The Price of Being Human is a compelling, witty, and insightful exploration of the irrational economic choices we all make—not because we’re foolish, but because we’re human. Drawing from behavioural economics, psychology, and cultural critique, author Zoya Parkier translates dense academic theories into engaging, relatable storytelling for young adults learning to navigate the world.

Each chapter takes a familiar economic idea—money and happiness, investing, tipping, saving, advertising—and unpacks it through the lens of human emotion, cognitive bias, and social pressure. The result is a powerful reframing of modern life’s most common decisions: why we spend, why we save (or don’t), why we obsess over status, and why we keep chasing fulfilment through purchases and promotions that never quite deliver.

Parkier unpacks myths like the rational investor or the happiness-wealth link, using case studies ranging from Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness policy to the GameStop saga. She explores the hidden labour behind a smile in the service industry, the performative nature of generosity, and the illusion of choice in markets that manipulate more than they serve.

Ultimately, the book offers more than just critique—it proposes a more humane way to engage with modern life. Instead of treating economics as a bloodless machine, Parkier insists we see it as a mirror reflecting our fears, desires, and contradictions. By rewriting the “happiness equation” and challenging the myth of control, she invites us to opt out of toxic cycles and step into more intentional, values-aligned choices.

The Price of Being Human doesn’t just dissect our irrational choices—it invites young adults to reclaim their agency within a system designed for profit, not people. Eye-opening, entertaining, and fiercely compassionate, this book is a manifesto for a more humane kind of economics—one that starts not with markets, but with what it means to be human.

Preface

Chapter 1: The Happiness Equation

• The Money-Happiness Myth

• Hedonic Adaptation: Why the Glow Fades

• Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness

• The Diminishing Returns of Wealth

• What Actually Makes Us Happy?

• The Psychology of Spending

• The Happiness Trap

• The Happiness Equation (Rewritten)

• Final Thoughts: A Million Pounds and a Monastery

Chapter 2: Your Brain Is a Terrible Investor

• The Myth of the Rational Investor

• GameStop and the Madness of Crowds

• Overconfidence: The Investor’s Blind Spot

• Monkey vs. Wall Street

• The Fear-Greed Cycle

• The Psychology of Risk

• The Myth of Control

• What Actually Works?

• Investing Beyond Money

• Final Thoughts: Outsmarting Yourself

Chapter 3: Why We Tip Strangers and Not Teachers

• The Origins of Tipping: A Token of Gratitude… or Control?

• Reciprocity: The Social Glue of Generosity

• Signalling Theory: Look at Me Be Generous

• The Asymmetry of Service

• The Power Dynamic

• The Global Tipping Map

• Generosity as Identity

• Moral Licensing: I Gave, So I’m Good

• The Inefficiency of Tipping

• The Paradox of Generosity

• What This Means for Policy

• Final Thoughts: Generosity, Rewritten

Chapter 4: The Illusion of Choice

• The Paradox of Choice

• Jam Today, Jam Tomorrow

• The Myth of Autonomy

• The Psychology of Menus

• The Illusion of Choice in Politics

• Decision Fatigue: Why You’re Tired All the Time

• The Paradox of Personalisation

• Too Much Choice Can Be a Trap

• Reclaiming Choice

• Final Thoughts: Freedom Isn’t Found in the Aisle

Chapter 5: The Price of a Smile

• What Is Emotional Labour?

• The Two Faces of Emotional Labour

• Why Do We Pay for Feelings?

• Smile, You’re Being Watched

• Gender and Emotional Labour

• Racialised Emotional Expectations

• The Cost of Emotional Contortion

• The Rise of “Emotional Branding”

• When Empathy Becomes Currency

• The Problem with Performed Empathy

• The Future of Emotional Labour

• Final Thoughts: The Value of a Genuine Smile

Chapter 6: Blame the Brain, Not the Budget

• The Scarcity Mindset: A Cognitive Tax

• The Mental Load of Being Poor

• The Myth of the Welfare Queen

• The Brain on Scarcity

• The Cost of Being Poor

• The False Freedom of Choice

• The Blame Game

• Why Financial Literacy Isn’t Enough

• The Real Solutions

• Final Thoughts: Rethinking Responsibility

Chapter 7: How to Sell to a Goldfish

• The Attention Economy: What Are We Really Selling?

• From Billboards to Brainwaves: The Evolution of Advertising

• The Fragmented Mind

• Selling in Seconds

• The Architecture of Distraction

• FOMO: The Fear of Missing Out

• Influencer Culture and the Marketplace of Self

• The Burnout Generation

• Chapter 8: The Cost of Cool

• What Is Cool, Really?

• The Economics of Cool

• Branding and the Birth of Identity

• How Trends Spread

• Scarcity and the Hype Machine

• Cool and Class

• The Cost of Cool (Literally)

• When Cool Hurts

• Reclaiming Authenticity

• Final Thoughts: Cooler Heads

Chapter 9: Regret Is a Terrible Financial Planner

• The Anatomy of Regret

• The Sunk Cost Fallacy

• Why We Hesitate

• The Loop of Repetition

• When Regret Becomes Identity

• Regret Minimisation: A Better Framework

• Forgiveness and Financial Healing

• Final Thoughts: Regret Isn’t the End

Chapter 10: The Morality of a Sale

• The Invisible Hand and the Moral Void

• Profit vs. Exploitation

• The Illusion of Consent

• The Ethics of Price

• Greenwashing and Corporate Virtue

• Moral Licensing: I Bought the Organic Soap, So…

• Marketing and Manipulation

• The Burden on the Consumer

• When Doing Good Becomes Good Business

• Final Thoughts: Selling with Soul

Chapter 11: The Paradox of Saving

• The Evolutionary Brain vs. the Modern Wallet

• The Intention-Action Gap

• Saving Is Invisible

• The Culture of Consumption

• The Myth of Self-Control

• Automation: The Saving Superpower

• The Role of Identity

• Micro-Saving and Mental Reframing

• Financial Trauma and the Fear of Saving

• The Inequity of Saving

• The Paradox in Reverse: Saving Too Much

• Designing for a Saving Society

• Final Thoughts: Save Like You Mean It

Chapter 12: Groupthink and the Market Mob

• Bubbles in the Making: Tech Hype and the Next Big Thing

• Historical Case Study: The South Sea Bubble

• The Role of Authority in Herd Behaviour

• The Bystander Effect in Market Crashes

• Case Study: The Housing Market and Confirmation Bias

• Herd Mentality in Personal Finance

• Herding in Digital Spaces: The Algorithm Effect

• Case Study: Terra and the Crypto Crash

• Bubbles as Social Phenomena

• Lessons from Behavioural Economics

• Herding in Everyday Decisions: Beyond Markets

• Herd Behaviour in Emergencies: Fight or Flight Together

• Tools to Resist Groupthink

• Herding in Morality and Social Change

• What the Smartest Investors Do

• The Courage to Be Alone

Chapter 13: Why Scarcity Sells Lies

• Scarcity in the Wild: An Evolutionary Primer

• The Neuroscience of Urgency

• Scarcity as a Marketing Strategy

• The Principle of Reactance

• Artificial Scarcity: Manufactured Urgency

• Social Proof Meets Scarcity

• Scarcity’s Role in Inequality

• Scarcity in Dating and Social Dynamics

• Scarcity in Luxury and Status Brands

• The Scarcity-Value Fallacy

• Scarcity and the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO)

• Psychological Immunity: How to Resist Scarcity Traps

• Ethical Questions: When Scarcity Becomes Exploitation

• Closing Reflections: Scarcity Is a Lens, Not a Truth

Chapter 14: Who Really Runs the Economy?

• Classical Economics: A World of Perfect People

• Enter Behavioural Economics

• Bounded Rationality: The Limits of Thinking

• The 2008 Financial Crisis: A Case Study in Overconfidence

• COVID-19: Uncertainty, Emotion, and Economic Policy

• Financial Decision-Making: The Myth of the Rational Investor

• Narrative Economics: The Power of Stories

• Trust and Economic Behaviour

• Behavioural Policy in Action: Nudging Towards Better Choices

• Who Actually Runs the Economy?

• A More Human Economics

Chapter 15: The Value of Being Human

• Efficiency vs Humanity: The Core Tension

• Redesigning for Wellbeing

• Degrowth: Challenging the Gospel of Expansion

• The Future of Behavioural Policy

• The Price of Being Human

Notes

Walk into any modern supermarket and stand in front of the cereal aisle. There, staring back at you, are 76 different types of cereal: low-fat, high-fibre, extra-crunchy, chocolate-dipped, gluten-free, kid-friendly, adult-only, ancient grain, oat cluster, almond swirl. It’s an explosion of options. A buffet of decisions. A democracy of flakes.

You came in for cereal. You leave with existential dread.

This is the paradox of modern life. We have more choice than any generation before us, more freedom to customise, optimise, and personalise. We can choose our toothpaste from an aisle of minty green tubes, choose our careers from a dropdown menu of personality-aligned vocations, choose our relationships with a swipe, and even choose which personality we want to project today—casual? corporate? cottagecore?

