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Productivity, or the tale of two men (to say nothing of the cows) Once upon a time there were two men living in the same village. Each had a cow to provide him with milk. But though their cows were the same, one man was getting much more milk from his cow than the other, and while the second man could hardly satisfy his own needs, the first always had surplus to sell. So, one day the first man said to the second, "Listen, my friend, we've known each other for a long time and by now it is quite clear that I am much better at getting milk from the cows than you're ever going to be. What would you say if I take over your cow as well and whatever milk I get from the two of them we will split equally. You can't deny we both will be better off, can you?" This proposition sounded so reasonable and fair to the second man that he immediately agreed. At the beginning this arrangement seemed satisfactory to both sides. But little by little the first man, who originally offered to take care of both cows and to share milk equally with the second man (who by now was doing nothing), started to feel increasingly uneasy about the whole situation. And the more he thought about it the more unfair it looked to him. Eventually, he made up his mind and told the second man that from now on, instead of a half, the second man's share would be a quarter and his, since he was doing all the work, three quarters. The second man wasn't very happy about the new arrangement but when he figured out that he would still be getting as much milk as if he had been working, he reluctantly said "yes'. But very soon this didn't satisfy the first man either. So, after a while, he reduced the second man's share to one tenth, this time without asking him. He even thought of giving the second man, whose idleness bothered him the most, something to do but dismissed it as a dangerous idea, because then the second man could demand the bigger portion of milk which the first man was obviously unwilling to do, as he had got used to getting the lion's share. Actually, he would have loved to have it all but was afraid that then in desperation the second man would turn to violence or even murder to take his cow back. As a matter of fact the second man was thinking about it himself more and more often, for by now he was almost starving and looking for the ways to escape his predicament. He would have loved to get his cow back but knew that this couldn't be done now without fighting, and besides, he wouldn't know what to do with it anyway, for after not taking care of cows for a long time he completely forgot how to do it. He couldn't go away either, because nobody was going to give him even as little as the first man did. Now, if you want to hear the rest of this story, I can only tell you that both men are still living together. The first man is doing all the work and getting 90% of the milk, while the second continues to do nothing and gets what is left. Both are frustrated and angry, each for his own reasons, but neither is doing anything about it. And though I am the one who has written this tale, even I don't know how it will end. |
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