What Do You Want to Be?

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A lot of the biggest choices that we make in life are about trying to decide who we want to be. And our obsession with life acts productivity hacks, apts to make us more productive but it could deceive us into thinking that that's the essential question of life. So there is a sub theme in the book that happiness is overrated. The unexamined life is not worth living. Don't just take who youar s as data. Think about who you want to be and what gives you satisfaction.

Waze and Google Maps tell us the best way to get to where we're going. But no app or algorithm can tell us whether we should head there in the first place. To economist Russ Roberts, the reason is simple: Humans are dynamic and aspirational beings. When it comes to making life's big decisions, from what to study to whom to marry or whether to have a child, it's not always us doing the deciding, he argues, but rather the people we want to be. Join the host of EconTalk, the president of Shalem College, and the author of the new book Wild Problems: A Guide to the Decisions that Define Us, as he speaks with friend and EconTalk favorite Michael Munger about why the traditional economic models for decision making can lead us astray--and why life should be less about solving problems than embracing possibilities.