства — непомерные долги, фальшивая отчетность, нерадивое население, обманывающее родное правительство, и правительство, обманывающее Евросоюз!

До кучи приписали Греции и фирменные «проблемности» региона: основной перевалочный пункт для доставки гашиша и героина с Ближнего Востока и Юго-Восточной Азии в Европу, транзит колумбийского кокаина, отмывание наркоденег, организованную преступность. Если сегодня — в феврале 2010 года — почитать американскую, немецкую, французскую или британскую прессу, создастся впечатление, что Греция — не просто очередная жертва мирового экономического кризиса, а едва ли не главный его инициатор!

Открываются торги на Нью-йоркской фондовой бирже обвалом — кто виноват? Греция! Обвалилась Япония, обвалился Гонконг, обвалилась Австралия — с чего бы это? Ну как же — «investors concerned over the Greece»2! Эдакий универсальный козел отпущения, эффективный в любой точке планеты.

Сильно захотелось разобраться. И что? Первое же открытие обескуражило: Греция, оказывается, далеко не единственная возмутительница спокойствия! Взглянем на хронологию последней волны европейского экономического кризиса:

4 октября 2009 года: к власти в Афинах приходят социалисты, которые с места открещиваются от популистской расточительности предшественников-консерваторов (вот они — причудливые перевертыши европейской политики!) Премьер-министр Георгиос Папандреу решительно заявляет, что первой же мерой правительства по обузданию кризиса станет сокращение бюджетных расходов на здравоохранение, пенсионное обеспечение и заработную плату работников госсектора. Меры хоть и не социалистические, но более чем уместные в контексте рекомендаций Брюсселя по сдерживанию бюджетного дефицита.
20 октября министр финансов Греции Йоргос Папаконстантину делает сенсационное заявление: обещанный консерваторами дефицит бюджета в 3,7% (относительно ВВП) нереален, и страна по итогам 2009 года выйдет на «чудовищный» показатель в 12,5%. Мотивация нового министра понятна: окончательно припечатать политических противников к стене позора, списав на консерваторов не только 300 млрд долларов национального долга, но и обман общественности.
22 октября (через два дня после заявления Папаконстантину) агентство Fitch снижает суверенный рейтинг Греции с «А» до «А-» — демарш, на который греческое правительство явно не рассчитывало. Эксперты почему-то не обращают внимания на цифру дефицита, приведенную министром финансов: 12,5%. То, что она взята с потолка, сомнений не вызывает (иначе и быть не может — за квартал до окончания года!). Но почему 12,5, а не 13,5? Да потому что 13% — это водораздел, по которому сегодня проходит граница терпимости бюджетного дефицита для стран Евросоюза. Достаточно сказать, что у Великобритании именно 13%. Греки выбирают цифру 12,5 — хоть и печальную, но все же терпимую и во всяком случае не «чудовищную»: чуть-чуть ниже, чем у негласного лидера Западного мира. Расчет, однако, оказался провальным.
19 ноября начинаются любопытные события. Справедливо рассудив, что снижение рейтинга на одну ступень, тем более в диапазоне А, — штука вполне приемлемая, к игре Греции присоединяется Португалия. Министр финансов Фернанду Тешейра душ Сантуш публично заявляет: бюджетный дефицит 2009 года составит не обещанные ранее 5,9%, а 8%. Резонанс просчитан правильно, и уже через пару дней Португалия получает по шапке от рейтингового агентства Standard & Poors.
8 декабря Fitch снижает рейтинг Греции еще больше — с «А-» до «ВВВ+», а на следующий день очередь доходит до Испании: вторую иберийскую «преступницу» клеймит позором Standard & Poors.
16 декабря Standard & Poors добирается до Греции: суверенный рейтинг страны опускается с «А-» до «ВВВ+».
22 декабря Грецию опускает и Moody’s — с «А2» до «А1».

Как видите, в конце 2009 года на европейском фронте не происходило ничего интересного. Разве что давно набившая всем оскомину позиционная война между американскими рейтинговыми агентствами и очередной партией европейских «париев» — Грецией, Испанией и Португалией. Война эта мало кого беспокоила не столько потому, что приелась, сколько из-за упавшей ниже плинтуса в результате ипотечно-банковских махинаций 2007–2008 годов профессиональной репутации «беспристрастной тройки» (Standard & Poors, Moody’s и Fitch). Инвесторы, а тем более правительства, давно раскусили истинную цену всех этих взятых с потолка «А», «ВВ» и «ССС», и потому не особо парились.

С приходом нового года ситуация меняется кардинально. Сначала с радаров общественного интереса неприметно исчезают Португалия с Испанией, словно и не было у них никогда никаких проблем с дефицитом бюджета и суверенным долгом. Затем в одночасье из нерадивого второгодника Греция превращается в злостного рецидивиста.

Матерые уголовники, как известно, никогда не действуют в одиночку. И то верно: как по мановению волшебной палочки обнаруживается сообщник и у Греции. Им оказался инвестиционный монстр Goldman Sachs: «Если подтвердится информация, что фальсифицировать отчетность Греции помогали те же самые банки, что ранее довели нас всех до края бездны, будет скандал», — бьет в набат канцлер Германии Ангела Меркель.

Евросоюз создает комиссию по расследованию финансовых злодеяний Греции и, кажется, не замечает новые цифры, которыми Португалия с Испанией «радуют» общественность: 9,4% — итоговый дефицит бюджета в Португалии (а не 8, и тем более не 5,9, как говорилось ранее) и 11,4% — дефицит Испании, от которого рукой подать до греческих 12,5%.

Но все это уже не имеет значения: пафос общественного порицания целиком и полностью сконцентрировался на непутевой родине Геракла.

Что же такого страшного натворила Греция? Признаюсь, балканцам навесили столько «преступлений», что даже непонятно, с какой стороны их распутывать:

более половины бюджета тратится на пенсии и заработные платы госслужащим;
средний возраст ухода на пенсию в стране — страшно даже подумать! — 58 лет;
ежегодно недобирается, по самым скромным оценкам, 30% налогов на добавочную стоимость;
95% населения указывает в декларациях доходы ниже 30 тысяч евро;
государственная система погрязла в коррупции с головой;
главный национальный спорт называется «Укрой налоги».

Список, конечно, ужасный, но только непонятно, что в нем... специфически греческого?! Перед нами джентльменский набор любой восточноевропейской нации, разве что приправленный для пикантности «балканским духом», который на поверку оказывается не чем иным, как разлагающим влиянием турецкой астении. Если присмотреться к соседям — Болгарии, Македонии, Черногории, Албании, Румынии, Сербии, Хорватии, то выяснится, что положение в этих странах еще более аховое: и уровень безработицы выше, и уровень доходов населения ниже, и собираемость налогов хуже, и коррупция ничуть не слабее, и дефицит бюджета такой же.

Тем не менее, именно Грецию Евросоюз назначил крайней. Почему? Видать потому, что ищем мы не в том направлении. Отвлечемся-ка лучше от «системных изъянов» греческой нации и сосредоточимся на главном обвинении Брюсселя: подделке отчетности. Чтобы разобраться в «гешефтах» Эллады, нужно хотя бы в общих чертах обозначить параметры, задающие границы экономического комильфо в Объединенной Европе.

Параметры «хорошего поведения» определил в 1996 году т. н. Договор о Стабильности и Росте (Stability and Growth Pact, SGP), установивший допустимые значения двух ключевых показателей: отношения национального долга к ВВП, которое не должно было превышать 60%, и отношения дефицита бюджета к ВВП (не более 3%).

Программа избыточного дефицита (Excessive Deficit Programme, EDP) определяла размер штрафа за нарушение вышеописанных норм странами-участниками Евросоюза. На бумаге этот штраф достигал нешуточных 0,5% от ВВП. Наблюдение за выполнением норм SGP поручили Статистическому бюро (Eurostat).

Не успели высохнуть чернила на SGP, как самые изобретательные члены ЕЭС приступили к поиску путей обхождения драконовских ограничений. Уже в том же — 1996 — году Италия изобрела и успешно апробировала на практике с помощью инвестиционного банка JP Morgan схему, за которую сегодня Евросоюз линчует Грецию.

Инструмент, использованный в 1996 году Италией (а впоследствии — и Грецией, а также Францией, Испанией, Португалией, Великобританией — да вообще всеми, кому не лень), назывался валютным свопом. Важное обстоятельство: ни в самом инструменте, ни в его практических модификациях никакого криминала, с точки зрения существующего законодательства, нет! Вернее, не было до 2007 года, когда Евросоюз, запаниковав от массового использования валютных свопов для камуфляжа реального дефицита бюджета, внес соответствующие ограничения в нормативы SGP. В любом случае все, что делали Италия в 1996 году и Греция в 2001-м, было полностью легально.

Не вдаваясь в частности биржевой теории, скажу лишь, что сама по себе сделка валютного свопа не предполагает извлечение прямой прибыли. Участники сделки получают лишь сравнительные преимущества (в терминологии Давида Рикардо) за счет исключения курсовых рисков.

Итальянская инновация валютного свопа, однако, предполагала прямую выгоду и для Апеннинского Сапожка, и для нью-йоркских банкиров. Эта выгода возникала за счет искусственного изменения обменного курса валют: государственные обязательства Италии, номинированные в иенах на общую сумму в 200 млрд, JP Morgan обменял на долларовые облигации в декабре 1996 года по курсу мая 1995 года. В результате Италия получила от банка несколько миллиардов долларов «курсовой разницы», которые, по сути, являлись скрытым кредитом. Выгода JP Morgan, в свою очередь, заключалась в последующих купонных платежах, их Италия выполняла по своим новым долларовым облигациям по завышенному (относительно старых облигаций в иенах) курсу.

Поскольку валютный своп формально не являлся кредитом, Италия продемонстрировала в отчетности прибыль от курсовой разницы валют — обстоятельство, позволившее ей элегантно вписаться в трехпроцентный норматив SGP по бюджетному дефициту.

