Getting More for Less

Come on, baby, dry your eyes
Wipe your tears
Never like to see you cry
--Human League

While at Target (TGT) last weekend, I mistakenly walked out of the store with a bag of fertilizer that I didn't pay for. I had put the bag on the bottom cart rack and forgot that it was down there when I was checking out. Neither the cashier nor I noticed it.

I was still oblivious while putting the items that I did pay for into my car. It wasn't until the cart was empty that the bag on the bottom rack was visible.

Rationalizing about keeping it was easy. It's heavy and would be a hassle to take back in. I'll more than make up for this freebie with future purchases. It's the cashier's responsibility to look out for items on the bottom of the cart. It's Target's problem, not mine. This makes up for the high price I paid on that other item.

So I started home with my bag of 'free' fertilizer. That little voice inside my head got louder with each mile I drove away from the store. My conscience was yelling at me. It is wrong to take someone else's property.

About half way home, I turned the car around, went back to the store, carted the bag inside, and paid for it.

The urge to get more for less, or in its extreme form the urge to get something for nothing, is strong. It comes from the axiomatic drive in each of us to economize. Resources are scarce. In our efforts to reduce scarcity, we want to be as productive as possible. Stated more plainly, each of us wants to get as much out of life as we can. What exactly each of us desires varies from person to person. Some desire lots of material goods. Others value good feelings or spiritual benefits.

Whatever the case, we jump at the chance to get more of what we want for less cost. It drives us to take the escalator rather than the stairs, to clip coupons and shop for discounts, to buy lottery tickets, to park closer rather than farther away from our destination, to seek more pay for the same (or even less) amount of work, to constantly seek faster ways to get to where we want to go.

The problem is that our drive to economize can cause us to blur the line betwen right and wrong. Taking home that bag of fertilizer is ok because it will more than even out in the long run. Taking property from others at gunpoint is ok because it levels out wealth and some of what is taken helps the poor.

We might be led to act on this temptation, doing wrong directly through our own behavior or indirectly through the behavior of institutional agents who act on our behalf.

The urge to get more for less fosters the aggression that opposes freedom.

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