Scarcity cover

Scarcity

Rating 4.0
Word count
188K words
Chapters
79
ISBN
9787572243394

Tags

Summary

Scarcity, the behavioral economics book most highly praised by Daniel Kahneman, author of Thinking, Fast and Slow and Noise, reveals the complex causes of the scarcity mindset and proposes a remedy: using "slack" to hold scarcity in check. How can individuals escape financial distress, organizations regain time, and society help the poor? Only by planning and managing "bandwidth" sensibly can we move from scarcity to abundance.

Editor's review

This book pulls "working poor" and "no time" out of moral blame and places them within an analyzable psychological mechanism. The authors use the scarcity mindset to explain how attention is captured by immediate lack, how bandwidth is squeezed, and how people then make choices that look short-sighted but are in fact forced by circumstance. The strength is that it does not stop at personal finance or time management; it discusses scarcity at the level of organizations and social policy and proposes using "slack" to create a buffer. It reads with cases and a sense of experiments, but core concepts recur, so it suits reading alongside one's own bills, schedule, and decision habits when life's pace slows a little. It offers no quick-fix checklist, yet it explains clearly "why the busier you are, the more chaotic things get," and is friendly to readers wanting an entry point into behavioral economics.

Who it's for

A good fit for

  • Readers who often feel short of time or money and want to understand the psychological mechanism behind it
  • Non-specialist readers interested in behavioral economics and decision research
  • Managers and nonprofit practitioners who need to design buffer mechanisms
  • People who want to break out of the "working poor" cycle and look for actionable ideas

Not a good fit for

  • Those expecting immediate concrete financial plans or time-management templates
  • Readers who want only light stories and are unwilling to engage with conceptual reasoning
  • Those already familiar with frontier behavioral economics research and seeking entirely new theory

Reading tips

  1. Read the first two chapters first to grasp the two core terms "scarcity mindset" and "bandwidth," then revisit the cases in later chapters.
  2. When you reach a policy or organizational case, pause and write down one corresponding scene in your own life.
  3. After each section, record in one sentence "the last decision I made because of scarcity" for later review.

About the publisher

Zhejiang Education Publishing House China · Founded in 1983

Zhejiang Education Publishing House is a professional publisher focusing on educational publishing while also serving general readers and academic accumulation, with publications covering textbooks, educational readers, popular science, and academic works. Judging from the more than 1,000 titles in the database, the press places considerable emphasis on classics and traditional culture for general readers: modern literature includes Lao She's Camel Xiangzi, Lu Xun's Call to Arms and Wandering and Wild Grass, Xiao Hong's The Story of Hulan River, and Zhu Ziqing's Back View; classical poetry includes Three Hundred Tang Poems and selections from the "Good Chinese Poetry" series, such as the Chu Ci and Qing ci anthologies. Related authors include modern writers such as Lao She, Lu Xun, Xiao Hong, and Zhu Ziqing, as well as classical literature selectors and annotators such as Hengtang Tuishi, Jin Xingyao, Jin Kaicheng, and Qian Zhonglian. Common categories in the database also include social novels, classic works, prose and miscellaneous writings, popular science, and inspirational growth, reflecting a publishing orientation that balances educational service with the popularization of public culture.

Contents

  1. 版权信息
  2. 赞誉
  3. 埃尔德·沙菲尔访谈录
  4. 引言 资源稀缺不可怕,就怕有稀缺心态
  5. 第一部分 稀缺心态是一切稀缺的根源
  6. 第1章 专注的“得”与管窥的“失”
  7. 资源稀缺换来了专注与回报
  8. 专注红利
  9. 管窥
  10. 管窥所导致的忽视
  11. 管窥负担
  12. 第2章 带宽负担会降低人的智商
  13. “噪声”干扰了我们的思想
  14. 带宽负担1——认知能力
  15. 带宽负担2——执行控制力
  16. 收割前后的印度农民
  17. 其他形式的稀缺
  18. 稀缺,完全不同于压力和忧虑
  19. 稀缺让人变笨和更加冲动
  20. 第二部分 贫穷和忙碌是如何让“带宽”变窄的
  21. 第3章 装箱、余闲和权衡式思维
  22. 权衡式思维
  23. 余闲
  24. 穷蜜蜂与富泥蜂
  25. 余闲心态下的购买行为
  26. 没有余闲时犯错,后果很严重
  27. 稀缺的本质就是没有余闲
  28. 第4章 行为经济学告诉我们的道理
  29. 50美元,在穷人和富人眼中的价值不一
  30. 知觉的相对性
  31. 1美元的真正价值
  32. 识解
  33. 机会成本
  34. 第5章 借用与短视
  35. 管窥与借用
  36. 《家庭问答》的启示
  37. 忽视未来
  38. 无力规划
  39. 第6章 稀缺陷阱
  40. 停不下来的杂耍
  41. 逃离
  42. 问题的根源
  43. 余闲,应对突发事件的利器
  44. 贫穷始于富足
  45. 孤独就是社交稀缺
  46. 改变心态,逃离稀缺陷阱的唯一希望
  47. 第7章 穷人为什么穷
  48. “最后一公里”问题
  49. 无能可以导致贫穷,贫穷也可以导致无能
  50. 大脑自由才能成为合格家长
  51. 穷人缺钱又缺带宽
  52. 带宽负担导致智力下降
  53. 第三部分 如何从稀缺走向富足
  54. 第8章 如何让穷人摆脱贫穷
  55. 包容穷人的不当行为
  56. 让“警报”来得更早些
  57. 节省带宽的方法才是好方法
  58. 带宽可以构建
  59. 扶贫是个长期项目
  60. 第9章 如何解决组织中的时间稀缺
  61. 余闲的重要作用
  62. 余闲,不能太多也不能太少
  63. 4.45倍!火星探测器的教训
  64. 用余闲对抗救火陷阱
  65. 亨利·福特的时间管理智慧
  66. “红花”日本料理的启示
  67. “舍维斯”的餐桌管理经验
  68. 第10章 如何应对日常生活中的稀缺
  69. 把重要事情拉入“管子”视野中
  70. 让“疏忽”等同“默许”
  71. 保持警觉
  72. 找准关联行动时机
  73. 节约利用带宽
  74. 在带宽充裕时行动
  75. 为带宽不足的人提供便利
  76. 从富足起步
  77. 以余闲应对突发事件
  78. 结语 规划和管理好“带宽”,稀缺问题就会迎刃而解
  79. 译者后记

