Nudge - Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness - Richard Thaler / Cass Sunstein

-



ISBN: 978-0-300-12223-7

Verdict: 👍👍


The book, quite rightly so, starts with a nice definition found on page 6 of what is to follow i.e. "A nudge, as we will use the term, is any aspect of the choice architecture that alters people’s behaviour in a predictable way without forbidding any options or significantly changing their economic incentives."


It is an enjoyable read and does not disappoint, it takes a basic concept from parts of human behavioural science and expands with some good examples of “Choice Architecture” to reinforce the concepts. My one criticism is that it is written with an American, as all case studies and examples are US centric and, in some cases, not relevant to a British reader, hence my 2 thumbs - but still a good read. 


Here are my favourite snippets from the book;

  •        “If an option is designated as a “default”, it will attract a large market share. Default options thus act as powerful nudges.”   p35
  •        “Small interventions and even coincidences, at a key stage, can produce large variations in outcomes” p63
  •        We agree. Incentive-based approaches are more efficient and more effective, and they also increase freedom of choice p166

All in all a nice read – I did gain some useful insights which made me think and thats always good thing ! 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Surrounded by Idiots – The Four Types of Human Behaviour (or, How to Understand those Who Cannot Be Understood) – Thomas Erikson

-
Image
ISBN:  978-1-78504-218-8 Verdict :👍👍 I enjoyed reading this book with its elaboration of the concepts that centre around the D ominance, I nducement, S ubmission and A nalytics ability (DISA) system for  human  communication which the Author breaks into 4 Color Types ( Red , Yellow , Blue & Green ) and says that " behaviour.Its like a  recipe  - we need to understand all the ingredients before we bake the cake " p13 The book discusses the various  behavioural  traits of individuals which the author centers around a 4 square color model, with each color representing a specific trait and some behavioral patterns associated with the colors - here are some snippets; The Quote "Only Dead Fish Go with the Flow" to describe Reds is classical where Reds are quick thinkers and one on long before everyone else. Yellows can be amusing, creative and elevate the mood regardless of who they are with         p64 " Greens are easy to hangout with..
Read more

WHAT IT TAKES - Stephen A. Schwarzman

-
Image
ISBN:  978-1-4711-8955-5 Verdict :   👍👍 You have to respect Scharwazman for what he has achieved in his long life, reinforcing to some extent the old saying that ‘ money makes money ’.This book is worth reading if you are working in finance and is quite a nice read. The book takes you down Stephen's memory lane and his life time of investing. It’s a short book and does lack clarity on the analysis, rules and logic applied on the business decisions. The book is about Stephen and the people he knows and boy does he ‘name drop’, throughout the book, to the extent it was getting boring reading another name popping up towards the end.  There are snippets on Blackstone’s Business Drivers/Methodology e.g.  Blackstone’s three tests  “It must have potential to be hugely rewarding for investors . It must add to Blackstone intellectual capital. And it must have a 10 in charge of it.”          p281  Below are some of my best bits from the book; There
Read more

The Technology Trap - Carl Benedikt Frey

-
Image
I SBN :  978-0691172798 Verdict :  👍👍   👍 This is one of those books that you have to read in full to fully appreciate, with its well-researched examples to support the concept behind the book.  The book highlights how current automation and Artificial intelligent(AI) systems trends can be used with an historical economic lens to project and address the economic, political and social affects that will arise and by using examples from the industrial revolution when technology displaced workers we can predict the effects of technologies like driverless cars. I like the structured approach to present the argument and learnt along the way with references to various paradox ( Moravec, Polanyi etc. .) which I had not come across before and had to look up  Here are some bits I highlighted in the book. however, there were quite a few so I couldn't  list them all ; The pre-industrial era did not suffer a shortage of imagination, it suffered from a shortage of realization . ” P73 Parliam
Read more