In this episode, we explore how good intentions and good outcomes are so easily destroyed by the same bad decision… What’s the purpose of a prison? In an ideal world, it shouldn’t exist at all - but we don’t live in an ideal world. So at best it’s perhaps an unfortunate social-necessity, a place to isolate people who’ve become unable to act appropriately within the agreed rules of the society. To use the US term, a ‘penitentiary’, where people can repent for their misdeeds and return to society as good citizens. Fluffy abstract descriptions of that kind, anyway, that gloss over so much of the sheer
Perverse indeed, many such scenarios exist Today which mirror your examples. Banks are always a prime example of such incentives, first time home-buyers are almost criminally allowed to apply for loans which stretch their finances to the limit. When interest rates inevitably climb the homeowners cannot afford to maintain instalments, and thus put up their house up for sale to settle the original debt. The house of course has re-entered the market place for the next potential buyer ensuring that the perverse incentive forms a continuous loop at ever increasing interest rates.
Perverse indeed, many such scenarios exist Today which mirror your examples. Banks are always a prime example of such incentives, first time home-buyers are almost criminally allowed to apply for loans which stretch their finances to the limit. When interest rates inevitably climb the homeowners cannot afford to maintain instalments, and thus put up their house up for sale to settle the original debt. The house of course has re-entered the market place for the next potential buyer ensuring that the perverse incentive forms a continuous loop at ever increasing interest rates.