But more choice doesn’t always mean more happiness. In fact, often, it means less. Welcome to the illusion of choice.

In this chapter, we’ll dive into why choice—so central to our identity and our economic systems—often overwhelms us. We’ll explore choice overload, default bias, framing effects, and the silent power of design. We’ll explore why more options make us feel worse, not better; why we’re manipulated by menus, government forms, and social media algorithms; and why, in a world obsessed with autonomy, our freedom to choose may be far more limited than it appears.

The Paradox of Choice

Psychologist Barry Schwartz, in his influential book The Paradox of Choice, outlines a deceptively simple idea: while some choice is good, too much choice can lead to anxiety, paralysis, and ultimately, dissatisfaction. It’s not a radical claim. In fact, it resonates because you’ve likely lived it.

Consider the last time you tried to pick a film on Netflix. You had hundreds of options. Rom-coms, thrillers, award-winning documentaries, “critically-acclaimed cerebral dramas”—a genre invented by algorithms just to sound smart. You scrolled for 30 minutes, maybe 45. You watched a trailer. Then another. Then, exhausted, you gave up and rewatched The Office.

Choice fatigue is not some abstract academic concept. It’s Tuesday night.

Schwartz illustrates this dynamic with the now-famous jeans story. Once upon a time, buying jeans was a grim but straightforward task. There was one style: denim. They came in your waist size, they were stiff, and you wore them in. Now, enter the modern denim emporium, and you’re faced with wall-to-wall options: skinny, slim, regular, bootcut, tapered, high-rise, mid-rise, distressed, acid-washed, stretch, no-stretch, and jeans made from recycled water bottles. (Why? Because we’re apparently trying to save the oceans one pair of pants at a time.)

You try on five. You buy one. It fits well. But you walk out less satisfied than if you’d had just one option—because now, you’re plagued with the question: What if one of the others was better? This is opportunity cost regret—the mental tax you pay for knowing there were other possibilities. You can’t help but imagine the alternate outcomes, the other versions of your purchase, and by extension, of yourself. What if you had chosen the acid-wash vintage cut? Would you have felt cooler, more fashion-forward, more you?

The irony is that by opening up more avenues for personal expression, hyper-choice narrows our ability to feel content. We become acutely aware not of what we gained, but of what we might have missed out on, and when a choice goes poorly—when the jeans stretch out weirdly after one wash, or the movie you picked turns out to be a snoozefest—you don’t blame bad luck. You blame yourself.

In a world where you can “choose anything,” a bad outcome feels like a personal failure. You had 76 cereals to pick from and you chose this? Really?

This is what Schwartz refers to as the tyranny of freedom. We’ve been sold a seductive idea: that freedom equals happiness, and freedom means choice. But the psychological reality is more complex. Choice can liberate us, but it can also burden us. It creates expectations. It demands optimisation. It turns everyday decisions into tiny moral tests of self-worth and competence.

Worse still, choice overload isn’t just stressful—it’s demotivating. When faced with too many options, people are more likely to walk away entirely. The cereal aisle doesn’t just make you regret your purchase—it might make you skip cereal altogether.

So, paradoxically, more options often result in fewer decisions. More freedom can lead to less action, and what started as empowerment becomes paralysis. That’s the paradox we’re stuck in. We think we want endless choice, but what we’re really craving is clarity.

Jam Today, Jam Tomorrow

Let’s talk jam.

In 2000, psychologists Sheena Iyengar and Mark Lepper conducted an experiment that would become iconic in the world of behavioural economics. The setting? A high-end grocery store in California. The star? Jam. Delicious, sugary, toast-enhancing jam. They set up two tasting booths on alternating weekends. One booth offered 24 varieties of jam—blackberry, apricot, raspberry, kiwi-lime, probably one labelled “forest berries” which no one can actually define. The other booth offered just six.

Here’s the twist: while the 24-jam booth attracted more attention—people crowded around, marvelling at the choice—the booth with only six options led to significantly more purchases. In fact, people were ten times more likely to buy from the simpler setup.

This wasn’t a fluke. It was a spotlight on the human brain.

Faced with too many options, our cognitive gears begin to grind. We second-guess. We procrastinate. We suffer from a charming condition called analysis paralysis—a state in which the abundance of choice makes us less decisive and less satisfied, even when we do make a decision.

At first, the 24 jars feel exciting, like a carnival of culinary possibility. But once the taste test is over, the sheer volume of options creates a psychological bottleneck. Which one was best? Was it the fig and vanilla? Or the blood orange and clove? What if you pick one and then realise, too late, that you were a guava person all along? That anxiety—tiny and seemingly irrational—is the cost of choice overload.

Jam was just the beginning. This experiment has since been replicated in countless domains: from 401(k) retirement plans to dating apps to medical treatment options. The result remains consistent: the more choices people are given, the less likely they are to make any at all.

Let’s take retirement savings as an example. In one study, participation in employer-sponsored retirement plans dropped as the number of investment options increased. When workers had to choose between five plans, many signed up. When presented with 45, participation rates fell. It wasn’t laziness—it was fear of making the wrong decision. Paralysis in a pinstripe suit.

It’s not just that too many options make us slow to act—they also diminish our satisfaction after we’ve chosen. With every extra option, the list of “what-ifs” grows longer. Regret has more doorways to enter from. Even when the jam you choose is good, you wonder if the blueberry-basil fusion might have been transcendent. This is post-decision regret, and it feeds off of missed opportunity. In simpler choice environments, we make peace with what we picked. In complex ones, we imagine the fantasy lives we didn’t live because we didn’t choose “wild huckleberry.”

There’s another wrinkle: expectation inflation. When we’re presented with more options, we expect the result to be better. If a shop has two shirts and we pick one, we’re happy enough if it fits. If there are 100 shirts, we expect the one we pick to wow us. It had competition! It was chosen! It should deliver! If it doesn’t, our disappointment isn’t just a product of poor quality—it’s a product of elevated expectation.

Jam, it turns out, isn’t just a breakfast condiment. It’s a behavioural mirror. It reveals how fragile our minds are when overwhelmed with too much choice and too little guidance. In a world where everything is increasingly customisable, from your playlist to your personality test results, the jam problem is no longer quaint—it’s universal. So yes, fewer options can actually be more freeing.

The Myth of Autonomy

We love the idea of autonomy. It’s the crown jewel of modern identity—the ability to choose for ourselves, to steer our own lives, to swipe right or left on our destinies. In fact, the very architecture of modern capitalism and democracy rests on the belief that individuals are autonomous agents making rational decisions. But what if that belief is, at least partially, a well-dressed illusion?

Let’s begin with defaults—the silent choices made for us when we choose nothing. These are the “pre-selected” options, the paths of least resistance, the tiny nudges that tip the scales without our permission.

One of the most compelling examples comes from organ donation. In countries like Austria and Belgium, where citizens are automatically enrolled as organ donors unless they opt out, consent rates hover above 90%. In contrast, countries like Germany and the United States—where individuals must opt in—see consent rates languish below 20%.

Same humans. Same moral instincts. Same desire to save lives. But radically different outcomes. Why? Because the default is sticky. It feels like the “recommended” choice, or at the very least, the one we can get away with not thinking about. This isn’t a small deal. It’s a seismic reminder that the structure of a decision matters just as much as its content. Our brains are busy. Our days are full. So when a form already has a box ticked, or a button is highlighted, we often go with it—not out of deep agreement, but out of convenience.

That convenience is often mistaken for autonomy. However, really, it’s more like decision autopilot.

This doesn’t just apply to medical forms. It shows up in how we subscribe to newsletters, how we share our data online, how we vote, save, spend, and scroll. Tech companies, governments, marketers—they all understand default bias. They bake it into their design. When you control the defaults, you don’t need to control the decision-maker. You just need to guide the path.

This is the subtle genius of choice architecture—a term coined by behavioural economists Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein. It’s the art of shaping environments so that people, left to their own devices, choose what you want them to choose. Here’s the twist: it can be both benevolent and manipulative.

Defaulting people into retirement savings? Helpful. Defaulting them into sharing personal data with thirty third-party apps? Less so. The scary part? Most people don’t even notice. We think we’re steering, but we’re often gliding down pre-laid tracks, built by someone else.

This isn’t to say we’re powerless. But true autonomy requires more than just choice—it requires awareness. It requires seeing the mechanisms behind the curtain: the ticked boxes, the menu placements, the UX designs masquerading as freedom. So, the next time a screen offers you two options and one is already highlighted, ask yourself: is this what I want—or what someone wants me to want?

Autonomy isn’t just about having choices. It’s about recognising when the choice has already been made for you.

The Psychology of Menus

Think about the last time you opened a restaurant menu. You might’ve assumed you were in charge—ready to scan the options, weigh the flavours, and choose the dish that matched your mood. But in reality, the menu had already made its move. Long before your eyes met the appetisers, someone had subtly nudged you toward a decision. Welcome to menu psychology, where the real secret ingredient is behavioural economics.

Menus, like supermarkets and political ballots, are designed environments, and like all designed environments, they guide behaviour more than they seem to. Every element—from font size to placement to naming conventions—is part of an elaborate script meant to lead your brain down a very specific path.

