In a book called, “The Life You Can Save,” Yale ethicist Peter Singer puts the problem of perceived scarcity in startling terms.  He envisions a hypothetical scenario in which a train steams towards a human being.  If action isn’t taken, the lumbering locomotive is sure to level this person, killing them.  Thankfully, you look down and right beside you in a rail switch.  Pull the lever and the train takes a track away from the person standing on the tracks. 

           You’d pull the lever, right?

           But, Singer suggests, what if your most prized possession lay on this track, waiting to be destroyed if you save the man.  Well, you’d pull the lever still, wouldn’t you?

           But, Singer wonders, what if it weren’t just a prized possession?  What if the cost of pulling the lever would be the loss of your job or some measure of security like a portion of your retirement funds or even a year of your life?  What about then?  Would it be so easy to pull that lever if what you thought was absolutely necessary for your life or comfort here on earth were in jeopardy? 

           Well, Peter Singer knows, sadly.  We’d let the person die if the stakes are perceived as high enough and the person unknown to us.  Now, not if it was someone we know, but like a random stranger who were never going to know or be affected by their loved one’s grief.  

            Scarcity is something we all fear, isn’t it?  That is that there won’t be enough of something when push comes to shove.  I know I fall prey to this sometimes, to be sure.  In the early days of the pandemic, there was a real concern about toilet paper.  Well, I didn’t want any part of lacking that, so online I went, scouring through the webpages of online vendors, looking to add to it.  I found some and ordered as much as I could.  Natalie can tell you we’ve got enough toilet paper in our house to last until the Kingdom comes.  And it was all because I had fallen into the scarcity trap. 

            I call it the scarcity trap because, once you fall into it, it’s dreadfully hard to get out.  That is to say that one can remain stuck there for most of the days of their life.  Worse thing is, when you’re afflicted with the scarcity syndrome, you don’t realize you have it.  You think you’re being practical.  After all, who wants to end up without toilet paper, right?  So not only are you trapped, you don’t realize your predicament.

            But why do I call it that?  Practicality as a predicament?  It is restrictive in a subtle way that’s not readily apparent.  You see, when you’re frightened, scared that is of anything, your mind has a tendency to reduce all the options available to you to just three – flight, fight or freeze.  Now, here’s the thing.  NO matter what, there are typically other options than just those three but, when your mind perceives danger, this is a protective device to help us survive.  So, like if a bear is running toward us (which might happen, by the way, one our neighbors got some doorbell camera footage of a black bear strolling by their front door), fight flight or freeze is great.

            If, however, we’re fearful of not having enough toilet paper, fighting to make sure you have 1000 rolls stockpiled in your house makes a whole heck of a lot of sense.  Of course, the problem becomes that when certain people sense the need to have a thousand rolls of toilet paper, some people are likely going to have to go without.

            A scarcity mindset deeply affects how we treat other people.  If we don’t think there’s enough of anything to go around, then we can become jerks rather quickly.  I mean, take for example every year at Christmastime.  There’s always one insanely hot toy that every kid wants.  Parents have been known to do some pretty stupid stuff trying to get those, don’t they?  Ever seen some of the footage from Wal-Mart’s Black Friday Sales?  Savages.  And I should know, right?  Takes one to know one.

            But it isn’t just toys or toilet paper or even things that the scarcity syndrome affects once it takes root.  We can become convinced that there just isn’t enough time, not enough power for everyone to thrive and, as such, we treat others with reckless indifference.  When we think there isn’t enough time, we can do dangerous things like drive really, really fast or take chances with our health.  If we’re convinced, we won’t get sufficient love, we can actually end up abusing the very people who do love us. 

            And it’s all because we think there just isn’t enough of any good thing to go around.