В 2001 году Греция совместно с Goldman Sachs провернула аналогичную операцию. В результате валютного свопа облигаций, номинированных в долларах и иенах, на облигации в евро греческое правительство сократило долговые обязательства на 2,367 млрд евро. Это обстоятельство позволило Греции не только снизить долговое бремя со 105,3% до 103,7% (от ВВП), но и прибить ставку по купонным платежам с 7,4% в 2001 году до 6,4% в 2002-м. Goldman Sachs за свои «благодеяния», по слухам, получил от Греции около 300 млн долларов3.

Надо сказать, что сделка, в которую мертвой хваткой вцепились брюссельские бюрократы, явилась всего лишь скромным звеном в пышном веере творческих «гешефтов», с помощью которых бедная Греция пыталась на протяжении первого десятилетия нашего века хоть как-то продержаться на плаву в жесткой связке Евросоюза.

Так, валютному свопу с Goldman Sachs предшествовала (в 2000 году) сделка под кодовым названием «Ариадна», по которой Греция продала будущие доходы от розыгрышей государственных лотерей. В 2001 году операция «Аол» принесла стране вожделенный кэш в обмен на аэропортовские и шоссейные сборы на годы вперед.

У сделки с Goldman Sachs тоже было свое хитрое продолжение. В 2004 году инвестиционный банк сначала пересмотрел условия валютного свопа (скорректировав вниз купонную ставку по облигациям), а затем продал своп Национальному банку Греции (2005). В 2008-м Национальный банк (с помощью того же Голдмана) создал специальный фонд Titlos, которому передал на баланс все тот же валютный своп 2001 года. Titlos выпустил под залог свопа собственные облигации и передал их Национальному банку. Под занавес Национальный банк заложил облигации Titlos Европейскому Центробанку под щедрую кредитную линию.

Короче, греки крутились, как умели, и делали это вполне изобретательно. Главное же — не одни они! Крутились, собственно, все правительства Евросоюза, в той или иной мере балансируя между теоретически стройными, но лишенными жизни требованиями Брюсселя и реальными социальными нуждами своих народов. Италия, Испания, Великобритания и Португалия лихо секьюритизировали и монетизировали все, что только было возможно (и плохо лежало). Специализацией же Франции и Германии — станового хребта Евросоюза — стала творческая разработка концепции SPV — Special Purpose Vehicle (юрлиц целевого назначения).

Чем, по сути, занимались Италия с Грецией, подписывая валютные свопы? Получали наличные деньги, свободные от кредитного статуса. Это обстоятельство позволяло улучшать показатели бюджета, демонстрируя чистую прибыль, никак не связанную с долговыми обязательствами будущих периодов. Носители нравственной чистоты в ЕЭС и главные обвинители средиземноморских гешефтеров — Франция и Германия — занимались абсолютно тем же, только другими способами. Так, Германия предпочитала получать кредиты не от собственного имени, а через подставные юрлица, которые пользовались государственной скрытой поддержкой и косвенными гарантиями. Хрестоматийный пример — Kreditanstalt f..ur Wiederaufbau (KfW), Франкфуртский банк экономического развития, находящийся полностью под контролем государства и являющийся неистощимым источником финансирования казны, однако никак не отраженный на балансе государства.

Чем немецкие SPV лучше греческих и итальянских валютных свопов, неясно. На мой взгляд, даже хуже, потому что этот инструмент является визитной карточкой «Энрона», вошедшего в историю как самый безнравственный гешефтсмахер эпохи виртуальных финансов.

Другое немецкое ноу-хау — евробонды, эмитированные юрлицом целевого назначения Aries. В эти облигации немецкое правительство элегантно перепаковало российские долги на сумму в 20 миллиардов евро и сбросило их, тем самым, с баланса4.

Не отстают и французы: Erap, холдинговое подразделение ELF, чья активность была полностью заморожена до 2002 года. После этого французское правительство внесло специальные изменения в законодательство, которые позволили частной компании провести долговое финансирование в размере 10 млрд евро, направленное на спасение France Telecom. В результате этой SPV-схемы Париж блестяще поддержал бюджет в границах требований SGP.

Кульминацией тонких гешефтов «станового хребта» Евросоюза стал грандиозный скандал в ноябре 2003 года, когда Комитет финансового контроля Европы (Ecofin) принял историческое решение: не налагать штрафы на Францию и Германию, вопреки однозначным нарушениям этими странами нормативов SGP. Блестящей иллюстрацией оруэллианской мудрости («все животные равны, но некоторые все же равнее») стал штраф, наложенный Евросоюзом на Италию несколькими месяцами ранее за точно такие же нарушения.

Можно много рассуждать про «рыльца в пушку» и на тему «а судьи кто?», но факт остается фактом: зимой 2010 года Германия и Франция спустили всех собак на щуплую Грецию, обвинив ее в смертных грехах, в которых сами были неоднократно уличены. «Становой хребет» понять можно: младшие братья по Евросоюзу смотрят на Германию и Францию как на перманентную дойную корову, эдаких Чипа и Дейла, спешащих на помощь по первому зову увязших в долговом болоте непутевых утят. Германии и Франции подобная незавидная репутация изрядно надоела, поэтому они изо всех сил стараются максимально дискредитировать провинившихся членов ЕЭС и принудить их самостоятельно изыскивать выходы из кризиса.

Есть, однако, в травле Греции и еще одна — на мой взгляд, главная — составляющая. Это длинный нос нью-йоркского Goldman Sachs, торчащий практически из всех гешефтов Эллады. Именно это обстоятельство не может пережить Германия, финансовая элита которой давно уже точит зуб на инвестиционные банки Америки в целом, и на Goldman Sachs в частности.

Как давно? Думаю, с тех самых пор, как франкфуртский KfW попал на грандиозный «кидок», достойный Книги рекордов Гиннесса. 15 сентября 2008 года протеже немецкого правительства умудрился перевести в Lehman Brothers 300 млн евро за несколько часов до того, как бедолага объявил о банкротстве5. Читатель наверняка помнит, что Goldman Sachs был не самым последним на празднике распила Lehman Brothers...

А тут еще эти валютные свопы Голдмана, позволившие Греции столько лет дурачить Eurofin! Разве ж могла пережить такое унижение Ангела Меркель?! Оттого сегодня и гонобобят Элладу, которая сама по себе (без Голдмана!) со своим 13-м местом по объему ВВП способна была поднять волну разве что в «ближнем круге» — Албании да Македонии!



1 «Убирать с глаз долой», «заставить улететь» (японск.) — финансовая схема, придуманная в 1992 году компанией Yamaichi, которая позволяет выводить убытки из баланса, распределяя их по инвестиционным портфелям подставных (либо специально созданных) клиентов. Различные вариации на тему тобаши использовались впоследствии как отдельными компаниями («Энрон»), так и государствами (от Италии до Греции).

2 Инвесторы обеспокоены Грецией (англ.).

3 На момент написания статьи Евросоюз только-только потребовал от Goldman Sachs обнародовать подробности сделки 2001 года. Однако, судя по первому пресс-релизу инвестиционного банка, значимых пикантностей европейские политики будут дожидаться до второго пришествия.

4 Сделка была проведена как секьюритизация, а не государственное кредитование через облигации.

5 После этого за KfW закрепилось в прессе прозвище «Самого тупого немецкого банка».

http://www.business-magazine.ru/mech_new/experience/pub330460

Сергей Егишянц: строительство в США

В строительной статистике можно обнаружить много впечатляющих плюсов – однако же по факту имеем: реально строится сейчас на 1.6% меньше односемейных домов, чем год назад – по многоквартирным, напротив, взлёт (+9.9%), что говорит о неспособности многих людей позволить себе частный дом. Индекс Национальной ассоциации домостроителей в мае установил 5-летний пик – который, увы, находится около самого дна за всю историю наблюдений с 1985 года и до начала текущего кризиса.
http://www.itinvest.ru/analytics/reviews/world-markets/6601/

Сергей Егишянц о Франции и Германии


Президентский срок Франсуа Олланда начался непросто – едва вступив в должность и движимый рвением евро-интегризма, он полетел в Берлин, но тут в дело вмешалась природа: в самолёт главы Франции ударила молния, так что пришлось вернуться и сменить борт – тем не менее, Олланд сразу снова полетел на другом самолёте и всё же встретился с Меркель. Однако предостережение свыше пришло не напрасно – переговоры показали несогласие сторон по ключевым вопросам; они, конечно, сделали хорошую мину ("мы готовы работать вместе над основными проблемами", бла-бла-бла) – но всем ясно, сколь плоха игра на самом деле. Собственно, дела бундесканцлерин печальны и без Олланда – поражение на выборах в мелкой земле Шлезвиг-Гольштайн не выглядело опасным, но полный провал в ключевом для экономики и крупнейшем по населению регионе Северный Рейн – Вестфалия (26% голосов, худший результат за все 67 лет с конца Второй мировой войны) воспринимается как катастрофа; социал-демократы и зелёные играют на том же, на чём выехал Олланд во Франции – долой жёсткую экономию и хай живе фискальное стимулирование спроса.
http://www.itinvest.ru/analytics/reviews/world-markets/6601/



The Paradox of Choice - Why More Is Less (English)

See also:
TED Talk: Barry Schwartz on the paradox of choice



Full transcrition is below.

Ниже есть продолжение.

