FT on gamification:”The ‘gamification’ of leisure and work has become widespread — and controversial…In video games, player motivations are divided into two categories: extrinsic — when players perform a task because of an incentive, such as new items or achievements; and intrinsic — when they do it simply because they want to, because it’s fun or fulfilling. Extrinsic reels us in, but intrinsic keeps us coming back and makes play meaningful. Gamified employment leans heavily into extrinsic motivations but ignores the intrinsic, and so its long-term effectiveness is dubious. Gaming would not be the art form it is today if it merely used points and objectives to sate players’ lizard brains.”
Tyler Cowen: “One of the most important yet neglected concepts is that absolutely everything can be expressed as a percentage of GDP…An appreciation of GDP helps keep things in perspective. Say there is some social or economic trend you dislike or think dangerous. One inclination would be to try to visualize that trend as a share of GDP.”
Donald Boudreaux on the inevitable failure of socialism: “Since the collapse of Soviet-style communism three decades ago, many people today who are skeptical of free markets concede the validity of Mises and Hayek’s demonstrations of the inevitable failure of full-on socialism – that is, the inevitability of failure of state ownership of all means of production and of comprehensive economic planning. Yet it’s not uncommon for such people nevertheless to propose that a great deal of resource allocation be carried out by government, and that government often otherwise interfere with the operation of the competitive price system…To insist that Mises and Hayek’s case against socialism applies only to full-on socialism, and is thus irrelevant in discussions of piecemeal economic intervention, is to miss the foundational lessons in these economists’ virtuoso explanation of the formation of, and role played, by market prices.”
