By Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN-978-o0300-12223-7
I am not a particular fan of books on healthy living or self-improvement. Having given up, without outside help, smoking a pipe after more than 35 years was enough to convince me that I had no use for such books… I have never drunk alcohol and am into my second marriage, so there is little left I could improve.
At first I viewed Nudge with the suspicion I reserve for anything by-lined “Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness”. Opening the book randomly presented my with Chapter 15 – Privatizing marriage. I started reading and after just a few pages was convinced that I should tell you about this book, principles or not.
Thaler is the inventor of behavioral economics and Sunstein is a brilliant legal mind and they combined to create a book that will not simply nudge you, it will knock you off your feet. As Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology at Harvard University put it: “In this utterly brilliant book, Thaler and Sunstein teach us how to steer people toward better health, sounder investments, and cleaner environments without depriving them of their inalienable right to make a mess of things if they want to.”
What I like about this book (and hate about some of the others) is the way the authors formulate their message so that you feel the gentle nudge to do what is in your best interest but you can still opt out if you want to without being left with a bad conscience. No sir, this is not a book offering the silver bullet of self improvement for all occasions. It is much more than that.
The reader is taken into a virtual world where our humanness is taken as a given, for better or worse. Then we are shown how by knowing how people think we can design choice environments that make it easier for people to choose what is best for themselves, their families and their society. These choice architectures are able to nudge us in beneficial directions without limiting our freedom of choice.
Great, you will say. But who has the time? Well, this is the neat trick about this concept. Once you adopt it, it as like breathing. You notice the lack of it only when it stops.
You may love this book or hate it. But read it you should!