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28 april 2012, the art of gentle shoving

I'm not sure its wholly new, or isn't more about presentation, but the "nudge" has become one of those ideas that has what people in the political sphere like to call traction. The british prime minister has his own nudge unit, and now obama is at it too, hiring one of the book's authors. At its heart is a tweak to economics, which traditionally rests on a big presumption: that people act rationally. By contrast, behavioural economics tries to understand why decisions are taken. Maybe people are actually badly informed, or inconsistent, leave decisions to another day, or just lazy. Whatever the logic, maybe we'd take a bit of jam today, rather a whole cake tomorrow. Nudge gives focus to the influence of context, social norms, and looks to change behaviour rather than opinion, for example by presenting choices in different ways. One british trial looked at why people were not taking up incentives to reduce their energy consumption by insulating their homes. It found that many could not be bothered to clear out their loft. So, the insulation firm offered to clear the loft, leading to a tripling of insulation grant take ups. The use that can be made of social norms can be seen in denmark, where green footprints were put on the floor leading to rubbish bins, reducing littering by 46%. An american example reduced energy use by providing information about how neighbours used less. Strangely, some brits don't sign up to their (free) company pension plan. A new law nudges them to do so, by making joining the default option. All good, if not revolutionary stuff, but maybe salvation comes not from exhaltation, but from nods and winks - and nudges.