Scarcity and Economic Tradeoffs

Most of us have heard the truism that life is full of tradeoffs. This is indeed a truism because nearly every resource necessary to pursue happiness is in short supply. People must choose between alternatives under these axiomatic conditions of scarcity, lest the resources run dry. The heuristic is an economizing one--consume scarce resources in an order that maximizes satisfaction.

Pervasive scarcity thus drives people to be predominantly 'economic' in their behavior, trading off one thing in order to obtain something else deemed to possess more utility.

A class in economics is not necessary to learn this. Pursuing our dreams demands that we learn about making tradeoffs (i.e., economizing) in our daily decision-making.