{"id":5900,"date":"2013-01-31T08:19:02","date_gmt":"2013-01-31T16:19:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/?p=5900"},"modified":"2015-05-05T15:00:12","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T22:00:12","slug":"the-law-of-diminishing-returns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/2013\/01\/31\/the-law-of-diminishing-returns\/","title":{"rendered":"The Law of Diminishing Returns"},"content":{"rendered":"

There’s a truth we all experience, whether we’ve seen it just that way or not. It’s a basic concept in economics, the law of diminishing returns<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Take mining for example. You’re walking along and find a piece of gold lying on the ground. Wow. All luck, no work, 100 percent profit! You figure there’s gold in the area and start panning in the stream. Lots of work for lesser result. You figure there must be a vein underground. Much more work, and maybe now a crew of people. Pretty soon you’re forming a mining company and digging up a mountain. If it’s still working for you, great, but the profits keep spreading out to others and it’s a long ways from the early 100 percent.<\/p>\n

Okay, you’ve never found any gold? How about your first car, or your first house? It was all joy, and all arrival. Now, cars and houses later, they’re still great, but what with maintenance and expenses and all manner of complications, the joy is not quite as pure.<\/p>\n

A dentist friend of mine shared his business with his wife who has a talent for organizational development. While he was doing teeth, she built the place into a full-on clinic. In time he found himself coming into the office wondering, \u201cWhat is this, Motor Vehicles<\/em>? Who are all these people?\u201d<\/p>\n

It’s just like it says in Ecclesiastes:
\nAs goods increase,<\/strong>
\n so do those who consume them.<\/strong>
\n And what benefit are they to the owner<\/strong>
\n except to feast his eyes on them?<\/strong>*<\/p>\n

Not that feasting one’s eyes on something isn’t a reward of sorts. But one sees through that, too, and wonders if something’s been lost.<\/p>\n

A client of a financial advisor friend of mine told him how he, the client, has reached such a state of success, all he has left to look forward to is his next steak dinner.<\/p>\n

It’s hard to feel sorry for the guy, but it does seems it’s the law of diminishing returns taken to the extreme.<\/p>\n

Here’s a Chinese proverb:
\n<\/span>Even though you have ten thousand fields,<\/em><\/strong>
\n you can eat no more than one measure of rice a day.<\/em><\/strong>
\n Even though your dwelling contains a hundred rooms,<\/em><\/strong>
\n you can use but eight feet of space a night.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Best to keep things simple, and enjoy them 100 percent.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

______________
\n*Ecclesiastes 5:11<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You win the lottery? Great. But where did all these friends come from? Not to mention the government. What happened to the 100 percent?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5900"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5900"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5900\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10721,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5900\/revisions\/10721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hyattmoore.com\/blank-slate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}