0:00
0:28
MALE SPEAKER: We're very pleased to have you here for
0:30
the marketing talk with Professor Barry Schwartz on
0:32
the paradox of choice.
0:34
And Professor Schwartz, we're also very
0:35
honored to have you here.
0:36
Thank you for coming.
0:38
Barry Schwartz is the Dorwin Cartwright Professor of Social
0:40
Theory and Social Action at Swarthmore College.
0:43
He is the author of 10 books, among them The Battle for
0:46
Human Nature, The Cost of Living, and The Paradox of
0:49
Choice: Why Less is More.
0:51
He is a fellow of both the American Psychological
0:53
Association and the American Psychological Society.
0:57
His research and teaching focus on the intersection of
1:00
psychology and economics, and more specifically, how the
1:03
abundance of choice in modern life both liberates and
1:07
bedevils those who face it.
1:09
So please join me in welcoming Professor Schwartz.
1:11
1:19
BARRY SCHWARTZ: Hi, everybody.
1:20
I'm really quite honored to be here.
1:22
And just two preliminary remarks.
1:25
One is that I'm shorter than I used to be.
1:31
One is that I thought it was presumptuous for me to make
1:43
myself an expert in what you do.
1:46
So my talk is mostly not going to be about what you do.
1:50
It's going to be about what I take to be a significant
1:54
problem in people's lives more generally.
1:57
And I trust that you're all smart enough A, to determine
2:00
whether what I have to say is relevant to what you do, and
2:03
then B, what to do about it.
2:05
So I haven't tailored my remarks particularly except
2:08
for a few things here and there to the particular
2:11
concerns that I imagine folks who work here might have. I
2:15
don't want to insult you by doing that.
2:18
Second is I'm happy to have you interrupt with questions
2:21
and comments as I talk.
2:24
And if it looks like it's getting out of hand, since I'm
2:27
a stern teacher, I can just tell you shut up and save it
2:31
for the end.
2:31
So don't hesitate if you want to raise something now.
2:34
And as I say, if it looks like I'm never going to get past my
2:38
first two slides, then I'll change the rules.
2:42
OK?
2:43
So first, I want to acknowledge the people I've
2:53
collaborated with on a lot of what I'm going
2:55
to talk to you about.
2:57
Some of these are students of mine.
2:59
Some are colleagues in various places.
3:02
Anything you find worthwhile they had nothing to do with.
3:05
3:08
There is in American society--
3:10
not only in American society, but more here than anywhere
3:13
else-- what I have come to call the official syllogism.
3:18
And this is a set of assumptions that we have about
3:21
well-being and about how society should be organized
3:24
that runs so deep that I think we don't realize we make them.
3:28
And the only time you start to notice that you make them is
3:31
when you start to accumulate evidence that they're wrong.
3:36
So what is this the official syllogism?
3:38
First, we all think that the more freedom people have, the
3:42
more welfare they have. How could you think otherwise?
3:47
This is a no-brainer.
3:49
What argument could you even make to suggest that there's
3:52
anything wrong with this assumption?
3:55
The second thing we think is that the more choice people
3:58
have, the more freedom they have. What does freedom mean
4:01
if not choice?
4:03
In fact, for most Americans, particularly Americans of the
4:07
educated classes, freedom and choice are two words for the
4:11
same thing.
4:12
To say that people have more freedom is to say that people
4:14
have more choice.
4:15
And so it follows from these two assumptions that the more
4:20
choice people have, the more welfare the have. So as I say,
4:25
we so deeply believe this to be true that probably most of
4:29
us didn't realize that this was just a set of assumptions,
4:33
that there are other assumptions one could make,
4:34
and that they might even be empirically false.
4:38
And I'm going to try to convince you today that they
4:40
are empirically false.
4:43
First, to what extent has modern life embodied these
4:47
assumptions and improved people's lives
4:49
by giving them choice?
4:52
This is my supermarket, which is not an especially big one.
4:58
The salad dressings, I should point out--
5:01
that doesn't include the 10 extra virgin olive oils and 12
5:05
balsamic vinegars that were also there in case none of the
5:08
175 salad dressings suited you.
5:11
So those of you know how to do combinatorial mathematics can
5:14
compute how many different homemade salad dressings you
5:17
can create out of all those balsamic vinegars.
5:21
So there's a huge amount of choices, even choice about how
5:24
we get our stuff packaged.
5:25
5:28
And I want to give credit to the cartoon bank--
5:36
you're going to see a bunch of cartoons from The New Yorker
5:38
so you don't go to sleep.
5:39
And so I want to acknowledge The Cartoon Bank, which has
5:43
generously given me permission to show some, but not all, of
5:47
the cartoons that I'm going to be showing you.
5:49
5:51
So we've always had a choice in supermarkets.
5:57
And now we have more choice.
5:58
How much more?
6:00
In the United States, there was a threefold increase in
6:03
brands on grocery shelves in the 1990s.
6:06
The average grocery has upwards of 30,000 SKUs.
6:12
And these mega groceries, God only knows how much they have.
6:16
So we've always had choice.
6:18
Now we have more choice.
6:19
And in the world of consumer goods, you can tell the same
6:22
story pretty much everywhere.
6:23
There was always choice, and now there's more choice.
6:26
And one could argue that this is merely a
6:27
quantitative change.
6:29
No big deal.
6:31
Well, two things about that.
6:32
One, sometimes quantitative changes become qualitative if
6:35
they're big enough.
6:36
But second, in addition to having more options than we
6:39
used to in areas where we always had options, there are
6:42
whole new domains of life where there used to be no
6:45
options, where now people have significant options.
6:49
And I mention this because I want to give you a sense of
6:52
what it is that is on everybody's shoulders as they
6:55
get up out of bed every morning.
6:57
Some of these choices are inconsequential, and some are
7:00
extremely consequential.
7:02
I give you just a few examples.
7:04
There are many more.
7:06
There's probably nobody in this room except me who's old
7:10
enough to know that there was once a time when you could get
7:13
any kind of phone service you wanted as long as it was
7:16
provided by AT&T. There was a monopoly.
7:20
There was the phone company.
7:22
And not only was there the phone company, but the phone
7:25
company owned the phone.
7:26
You rented it.
7:27
And you know what?
7:28
It lasted 100 years.
7:30
It never broke.
7:31
These days, we get to choose long-distance service, local
7:35
service, cell phone service, and God knows we get to choose
7:37
a lot of products.
7:38
These are the cell phones of the future.
7:41
The one I like best is the middle one.
7:43
It's a phone, an MP3 player, a nose hair trimmer, and a creme
7:46
brulee torch.
7:49
And if you haven't seen this phone yet, you can be sure
7:52
that in a week or two, you will.
7:54
And what that does is it leads people to go into their cell
7:56
phone store and asked this question.
7:59
And what's the answer to this question?
8:01
Do you have a phone that doesn't do too much?
8:03
The answer to this question is no.
8:06
The only kind of cell phone I think you can no longer buy is
8:08
a cell phone that's just a phone.
8:12
I guess this is progress, but that means that there are a
8:14
lot of choices we have that we didn't have before.
8:17
In the world of health care, the notion that the doctor
8:20
told the patient what to do and the patient did it is a
8:26
distant memory.
8:27
Nowadays, the ethic of medical care in the United States is
8:30
the doctor and patient autonomy.
8:32
And what that means is that docs give you the options,
8:36
explain what the cost and benefits are of the various
8:38
options, and you choose.
8:41
Docs propose.
8:42
Patients dispose.
8:43
And if you say, but what do you recommend?
8:46
A really principled doctor will say, well, I
8:49
already told you.
8:49
These are the pluses and minuses of surgery.
8:52
These are the pluses and minuses of chemotherapy.
8:54
You have to choose.
8:55
And if you then say, but Doc, if you were me,
9:00
what would you do?
9:01
The doctor says, but I'm not you.
9:05
So an enormous burden is now on all of our shoulders to
9:09
make life and death decisions, typically on the basis of
9:12
close to no information.
9:14
And this burden is mostly borne by women, who take care
9:17
of themselves, take care of the kids, and also take care
9:19
of their husbands.
9:21
The clearest evidence of how the world of health care has
9:25
changed is in the direct marketing of prescription
9:28
drugs to people like you and me.
9:30
Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent every year
9:32
by drug companies selling products to people
9:35
who can't buy them.
9:38
Why would you ever have an ad for prescription drugs on a
9:41
network television show?
9:43
The only explanation is that the model now is that patients
9:47
will call the doctor's office the next morning and insist
9:50
that they get switched from drug X to drug Y because they
9:53
just saw a commercial.
9:54
And it must also be the expectation that docs will
9:57
honor the patients' requests.
10:00
I don't think companies just burn money.
10:03
Physical appearance is a matter of choice in a way that
10:05
it didn't used to be.
10:06
What do I mean by that?
10:07
What I mean is that there's essentially no part of your
10:11
body that can't be altered.
10:14
And not only is that true, but it's no longer even something
10:19
to be ashamed of.
10:21
People used to have cosmetic surgery and
10:23
pretend that they hadn't.
10:25
And of course, everybody knew that they had because their
10:28
faces looked weirdly constructed.
10:32
But everyone politely didn't talk about it.
10:34
Nowadays, people brag about their cosmetic surgeries, at
10:37
least on the two coasts.
10:39
If you have too much tissue in one part of your body and not
10:41
enough in another, you can just suck it out of the place
10:45
where you don't want it, injected it into the place
10:46
where you do.
10:48
What's the consequence of this?
10:49
The consequence is that how you look is a matter of
10:53
choice, which means that if you're an attractive, it's
10:56
your fault.
10:59
Nobody has to play the hand they were dealt any longer.
11:05
In the world of work--
11:06
I know that this doesn't apply to the people in this room,
11:09
but modern technology has made it possible for each of us to
11:13
work every minute of every day, no matter
11:17
where on earth we are.
11:19
And what that means is that whether or not to work is a
11:23
matter of choice, every minute of every day.
11:27
You take your kid to play soccer, and you're sitting
11:30
there watching the game, and you've got your cell phone on
11:33
one hip and your BlackBerry on your other hip, and your
11:36
laptop on your lap.
11:37
And they're all off.
11:40
And as you watch this boring game, you ask yourself, maybe