FAQ

Does this book mainly solve personal finance problems?
Not entirely. It focuses more on how the scarcity mindset affects attention and judgment; personal finance is only one entry point. The book also discusses organizational time management and social policy for the poor, with the emphasis on understanding mechanisms rather than giving financial steps.
Can I read it without a background in economics?
Yes. The authors explain concepts through cases and experiments, with few technical terms, centered on "bandwidth" and "slack." When encountering an unfamiliar experimental design, grasp the conclusion first; you need not work through the statistical details paragraph by paragraph.
Can the book's suggestions be followed directly?
What the book offers is more directional thinking, such as actively creating slack and reducing bandwidth occupation. Specific practices need to be adjusted to your own schedule and budget; they should not be copied as fixed templates.

Comments

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About the author

Publicly available personal information about Sendhil Mullainathan is limited. What can be confirmed is that his works are classified under management and finance in the Chinese book market, with three related titles held in the collection. Among them, Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much is the best known to readers, and a "classic edition" of Scarcity is also in circulation. These works show that Mullainathan focuses on how people's cognition and decision-making behave under resource scarcity, discussing how poverty and busyness reinforce each other and combining psychological observation with economic and management issues. His writing tends to explain everyday predicaments through conceptual frameworks and is noted for readability, giving it some influence among popular finance and business books.

Erd Shafir: publicly available information is limited, and details of his identity and biography are not recorded in the library. Judging from the three works held in the collection, he writes around the theme of scarcity. His representative works include Scarcity Classic Edition, Scarcity: How We Fall into Poverty and Busyness, and Scarcity. These titles are classified under management and finance, and they focus on how a lack of resources affects people's judgment, choices, and behavior, and in turn shapes individual circumstances and organizational operations. Shafir's writing approaches real-world problems through concepts, combining economic and psychological observations in an analytical style suitable for readers who want to understand the relationship between scarcity and decision-making. The three works, with related titles and different editions, also indicate that this theme occupies a central place in his writing.

魏薇 Author

Public information about Wei Wei is limited, and her nationality, dates of birth and death, and educational background cannot be confirmed. Judging from the 15 works held in the database, her translation and editorial work centers on social psychology, management, social science, popular science, and finance, covering subjects that combine academic depth with accessibility for general readers. Representative works include Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress; SuperCooperators; Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much and its classic edition; Solving Problems Like an Expert; and The Origins of Creativity. Most of these are introduced social-science and popular-science titles dealing with reason and progress, cooperative behavior, scarcity and decision-making, problem-solving methods, and the sources of creativity, indicating sustained engagement with general-knowledge publishing. Overall, her work focuses on bringing important overseas ideas and scientific findings to Chinese readers, with a style that aims at accuracy and clarity for a broad audience.

龙志勇 Author

Long Zhiyong is a book author whose works span management, artificial intelligence, social science, and finance. Public information about him is limited: his nationality, dates of birth and death, educational background, and professional experience are not clearly documented, and the only confirmed fact is that eight of his works are held in the collection. Judging from his representative titles, he addresses interdisciplinary themes such as cooperation and trust mechanisms, while also exploring economic and management topics including the scarcity mindset, demand, and the roots of great business legends. His interests extend to the credibility of artificial intelligence and the technological wave of the large-model era. His writing centers on cutting-edge concepts and social science research, combining informative content with real-world concerns for readers seeking to understand the relationships among business, technology, and human behavior.

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