There are so many problems all around us. Problems are a part of life. Sometimes they are small, like forgetting to put gas in the car, and sometimes they are big, like political division.
But no matter their size, all problems have solutions.
Things can get better.
The key is to find the right solution or strategy.
For example, if your car runs out of gas, the goal is simple: you just need to fill up the tank. To get that gas, you can walk to a gas station, call AAA, or a friend. There are different ways to reach the “goal” of putting gas in your tank.
But finding a “solution” to political division is much more complex. The media, elections, the political and economic climate, and more conspire to drive this social polarization. Developing effective solutions to tone down the anger will require the efforts of individuals, businesses, and governments. It might seem hopeless.
But even if a problem seems insurmountable, remember that there are always solutions to be found. What I’m calling “strategies” to make things better, to reach our goals.
That’s what this site is all about.
Less Bad is organized to serve this problem-solving process.
At its core, the pages on the site fall into one of four buckets, four “lenses” through which to view the world at large:
- Goals – What are the characteristics of a perfect world? What would universal human happiness look like?
- Strategies (this page) – Solutions, ways to make progress toward those goals, how ta make things Less Bad.
- Problems – Aspects of society we don’t care for, that we want to improve.
- Causes – The reasons the problems are there, and why things are the way they are.
Complimentary to those elements, we’re also classifying these issues or topics into four categories: the environment, business, government, and society. So for each of these categories, there are associated problems, causes, goals, and strategies.
Most of them overlap, but the majority fall into one category more than another, and society catches anything that doesn’t fall into the other four.
The whole point is to come up with a roadmap to improve things, at least make them Less Bad. The hope is that with some structure, the problem-solving process becomes easier.
This hub, strategies to make things better, is probably the most important aspect of the site. It’s a bunch of ways we can go about making things Less Bad.
Some are harder to push than others. And some affect more people than others.
But compared with the goals, these strategies to improve the world are much more manageable.
I hope that makes sense.
So, here are some of the ways we can go about improving society, and the solutions to all the problems, grouped into the four hubs (business, society, government, and environment).
Strategies to Make Business Better
The power of business is indisputable, and I maintain that leveraging business is the only way we’re going to make meaningful positive changes in society. The most powerful way to make improvements in society is to align the goals of businesses with society at large.
Here are some strategies we can harness the power of business to improve life for everyone.
A Four-Day Workweek
AI – The Path To Sentience
Aligning Incentives: Using the Free Market to Create a Better World
America’s Biggest Ports
Artificial Intelligence – Is It the Answer?
Build on What Exists
Champion Honest Pay
Cooperation: The Way to Go
Demand Transparency: We Can’t Make Progress if We Don’t Know What’s Going On
DNA Sequencing: Unlocking the Secrets of Life
Eliminating Dark Money
Embrace Innovation
Energy Storage
ESG Claims Need Transparency: Lobbying Disclosure is the First Step
Fixing the World: The Ultimate Guide
Force Multipliers: Turbo-charging Societal Progress:
How to Solve Problems in Society
Impact Consumerism
Include True Costs in Prices
Increasing Accountability: How to Hold the Powerful Responsible
Making Progress: The Only Way
Measuring Twice and Collapsing Superposition
Pigovian Taxes
Project: Fix Everything
Reduce Health Care Cost
Reduce Traffic
Reform the Finance Industry
Reform the FIRE Sector
Reform the Jones Act
Reward “Good” Work
Systems Thinking: Navigating Complexity
The Humanity Index
The Rise of Impact Consumersim
The Secondhand Economy
The Simple Solution to All Our Problems
Value-Based Care Can Remake the Health Care System
Virtuous Cycles Can Solve All Global Challenges
By no means comprehensive, but I think those are some of the most powerful ways we can use business to make life better for everyone.
Strategies to Make Society Better
Yes, you could say that business is part of society, and you’d be right. But for the sake of organizing, the following strategies to improve society have more to do with people and communities than corporations or the government. Things like fostering cooperation, supporting good causes, taking personal responsibility, and things like that.
Here are some of the most powerful strategies to improve society.
A Four-Day Workweek
AI – The Path To Sentience
Artificial Intelligence – Is It the Answer?
Being Constructive: How to Move Forward
Build on What Exists
Champion Honest Pay
Close the Carried Interest Loophole
Cooperation: The Way to Go
Data Science and Its Ability to Help Further Progress
DNA Sequencing: Unlocking the Secrets of Life
Embrace Innovation
Fixing the World: The Ultimate Guide
Follow the Golden Rule
Force Multipliers: Turbo-charging Societal Progress:
Give People Meaning
How to Change the World
How to Solve Problems in Society
Impact Consumerism
Improving Education
Include True Costs in Prices
Increase the Inheritance Tax
Increasing Accountability: How to Hold the Powerful Responsible
Legal Reform
Making Progress: The Only Way
Measuring Twice and Collapsing Superposition
Prioritize Human Flourishing
Promoting the Common Good
Promoting Upward Mobility: The Key to the American Dream
Reduce Health Care Cost
Reduce Traffic
Reform the Finance Industry
Reward “Good” Work
Taking Personal Responsibility
The Great Machine
The Humanity Index
The Rise of Impact Consumersim
The Secondhand Economy
The Simple Solution to All Our Problems
Universal Basic Income: Game-Changer Policy or Pipe Dream?
