About five years back when I moved into my current apartment community, the area around was pretty much empty. The open land and the surrounding greenery attracted so much that making the decision was a no-brainer.
Or so I thought because I forgot one thing. I should have asked for a guarantee that the greenery will stay that way.
It didn’t take much time for small houses to start mushrooming around the campus. Honestly, I shouldn’t be complaining. It’s a free country and people are allowed to construct houses. But it’s always the second order effects which create unexpected problems.
With inadequate supply of water from the government, came the need for bore wells for every house. I guess you can imagine where this story is going.
With bore wells getting installed in some or the other house every few weeks, started the unwanted and unbearably irritating noise emanating from heavy mechanical devices, drilling holes in mother nature’s heart.
I felt I was living in the middle of a factory. I had never signed up for this.
In today’s capitalist society, when I want to listen to a song on iTunes, I have to shell out money for it. But if I am forcefully exposed to a deafening, non-musical, and unhealthy sound, why am I not being compensated for it? Who should pay for my misery? The driller, the landowner, the government? I demand that all of them should but nobody seems to be interested.
[Read more…] about Latticework of Mental Models: Externalities