Let’s start with anchoring. You know that $110 ribeye steak at the top of the page that seems absurdly overpriced? That’s not there to be sold. It’s there to make the $48 ribeye seem reasonable. Your brain compares options relative to each other, not in isolation. So even if you weren’t planning to splurge, suddenly $48 feels “sensible.” The menu has anchored your expectations.

Next, there’s highlighting—a little icon next to the chef’s favourite, a box around the lobster mac and cheese, a subtle star to suggest popularity. These aren’t just decoration; they’re nudges, exploiting our tendency to assume that something visually distinct must be important. If it’s in a box, it must be good, right?

Even the layout plays a role. Studies show that people’s eyes tend to gravitate toward the centre and top-right section of a menu first. So guess where the high-margin items go? Right there, glowing under the warm spotlight of your subconscious attention. Let’s not forget descriptive labelling. You’re not ordering “mashed potatoes.” You’re ordering “buttery Yukon gold mash with a hint of thyme.” It’s the same scoop, just dressed in poetry. The more vivid the language, the more we’re willing to pay. Our brains eat with their imaginations first.

The pricing format is no accident, either. Many high-end restaurants remove the currency symbol altogether—no $, just “38.” Why? Because the presence of a pound sign activates the “money pain” part of your brain. Strip it away, and spending feels less real—more like a gentle suggestion than a transaction.

So here’s the uncomfortable truth: you don’t choose from a menu—you’re guided through it. Your autonomy hasn’t been taken away, exactly. It’s just been softly, expertly steered. This doesn’t end with restaurants. Think about subscription plans for apps, streaming services, or airlines. There’s always a “best value” option helpfully highlighted, a “premium” tier that’s overpriced just enough to make the “standard” plan look like a bargain. It’s the same psychological playbook—anchoring, scarcity, framing—just dressed in modern UI instead of rustic font.

Here’s the clincher: we usually don’t mind. In fact, we often welcome the guidance. Faced with overwhelming options, our brains want shortcuts. They crave hints, defaults, and signals. Menu psychology doesn’t just manipulate—it fills a gap. It simplifies.

The real problem isn’t that menus influence us. It’s that most of the menus we interact with—be they for food, apps, or healthcare—are designed by people who know more about our brains than we do. So the next time a waiter smiles and hands you a laminated script of behavioural traps, pause. Notice the highlighted box. The eye-catching name. The top-right corner where your gaze lands like a well-trained pigeon.

Then, if you want the cheapest pasta on the list, get it. But know that you’re not just eating dinner. You’re swimming in a sea of psychology—one menu at a time.

The Illusion of Choice in Politics

Democracy loves the language of choice. Vote blue, vote red. Left wing, right wing. Progressive, conservative. A buffet of ideologies—or so it seems. However, beneath the banners and slogans, political choice often turns out to be less a smorgasbord and more a binary illusion.

You show up to the polling station, proud to be part of the democratic process. But as you scan your options, a creeping sense of déjà vu sets in. The candidates talk differently but legislate similarly. They disagree loudly on culture war topics but converge quietly on economic policy. You begin to wonder: Is this really a choice—or just political theatre with new actors?

This isn’t a conspiracy. It’s a design, and it has a name: manufactured consent.

Coined by Edward S. Herman and popularised by Noam Chomsky, the term describes a system in which media, elites, and institutions create the appearance of debate and diversity, while keeping actual power structures intact. You’re allowed to argue over the curtains, but the architecture of the house stays the same.

Take the classic two-party system. It frames politics as a rivalry, a grand battle of opposing visions. But often, it’s just a narrow corridor with slightly different wallpaper. The Overton window—the range of acceptable political discourse—is set before the public even gets involved. Radical ideas are kept safely off-stage. You can pick between A and B, but C, D, and E were quietly removed during the dress rehearsal. Even when new voices emerge—third-party candidates, independents, grassroots movements—they’re often undermined by ballot access laws, lack of media coverage, or electoral systems designed to favour the duopoly. Ranked-choice voting? Proportional representation? Good luck finding those in a system built for winner-takes-all.

Perhaps the most subtle manipulation comes through framing. The way political issues are presented shapes how we think about them. Are we talking about “welfare” or “social safety nets”? “Illegal aliens” or “undocumented immigrants”? These aren’t just word choices—they’re value-laden cues engineered to elicit specific emotional reactions. The menu may be short, but the dish descriptions are heavily seasoned.

Social media adds another layer. Algorithms feed you content that aligns with your views, reinforcing what you already believe and filtering out dissenting perspectives. You think you’re engaged in informed debate, but really, you’re circling in a digital echo chamber. The result? An electorate that’s polarised, fatigued, and yet somehow still convinced that choice is abundant. That’s the great irony. In politics, choice is both everywhere and nowhere. There are thousands of headlines, hot takes, polls, and policy promises—but when it comes time to act, the path is often pre-decided. The feeling of freedom remains, even as the options narrow. It’s like ordering from a “customisable” sandwich shop where you’re told you can have anything—as long as it’s ham or turkey.

Of course, this doesn’t mean all hope is lost. Real political change happens—just usually slowly, and with friction. But to understand the system, we have to stop taking the choices at face value. We have to ask: who set this menu? Who benefits from keeping it so limited?

In politics, as in supermarkets and restaurants, the most important choices are often the ones you’re not allowed to make.

Decision Fatigue: Why You’re Tired All the Time

Ever stared at your wardrobe in the morning and thought, “I have nothing to wear,” while surrounded by clothes? Or opened Netflix, scrolled for 40 minutes, and then given up without watching anything? That’s not laziness. That’s decision fatigue—and it’s quietly draining the battery of your brain.

The human mind has a limited capacity for making good decisions every day. Each choice, no matter how small, chips away at your mental resources. By the time you’ve chosen between almond milk or oat milk, answered 14 texts, edited a selfie, rejected three LinkedIn requests, and decided whether to respond with “k” or “ok,” you’ve already burned through a surprising amount of cognitive fuel.

Decision fatigue was famously studied by researchers at Columbia University, who analysed the rulings of parole judges. They found that prisoners who appeared early in the day were far more likely to be granted parole than those who came later—regardless of their crime or behaviour. The more decisions the judges made, the more their mental resources depleted, and the more likely they were to default to “no.” Not because they were biased—because they were tired. This is the hidden tax of modern life. From email inboxes to food delivery apps, we’re constantly confronted with micro-decisions that add up. Psychologist Roy Baumeister, who helped coin the concept, found that our willpower—like a muscle—gets fatigued. Once it’s spent, we start making worse choices: we impulse-buy, skip the gym, lash out, or surrender to the gravitational pull of social media.

It’s no coincidence that supermarkets place sweets and snacks near the checkout aisle. That’s where your cognitive guard is down. After deciding what type of rice to buy, which brand of toilet paper is most ethical, and whether or not you’re the kind of person who buys kale, you’ve got nothing left. Suddenly, a $5 chocolate bar makes perfect sense.

To cope, we unconsciously look for shortcuts—mental heuristics like going with the default, sticking with what we know, or not deciding at all. This can be practical… until it becomes a pattern. Over time, we outsource our choices to algorithms, marketing tactics, or whatever’s first in the queue.

Even small, supposedly empowering choices—like what font to use in an email, or which filter to slap on a story—contribute to the background buzz of indecision that leaves us feeling strangely exhausted by noon.

So, what do successful people do? They reduce the trivial. Steve Jobs famously wore the same black turtleneck every day. Barack Obama limited his wardrobe to two suit colours. By eliminating low-stakes decisions, they preserved mental energy for high-stakes ones. It’s not about minimalism for Instagram aesthetics. It’s about functional clarity. Decision fatigue isn’t a failure of discipline—it’s the cost of living in a hyper-stimulated world.

The next time you find yourself frozen in front of a menu or re-reading the same paragraph for the fifth time, don’t beat yourself up. It’s not you. It’s your prefrontal cortex, running on fumes.

Maybe what you need isn’t more caffeine. It’s fewer choices.

The Paradox of Personalisation

On the surface, personalisation feels like power. Your playlist is curated. Your feed is tailored. Your ads know you better than your mum. From Spotify Discover Weekly to Netflix recommendations, the world now bends itself to your preferences like a digital concierge who never sleeps. There’s a comfort in having everything filtered through your likes, your habits, your history. No more endless scrolling—just what you want, right when you want it. You are the main character, and the algorithm is your stage manager.

But here’s the twist: while personalisation gives the illusion of choice, it often narrows your world instead of expanding it. Your taste becomes a loop. The algorithm notices you liked a post about pasta? Here’s 37 more. You watched a documentary on serial killers? Say hello to your new identity. You lingered for two seconds too long on a cat video? Congratulations, your feed is now 80% feline.

What begins as curation becomes containment.

This is the filter bubble—a term coined by Eli Pariser to describe the digital echo chambers we get trapped in. Algorithms feed us content that confirms what we already think, like, or believe, creating a reality that feels tailored but is actually tunnelled. Over time, this makes us less curious, less challenged, and more convinced that our corner of the internet is the whole map.

