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There's nothing wrong with efficiency and it provides a lot of benefits, as you say. But the efficiency argument is also used to knock out local businesses in f
by rgrieselhuber 6y ago
There's nothing wrong with efficiency and it provides a lot of benefits, as you say. But the efficiency argument is also used to knock out local businesses in favor of big box stores and so on. Everybody likes efficiency but we should be wary of using that as the only way to measure outcomes.
- m12k 6y agoI agree that a singular focus on efficiency without regard for unintended side effects or negative externalities is crazy too. "Sustainability" should be right up there with efficiency as a main tool - doing something efficiently in an unsustainable way (societally, economically or ecologically) will by definition not be efficient in the long term anyway - but our society is often organized in a way where those who benefit from short term profits are not the same as those who must bear the long term costs, so they don't balance out like ideally they should. So the effort should be put into aligning those incentives, make it unprofitable to chase short-term profits in ways that harm society - not to fight efficiency as a concept.