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_{Exploring incentives, new models, and your schedule}

Happy Thursday! Thanks for reading Intentional Dollar — where we look at old money ideas through a new perspective.

What’s inside?

• One idea to experiment with

• Two quotes from others

• Three questions to dig deeper

• Four lines of poetry for the point

Disclaimer: This is not investment advice. These weekly posts represent my simple thoughts, a few quotes, and some questions — for educational purposes only.

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_{One idea to experiment with:}

Incentives

Incentives explain more of human behavior than most people realize. We like to think decisions are driven by values or reasoning. In reality, people respond to rewards, punishments, and consequences. As Charlie Munger famously said, “Show me the incentive and I’ll show you the outcome.”

This is why good people sometimes make bad decisions. It is not a matter of ethics or intelligence; it is the system they operate in. Governments, schools, and organizations drift in ways that serve the people or processes that are rewarded. Incentives, not intentions, guide the results.

Incentives are not always financial. Attention is an incentive. Convenience is an incentive. Avoiding discomfort is an incentive. When a system rewards quick responses, we train ourselves to be reactive. When it rewards avoiding hard work, procrastination becomes rational. In every case, behavior aligns with the payoff, whether we notice it or not.

Munger warned repeatedly: “Never, ever think about something else when you should be thinking about the power of incentives.” Warren Buffett has echoed this principle in investing and management: incentives determine behavior, and ignoring them leads to predictable mistakes.

The power of incentives is often invisible. They silently shape what gets repeated and what gets ignored.

A practical question to keep in mind is simple: what behavior does this system actually reward? Not what it claims to value, not what seems fair or ethical, but what people are actually incentivized to do. Understanding incentives is not just useful; it is essential.

Ignore them, and even the best intentions will rarely produce the outcomes you expect.

Incentives do not care about morality, logic, or effort. They care about outcomes. And if you want to understand why people or systems behave the way they do, start with the incentives.

_{Two quotes on new models:}

How can you build new models that get you out of the old way of thinking, to get a new look on old problems?

_{Three questions on your schedule:}

1. What could you stop doing this week to gain more freedom?

2. Where are you letting other people set your schedule?

3. What is one small change that could reclaim hours each week?

Which question stuck with you? Questions like these are spotlights for the mind. Reply to this email and let me know which one shined light on a previously dark cave.

_{Four lines of poetry for the point:}

Contact Me:

Content ideas, questions? Reply to this email or reach out to me at [email protected]

Disclaimer: This is not investment advice. These weekly posts represent my simple thoughts, a few quotes, and some questions — for educational purposes only.

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