It’s not just annoying—it’s dangerous. In politics, personalised news feeds create ideological silos. In education, tailored content reinforces existing knowledge gaps. Even in relationships, dating apps show you the same “type” over and over again, as if human connection could be pre-sorted by filter settings.

The catch? You think you’re in control. You swipe, you click, you scroll—but behind each action is an invisible architecture nudging your behaviour. It’s not a suggestion. It’s gentle coercion wrapped in UX design, and it extends beyond screens. Walk into a modern store and you’re met with targeted in-store promotions based on your digital footprint. Your grocery app knows your shopping habits better than your flatmate. Your smart speaker finishes your sentences—creepily well. All of this creates a paradox: we crave uniqueness, but settle into sameness. We’re told personalisation is about freedom, but often, it’s about predictability. For the companies running the algorithms, your individuality isn’t a mystery—it’s a monetisable pattern.

So what’s the antidote?

Occasionally, choose something unexpected. Listen to a genre you don’t know. Read a viewpoint you disagree with. Talk to someone whose playlist would confuse your algorithm. Break the loop.

Too Much Choice Can Be a Trap

At first glance, having options feels like winning. A sprawling Netflix library? Empowering. Thirty-five toothpaste variants? Responsible hygiene. University courses with more electives than lectures? Academic freedom. But there’s a hidden cost to all this autonomy.

When choices multiply, so does the pressure—not just to choose, but to choose correctly, and when you don’t? That’s on you. After all, the system gave you options. You had freedom. If you’re unhappy, clearly you picked wrong. Try again. Choose better next time. This is where choice becomes a trap, not because the system failed you, but because it convinced you it was benevolent.

In healthcare, patients are now encouraged to “co-decide” their treatment with doctors. Sounds nice. Democratic. But when you’re exhausted, overwhelmed, and googling terms like “prognostic significance,” the last thing you want is to compare six equally terrifying plans. If it goes wrong? That guilt is yours to carry. You chose it.

The same happens in education. You pick your modules, your learning style, your academic path. But if you fall behind or burn out? You just didn’t manage your choices well enough.

Even relationships aren’t spared. In the age of dating apps, commitment is often paralysed by the knowledge that there are thousands of options, all a swipe away. Pick someone and it doesn’t work out? Maybe you should’ve kept scrolling. It’s no longer bad luck. It’s bad judgement.

The narrative has quietly shifted. Failure isn’t circumstantial anymore—it’s personal. If you’re not fulfilled, not successful, not radiant with contentment… it must be because you chose the wrong job, the wrong major, the wrong partner, the wrong cereal. But here’s the truth nobody prints on packaging: having more options doesn’t guarantee better outcomes. Sometimes, it just guarantees more doubt, more stress, and more internalised blame when things don’t go according to plan.

It’s decision fatigue on a societal scale. The worst part is that it disguises systemic flaws as personal shortcomings. So the next time someone says, “You’re free to choose,” pause and ask: “Free… within what framework? Who set the menu?”

Not every buffet is generous. Some are just distractions with better lighting.

Reclaiming Choice

If choice has become a trap, then the antidote isn’t necessarily fewer choices—it’s smarter relationships with the ones we already have. It starts with reclaiming our power not just to choose, but to understand how we’re being nudged, steered, and sometimes gently shoved.

Step one: Recognise the architecture. Defaults, framing, the layout of a menu, the design of a checkout page, the “recommended for you” queue on YouTube—these aren’t innocent. They’re engineered environments designed to optimise someone else’s outcome, not necessarily yours. Once you see the strings, you’re less likely to dance on command.

Step two: Automate what doesn’t matter. One of the most powerful mental upgrades isn’t making better decisions—it’s making fewer. Not because you’re lazy, but because you’re strategic. Automate your savings. Pick one brand of socks. Decide your daily lunch in advance. Create routines that protect your energy for the things that actually deserve your bandwidth. It’s what high performers from athletes to presidents do. They reduce trivial choices so their minds stay sharp for the big ones.

Step three: Set boundaries with your attention. The modern economy doesn’t just want your money—it wants your mind. Notifications, ads, infinite scrolls—all engineered to provoke micro-decisions that drain your focus. Protect your attention like it’s currency. Because it is.

Step four: Embrace constraints. It’s counterintuitive, but limitations often breed clarity. Creativity thrives on boundaries. Satisfaction deepens when you work within limits. Choosing from a menu of five good meals is often more gratifying than navigating a 20-page catalogue of culinary chaos. When options are filtered by your values—not your impulses—you get closer to what actually matters.

Step five: Redefine what a “good” choice means. Not every decision needs to optimise for efficiency or status or social approval. Sometimes a “good” choice is one that aligns with your gut, your purpose, your peace. That shirt might not be the most flattering, but if it makes you feel like yourself, that’s the win. That job might not impress LinkedIn, but if it lets you sleep at night and laugh at lunch, that’s the jackpot.

In other words: we reclaim choice not by eliminating options, but by anchoring decisions in clarity, not chaos. By remembering that saying “no” is often more powerful than saying “yes.” By recognising that the most meaningful decisions often happen before you ever enter the aisle.

Final Thoughts: Freedom Isn’t Found in the Aisle

You’re back in the cereal aisle. Seventy-six kinds of flakes glare at you, each whispering promises of crunchier mornings and fibre-filled fulfilment. But this time, you don’t freeze. You don’t spiral. You reach out, pick a box—any box—and smile. Because the box isn’t the point.

Real freedom isn’t about having every option. It’s about not letting every option own you.

Occasionally, the boldest act of autonomy is knowing when to choose less. Sometimes, it’s walking away from the aisle altogether and making oatmeal at home.

Maybe that’s the truth about choice: you don’t need all of them. You just need one that feels like yours.

There is something about scarcity that captivates the human brain. It triggers urgency. It awakens instinct. It makes us want what we weren’t even thinking about until we saw the sign: “Only 2 left.”

Scarcity is one of the most potent psychological levers in marketing, decision-making, and manipulation. It doesn’t just signal limited supply. It creates perceived value, emotional pressure, and impulsive behaviour.

And that’s where the lie begins.

This chapter explores why scarcity works, how it evolved, where it deceives, and why so many of us—even the most rational—still fall for it. We’ll dive into behavioural economics, cognitive psychology, and marketing manipulation to unravel the tricks scarcity plays on our decision-making—and why it remains one of the most powerful tools of persuasion in existence.

Because what we fear losing often outweighs what we hope to gain.

Scarcity in the Wild: An Evolutionary Primer

Long before “only 2 left in stock” became a shopping trigger, scarcity meant something far more primal. It wasn’t about flash sales or limited-edition sneakers—it was about survival. For most of human history, scarcity was not a sales tactic. It was a threat. A real, tangible, daily concern that determined whether you lived to see another sunrise.

Our ancestors didn’t scroll through online stores debating which protein bar had more macros. They foraged, hunted, and rationed. Food was seasonal. Weather was unpredictable. A poor harvest wasn’t an inconvenience—it was a crisis. Scarcity meant empty stomachs, exposure, and extinction. And in that environment, our brains adapted not just to notice scarcity, but to prioritise it. This evolutionary wiring still pulses through us today, even if we now live in a world where scarcity is more often simulated than real. The psychological term for this is the scarcity heuristic—a mental shortcut that equates rarity with value. If something is limited, our brain assumes it must be important. If everyone else wants it, our brain assumes we should want it too.

These assumptions once made sense. In environments where water sources dried up, animal migrations were unpredictable, and winter stores could make or break a tribe’s survival, being attuned to rarity was advantageous. That instinct helped early humans act quickly, conserve wisely, and seize opportunities before they vanished.

The trouble is, evolution didn’t foresee flash sales and Instagram drops. It didn’t plan for countdown timers or “members-only” access codes. So, the same instincts that once helped us survive now leave us vulnerable to manipulation—hijacked by marketers who know how to mimic the signals our brains were taught to respect.

Modern scarcity cues—low stock alerts, exclusive deals, ticking clocks—aren’t just marketing fluff. They’re direct appeals to ancient survival machinery. They whisper, “Act now, or lose out forever,” and our brains respond as if the stakes are life and death.

But it’s not mammoth meat we’re chasing anymore—it’s AirPods. While the object has changed, the urgency hasn’t.

So, when we say scarcity sells, we mean it literally taps into the oldest parts of our psychology—the parts that evolved in caves, not high-rise apartments.

The Neuroscience of Urgency

Scarcity doesn’t just nudge us into action—it hijacks the brain like it’s got backstage passes to our neural circuits. When we sense that something is about to disappear, our brains don’t calmly weigh the pros and cons. They ring the alarm bells. The moment scarcity is detected—whether it’s “last chance to buy!” or “limited spaces available”—several key brain regions light up like a Black Friday sale. First on the scene is the amygdala, our emotional processing centre. It scans for threats and opportunities and, crucially, it doesn’t wait for full context. If something seems scarce, it assumes danger. Or at the very least, that we should act—fast.

