One where I actually followed Megan McArdle’s chain of thought here without once bobbling. Or boggling:
I invested almost four years in an almost-great relationship that ended with me, shattered and tear-stained, deciding to pick up and move to Washington. You can hear all about it in this NPR segment from a few months back, which they re-aired this morning. Or you can read about it in my book, where I delve into even more of the gory details and deftly weave it together with the sad saga of GM’s decline, which happened for much the same reasons that my failed relationship did.
“Seriously?” you’re asking. “Love is like … automobile manufacturing?” Well, no. But companies are composed of people. And people tend to make the same sort of mistakes over and over. This particular mistake is so common that economists have a name for it: the sunk cost fallacy.
Seriously. I read through that, nodded, kept going – and then had a record needle-skipping moment and went back. Which is not really relevant for anything else; it’s just funny. It’s a weird life I have now. Nice, but weird.
Moe Lane
PS: Megan’s right, by the way: at a certain point in the relationship you gotta, as my father used to say, sh*t or get off the pot. But the women facing that situation probably already know that. And they know what the answer is gonna be. …Sorry? I had very little input into how we set up modern society, mind you.
the world tends to give you what you need. not necessarily what you think you want, tho. just get the ego out of the way and see what happens. been there, done that, got the ratty old t-shirt. it’s good.
© 1969 Mick Jagger and Keith Richards
I read through the entire article, got to the bottom, and saw the next article about how Don McLean is going to auction off his entire original notes for American Pie.
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-02-14/-american-pie-and-sweet-unknowns