Dating Market Failure Part 3: Why Modern Dating is Failing

Welcome to my third and final piece of dating market failure.

Imagine you live in a medium-size town, and this town gets all of its water supply just a few miles away from this single lake. The lake has no rivers that flow into it. So it has to rely on rainfall to maintain its size. Everyone understands if the lake is exploited, it may dry up one day.

So protecting it is extremely important. However, there is one big problem that people may understand the Lake’s importance as a collective. But, as individuals, unless you introduce laws or limits on how much water each person can use, it means there is nothing that can stop anyone from taking more from the lake than they should.

So what ends up happening is 10% of the people turn a completely blind eye to the lake’s preservation. Humans are doing what humans do best.

They decide to grow extensive lawns, wash their vehicles daily and install fountains, which are all very water-intensive. And in the short term, this 10% of the population is very happy, but unfortunately, this was never sustainable, and slowly but surely, the lake dried up, and the 10% ended up ruining it for everybody.