At the same time, dopaminergic pathways are activated. Dopamine, often mistaken as the “pleasure chemical,” is actually more about anticipation. It fuels motivation. When scarcity is perceived, dopamine spikes—not because we’re enjoying something, but because we’re chasing it. That chase feels urgent. It feels important. It feels like something that must be done now.

This neurochemical cocktail sharpens focus and heightens arousal—like caffeine for your impulsivity. Logic, meanwhile, gets politely shown the door. The prefrontal cortex, responsible for reasoning and long-term planning, doesn’t shut down completely, but it does take a back seat. After all, who needs rational thought when there are only 3 concert tickets left?

And the result? You add-to-cart faster. You skip the reviews. You make decisions your calmer self might’ve second-guessed—and sometimes deeply regrets. Urgency doesn’t just drive action; it compresses time. It creates a false binary: buy now or miss out forever. And our brains, under pressure, aren’t great at calling that bluff.

This isn’t hypothetical. Studies using fMRI scans show that scarcity-related messages activate the same neural circuits as physical danger. That “low in stock” notice? Your brain might process it in the same neighbourhood as it would a bear sighting. So while the modern world may be safer, your brain is still operating on prehistoric wiring—one that’s vulnerable to manufactured urgency. And that’s the magic of scarcity. It doesn’t just influence what we do. It changes how we think while we’re doing it.

Scarcity as a Marketing Strategy

Marketers didn’t invent scarcity—but they definitely industrialised it. Somewhere along the assembly line of modern capitalism, someone realised that you don’t need a better product. You just need to make people think it’s about to vanish.

Enter: the scarcity playbook.

Phrases like “Only 3 left in stock”, “Offer ends at midnight”, or “Be the first 100 to sign up” aren’t about informing consumers—they’re about activating them. These aren’t statements of fact; they’re psychological trigger points. They create a competitive atmosphere, even when there’s nothing to compete over. Suddenly, shopping feels like a race—and no one wants to come last. 

The genius of this tactic lies in its simplicity. Scarcity doesn’t need bells and whistles. It needs a ticking clock. The illusion of vanishing opportunity injects adrenaline into decision-making and silences the part of the brain that might ask, “Do I even need this?” And the data backs it up. Studies in behavioural economics show that even subtle scarcity cues—like showing how many people are viewing the same hotel room online—can significantly increase conversions. Not because the product got better, but because it felt like a contest. Scarcity makes consumers behave less like shoppers and more like contestants on a game show called “Buy It Before Someone Else Does.”

It’s also scalable. Scarcity works for physical products, digital services, memberships, experiences—you name it. It can be real or completely fabricated (more on that in a minute). Either way, it’s frictionless. It slides under the radar of reason and lands directly in the emotional centre of decision-making.

What makes it especially effective is how it piggybacks on our aversion to regret. The idea that we might miss out on something potentially great is more motivating than the idea of gaining something average. So we leap. And by the time we ask, “Was this actually worth it?”—the marketing team has already moved on to the next countdown clock.

Scarcity doesn’t win because it tells a better story. It wins because it makes you afraid to miss the ending.

The Principle of Reactance

Scarcity doesn’t just trigger urgency—it taps into something deeper and more defiant: our need for freedom.

Enter reactance. It’s not a word you hear often outside psychology circles, but you’ve definitely felt it. It’s that rebellious itch you get when someone tells you “you can’t.” It’s why you’re suddenly interested in a book the moment it gets banned, or why you become emotionally attached to a discontinued snack you never cared about until it vanished. Reactance is our psychological protest against lost autonomy.

When something becomes less available—or when we’re told we might miss out—our brain interprets that as a threat to our freedom to choose. And we don’t like being told what we can’t have. So, paradoxically, we want it more. Marketers know this and lean in—hard.

When you see phrases like “while supplies last,” “exclusive offer,” or “access restricted,” they’re not just highlighting scarcity—they’re deliberately poking your sense of agency. It’s less “here’s a product you might enjoy” and more “you better act fast before someone takes this away from you.” It’s no longer about the object—it’s about the principle. You’re not buying the item because you love it. You’re buying it because how dare they tell you you can’t.

Reactance is also why limited-time offers work so well. Time limits make us feel boxed in, like someone else is controlling the decision window. And as soon as we feel boxed in, we start scrambling—not to evaluate the offer, but to reclaim our power. It’s not logic—it’s resistance shopping.

Ironically, this makes scarcity feel like rebellion. We think we’re asserting independence by snapping up that exclusive deal, when in reality, we’ve just been expertly nudged into making a rushed purchase. We’re not reclaiming freedom—we’re reacting to the illusion of lost choice.

It’s the consumer equivalent of “you’re not the boss of me.” And yet somehow, the marketing team still ends up calling the shots. 

Artificial Scarcity: Manufactured Urgency

Not all scarcity is real. In fact, some of the scarcest things in the consumer world—“limited releases,” “flash sales,” “one-time offers”—are as staged as a reality TV reunion.

This is artificial scarcity: the illusion of rarity, engineered to trigger urgency. It’s a strategy, not a supply issue. When a website flashes a countdown timer—only to reset it the moment you reload the page—that’s not a genuine deadline. That’s theatre.

Companies use this trick to hijack our instincts. They don’t need to actually run out of stock; they just need us to think they might. The panic doesn’t come from a lack of supply—it comes from a lack of time to think. And in that rushed moment, the brain does what it was designed to do in the face of threat: act now, rationalise later.

The genius of manufactured urgency lies in its subtlety. We know the product will probably still be there tomorrow. But what if it’s not? What if we miss the deal, the access, the edge? That sliver of doubt is enough to push us over the edge. And it’s not just online shopping. Think of the annual “limited-edition” flavours that somehow return every year. Or “exclusive” invites that flood your inbox. Or concert pre-sales that “sell out” before the actual public release. It’s not about inventory—it’s about intensity.

Scarcity realigns our focus. It narrows our attention. It turns a passive browser into an active buyer. And all of that is engineered—not by necessity, but by design. Which means half the time, you’re not even reacting to a product. You’re reacting to a clock someone set just to watch you run. 

Social Proof Meets Scarcity

Scarcity is powerful on its own, but pair it with social proof, and you’ve got marketing rocket fuel. Alone, “Only 3 left in stock” is compelling, but add, “29 people have this in their cart,” and suddenly you’re not just fighting the clock—you’re fighting the crowd. Now it’s not just about missing out. It’s about losing to someone else, and humans really, really hate losing.

This combo works because it activates two different fears: the fear of scarcity, and the fear of social exclusion. Not only might you miss out on the item—you might also miss out on the status, relevance, or community that comes with it. It’s the digital equivalent of watching a line form outside a nightclub and suddenly deciding you have to get in—even if you weren’t planning on going out.

Social proof gives scarcity context. It says, “This isn’t just rare—it’s desirable.” And we are social creatures. We trust crowds. If everyone’s buying, it must be worth buying, right? This is the psychology behind reviews, waiting lists, and follower counts. A pair of shoes with 12 five-star reviews feels different from the same pair with 12 people eyeing it in real time. Even if those 12 people are probably bots. Additionally, the effect is magnified by platforms that blend shopping and community. Live shopping events, influencer drops, and “trending now” sections all weaponise social validation. You’re not just buying into a product—you’re buying into a moment, a movement, and a micro-community that says, “You get it.”

But here’s the kicker: social proof is easy to fake. Algorithms can inflate popularity. Reviews can be bought. “People also bought…” might be based on data—but whose data? The line between what’s genuinely loved and what’s engineered to look loved gets blurrier by the day.

So when scarcity and social proof dance together, it’s not just persuasion—it’s performance. And the audience? That’s you.

Scarcity’s Role in Inequality

Not all scarcity is invented for marketing. In fact, some forms of scarcity are brutally real—and they don’t just nudge you into buying a limited-edition hoodie. They shape lives. Jobs are scarce. Affordable housing is scarce. Clean water, quality education, reliable healthcare—all scarce. Not because they’re inherently rare, but because access to them has been unevenly distributed. And unlike a flash sale, this kind of scarcity doesn’t come with free shipping or a returns policy. It comes with stress, exhaustion, and often, generational disadvantage. This is where scarcity shifts from sales tactic to structural issue. It’s not about countdown timers—it’s about inequality. When essential resources are scarce, they don’t just impact physical wellbeing—they hijack the mind.

In Chapter 6, we were introduced to Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir’s groundbreaking research on poverty: the experience of scarcity—real, chronic scarcity—actually reduces mental bandwidth. When your mind is preoccupied with how to pay rent, put food on the table, or make it to payday, there’s less cognitive room for long-term planning, reflection, or problem-solving. Not because you’re less capable, but because your brain is overloaded by survival-mode thinking.

Imagine running ten apps at once on an old phone. It doesn’t mean the phone is broken—it means the system is overwhelmed. That’s what poverty does to cognition. This matters. It matters when we judge people for “bad financial decisions,” when we design policies based on perfect rational actors, or when we peddle advice like “just save more” to someone whose reality is shaped by chronic scarcity. It also matters in education, employment, and health outcomes. When resources are scarce, every choice becomes harder, and every mistake becomes more costly.

