In an interview on Behavioural Economics

Let’s go onto Mindless Eating by Brian Wansink.

This is one of my favourite books. He takes many of these findings about decision-making and shows how they work in the domain of food. Food is tangible, so it helps us understand the principles. It shows all the kinds of mistakes we make – like the endless soup bowl you mentioned. It’s a really nice experiment with a soup bowl [that self-replenishes without the eater noticing]. It’s easy to visualise and we can imagine how it works in other parts of life. But also, as obesity becomes a bigger issue, the book has a lot of practical things to say about the obesity epidemic. It’s full of lots of very simple lessons.

And while he shows how we mindlessly put on weight, he also shows us that we can mindlessly take off weight. So there is a positive message at the end.

That’s right. Once you understand your mistakes, you can also think about how to correct them. That’s very useful.

So is the problem that we do things without thinking? Is that what all these books are saying?

Many times it is. I’m hesitant to say always, because there are many things that we overthink. But to a large degree, our actions are not consequences of deep, elaborate thinking. They sometimes involve some thinking, they sometimes involve no thinking. They often involve habitual decisions, and because of that we have a good chance of getting things wrong.

What struck me about these books is that they’re describing weaknesses in us that companies and individuals selling insurance, popcorn or used cars have been exploiting for a long time. The whole market is acting against us in a way, so who is going to help us make the right decisions?

You can think about the market economy in this way – almost nobody wants you to do something that is good for you in the long term. The incentive of everybody else is to do something that is good for them in the short term. It’s important that we as individuals understand this, and that we as individuals demand something better. I also think it’s important that we have regulators that understand these problems, and can help us.

Ultimately, is that what we’re talking about here – government regulation?

Yes, it is. But remember that sometimes it’s the good guys who are trying to influence us. There may be a company promoting long-term savings accounts. What’s implicit in what you’re saying is that it’s a market with zero sum games. That’s not the case always. In healthcare, for example, everybody wants you to be healthy. Your family, yourself, the healthcare system. There are cases where the incentives are aligned. They are often not, but there are cases where they are.