11:44
I can return that call, and answer that email, and draft
11:48
that letter.
11:49
And even if you say no to all of those things, you're
11:53
thinking about saying yes.
11:54
You're deliberating about it, which means that you have a
11:57
decision to make.
11:58
And it's a decision that you have to make basically every
12:00
30 seconds.
12:01
Because the game sure as hell isn't going to get less boring
12:04
as you watch it.
12:07
Just want to go home, crawl into bed, and
12:09
do some more work.
12:12
As I say, I know that this doesn't apply to
12:14
anyone in this room.
12:17
The company pension is a thing of the past,
12:20
for a couple of reasons.
12:21
One is that companies would much rather that their
12:23
employees bear the risk than that they do.
12:25
But the second is that instead of having a single financial
12:30
instrument or a couple of financial instruments that
12:32
your pension money goes into, employers in their benevolence
12:36
have now offered people large numbers of
12:39
options to choose from.
12:41
You have in many workplaces a wide array of possible
12:45
investment vehicles for your retirement pension.
12:48
And I'll talk a little bit later about the
12:49
consequences of that.
12:52
Just to show you that everybody bears some
12:54
responsibility for this, institutions like mine have
12:57
completely abdicated responsibility for being
12:59
educational institutions.
13:01
We have this gigantic list of courses and basically tell
13:04
kids, take whatever you want, often with disastrous
13:08
consequences.
13:09
Now, in the world of family, at least two generations ago,
13:17
and maybe one and a half generations ago, nobody ever
13:21
forced you to get married, and nobody
13:23
forced you to have kids.
13:24
But there was what you might call it a default assumption
13:28
that was very powerful and governed
13:31
almost everybody's behavior.
13:32
And the default assumption was that you get married as soon
13:36
as you can and you start having a family
13:38
as soon as you can.
13:39
And there was only one choice to be made.
13:41
And that was who.
13:43
The rest was sort of laid out for you.
13:46
Those days are certainly gone.
13:49
Whether or not to marry, whether to do it soon or do it
13:52
late, whether or not to have kids, whether to do that soon
13:54
or late, none of these things is taken for granted.
13:57
There is no default.
13:59
And what that means is that young people spend an enormous
14:02
amount of their time thinking about things that were
14:05
non-decisions when I was their age.
14:08
There's a lot that's good about this, but one
14:12
unfortunate consequence of it is that they spend a lot less
14:15
time doing the work that I give them.
14:18
And I can't say that I blame them.
14:20
These are important things to figure out.
14:22
And reading another journal article is not a life and
14:24
death thing, whereas making the wrong decision about your
14:26
romantic life might be.
14:28
So they just were willing not to do all the
14:30
work and get bad grades.
14:31
So I just kept assigning less and less work.
14:34
Unfortunately, it hasn't helped them make any wiser
14:36
romantic decisions.
14:38
Even your identity has become a matter of choice in a way
14:41
that it wasn't years ago in the sense that, even though
14:44
you probably inherit an identity from your family,
14:47
your community, and so on, it's changeable.
14:51
You can reinvent yourself on a regular basis.
14:54
One is encouraged to do that.
14:56
Who I want to be today?
14:57
There's this company in Seattle that had a slogan
15:00
about, Where do You Want to Go Today?
15:02
Micro something.
15:03
This is, who I want to be today?
15:05
It's just as applicable.
15:06
15:14
You've got to admit, these cartoons are good, right?
15:16
So in every corner of our lives as Americans, the world
15:22
we used to live in looked kind of like this.
15:27
And the world we now live in looks like this.
15:33
And the question is, is this good news or bad news?
15:37
And the answer, as I'm sure you can tell, is yes.
15:40
15:43
Now, I want to be absolutely clear about this.
15:45
Though it never helps to say this, I will say it.
15:48
Choice and freedom are good.
15:51
Almost all of the things that I have just run down for you
15:54
represent real improvements in the human possibilities, in
15:58
the opportunity for people to be autonomous and in control
16:03
of their lives.
16:04
And all of that is good.
16:06
OK, I said it.
16:07
Remember that I said it.
16:08
Everyone knows that.
16:10
The thing that people have not been mindful of is that it is
16:13
also bad, bad in various ways that I'm about to describe.
16:18
That is to say, there is a dark side to all of this
16:21
freedom of choice, which has been up until
16:23
now completely ignored.
16:25
And all the rest of this talk is going to be black, black,
16:29
black, black, all the things that make everybody miserable.
16:32
But remember that I know just as you do that choice is a
16:35
wonderful thing.
16:37
Just not as wonderful as we thought.
16:40
So there was a survey done in Europe.
16:41
And the stem of the sentence was, "There is currently more
16:46
choice than I need," and then they asked people about
16:49
various different aspects of consumer goods.
16:54
And the results they got were this.
16:56
With respect to clothing--
16:58
this is the percentage of people who agreed that there
17:00
is currently more choice than they need.
17:03
Washing machines.
17:04
Savings accounts.
17:05
Utilities.
17:07
Cars.
17:08
Cleaning products.
17:11
And cell phones.
17:12
There were no items on the list where less than a
17:17
majority of people agreed that there was more choice than
17:21
they needed.
17:22
So with respect to everything, people thought there was more
17:24
choice than they needed.
17:25
They just differed from one item to another on how much
17:28
they agreed there was more choice than they needed.
17:30
So there seems to be a coming together, a consensus, that
17:33
people have more decisions to make than it's worth their
17:37
time and trouble to be making.
17:40
And I think there are three different effects that too
17:44
much choice has.
17:46
And I'm going to talk about each of them.
17:48
One effect of having too much choice is
17:51
that it produces paralysis.
17:54
There are so many options to consider that you end up
17:56
choosing none.
17:58
The first demonstration of this was at this fancy food
18:02
store in Palo Alto, the name of which I've forgotten.
18:06
Whenever they get a new product, they'll put it on a
18:08
table so that people can sample it.
18:11
So the experimenters got them to cooperate in this store.
18:14
And they put out 24 different flavors of an imported jam.
18:19
and anyone who stopped by could sample as many different
18:22
flavors as they wanted.
18:24
And if they did, they got a coupon that would give them $1
18:26
off on any jam they bought.
18:28
A few days later, they set up the table with six different
18:31
flavors of the same jam.
18:33
And if you stop and tasted, you'd get a coupon that would
18:35
get you $1 off.
18:36
And what the experimenters found is that more people came
18:40
to the table when there were 24 jams than
18:42
when there were six.
18:44
It was more inviting.
18:45
It was more exciting.
18:46
It was more interesting.
18:47
One tenth as many people bought jam.
18:51
One tenth as many people bought jam.
18:55
OK, now, they found the same thing with writing extra
19:00
credit essays.
19:01
Because of the connection between this company and
19:03
Stanford, I just thought I should mention this.
19:06
In a social psych course, if you wrote an essay, you could
19:09
get extra credit toward your grade.
19:10
And what was nice about this is that the credit was
19:13
independent of the quality of what you wrote, which could
19:16
only happen at Stanford.
19:19
So one class, the kids got 30 different essay topics to
19:25
choose from.
19:26
In another class, they got six.
19:27
And the investigators looked to see how many people
19:31
actually wrote essays.
19:32
Fewer people wrote essays when they had 30 topics to choose
19:35
from than when they had six topics to choose from.
19:38
And I think it's the same as with the jam.
19:41
Which flavor jam should I buy?
19:42
They're all attractive.
19:44
This is novel.
19:44
This is distinctive.
19:46
This I know I like.
19:47
Ah, I'll buy peanut butter.
19:48
Same thing happens with the essays.
19:50
All these interesting topics.
19:51
I don't know which one to choose.
19:53
So I end up doing calculus homework instead.
19:56
Speed dating.
19:58
You know what speed dating is?
19:59
Of course you do.
20:00
20:03
If not here, where?
20:07
So they set up two speed dating evenings.
20:10
And in one evening, people had 12 dates.
20:12
And in another one, they had six.
20:14
And the question was, how many matches get made?
20:16
And the answer is, more matches are made when you have
20:19
six dates that when you have 12.
20:21
See more people, have more choices, make fewer
20:25
selections.
20:26
And finally, to raise the stakes quite a lot, the
20:32
researchers got access, thanks to the cooperation of Vanguard
20:35
and about 1,500 employers, to the investment records of a
20:40
million employees working, as I say, at
20:42
1,500 different companies.
20:44
And what they were interested in was this.
20:46
How does the number of mutual funds that the employer makes
20:49
available affect the rate at which employees participate?
20:52
20:54
So one company offers three funds, one 10, one 30, one
20:57
100, one 300.
20:59
Does that matter?
21:00
The answer is yes.
21:02
How does it matter?
21:03
For every 10 funds the employer makes available,
21:06
participation goes down 2%.
21:10
The more funds you offer, the lower the rate of
21:12
participation.
21:14
Understand that in most of these cases--
21:17
not all, but most--
21:18
not participating meant passing up a significant
21:22
amount of money from the employer, matching money.
21:24
It was like you were taking a match and lighting it to a
21:26
$5,000 bill because you didn't know which fund to put your
21:30
retirement money into.
21:32
Now, this is an extremely consequential finding, since
21:34
Americans save nothing and everybody's going to be eating
21:37
dog food in 30 years, when they retire with no
21:41
money in the bank.
21:43
And what makes it especially significant is that if you
21:46
were a benevolent employer and you were concerned that your
21:48
employees weren't putting enough money away for their
21:50
retirement, and you went to an investment adviser, any
21:53
investment adviser, and said, listen, what can I do to get
21:57
my employees to save more?
21:59
Every single one of them would have told you the same thing.
22:02
Give them more choice.
22:05
Then everyone will find just the right fund with the right
22:08
amount of risk and safety and so on to satisfy their
22:12
particular needs and tastes.
22:14
Give them more choice, the worst possible advice.
22:18
So this is the first effect of too much choice.
22:24
It produces paralysis.
22:25
There's a little bit of research in real life on
22:29
reducing assortment in groceries.
