I know part of this is age as we try different things and they don't stick, but it seems like options in everything are shrinking (including opportunities). The food we want are out of reach due to price, career wise many seem to be wiped out or out of reach (they are for the elite), upward mobility is stunted, and things just seems more shallower than before. On first glance this might seem like a rant about the way of the world, but please follow.

While it may suck that I didn't go to Harvard or have a job that pays 500,000 a year, the fact is that if we are operating on fewer data points, it is harder to have a quality life. I might not be the best financial analyst and get held back, but if my second, third, and fourth choices are blocked, how does that help an intj that is bent on planning? It reminds me of a book that talked about Condorcts Theorem in relation to elections. If the ideal candidate gets knocked out in the primary rounds, that leads to less than ideal governing and is dumbed down to the lowest common denominator. Applying this to careers and consumer goods, by playing to the lcd, we don't properly allocate resources as a market economy. Inflation does have a part to pay, but that is beyond the scope of this. For me I have found an option career wise to make up for this short fall, but it is kind of suboptimal. That leads me to the question, in the face of scarcity how to we make decisions that are not as suboptimal and improve our chances at optimal outcomes?