> This is only true in a narrow time context. You might believe that, but I don't think you know for sure, and I doubt you could prove it. I would not know wh

> This is only true in a narrow time context. You might believe that, but I don't think you know for sure, and I doubt you could prove it. I would not know what evidence of that claim would look like, or how to evaluate it. What I would like, though, is to unask the question completely. Maybe Olaf's menu item saved the company money in the long term, or maybe it cost the company money in the long term. Why is that so important? Why should that be the primary consideration (or only consideration) when we judge whether the project was worth doing? I would like a framework for evaluating these sorts of choices starting from a different place. Something that has been on my mind a long time is the idea of persuading local merchants to pay someone to pick up trash on their street. In the USA, the argument would look like this: "If you chip in a small amount of money to pay for street sweeping, that cost will be more than offset by the revenues stemming from increased foot traffic to your business.” This to me seems deeply insane. Everything is measured in dollars. To Americans, not living in a pile of filth has no intrinsic value apart from increased business returns. The argument “even if the cost isn't offset by increased revenues, at least you won't have to walk through piles of trash every day” does not carry any weight. I would like to live in a world where Olaf's menu item was sufficiently justified by its obvious benefit to Olaf, and the presumption was that it was worth doing on that basis alone.