So yes—scarcity sells. But it also silences. It narrows vision. It tightens margins. And when scarcity is baked into the system, it stops being a feature of marketing and becomes a fault line in society.

Scarcity in Dating and Social Dynamics

Scarcity doesn’t just live on the shelves of Supreme or inside the Amazon cart countdown. It lives in our relationships, our swipes, our seen-and-ignored messages. Because scarcity, it turns out, is heartbreakingly good at flirting.

In dating, the perception of being “hard to get” often amplifies attractiveness. If someone seems too available, we instinctively assign them lower value. But if they’re elusive—if they take hours to reply, seem in demand, or project mystery—we’re hooked. It’s not necessarily their charm; it’s their apparent scarcity.

This phenomenon isn’t new. In evolutionary terms, desirable mates were often rare and fiercely competed for. Our ancestors didn’t swipe right, but they did scan the savannah for the best possible partner—someone whose genes were just rare enough to be impressive, but not so rare they’d ghost the tribe.

Modern dating platforms have simply digitised and weaponised that instinct. Features like:

• “Limited likes today”

• “This person already liked you—upgrade to find out who”

• “You matched—don’t miss your chance!”

…simulate scarcity at scale. The illusion is clear: matches are fleeting, time is running out, and connection is rare. Better act now.

But here’s the thing—this kind of scarcity doesn’t encourage intimacy. It encourages pursuit. We’re not just chasing people; we’re chasing validation, status, and the reassurance that we’re wanted in a sea of digital ambiguity. Though, it comes at a cost. When dating becomes an economic equation—supply, demand, timing, desirability—human connection risks becoming transactional. Vulnerability gets replaced by strategy. Affection gets rationed. And ghosting becomes a currency of perceived value.

Scarcity makes things feel special. But sometimes, it just makes them exhausting.

Scarcity in Luxury and Status Brands

Luxury doesn’t just whisper quality—it screams exclusivity. And nothing fuels exclusivity like scarcity.

Luxury brands have mastered the art of controlled access. A Hermès Birkin isn’t just expensive—it’s elusive. You can’t just walk into a store and buy one, even if you can afford it. You must prove yourself. There’s a waitlist, a relationship to build, a kind of unspoken courtship between you and the brand. By the time you’re “offered” the chance to purchase, you’re not buying a bag—you’re buying the right to buy a bag.

Scarcity here isn’t a by-product of production constraints. It’s the product. Limiting supply isn’t inefficiency—it’s the entire strategy. And it works. When something becomes hard to get, we assume it must be worth getting. Not because it solves a problem, but because it signals status. A Rolex doesn’t tell time better than a Casio, but it does tell a better story.

In fact, many luxury houses destroy unsold inventory rather than discount it. To lower the price would be to dilute the illusion. It would suggest that the product’s value is tied to its function or market demand—when really, it’s tied to how few people can have it.

Even in the age of mass production, brands maintain the theatre of scarcity through selective releases, “VIP-only” drops, and artificial limitations. A hoodie that costs $20 to make becomes a $600 artefact when it’s stamped with the right logo and sold in the right quantity.

Scarcity transforms everyday items into emblems. It elevates ownership into identity. And it doesn’t matter whether the item is rare—only that it feels rare to you.

That feeling? That’s the real product. And people will pay dearly for it.

The Scarcity-Value Fallacy

Scarcity tricks the brain into assigning value where there may be none. Just because something is rare doesn’t mean it’s worth having—but try telling that to the person bidding on a discontinued Barbie at 2 a.m.

This is the scarcity-value fallacy: the flawed logic that equates rarity with importance. We assume that if something is hard to get, it must be special. And marketers—bless their cunning hearts—know exactly how to fan that illusion.

Diamonds, for instance, were once marketed as rare despite being geologically abundant. A carefully controlled supply chain, combined with decades of romantic advertising, convinced generations that love could be measured by carats. Never mind the ethics. Never mind the cost. Rarity equals value—or so we’re told. It’s the same logic that fuels bidding wars over celebrity-owned chewing gum, or bananas duct-taped to a canvas. These things aren’t inherently useful or beautiful or even meaningful. But they’re exclusive. And in a culture that equates exclusivity with superiority, that’s enough.

Scarcity can also inflate emotional value. A concert ticket becomes priceless if it’s the “last tour ever.” A discontinued lipstick shade becomes a cult obsession. The fewer there are, the more we convince ourselves we need one. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: sometimes we’re not chasing value—we’re chasing validation. We want to be the person who got the thing others didn’t. We want to feel chosen. Scarcity doesn’t always reveal value. Sometimes it just reveals how easily we mistake access for worth.

Scarcity and the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO)

FOMO is the emotional twin of scarcity—cut from the same anxious cloth. Where scarcity says, “Act fast or lose it,” FOMO whispers, “Everyone else already did.”

It’s not just about what you want. It’s about what others already have. Or worse—what they might be experiencing without you. A party, a trend, a crypto boom, a new app “everyone is raving about.” You weren’t thinking about it. And then suddenly, you’re refreshing your feed at 1 a.m., wondering if you’re being left behind.

This isn’t some modern-day neurosis born out of too much scrolling—it’s evolutionary. In social species like ours, exclusion can feel like a threat. Thousands of years ago, being left out could mean losing protection, resources, or even your life. Today, it just means you didn’t go to brunch with the right people—but your brain hasn’t quite evolved to tell the difference.

FOMO is what drives:

• Impulse travel bookings for fear of missing the “last seat”

• The urge to buy into a viral product before it sells out

• Attending events we’re not interested in just because everyone else is going

• Investing in trends we barely understand (hello, meme stocks)

Scarcity fuels the fear. FOMO accelerates the cycle. And the worst part? It feeds itself. You see others panic-buying, and you panic. They see you panic, and they join in. It’s not just about the thing anymore—it’s about the status, the social proof, the reassurance that you’re not the only one chasing. 

This loop is emotion-led, not logic-led. It doesn’t care if you need the thing, like the thing, or even understand the thing. It just wants to make sure you’re in.

And for marketers, FOMO isn’t a bug. It’s the entire system update.

Psychological Immunity: How to Resist Scarcity Traps

Scarcity may hijack the brain, but it doesn’t have to own the whole operating system. Like any good con, it works best when you don’t know you’re being played. Once you spot the trick, the spell starts to break. That’s where psychological immunity comes in—not full protection, but enough resistance to pause before plunging headfirst into the “Last chance! Ends tonight!” abyss.

Here are a few antidotes for the next time you’re tempted by artificial urgency or a ticking timer:

1. Pause Before Purchase

Give it 24 hours. Just one day. You’d be amazed at how quickly “must-have” morphs into “what was I thinking?” Urgency hates time. Time brings clarity. Delay is the enemy of impulse—and it’s your best friend.

2. Reality Check

Ask yourself, “Do I even want this—or do I just not want to miss out?” Half the time, the answer is embarrassing. You weren’t thinking about this item five minutes ago. You only care because it might disappear. That’s not desire. That’s panic dressed up in desire’s clothes.

3. Inventory the Lie

Name the tactic out loud: “This is artificial urgency.” Just saying it puts your rational brain back in charge. If the countdown resets every time you reload the page, it’s not a countdown. It’s a manipulation.

4. Focus on Function, Not FOMO

Would you still want the item if nobody else had it? If it wasn’t trending? If it didn’t come with a badge of honour or a limited-edition sticker? If the answer’s no, then congratulations—you just dodged a marketing bullet.

5. Project into the Future

Ask, “Will this still matter in a month? A year?” Most scarcity-driven purchases don’t age well. Trends fade. The rush wears off. And you’re left with a thing that solved a feeling, not a need.

These tools won’t erase the emotion. But they give you a beat to think before buying. And that beat—the pause, the breath, the wait-a-minute moment—is exactly what scarcity tactics try to erase.

Scarcity thrives on urgency. Psychological immunity thrives on awareness. One is fuelled by fear; the other by intention. And while you can’t rewire your instincts, you can choose not to hand them your credit card.

Ethical Questions: When Scarcity Becomes Exploitation

Scarcity isn’t inherently unethical. It’s a tool—and like any tool, it depends on how it’s used. A scalpel in a surgeon’s hand can save a life. That same blade in the wrong hands? Not so noble. The same goes for scarcity. It becomes exploitative when it stops being informative and starts being manipulative—when it’s designed not to guide the consumer, but to pressure them. And the line between persuasion and coercion? It’s thinner than most brands would like you to believe.

Let’s talk specifics:

• Manufactured panic: Think toys released in ultra-limited quantities right before the holidays, when parents will do anything—literally queue at 3 a.m. in freezing weather—to avoid disappointing their child. That’s not clever marketing. That’s emotional blackmail disguised as exclusivity.

• Countdown deception: Those fake timers on websites that restart every time you reload the page? That’s not urgency. That’s lying with HTML.

• Subscription traps: “Only one spot left!”—until you return next week and miraculously, there’s still just “one spot left.” Either everyone’s terrible at commitment, or you’re being played.