Value-Based Care Can Remake the Health Care System
Virtuous Cycles Can Solve All Global Challenges
What Are We Going to Do?
Unfortunately, even if we all regular people followed The Golden Rule, only doing what was best for everyone if the animals that “run” government stayed in power there would still be a lot of problems.
How to Make the Government Better
We know that the government has been broken for a while. There are so many reasons the government is broken that it’s easy to despair. It won’t happen overnight but the possibility of reforming government, however slim, exists.
This section asks the question “How can we fix government?”
Build on What Exists
Building A Better Government: How to Create a Country We Can Be Proud Of
Close the Carried Interest Loophole
Contact Your Elected Representatives: How to Effectively Voice Your Opinion
Cooperation: The Way to Go
Demand Transparency: We Can’t Make Progress if We Don’t Know What’s Going On
Eliminating Dark Money
ESG Claims Need Transparency: Lobbying Disclosure is the First Step
Fixing the World: The Ultimate Guide
Getting Money Out of Government
How to Solve Problems in Society
Impact Consumerism
Improving Education
Include True Costs in Prices
Increase the Inheritance Tax
Increasing Accountability: How to Hold the Powerful Responsible
Legal Reform
Making Progress: The Only Way
Reduce Health Care Cost
Reducing Polarization
Reducing the Federal Debt
Reform the Finance Industry
Reform the Jones Act
Reform the Media
Term Limits
Universal Basic Income: Game-Changer Policy or Pipe Dream?
Value-Based Care Can Remake the Health Care System
Virtuous Cycles Can Solve All Global Challenges
Vote Out Career Politicians
Voting Better
Washington DC is a real mess, and none of these strategies are enough to get the government working on its own. But if different groups (cooperating across local, state, and federal government, the business community, non-profit and charitable organizations, etc) work on different strategies, it all adds up to real progress toward improving everyone’s lives.
And finally, we get to the environment. I hate to put it last because if the environment goes then we all go. If the fires and drought we’ve been seeing aren’t enough to scare you, I don’t know what is. But unfortunately, I’m afraid that unless we tackle some of these deeper issues in society at large and in business and government, we won’t be able to make a real, effectual change in terms of creating a healthy environment.
Again by no means comprehensive, but here are some strategies we can take to improve the environment:
Ways to Improve the Environment
Build on What Exists
DNA Sequencing: Unlocking the Secrets of Life
Energy Storage
Fixing the World: The Ultimate Guide
How to Solve Problems in Society
Impact Consumerism
Include True Costs in Prices
Making Progress: The Only Way
Pigovian Taxes
Reduce Traffic
Reform the Finance Industry
The Quintessential Example of the Power of Transparency
The Secondhand Economy
Virtuous Cycles Can Solve All Global Challenges
We’re One, Big Organism
While certainly not enough to get us where we need to be to avert major instability, these strategies to help the environment are a good start.
The Benefits of Concentrating on Strategies
Identifying solutions, or strategies, makes problem-solving more manageable. They are key to cooperation. They provide a way for people to work together to solve problems and find opportunities.
When people cooperate, they can achieve things that they couldn’t achieve on their own. Real, tangible solutions allow people to pool their resources and knowledge, and to work together towards a common goal. This cooperation leads to prosperity. When people prosper, they can lead better lives and provide for their families. They also have more time and energy to devote to cooperation, which further drives economic growth.
Identifying strategies and solutions for problems is essential for cooperation and prosperity. Without them, both are impossible.
There are No Guarantees – I’m Just Throwing These Out There
I don’t know anything – the strategies above are just the best I came come up with based on limited understanding.
They are a starting point, not the endpoint. Strategies are malleable and are shaped by circumstances and information.
I’m not an expert (are you? If yes please help me!)
These are just some strategies that are floating out there
Is a Universal Basic Income a good idea? I don’t know… I can see both sides… (We don’t want to reward laziness, but if robots do all the jobs… what are we going to do?) But the point is that it’s just one idea that’s out there, that people are experimenting with.
Just because I write about a strategy doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. It’s a starting point.
Although I’m trying to highlight ideas and strategies I think are helpful, this is more of a collection of strategies floating out there.
For example, you might love unions, you might hate them. In this space right now, whether they are helpful or not isn’t as important as identifying them as a strategy to drive change.
It’s all about how we go about deploying these strategies.
Working Together to Find Solutions
Cooperation and communication are essential to the common good. When people work together, they can pool their resources and talents to achieve results that would be impossible to achieve alone. This is especially true when it comes to solving problems.
By working together, we can share ideas and experiences, leading to a more comprehensive understanding of the issue at hand. Furthermore, cooperation can help to prevent conflicts from escalating, as people are more likely to find common ground when they are working together towards a shared goal.
Cooperation is essential for finding solutions that benefit everyone in the community.
Be a Part of the Solution
We can solve many social problems if we work together and put our minds to it. We have seen the success of implementing solutions to reduce crime, hunger, homelessness, and inequality. Solutions give us hope and a way forward. They provide us with the opportunity to learn from our mistakes and make things better for everyone involved.
If you think there is a particular social problem that is most important to solve, let me know so we can discuss it further and find a way to work on it together.
Sign up for the newsletter to learn more.