22:31
For some reason, all the research that's been done in
22:33
real life settings has been done with supermarkets.
22:36
What happens when you reduce the amount of selection in a
22:38
grocery is that the strong brands gain market share, the
22:43
higher priced brands gain market share, store brands
22:46
lose market share.
22:48
And by and large shoppers are not influenced by how many
22:53
different kinds of things are on the shelves.
22:55
They're just influenced by how much stuff is on the shelves.
22:58
So as long as you keep the amount of stuff on the shelves
23:00
bountiful, there will be no perception on the part of
23:03
shoppers that you have reduced choice.
23:06
However, they will buy more and they'll be more satisfied.
23:10
They won't feel like you've take anything away from them.
23:12
They will buy more, and they'll be happier with the
23:16
experience.
23:17
Overall sales go up, though only marginally, when you
23:21
reduce variety.
23:24
AUDIENCE: But store brands lose [UNINTELLIGIBLE]?
23:27
BARRY SCHWARTZ: Store brands lose--
23:28
well, statistically reliable, yeah.
23:31
I suppose this is probably a compliment to
23:34
higher priced brands.
23:36
Higher priced brands gain.
23:38
AUDIENCE: But it seems to imply that this
23:40
isn't going to change.
23:41
It seems to imply this is not going to change because it's
23:44
not in the store's interest.
23:45
BARRY SCHWARTZ: It's not in the store's interest to
23:46
change, because it wants you to buy its brand, because it's
23:48
got a better markup.
23:50
That may be true.
23:51
But but also, there are only a handful of studies.
23:54
And we don't know whether this is inevitable.
23:56
This is what's been found, but if you engineered things, you
23:59
might be able to get the benefits of reduced selection
24:02
without paying that particular price.
24:05
For example, Trader Joe's is the fastest growing
24:07
supermarket chain the United States.
24:09
And everything there is store brand, pretty much.
24:11
So it's not inevitable.
24:14
There are two caveats to this choice paralysis thing that
24:16
are worth mentioning.
24:17
One is what's known as preference articulation.
24:22
If you know exactly what you're looking for, more
24:26
choice is better.
24:29
Because the more options there are, the more likely it is
24:33
that you'll be able to find exactly what you want.
24:37
So he calls this preference articulation.
24:39
And the model here is before you look at anything, you sit
24:42
down and you say, what do I want in a car?
24:44
And you list all the things you care about in a car.
24:47
And then you go out in the world to do a pattern match
24:50
and find and find it.
24:52
How often do people make choices like this?
24:55
My estimate is never.
24:57
At least for anything more
24:58
complicated than, say, raisins.
25:00
Instead, what happens is you kind of get a rough idea of
25:03
what you care about in a car.
25:04
It's got to be safe.
25:05
It's got to be fuel efficient.
25:06
And after that, you let the market help you figure out
25:09
what else you care about.
25:10
So you go shopping trying to answer two questions.
25:13
One, what do I care in a car?
25:16
Two, which one of these things has what I care about?
25:19
And under those conditions, choice
25:20
paralysis is a likely result.
25:23
However, it's useful advice to you personally to sit down and
25:28
figure out exactly why you're buying whatever it is you're
25:30
buying before you look at any of the alternatives.
25:33
I know that no one will do that.
25:34
It's way to hard.
25:36
Second, if the different options are alignable, meaning
25:41
that can all be scaled on the same dimension, then again,
25:45
more options are better than fewer.
25:48
So if you're going to Kentucky Fried Chicken--
25:51
I bet nobody eats that crap.
25:53
If you're going to buy Kentucky Fried Chicken or some
25:56
equivalent and it turns out that they now offer you a one
25:59
box, a two box, a three box, a four box, a five box, an eight
26:03
box, any size portion you want, the more different sized
26:07
portions they offer, the happier you are.
26:09
Everyone will be able to get exactly the number
26:11
of pieces they want.
26:13
And that's the only respect in which these different options
26:16
differ is the size of the box.
26:18
So if you're talking about choices that are like this,
26:22
more is better.
26:23
More options are better than fewer.
26:24
Again, how often are these the kind of
26:26
choices people are making?
26:27
I would say close to never.
26:29
It's almost always involves multiple dimensions.
26:31
It involves making tradeoffs.
26:33
And under those conditions, you can boggle the mind by
26:36
giving people too much choice.
26:37
Second, if you overcome paralysis and choose, the
26:42
second effect that too much choice has is it induces you
26:45
to make worse decisions.
26:47
In the dating case, the speed dating
26:49
case, here's what happens.
26:51
You ask people in advance, what do you care about in a
26:54
romantic partner?
26:55
And they tell you all of the right things.
26:57
I want somebody who's smart, interesting, makes me laugh,
27:02
kind, understanding, thoughtful, sensitive,
27:06
empathic, and really hot.
27:11
OK.
27:12
now comes the dating experience.
27:14
Now evaluating how smart, how kind, how empathic, how funny,
27:19
how all of those things 12 different people are is hard.
27:24
So what do people do?
27:25
They use a simplifying strategy.
27:27
And they end up choosing entirely on the
27:29
basis of how hot.
27:32
Then they wake up the next morning and they go, what was
27:34
I thinking?
27:36
So they adopt a strategy that makes the decision makeable, a
27:39
simplifying strategy.
27:41
But the problem is that the criteria that are simple
27:43
aren't the ones that really matter.
27:45
So they will consistently make bad decisions just because the
27:48
world has forced them to adopt a strategy that simplifies the
27:52
information assessment task.
27:56
In the case of the 401(k), people who knew that it was
27:59
stupid beyond words not to participate--
28:03
I have to participate.
28:04
My employer is giving me $5,000.
28:06
I have to do something.
28:08
What do they do?
28:09
For every 10 mutual funds you offer, the number of people
28:14
who put their money into a money market
28:16
account goes up 7%.
28:18
So they make the worst possible investment.
28:21
Because they know they have to do something, but they don't
28:23
know which thing.
28:24
So they say, ah, I'll just put it in the bank and tomorrow
28:27
I'll figure out what mutual fund to invest in.
28:30
They get 3/4 of a percent, 1/2 percent interest. You could
28:33
take a dart and throw it at the set of mutual fund
28:36
opportunities, and any of them would be better
28:38
than what they choose.
28:39
It's a nice simplifying strategy, but it's clearly not
28:42
the right decision.
28:44
OK.
28:46
But mostly I want to focus on the third effect that too much
28:49
choice has.
28:50
If you manage to overcome paralysis, and if you manage
28:56
to make a good decision, what happens to the satisfaction
29:00
you get out of making good decisions?
29:02
And I want to focus on this because this is I think in
29:05
some ways the most surprising aspect of the problem and
29:08
perhaps the most significant.
29:10
People may do better objectively when they have a
29:14
lot of options to choose from as opposed to a few.
29:17
However, they will feel worse.
29:20
Doing better and feeling worse is the song I'm going to be
29:23
singing to you for the next long time.
29:26
29:29
So--
29:32
they don't quite say this, but this is what they're thinking.
29:34
29:38
If you can't see the captions, "They never should have
29:39
allowed us to be
29:40
free range." OK.
29:44
Now, why does this happen?
29:46
I didn't know exactly where to fit this in,
29:48
so I put it in here.
29:50
It doesn't quite fit, but it ought to be relevant to you.
29:52
A study was recently done.
29:54
What it shows us is that people don't know their own
29:57
minds very well.
29:58
This will come as a shock to you, I'm sure.
30:01
This was a study where people got to
30:04
rate digital CD players.
30:07
So it was all software.
30:08
And people got--
30:10
one CD player had 7 features, one had 14, and one had 21.
30:14
And people got to-- first they were asked which of them they
30:18
would prefer.
30:20
And the majority of people said they would prefer the CD
30:23
player that had 21 features.
30:27
That is to say, they're interested in choosing
30:29
something that has enormous capability.
30:32
Now, you let them construct their own CD player by giving
30:37
them a list of the 21 different features that are
30:39
available, and you see how many of them they pick.
30:43
They pick only 19 of the 21.
30:45
I want my CD player to have these particular
30:47
19 customized features.
30:50
Now, in the third experiment, you actually let people use
30:53
the CD player with 21 features for a while.
30:56
Give them a manual.
30:57
Let them play with it.
30:58
And now you have them choose between that and a CD player
31:02
that has seven features.
31:03
And now they choose the simpler one.
31:07
So there's a tradeoff between capability and usability.
31:13
As far as I know, no one has figured out how to achieve
31:16
maximum capability and maximum usability in the same device.
31:21
There's a tradeoff.
31:23
In prospect, capability seems way more
31:26
important than usability.
31:28
In practice, the reverse is true.
31:31
What's weird about this, though, is that it's not like
31:34
the people in the study haven't already learned this.
31:38
They probably have closets full of devices that they
31:41
never use because they couldn't figure out how to get
31:44
it to do the simple things because it was able to do all
31:46
these complicated things.
31:47
They have taught themselves again, and again, and again
31:50
that usability is more important than capability.
31:53
Nonetheless, when the next device it appears, it seems
31:56
that they're driven by
31:57
capability rather than usability.
31:59
So people are not likely to get this right on their own.
32:02
And I mention this because it seems to me that you are in
32:05
perhaps a unique position in knowing this to help to
32:09
protect people from themselves, which is what I'm
32:12
going to recommend to you at the end.
32:14
So why is it that all this choice makes people miserable?
32:17
There are four different things,
32:18
four different reasons.
32:19
The first is regret.
32:23
You choose something, and it's good.
32:26
Is it perfect?
32:28
Nothing's perfect.
32:29
But it's good.
32:31
Yeah?
32:32
AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE]
32:34
slide, capability versus usability.
32:36
I was just thinking, isn't capability aspirational?
32:38
So you choose something that has many more features than
32:41
you're capable of using now because you think, I could get
32:45
to be that proficient.
32:45
Whereas usability is marked by what's available to me now.
32:49
But tomorrow is a new day.
32:51
BARRY SCHWARTZ: It's true.
32:52
You're absolutely right.
32:53
Capability is both a prediction about what you'll
32:56
