Tim Wu

unpleasant lifestyle to be constantly feeling you're being exploited.

And the other thing I'll say is there's also a huge amount of effort people make trying to move what category they're in and pretend to be poor.

So I think it is overrated.

And I guess it relies on overly simplistic models of what makes people happy.

There's a way in which efficiency, I always think, is an interesting term in economics.

Because in economics as in life,

you want things to be somewhat efficient, but too much efficiency becomes truly inhuman.

I find this even in the very modest example of personal productivity efforts.

It's great to have a to-do list,

If I really force myself onto the scaffolding of a to-do list at all times, I feel like I cease to be a human being and become a kind of machine, always just getting things done and responding to the emails.

And I think it was important, Tim, when you said it raises the question of what kind of world you want to live in.

Because the truth is that I don't want to live in a maximally efficient world.

I have other competing values.

you know, the competitive efficient market is good up to a point and after a point, it becomes something corrosive to human bonds, human solidarity, just-in-time scheduling makes sense from the perspective of economic efficiency and not if you want healthy families in your society.

And I think being able to articulate that question of what kind of world you want to live in, not just what kind of economy works on models, I think is important and often a lost political art in my view.

Yeah, I agree.

And I feel there's some intuitive feelings, like people feel it's unfair.

People don't like being ripped off.

People hate paying junk fees.

The original word for that, by the way, was bullshit fees.