Hitler and Nudge

It seems a bit extreme to me to use a Nazi ballot to explain the "power of defaults," although this is a new concept for me. Perhaps I need it explained to me better than in this article (and the links in the article), but I'm sure the author must have some idea of the horror that an individual voter would meet if he checked "Nein" on that ballot. That is not the same as choosing WalMart over a local mom-and-pop because it's closer and cheaper.

Granted, corporations do indeed benefit from this phenomenon, at least that much is clear to me now. However, if I check "Nein" for WalMart and all other corporations (which I am in the process of doing), nobody is going to come to my door and demand answers, like the Census Taker I referred to in a previous article.

It takes some doing to resist the default options, but it is possible. I have now concluded that everything I need that I used to rely upon the corporate supermarkets for, can be purchased at a local privately-owned health food store, and a mom-and-pop farm store. Furthermore, much to my delight, a brand of chocolate chip cookies, the only kind of store-bought that I like, that I also thought were no longer being made, are available at yet another mom-and-pop! Oh, joy!