want the device to do and a prediction about what you'll
32:59
be able to get the device to do.
33:01
But experience teaches most people-- not all people--
33:05
that they will never, either for reasons of talent, or
33:09
temperament, or time--
33:10
they will never be able to get the device to do all the
33:13
wonderful things it can do.
33:14
And that doesn't seem to stop them from choosing exactly
33:17
that kind of device the next time around.
33:19
And it's not like these choices are free.
33:23
Because when you choose a device that's got a lot of
33:25
capability, invariably the easy things are harder to do.
33:30
So, plug and play?
33:32
Right.
33:33
So the result is that you end up getting even less out of
33:37
the highly capable device than you would out of a less
33:40
capable device where it was transparent how to get to do
33:44
the things you cared about.
33:45
So, yes.
33:46
It may be aspirational.
33:47
But the question is, why don't people learn from their failed
33:50
aspirational efforts in the past to adopt a different set
33:53
of standards about what they should be looking for?
33:57
And people are endlessly optimistic.
33:59
Tomorrow is the first day of the rest of my life.
34:03
Could be that.
34:04
So regret.
34:05
Any choice it's not perfect, it's easy to imagine
34:08
alternative would have been better.
34:10
And the more alternatives there are, the easier it is to
34:14
imagine that an alternative would have been better.
34:16
If there are only two different kinds of cereal to
34:18
choose from, how much can you regret the one you chose?
34:21
If there are 200, well now, only an idiot could think that
34:25
you've actually stumbled onto the best cereal.
34:28
So what regret is going to do is it's going to reduce the
34:30
satisfaction you get out of good choices.
34:34
What anticipated regret does is it prevents you from making
34:37
choices at all.
34:39
You're so sure you're going to regret the decision that you
34:41
don't make it.
34:42
This I'm sure is a lot of why people don't put money into
34:45
their 401(k)s.
34:47
Some other fund will outperform the one they choose
34:49
and they'll spend the rest of their lives kicking
34:50
themselves.
34:52
The specter of regret, I think, makes even unimportant
34:56
decisions loom large.
34:57
And lastly, for all eternity, French, blue cheese, or ranch?
35:01
For one salad, it really doesn't matter what dressing
35:03
you have. But if I tell you you're going to pick the salad
35:05
dressing that you're going to have from now until the end of
35:07
time, you really want to get that right.
35:10
And I think that the specter that people will regret their
35:14
decisions is really what's driving the agony that people
35:18
have making even inconsequential choices.
35:21
Second, related to regret, what economists call
35:23
opportunity costs.
35:25
And that is, once again, you make a choice.
35:29
But the thing you choose is not the best in all respects.
35:32
You get great gas mileage and real safety and reliability,
35:38
but the ride isn't as smooth as you might like.
35:40
Or you get a really smooth ride, and everybody stops and
35:44
looks at your car as you drive by.
35:46
But the mileage sucks and the thing's in the shop every
35:49
three days.
35:49
So life is tradeoffs.
35:51
The more options you look at, the more options there are,
35:55
the more options you look at, the more you will identify
35:59
attractive features and options that you reject.
36:04
And so you might well choose the thing that is the best for
36:07
you but still be unhappy about all these attractive features
36:13
of other options that you had to pass up.
36:14
And all these opportunity costs add.
36:18
And what they do cumulatively is subtract from the
36:20
satisfaction you get out of the decision you made, even if
36:23
you make the right decision.
36:26
So there's a lot to say about opportunity costs.
36:30
Parents aren't told enough about this when they are
36:33
prospective parents.
36:34
We found we really missed going to the theater and
36:36
eating at nice restaurants, so we gave our kids away.
36:41
Then there's this one.
36:42
36:45
People don't need to have this explained, even though they
36:48
don't come from New York.
36:49
But the thing to think about-- here's are these people living
36:52
in a midtown apartment house.
36:53
And they have a place in the Hamptons.
36:55
And there they are sitting on the beach, have the beach
36:58
themselves, it's gorgeous, it's August.
37:01
What could be better?
37:02
Life is perfect.
37:03
And all this guy is thinking is that it's August. Everyone
37:06
in our neighborhood is away on vacation.
37:08
I could be parking right in front of my house.
37:11
And every day he sits on the beach, and instead of being
37:15
thankful for the beautiful weather and the beautiful
37:17
setting, all he is is pissed off about the parking spaces
37:20
he's blowing.
37:21
And that's going to make his vacation a lot less enjoyable
37:24
than it would have been if he hadn't had to pass up great
37:27
parking spaces.
37:28
One last example.
37:30
37:41
There is no caption on this one.
37:43
I think a caption is quite unnecessary.
37:47
Just to show that this is not just a fiction of New Yorker
37:50
cartoonists' imagination, here's a study.
37:52
People participate in an experiment.
37:54
And then when they're done, you offer them $2 as a token
37:58
of appreciation for their participating.
38:00
Or you say, we have these nice pens with the school logo that
38:05
are available the bookstore for about $2.50.
38:08
And if you'd rather, you can have a pen.
38:10
And under these conditions, 75% of people choose the pen
38:14
over the $2.
38:15
In another condition, you offer them $2, or that same
38:20
good pen, or two less expensive pens.
38:24
Now the question is what percentage of people in this
38:26
condition will choose either of the pen options.
38:30
And the answer, as should be obvious to you, has
38:32
to be at least 75%.
38:36
Right?
38:37
75% of people prefer the good pen to $2.
38:40
How can fewer than 75% of people prefer
38:43
either pen to $2?
38:45
But then you're saying to yourself, why would he be
38:48
talking to you about this trivial study?
38:51
And the answer is that 45% choose either pen.
38:55
And this really captures in a nutshell what
38:57
opportunity costs do.
38:59
You're looking at the good pen.
39:01
And it's a good pen.
39:02
It's nice to have a good pen.
39:03
But you're giving up the opportunity to have two pens.
39:06
And that makes a good pen feel less good.
39:08
So you look at the two pens.
39:10
And that'll take care of all the writing have to do for the
39:12
whole semester.
39:13
But once in your life, it would be nice to
39:15
write with a good pen.
39:17
And that makes the two pens less good.
39:19
So the thing you're passing up with the alternative subtracts
39:24
from the satisfaction you'd get from
39:25
whichever one you choose.
39:26
And suddenly, neither of the pens is as good as $2.
39:30
So you take the $2.
39:32
This in a nutshell is what life is like when people are
39:36
choosing from among a large set of attractive
39:39
alternatives.
39:40
The thing you end up choosing is never going to feel as good
39:43
as it would have if the choice set were smaller.
39:46
Another way of saying this is that everything suffers from
39:49
comparison.
39:50
There's a nice little study--
39:52
I don't have time to get-- there's a theoretical
39:54
rationale for this that derives from a theory that
39:57
Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky developed known as
39:59
prospect theory.
40:00
Some of you may have sort of encountered it in
40:03
one place or another.
40:05
Tversky was a psychologist at Stanford who sadly died about
40:09
a decade ago of a brain tumor.
40:12
And Kahneman just recently won the Nobel Prize for this work.
40:15
Anyway, there's a theoretical rationale for this.
40:18
But the result is simply this.
40:19
You ask one set of people in the San Francisco area, how
40:24
much would you pay for a plane ticket for a
40:28
weekend in Las Vegas?
40:29
How much would you be willing to pay to fly for a long
40:32
weekend in Las Vegas?
40:33
And people give you a number.
40:35
Other group of people, you say, you know, you're thinking
40:38
about going away to Seattle, to LA, and to Las Vegas.
40:43
How much would you pay for a plane ticket to Las Vegas?
40:47
So you're asking them the same question.
40:49
But in one case, you are forcing them explicitly to
40:52
think about the value of going to Las Vegas in comparison
40:55
with the alternatives.
40:57
And people are willing to pay significantly less money in
41:00
the latter case than in the former.
41:03
And this is true whether it's Las Vegas or LA or Seattle.
41:06
Doesn't matter which one you're asking about.
41:08
People will pay less for a ticket anyplace when they're
41:11
evaluating it in a larger set than when they're evaluating
41:14
it by itself.
41:15
41:17
OK.
41:18
One other thing about opportunity cost that might
41:20
surprise you.
41:23
Is there anyone in this room who's pressed for time?
41:25
41:28
No?
41:29
Oh, you are treated really, really well.
41:30
So why do you think people feel so much time pressure?
41:34
Mostly people assume--
41:35
I assume--
41:36
that it's the pressure to get the things done that you have
41:39
to get done.
41:40
We all have a very long to-do list. We never get to the
41:44
bottom of it.
41:45
And that's why we feel rushed for time.
41:47
So people did a study in which some people were asked to list
41:50
all the things they had to do.
41:52
And other people were asked to list all the things they'd
41:54
like to do.
41:55
And then they were asked a bunch of questions having to
41:57
do with time pressure.
41:59
And guess which group felt more time pressure?
42:01
Not the group with a list of chores.
42:03
The group with the list of desirable activities.
42:05
What really seems to create a sense that there's not enough
42:08
time is all of the things we want to do and like to do that
42:12
we don't have time to do and that we're going to have to
42:14
make choices among that create the sense that there's not
42:17
enough time in life for me to be the person I want to be and
42:20
do the things I want to do.
42:23
OK, third.
42:24
I don't want to talk about that.
42:27
The third reason why we do well and feel crappy is that
42:30
when there are a lot of options, it's inevitable that
42:33
our expectations about how good the chosen
42:35
option will be go up.
42:38
The story I use to make this point is when I went to
42:40
replace my jeans at The Gap.
42:42
And for years and years I'd buy jeans.
42:43
And they came in one style, and I bought them.
42:46
And they fit however they fit, which was
42:48
usually not very well.
42:49
And you'd sort of break them in and wear them forever
42:52
because it was so unpleasant to break them in.
42:55
So I go to replace my jeans.
42:56
And I give them the size.
42:57
And I get asked, you want slim fit, easy fit, relaxed buttons
43:02
fly, zipper fly, stone washed, acid wash, boot cut?
43:05
On and on it goes.
43:06
So I tried on every damn kind of jeans they had.
43:09