• Ticket bots and resale rackets: Bots that scoop up concert tickets in seconds only to resell them at five times the price don’t just create artificial scarcity—they gatekeep joy. And the companies allowing it? Complicit.

• Targeting vulnerability: When scarcity tactics are aimed at kids, the elderly, or those already under financial strain, it crosses a line. Using emotional leverage against those least equipped to resist isn’t just shady—it’s predatory.

Here’s where things get uncomfortable: we often blame the buyer for “falling for it,” when really, it’s the system that’s rigged. When urgency is engineered, consent is compromised. That’s not a free market—it’s a fixed game.

Ethical scarcity does exist. Sometimes stock genuinely is low. Sometimes demand really does outpace supply. But the difference lies in transparency. Ethical marketing informs. It gives consumers real choices. It respects intelligence rather than exploiting instinct.

Manipulative scarcity, on the other hand, burns trust for short-term gain. And what’s worse—it teaches consumers to second-guess everything. Cynicism spreads. Loyalty evaporates. And the cost? Long-term credibility, customer relationships, and—ironically—profits.

So here’s the question every business should ask before pulling the scarcity lever: Are we guiding behaviour—or cornering it? Because if you have to trick people into buying, maybe the real scarcity isn’t your product. Maybe it’s your integrity.

Closing Reflections: Scarcity Is a Lens, Not a Truth

Scarcity isn’t good or bad. It’s not fact or fiction. It’s a frame—a lens through which we interpret urgency, value, and risk. Sometimes, that lens helps us to make smart decisions. Other times, it distorts our judgment and fuels panic over things we didn’t even want five minutes ago.

The trick isn’t to remove the lens (we can’t—it’s wired in). The trick is to recognise it. To ask, “Is this truly rare—or just dressed up to look that way?” That pause—that beat of self-awareness—is the gap where impulse ends and clarity begins. 

Once you name the illusion, you get your power back. And in a world built on selling speed, that pause? It’s revolutionary.

What is an economy for? It’s a question that gets buried under equations, forecasts, and stock tickers. We talk about GDP growth, labour productivity, inflation targets—as if the purpose of an economic system is to produce charts. But at its core, the economy is meant to serve people. And yet, somewhere along the way, people became the means rather than the end.

This chapter is about what happens when we flip that equation. When we ask: What would an economy look like if it were designed not for efficiency, but for wellbeing? What happens when we prioritise health over hustle, equity over endless accumulation, and humanity over hyper-optimization?

In other words, what is the true value of being human?

Efficiency vs Humanity: The Core Tension

Modern capitalism is remarkable in its ability to produce. It creates abundance. It scales innovation. It connects global markets. It rewards problem-solvers and risk-takers. In just a few generations, it has lifted billions out of extreme poverty and transformed how we work, live, travel, and communicate. That’s not a small achievement.

However, production is not the same as progress. Beneath the glossy metrics of GDP and quarterly earnings lies a more uncomfortable reality: an economic system that prizes efficiency above all else—even when it comes at the expense of people. Efficiency is seductive because it’s measurable. It tells neat stories in charts and spreadsheets. More output per worker. Faster delivery. Leaner supply chains. 

What those numbers often obscure is the human cost behind them. Efficiency doesn’t ask if the worker is burned out from gig shifts or juggling two jobs. It doesn’t ask if the consumer is drowning in debt, or addicted to dopamine hits from next-day delivery. It doesn’t ask if the communities left behind by automation or offshoring have the means to recover. And most of the time, neither do we.

The systems we’ve built are designed to reward productivity, not wellbeing. We are told to hustle harder, optimise every hour, monetise every passion, and stay relentlessly “on”—even as loneliness, burnout, and mental health issues climb. The economy is growing. But are we? This is the quiet dissonance of modern life: being surrounded by abundance, but feeling perpetually behind. Having more tools than ever, but less time. More options, but more anxiety. It’s what the late sociologist Zygmunt Bauman called “liquid modernity”—a world that moves faster than we can process, where nothing feels solid, grounded, or safe.

The irony is that efficiency was supposed to liberate us. Machines would handle the drudgery. Technology would free up leisure time. Wealth would open doors to possibility. Instead, we’ve shifted the goalposts. Each new wave of innovation has raised the bar, not lowered the pressure. Instead of sharing the benefits of efficiency—through reduced hours, better conditions, or social support—we’ve absorbed them into a never-ending race for more. More output. More growth. More “hustle.” Always more. 

But here’s the truth: you can’t optimise your way into contentment. No algorithm can tell you what gives life meaning. No efficiency metric can replace the warmth of connection, the safety of belonging, or the dignity of rest. And yet, these human experiences are often treated as inefficiencies—things to be minimised, outsourced, or monetised.

The tension, then, is not between capitalism and morality—it’s between a model that prioritises speed, scale, and output, and a reality where human needs don’t always fit into those boxes.

To be clear: efficiency has its place. It builds bridges, powers hospitals, distributes food, and scales medicine. But when efficiency becomes the goal, rather than a means, it begins to erode the very things that make us human.

And so the challenge isn’t to throw out efficiency. It’s to reframe it. To ask: Efficient for whom? For what? At what cost? A system that maximises productivity but ignores exhaustion, inequality, and disconnection isn’t efficient—it’s extractive. It pulls from the present to feed a future that never quite arrives.

In the end, the real measure of a successful economy isn’t just what it produces. It’s how it treats the people who live inside it.

Redesigning for Wellbeing

So what would it mean to design economic systems around human flourishing?

It starts by changing what we measure—and what we value.

For decades, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has served as the global yardstick for success. The higher the GDP, the healthier the economy—so the story goes. But GDP only measures output. It doesn’t tell us whether people are happy. Or whether that growth is sustainable. Or whether it’s shared. It doesn’t ask whether people feel safe, connected, purposeful, or rested. It just asks: how much did we produce?

That’s why some governments and economists are beginning to rethink the foundations. Countries like New Zealand, Bhutan, Scotland, and Iceland are pioneering what’s often called the wellbeing economy—a model that places human and ecological well being at the centre of policy.

In New Zealand, the government introduced the Wellbeing Budget, which allocates funds based not solely on economic growth, but on improving measurable wellbeing outcomes—such as mental health, child welfare, income equity, and climate resilience. In Bhutan, the idea of Gross National Happiness has long served as an alternative framework, embedding values like sustainability, cultural preservation, and holistic health into national decision-making.

These approaches aren’t perfect. But they represent something essential: a shift away from economic abstraction, and toward the realities of people’s lives. When you measure different things, you incentivise different behaviours. Instead of chasing growth for its own sake, wellbeing-centred systems begin asking different questions:

• Are people physically and mentally healthy?

• Do they have secure housing and meaningful work?

• Are children safe, nourished, and educated?

• Do workers have time and autonomy?

• Are communities resilient in the face of crisis?

• Is the planet livable for the next generation?

This isn’t utopian. It’s directional. And it opens the door to policy innovations rooted in empathy, psychology, and lived experience.

One such innovation is Universal Basic Income (UBI)—a concept that has moved from the fringes to mainstream economic debate. The idea is elegantly simple: provide every citizen with a regular, unconditional payment that covers basic living needs. Not as a handout. Not as welfare. But as a right. UBI challenges the long-standing idea that human worth is tied to productivity. It suggests that people deserve financial stability simply because they exist.

In 2017, Finland piloted a guaranteed income scheme, giving 2,000 unemployed people monthly payments of €560—no strings attached. While the economic results were mixed in traditional terms, the emotional and psychological impacts were powerful. Participants reported lower stress, improved wellbeing, greater trust in institutions, and increased optimism for the future. Some even found new work or started businesses, freed from the constraints of job insecurity.

Critics worry that UBI will disincentive work. But studies consistently show that people don’t stop working—they work differently. They take on education, passion projects, caregiving roles, or start-ups that wouldn’t have been financially feasible otherwise.

UBI doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing proposition. It can be targeted, seasonal, scaled, or stacked with existing support systems. The key insight is this: giving people a baseline of security improves not just their finances—but their mental clarity, decision-making, and sense of agency.

Such support can be especially critical for low-income families.  It gives families breathing room—the space to plan, save, and respond to emergencies without constant panic. It provides a hands-on opportunity to develop financial literacy, without the condescension often found in traditional financial literacy classes. Families learn how to manage longer-term expenses, make strategic decisions, and move toward greater independence.

It’s a subtle shift in mechanics—but a profound one in philosophy. It treats people not as passive recipients, but as capable agents of their own futures. It designs with their psychology, not against it.

These experiments—UBI, unconditional cash grants, wellbeing budgeting—are all part of a larger, emerging vision: a human-centred economy. One that recognises that policies aren’t abstract theories, but systems that shape real lives. One that understands money not as the end goal, but as a means toward dignity, security, and freedom. When you stop asking, “How do we grow the economy?” and start asking, “How do we grow people?”—the answers change.

And the outcomes do too.

Degrowth: Challenging the Gospel of Expansion

Let’s start with a confession: degrowth has a terrible PR problem.

