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Breaking tasks down into smaller sub-tasks can be very useful.
James Surowiecki
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James Surowiecki
Age: 57
Born: 1967
Born: April 30
Journalist
Writer
Meriden
Connecticut
James Michael Surowiecki
Smaller
Breaking
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More quotes by James Surowiecki
When all is said and done, cheap gas is an illusion, because our reliance on gas creates a whole series of costs that aren't factored in to the pump price - among them congestion, pollution, and increased risk of accidents.
James Surowiecki
Downsizing itself is an inevitable part of any creatively destructive economy.
James Surowiecki
The paradox of Steve Jobs's career is that he had no interest in listening to consumers - he was famously dismissive of market research - yet nonetheless had an amazing sense of what consumers actually wanted.
James Surowiecki
Companies, like people, don't much like to change.
James Surowiecki
The ban on sports betting does exactly what Prohibition did. It makes criminals rich.
James Surowiecki
There does seem to be some evidence that as people get older, they procrastinate less, perhaps because they feel the pressure of time more.
James Surowiecki
Technological innovation has dramatically lowered the cost of computing, making it possible for large numbers of consumers to own powerful new technologies at reasonably low prices.
James Surowiecki
Lower oil prices won't, by themselves, topple the mullahs in Iran. But it's significant that, historically, when oil prices have been low, Iranian reformers have been ascendant and radicals relatively subdued, and vice versa when prices have been high.
James Surowiecki
Popular as Keynesian fiscal policy may be, many economists are skeptical that it works. They argue that fine-tuning the economy is a virtually impossible task, and that fiscal-stimulus programs are usually too small, and arrive too late, to make a difference.
James Surowiecki
On Wall Street, fraudulent schemes tend to thrive during economic booms, and to blow up when times turn tough.
James Surowiecki
Politically speaking, it's always easier to shell out money for a disaster that has already happened, with clearly identifiable victims, than to invest money in protecting against something that may or may not happen in the future.
James Surowiecki
One of the problems that exacerbates procrastination is the feeling that you have lots of different things to do and no clear sense of which matter more, when they should be done, etc.
James Surowiecki
No decision-making system is going to guarantee corporate success. The strategic decisions that corporations have to make are of mind-numbing complexity. But we know that the more power you give a single individual in the face of complexity and uncertainty, the more likely it is that bad decisions will get made.
James Surowiecki
Of course, looking tough on inflation is part of any central banker's job description: if investors believe that inflation is going to get out of control, you end up with higher interest rates and capital flight, and a vicious circle quickly ensues.
James Surowiecki
In the heart of the Great Depression, millions of American workers did something they'd never done before: they joined a union. Emboldened by the passage of the Wagner Act, which made collective bargaining easier, unions organized industries across the country, remaking the economy.
James Surowiecki
The smartest groups, then, are made up of people with diverse perspectives who are able to stay independent of each other. Independence doesn't imply rationality or impartiality, though. You can be biased and irrational, but as long as you're independent, you won't make the group any dumber.
James Surowiecki
Since the Protestant majority in Northern Ireland wants to remain a part of Great Britain, and since Ireland itself has shown little interest in reunification, the IRA's prospects for success through political channels have always been limited.
James Surowiecki
From a social point of view, it's beneficial that homeownership encourages commitment to a given town or city. But, from an economic point of view, it's good for people to be able to leave places where there's less work and move to places where there's more.
James Surowiecki
The financial crisis of 2008 was not caused by investment banks betting against the housing market in 2007. It was caused by the fact that too few investors - including all of the big investment banks - bet too heavily on the housing market in the years before 2007.
James Surowiecki
Movies' mistrust of capitalism is almost as old as the medium itself.
James Surowiecki