And I walked out with the best fitting jeans I had ever had,
43:12
honest, and I felt worse.
43:15
I did better, and I felt worse.
43:17
And the question was why.
43:18
And the answer was, when they only came in one style or two,
43:22
I had no expectations about how well they would fit.
43:25
When they came in 20 styles, I expected perfection.
43:28
And what I got was good, but it wasn't perfection.
43:31
We evaluate our experiences in large part by comparing them
43:35
to what we expect them to be.
43:36
And if our expectations are high, even good experiences
43:39
will end up feeling like we have failed.
43:42
And there's no way I can imagine that adding options in
43:45
people's lives will do anything other than raise
43:48
people's expectations.
43:50
Plus the world does this to us.
43:52
Travel agents.
43:55
Contractors.
43:56
Would be possible for you to totally exaggerate how much it
43:58
will cost and how long it will take so we'll be pleasantly
44:00
surprised in the end?
44:04
Everything was better back when everything was worse.
44:08
The truth in this is that when everything was worse, people's
44:12
expectations were lower so that it was possible
44:15
occasionally to have an experience that exceeded
44:18
expectations.
44:19
In modern American society, at least among the affluent, I
44:22
don't think it's possible for anything to happen that's
44:25
better than we expect it to be.
44:27
Because we expect everything to be perfect.
44:30
And that's a recipe for at least disappointment, if not
44:33
abject misery.
44:34
And all this choice is one reason why.
44:37
This is an exaggeration, but it's funny.
44:39
44:45
We tend to romanticize poverty.
44:48
Just to let you know, in case you care, that this is false.
44:51
People are not happy in stinking hell
44:53
holes of abject poverty.
44:54
What is true is that once you cross subsistence, whatever
44:58
subsistence is in your society, additional increases
45:02
in wealth have virtually no effect on well-being.
45:05
There's a huge, steep curve going from zero to
45:09
subsistence, but once you cross that line, the curve
45:11
flattens out.
45:13
It's worth knowing in case you have a choice between X and
45:16
making more money.
45:17
Almost certainly X is what you should choose.
45:22
Self-blame.
45:23
45:26
The last thing that does us in is that you make a choice.
45:29
And it's a good choice, but it's not as good as you think
45:31
it will be, or hope it will be, or expect it to be.
45:34
And the question is why.
45:35
What went wrong?
45:36
Whose fault is it?
45:38
And when you're choosing jeans from two different styles, the
45:41
answer to the question what went wrong is obvious.
45:44
It's the world's fault.
45:46
They only make them in a couple of varieties.
45:48
What could I do?
45:49
Did the best I could.
45:51
But if you're choosing from 200 styles, and the result is
45:55
unsatisfactory, and you ask the question,
45:57
whose fault is it?
45:59
It seems to me now the answer is again obvious.
46:01
It's just different.
46:02
Now the answer is it's my fault.
46:04
With 200 options, there's no excuse for anything less than
46:07
perfection.
46:08
So not only do people have ridiculously high expectations
46:14
which are almost never met, but then when they aren't met,
46:17
they attribute the responsibility for that
46:20
failure to themselves.
46:22
And self-blame I think is a critical component of why we
46:26
are experiencing an epidemic of clinical depression in the
46:29
United States.
46:31
At a time when we've never been richer or had more
46:34
freedom of choice, people seem to be
46:35
getting sadder and sadder.
46:38
There's one modifier I want to add, because
46:40
I think it's important.
46:42
And that is that the problem of having too much choice is
46:46
enormously exacerbated, made worse, if you're the kind of
46:50
person who thinks that the aim in a decision is to get the
46:53
best, what we call maximizing.
46:56
The best job, the best cell phone, the best car, the best
47:00
vacation, the best restaurant, the best dish in the
47:02
restaurant.
47:03
You're out to find the best.
47:05
The alternative is to be out to find
47:07
something that's good enough.
47:08
And good enough can be very good.
47:10
You can have high standards.
47:12
Why does this make a difference?
47:13
Well, in a world with unlimited choice, how do you
47:16
know you've got the best?
47:19
You have to examine all the possibilities.
47:22
Well, you can't examine all the possibilities.
47:24
There are too many of them.
47:25
So you examine a bunch, and then you choose.
47:27
And if it's in any way disappointing relative to
47:31
expectations, you'll just be convinced that looking a
47:34
little longer or in a little different place you'd have
47:36
done better.
47:37
If you're out to get a good enough alternative, satisfice,
47:41
then you don't need to examine all the possibilities.
47:44
You just examine them one at a time.
47:46
And when you find one that meets your standards, you
47:48
choose it, and you don't look back.
47:51
So the difference between these two decision-making
47:53
styles is probably significant in general.
47:56
But it becomes especially significant in a world where
47:59
there are essentially unlimited options.
48:01
This is an example of a maximizer.
48:03
48:06
And here is a satisficer.
48:07
48:10
And I studied, whether this matters, with a bunch of
48:14
college seniors who were looking for
48:16
jobs a few years ago.
48:18
We started tracking them in October of their senior year.
48:21
And we stayed with them until June.
48:23
And we were interested in how hard they found the decision,
48:26
how many options they wanted, how well they did, and how
48:29
they felt about how well they did.
48:31
And what we found in a nutshell is this.
48:35
If you are a maximizer, if you are out to get the best, you
48:39
get a job with a starting salary that is 25% higher than
48:43
if you are satisfied with good enough.
48:46
Maximizers get better jobs.
48:50
$7,500 difference, 25% difference.
48:53
That's a lot for a starting salary right out of college.
48:55
48:59
But they are also more pessimistic, anxious,
49:04
stressed, worried, tired, overwhelmed, depressed,
49:06
regretful, and disappointed.
49:07
And they are less content, optimistic, elated,
49:10
excited, and happy.
49:12
In other words, they do better and they feel worse.
49:15
Now, we don't know how they feel when they're actually on
49:18
the job, because the study stopped before they had
49:20
actually started working.
49:22
But I have no reason to think it would be true of their
49:24
experience on the job as it is of their experience of a
49:27
starting salary.
49:29
So how can it be that choice is good and bad?
49:33
Because remember, I said choice is good.
49:39
Here's how.
49:40
49:44
These people, Coombs and Avrunin wrote an article 30
49:47
years ago in which they argued not about choice, about
49:50
something else, that good feelings, good things satiate
49:54
and bad feelings escalate.
49:56
So you're eating a meal.
49:58
And you're starving when you start.
49:59
And the first few bites are spectacular.
50:01
You keep eating.
50:02
It's still delicious, but with each succeeding bite, it gets
50:05
a little bit less delicious and a little bit less
50:07
delicious, until you're no are getting much of a hedonic kick
50:10
out of your meal.
50:13
Meanwhile, something else is happening.
50:15
And that is you're starting to get full.
50:17
First it's just mild, hardly noticeable.
50:19
By the time you get to your third course, you're really
50:21
kind of sagging.
50:23
But your grandmother told you that people are starving in
50:25
Africa, so you have to finish everything on your plate.
50:28
So you just keep eating, and eating, and eating.
50:30
The pleasure is gone.
50:31
The discomfort is getting worse, and worse, and worse.
50:35
So this is exactly the way I envision choice.
50:38
When you go from having no choice, like being really
50:41
starving, to having some choice, it's all good.
50:46
And a curve going up is the way I imagine what the dynamic
50:55
is of the good characteristics of choices.
50:57
So along the X-axis is number of choices.
50:59
Along the Y-axis is subjective state.
51:01
The line in the middle is neutral.
51:03
So having no choice, you feel infinitely bad.
51:07
As I give you choice, there's a huge improvement in your
51:10
well-being.
51:11
But eventually that curve levels off and there are
51:14
diminishing marginal returns to additional options.
51:16
And eventually there are no returns to additional options.
51:19
It's flat.
51:20
Meanwhile, all the stuff that I've been describing to you--
51:24
opportunity cost, regret, raised expectations,
51:27
self-blame--
51:28
all of that gets bigger, and bigger, and bigger as the
51:31
number of choices increases.
51:33
And all of that is negative.
51:35
And that's what this curve is that starts out at
51:38
zero and goes down.
51:39
And so how do you feel about your life with any given
51:43
number of choices is simply the algebraic sum
51:47
of those two processes.
51:50
With me?
51:51
And that's what it looks.
51:52
Why does it look like this?
51:53
Because I drew it.
51:56
So I can make it look any damn way I want.
51:58
But this conceptually captures what I think is going on.
52:02
A point is reached where there are no longer benefits to
52:05
additional options and there are very significant costs,
52:08
very significant subjective psychological costs, and the
52:11
costs can more than outweigh the benefits.
52:14
So you end up feeling worse than neutral.
52:17
Not simply worse than you would if you had fewer
52:19
options, but actually worse than neutral.
52:22
And that's the state I think many, many people in American
52:25
society are in.
52:27
There's a deep point in that curve which all almost all of
52:31
social science ignores.
52:32
And that is what we call the monotonicity assumption.
52:38
So people do research assume that the function relating X
52:43
and Y goes in one direction.
52:45
Doesn't have to be a straight line, but it
52:47
doesn't change direction.
52:48
So you have one group that has no choice, and one group has a
52:52
choice between two options.
52:53
That group is happier than the group that has no choice.
52:56
You don't need to study three options.
52:58
Because we know what that's going to look like.
52:59
Just keep on extrapolating the curve out.
53:02
Now, I say this only because there were 50 years worth of
53:05
studies comparing no options to two options, and it never
53:09
occurred to anyone to look at five or ten options.
53:12
Because we knew what it would look like.
53:13
And we just knew the wrong thing.
53:16
Because the relation between choice and
53:17
satisfaction is not monotonic.
53:19
It changes direction at some point.
53:22
Second principle that's worth paying attention to is what I
53:27
call the leakage principle, a very elegant
53:29
name, you'll agree.
53:30
And that is the context in which you make the decision
53:36
will continue to exert its influence after the decision
53:41
is made and you're actually experiencing the
53:43
thing you've chosen.
53:44
So the anguish you go through in choosing a car, or a job,
53:48