It sounds like an economic illness. Like something your GDP should be hospitalised for. And yet, behind the unfortunate branding lies one of the most provocative—and necessary—ideas of our time. At its heart, degrowth is not about collapse or chaos. It’s not calling for a return to candles and carrier pigeons. It’s about questioning a fundamental assumption that has shaped every major economy for the last hundred years: that more is always better.

More production.
More consumption.
More growth.
Forever. Amen.

But here’s the inconvenient truth: infinite growth on a finite planet is, well… mathematically awkward. You can only squeeze so much productivity out of people, land, and resources before something starts to fray—be it mental health, biodiversity, or your power grid. 

Degrowth says: what if we stopped sprinting on the economic treadmill? What if success wasn’t measured by how fast we can run—but by how well we live? It’s not anti-progress. It’s just asking: progress toward what, exactly?

Rather than chasing GDP like it’s the only number that matters, degrowth proposes we optimise for enough. Enough for people to live well. Enough for communities to thrive. Enough for the planet to recover.

That might look like:

• Shorter workweeks: because work spreads to take up time available.

• Localised economies: where goods don’t need a passport and four layovers to reach you.

• Circular production: where waste becomes input, not landfill.

• Public infrastructure: that’s shared, reliable, and doesn’t cost half your rent to access.

• Valuing leisure and care work: because rest and relationships are not luxuries—they’re vital infrastructure for a meaningful life.

It’s a radical reimagining of economic purpose. Not “how can we grow more?” but “how can we flourish with less?”

Degrowth isn’t about halting human development. It’s about steering it. Away from extractive models that chew through people and ecosystems, and toward models that prioritise sustainability, wellbeing, and community. Critics often imagine a degrowth world as one of austerity and stagnation. But the reality is more nuanced—and, in many ways, more joyful. A slower pace. Less pressure to perform. More time for art, parenting, walking, thinking, doing nothing in particular. Basically, the things we all claim to want more of… right after we check our emails. And it’s not just fringe academics saying this.

Some economists, climate scientists, and even business leaders are beginning to admit: endless growth might be good for stock markets, but it’s doing strange things to our society. The rising rates of burnout, ecological collapse, and political instability aren’t bugs in the system. They’re signs that the system might be overheating. Degrowth is an uncomfortable idea because it asks those of us in wealthy nations to reconsider our expectations. It invites us to trade ever more for better enough.

Fewer flights, but cleaner air.
Fewer possessions, but stronger connections.
Fewer hours worked, but more life lived.

It’s not about self-flagellation. It’s about self-preservation. When growth becomes an idol, everything else becomes a sacrifice: our time, our health, our planet, our future. Degrowth is not the final answer—but it is a powerful question.

What if the good life isn’t something we chase endlessly at full speed, but something we slow down to build, together?

The Future of Behavioural Policy

Behavioural economics has already tiptoed its way into public policy—sometimes so subtly you barely notice it’s there. That automatic enrollment in organ donation? Behavioural policy. The text message from your doctor’s office reminding you to show up (and guilt-tripping you with a “we’ve saved your spot”)? Behavioural policy. The fly etched into urinals to improve aim? Behavioural policy with questionable artistic flair.

However, the future holds more than just clever nudges. The next wave of behavioural policy won’t simply adjust your choices at the margins. It has the potential to reshape entire systems, building environments that make the healthy, helpful, and humane choice the natural one—not the hard one.

Imagine cities designed to invite walking—not just through wider pavements, but through delight. Park benches that spark conversation. Cafes that spill into bike lanes (safely). Sidewalk poetry. Urban planning that fosters serendipity, not just zoning efficiency. All of this is behavioural design at scale: tuning environments to fit the full spectrum of human behaviour, not just our need to get from A to B.

Imagine schools that reward curiosity, not just compliance. Where the furniture isn’t bolted to the floor and neither are the lesson plans. Where students are taught to understand their own cognitive biases—to know that sometimes their brains will trick them into procrastinating or catastrophising or comparing—but that those tendencies can be navigated. A curriculum in both maths and metacognition.

Imagine social support systems that feel like help, not punishment. Where applying for aid isn’t a Kafkaesque maze of paperwork, password resets, and music—but a dignified, intuitive process that says: “We trust you. Let’s get through this together.” Behavioural insights can smooth the friction, reduce stigma, and make support feel empowering instead of exhausting.

What about work? The future of behavioural policy in the workplace isn’t just free snacks and standing desks. It’s flexibility that actually flexes. It’s transparency without surveillance. It’s knowing that if you give people autonomy and meaning, they usually don’t need a motivational poster to do their jobs well. 

On a broader scale, behavioural policy can target some of society’s thorniest problems:

• Reducing inequality, not just through redistribution but through smarter default settings: like asset-building programmes that automatically create savings accounts for newborns.

• Improving public health, through subtle changes to food placements in shops, or better signage that turns stairs into a game.

• Fostering inclusion, by redesigning hiring processes to counteract bias—like anonymised CVs or structured interviews.

• Tackling climate change, not only with big carbon taxes but also small nudges—default green energy plans, real-time energy feedback, or a gentle reminder that yes, your fridge door is still open.

But—and this is important—all of this requires ethics. Behavioural policy isn’t just smart design. It’s power.

When you shape choice architecture, you shape decisions. And when you shape decisions, you shape lives. That’s a responsibility, not just a clever use of cognitive science. It means transparency, accountability, and guardrails. And perhaps most importantly: humility. Humility to admit that no policy—no matter how well-designed—can fix a system built on inequality. Nudges can’t replace justice. But they can make justice easier to deliver, more intuitive, more human, and less bureaucratic.

The future of behavioural policy isn’t about manipulating people into being better. It’s about designing systems that assume people already are—but that they’re busy, distracted, overwhelmed, and human. And maybe, just maybe, if we build systems that work for that version of us—not the hyper-rational robot economists once imagined—we’ll finally get an economy that feels like it was built for people. Because really, isn’t that the point?

(And if not, could someone please explain why I still get cashback offers for lawn mowers? I live in an apartment.)

 The Price of Being Human

We began this book by asking why we make the decisions we do. Why we buy things we don’t need, chase status, follow crowds, fear missing out, and undervalue silence. Why we pile our calendars and empty our hearts, or confuse what something costs with what something’s worth.

Through every chapter, we’ve traced the shape of our decisions—the hidden hands, the invisible nudges, the biases and beliefs stitched deep into the fabric of our minds. We’ve looked under the hood of the economy and found not just numbers, but narratives. Not just transactions, but traumas. Not just rational agents—but human beings, flawed and brilliant and tender.

We’ve explored scarcity and regret, hope and fear. We’ve dived into happiness equations and the science of saving. We’ve walked through the psychological architecture of capitalism, seen how marketing hijacks our attention, how habits are formed and broken, and how institutions—when designed well—can lift or crush a soul.

And now, we land here. Not with a formula—but with a feeling. Not with an answer—but a possibility.

The truth is, being human is expensive. Not just in dollars or time—but in vulnerability, in effort, in love. In showing up again and again, even when the world feels indifferent or unfair. Being human means having soft skin in a sharp world. It means wanting things deeply. It means choosing meaning over efficiency, joy over convenience, connection over perfection.

And yes—it means making bad decisions sometimes. But it also means having the power to make better ones, to forgive ourselves, to learn, to change. To design systems that honour who we are, not just who we could be on our best day with eight hours of sleep and no Wi-Fi distractions.

What we measure, we shape. What we value, we protect. So let us measure more than money. Let us value more than output. Let us build economies where people thrive—not just produce. Where the question isn’t "How much is it worth?" but "Who is it for?" 

The cost of fully being human is high. But the return? The return is imagination, compassion, creativity, resilience. Everything the markets can’t quite price, but that makes life worth living. So go forward not just with knowledge—but with kindness, with clarity, with the quiet conviction that better is possible.

Because in the end, this book was never really about money. 

It’s about the price of being human.

I was diagnosed with ADHD as a preteen, but in many ways, I already knew I was different. While most people moved through the world in straight lines, I zigzagged—thinking too much, feeling too deeply, questioning everything. What started as frustration eventually became fascination: Why do we punish ourselves for being human?

That was the beginning of a journey that led me into economics, psychology, and beyond. While I am currently studying these subjects in High School, my curiosity has never stayed neatly inside the classroom. I’ve read voraciously,  taken certified college-level courses online and written several articles on LinkedIn, where I share personal reflections on living with ADHD, the illusion of productivity, and the quiet beauty of self-awareness.

I’ve always been more comfortable alone. While other kids built social circles, I built questions, ideas, songs, and journals. I started writing when I was eleven. Not because someone told me to, but because it was how I survived the noise. I wrote lyrics when I couldn’t sleep, poetry when I couldn’t focus, and observations when I couldn’t understand the world around me. Writing became my way of making sense of both myself and the systems I lived in.

The Price of Being Human was born from that same place of solitude and quiet rebellion. It’s not been written from a podium, but from a seat at the edge of the room—the one I’ve occupied most of my life. It’s for anyone who has ever felt out of sync with the world, and who wants to understand it better anyway. I’m not done learning, but I’ve already lived enough to know that being different can be a strength, if you let it speak.