or a spouse, or a restaurant doesn't stop when
53:51
the choice is over.
53:52
It's not like, OK, I've now got this car, and I'm just
53:55
going to evaluate it on its own terms. No.
53:59
The the comparisons that you were making while making the
54:02
decision will continue to influence you as you
54:05
experience the car.
54:06
And the result is that you will like it
54:08
less than you should.
54:09
You will underappreciate it if you have tortured yourself in
54:12
making the selection.
54:15
This raises an interesting point that I think is directly
54:18
relevant to the work you people do.
54:20
And this is what economists refer to as the
54:22
principal-agent distinction.
54:26
Principals are the people who are going to
54:28
experience the good.
54:29
Agents are the people who get it for them.
54:30
So we have financial advisers to tell us what stocks to buy,
54:34
insurance agents to tell us what insurance to get, real
54:37
estate agents to tells what house to buy, and so on.
54:40
We are hiring their expertise.
54:42
And that's why we think we're doing it.
54:46
We're also hiring something else.
54:49
And that is, if you have an agent choosing your house,
54:53
your car, and your insurance, you don't have to make the
54:56
comparisons.
54:58
And what that means is that you won't suffer all of the
55:01
effects of all of these choices.
55:04
Because you only get to see the result.
55:07
Your agent says, buy a Honda Civic, so
55:09
you buy a Honda Civic.
55:11
Your agent says, buy this $6.3 million house up on the hill.
55:15
It's a steal.
55:16
For all I know in this neighborhood,
55:18
that would be a steal.
55:20
So the agent is the one who suffering making all of these
55:23
comparisons, except it's not really suffering because the
55:26
agent isn't going to experience
55:27
whatever gets chosen.
55:28
You are separating the choice from the experience.
55:31
And as a result, you're making the person who was having the
55:34
experience more satisfied than he or she would otherwise be.
55:38
And the thing I want to emphasize is that this is true
55:41
even if your agent doesn't know one bit more about the
55:44
thing than you do.
55:47
The doesn't need to be an expert in order for you to
55:50
benefit from the advice that the agent gives you.
55:53
All the agent needs to do is not be a complete moron and
55:56
actually be interested in making you better off.
56:00
And you will be better off because you don't torture
56:02
yourself over the decision.
56:04
All that's done by somebody else.
56:06
One view of what search engines can do or might do for
56:13
people is that they act as agents, presenting results,
56:17
hiding all of the tortured comparisons that must be made
56:20
in order to prioritize results so you only
56:23
get to see the winner.
56:24
And the result is that you appreciate the winner much
56:27
more than you would if you had to do all
56:29
those comparisons yourself.
56:31
Almost done.
56:33
56:35
This is just to show you that there are
56:36
companies that know this.
56:37
They have limited selection, and they do very well.
56:40
Costco-- do they have Costcos out here?
56:42
It started in Seattle, right?
56:43
Costco is the store that people leave with the biggest
56:46
smiles on their faces.
56:48
That's the store people like to shop in most. Limited
56:51
selection, good prices.
56:53
And the little surprise things that they have for sale, these
56:57
little affordable luxuries that they
56:59
don't normally carry.
57:01
Greek diners in New York City.
57:03
So Greek diners--
57:05
it's not like they have Greek food.
57:06
They're just owned by Greek people.
57:08
And their menus are about 1,000 pages.
57:12
There is no dish that anyone has ever eaten that isn't in
57:14
somewhere on those menus.
57:16
And tucked in the front cover of the menu is a little piece
57:20
of paper clipped to the front of the menu with today's
57:24
specials, four or five items.
57:27
Two things to know about today's specials.
57:29
One, they are the highest margin items. Two, they're the
57:32
same every day.
57:35
Inadvertently, you create an insoluble problem by giving
57:39
people 10,000 things to choose from.
57:41
And then you solve it for them by giving
57:43
them today's specials.
57:44
And people are driven to choose, take your advice, take
57:47
your recommendation, and choose today's specials.
57:50
So they make a lot more money than they otherwise would.
57:53
And they solve your choice problem, which of course
57:55
they've created.
57:57
OK, last substantive slide.
58:02
And then I'll say just a word or two about how this might
58:04
relate to you guys.
58:06
The more choices are available for people, the more likely it
58:10
is that people will choose nothing, that
58:14
they will be paralyzed.
58:16
What do you do in the face of that paralysis?
58:19
Paralysis can be extremely costly.
58:21
Sometimes you really should act.
58:23
Richard Thaler, an economist, and Cass Sunstein, a professor
58:27
of law at the University of Chicago, have actually offered
58:30
a guide for public policy which they call libertarian
58:33
paternalism.
58:35
And the title of their paper is "Libertarian Paternalism is
58:38
Not an Oxymoron," although it would seem to be.
58:41
And here's their argument.
58:42
I'll give it to you with examples.
58:45
Let's choose this one.
58:46
In the United States, when you renew your driver's license,
58:49
you get asked, would you like to be an organ donor?
58:53
28% of American licensed drivers are organ donors.
58:57
85% five percent of Americans think organ
59:00
donation is a good thing.
59:01
28% of licensed drivers are organ donors.
59:05
Several different European countries,
59:06
they do the same thing.
59:07
When you renew your driver's license, you get the
59:10
opportunity to be an organ donor.
59:11
And in these countries, 90% of licensed
59:13
drivers are organ donors.
59:15
28% in the US, 90% in these European countries.
59:18
What's the difference?
59:20
Europeans are nicer than Americans?
59:22
I don't think so.
59:24
Opt-in versus opt-out.
59:25
In Europe, you're an organ donor unless you say no.
59:28
In the United States, you're not an organ donor
59:30
unless you say yes.
59:31
Now, understand that either way, all you have to do is
59:33
check a box and sign a form.
59:35
This is not exactly rocket science.
59:38
Nonetheless, with the high likelihood that people will do
59:42
nothing, Thaler and Sunstein argue, organize options so
59:47
that if people do nothing, they get what is almost
59:51
certainly in their interests.
59:53
That's the paternalistic part.
59:55
The libertarian part is you do give them the
59:58
opportunity to say no.
60:00
With respect to 401(k) participation, same story.
60:04
Almost every workplace the United States, you have to
60:07
sign a form that says, withhold 5% of my pay and put
60:10
it into something.
60:11
And if you don't, nothing is withheld.
60:13
Suppose you reverse that and the form says, don't
60:16
deduct 5% of my pay.
60:18
I want everybody bloody penny of it.
60:21
You dramatically increase the rate of
60:23
participation in 401(k)s.
60:25
And we have good reason to believe that this
60:27
paternalistic manipulation of what the default is is
60:31
actually doing what people want.
60:33
Because, as I say, 85% of Americans
60:35
support organ donation.
60:37
And virtually everybody ends up
60:38
participating in the 401(k).
60:40
So all you're doing is inducing them to do it a
60:42
little bit sooner.
60:44
So in a world in which people are more and more likely,
60:47
because of the overwhelming number of choices they face
60:49
and the complexity of life, to do nothing, the most useful
60:53
thing that policy can do is organize the space so that
60:58
when they do nothing, good things happen.
61:00
[INAUDIBLE]
61:02
It will have as big an effect on the character of a variety
61:05
of American social institutions, bigger effect
61:08
anything else I can think of.
61:09
And it's free.
61:11
Essentially free.
61:13
So it is worth thinking long and hard about what the
61:17
defaults should be so that people are mostly satisfied
61:22
with what happens to them if they don't do anything.
61:25
SPEAKER 1: Let's have you keep going and--
61:27
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
61:28
61:31
BARRY SCHWARTZ: I already said this.
61:33
I think the capability/usability problem
61:36
is relevant to you.
61:37
But you know better than I how you face it and how
61:40
you would solve it.
61:42
I must say I like a lot that you give people--
61:47
what do you call it?
61:48
Packets?
61:50
Pack?
61:50
AUDIENCE: Pack.
61:51
BARRY SCHWARTZ: Instead of letting people choose one from
61:53
column A and two from column B, you to say--
61:55
If I were you, I'd say it a lot harder--
61:56
I'd say, listen.
61:58
This is what we think you should have. Click
62:00
and you've got it.
62:00
Instead of just saying, you can have it
62:02
all if you want it.
62:04
Urge people to want it.
62:05
We know more than you do.
62:06
This is what you should have.
62:09
Structure our options hierarchically.
62:11
A way of reducing the choice paralysis is to give people a
62:15
choice among four or five options.
62:17
And then once they've--
62:18
create trees.
62:19
Great trees intelligently so that people never have to go
62:21
back up the tree, realizing that they've gone down the
62:23
wrong branch.
62:24
I know this isn't easy.
62:26
But this is going to be a lot more satisfying and usable for
62:29
people than presenting 125 options all at once.
62:33
And is worth paying a lot of attention to how people use
62:35
your products to know just how these trees should be
62:39
structured so that you never feel like you're choosing
62:42
among a very large set of options.
62:44
I get the feeling that there's nothing I can say that you
62:45
haven't really thought about in this connection.
62:48
But what the hell.
62:50
I'll say it anyway.
62:51
I believe that for the most part, you people are part of
62:54
the solution rather than part of the problem, to pull a
62:59
slogan from the '60s out of my back pocket.
63:01
And that's something that you should be very pleased about.
63:04
And I'm certainly thrilled to death that you exist. Because
63:07
you're certainly part of the solution and not part of the
63:09
problem in my world.
63:10
Although there is one thing I'd like you to fix that we
63:12
can talk about later.
63:15
But I don't think there's anything
63:17
inevitable about this.
63:18
I think that you remain part of the solution rather than
63:20
becoming part of the problem only if you are deliberately
63:23
and self-consciously trying to be part of the solution.
63:27
There's enormous pressure to move in other directions,
63:30
where you will confuse, muddle, and frustrate people
63:36
rather than serving them.
63:38
And with your eye clearly on the prize and on how much
63:41
people need to be guided by the kind of information you
63:45
offer, you can resist the pressure that you may
63:49
experience some day in the future to be something
63:52
different than what you set out to be.
63:54
So thank you very much.
63:56
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iy8R5TZNV1A