Breaking Free from the Cycle
Bri Riggio bri.riggio.advising@gmail.com
Contents
Introduction Who am I? What is this? Who is this for?
What is Scarcity Mindset? What behaviors does scarcity lead to and why?
The “Scarcity Trap” Why the obvious solutions to scarcity reinforce it
Resources Further reading and a Trust & Safety case study
Designing for Scarcity How to intervene and alleviate the scarcity trap cycle
Introduction Who am I? What is this?
Current: Senior Manager, Safety & Revenue Policy @ Discord
Former: Trust & Safety Lead/Specialist/Analyst @ Discord
Even More Former: Assistant Director of Career Advising & Fellowships @ Higher Education (among many other roles)
In career advising, understanding cycles of scarcity helped to
understand why some students always struggled with assignments
and future career visioning
Scarcity: The New Science of Having Less and How It Defines Our Lives
By: Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir
Published: 2014
The book explains cycles of poverty in society through the
psychology theory of scarcity. This is not the only book on the topic but is a good introduction to the concepts. This resource draws
from this book.
THE THESIS:
Name it to Tame It: Teaching others about “scarcity mindset” and what it does to the brain will result in better awareness
and recognition of these behaviors in Trust & Safety teams by leaders and individual contributors.
Design for Scarcity: Those who are aware of “scarcity trap” behaviors
can better design interventions, systems, and workflows for themselves and their teams that
reduce scarcity’s impacts.
This can result in more resilient outcomes for Trust & Safety teams and individuals.
THE THESIS:
Why is this particularly important for Trust & Safety work?
Tech lauds and designs around scarcity. - Cost-cutting
- Efficiency optimization
Trust & Safety work contains inherent scarcities. - Knowledge and expertise
- Mistakes at scale - Escalations
The traumatic and activating nature of the work exacerbates the impacts of scarcity.
What is the “Scarcity Mindset”?
What is the “Scarcity Mindset”?
These needs can be real or perceived Needs are defined broadly:
In short, it is the subjective sense of having more needs than you have resources.
Scarcity literally and fundamentally changes the way you think by focusing your attention on the thing you lack, resulting in counterproductive (yet predictable) behaviors.
Time Money Shelter
Food Security
Love
Tooling support Headcount
Strategy and purpose
Empathy from others Visibility into the work
Understanding of work
Trust & Safety needs might include:
TUNNELING BANDWIDTH TAX BORROWING
What Happens in “Scarcity Mindset”?
Scarcity “captures the mind” and forces us to focus on the thing we lack. Left unchecked, this leads to a number of behaviors:
People focus intensely on immediate pressing needs while neglecting other important considerations. Like a tunnel
that narrows your field of vision, scarcity causes people to focus only on
managing the scarce resource.
Limited, time-bound focus can be helpful. Long-term “tunneling”
inhibits everything else.
Scarcity consumes mental capacity and executive control. Managing scarcity requires cognitive resources, leaving
less mental bandwidth for other tasks, planning, and self-control.
Scarcity directly reduces a person’s mental and physical bandwidth. It
becomes harder to resist temptations and to self-regulate.
People under scarcity often borrow from their future selves (taking high- interest loans, pulling all-nighters) to manage immediate scarcity, which often creates larger problems later.
This borrowing leads to decisions that alleviate short-term concerns
but result in more scarcity down the road, which requires even more
borrowing and “catch-up”.
TUNNELING BANDWIDTH TAX BORROWING
A reporting queue that never goes down. The perceived lack of control over the queue results in it becoming the focal point of the entire T&S team’s day-to-day work.
The proliferation of CSAM feels so overwhelming and upsetting, it becomes leadership’s primary harm type concern and resource allocation area above all others.
A manager responsible for queue operations resolves the out-of- control queue issue by throwing more agents at it and cannot see other upstream technical or operational solutions to the issue.
The agents responding 24/7 to CSAM experience physical and mental fatigue and lash out at others both at home and at work.
Agents are re-directed to “burn down the queue” in a heroic sprint. When agents return to their other tasks, they are behind on that work, and the queue creeps back up.
Agents implement an ML model that detects but over-enforces on CSAM, solving the immediate proliferation issue but increasing the volume of appeals, which must now be worked.
What Happens in “Scarcity Mindset”?
How might these behaviors show up in Trust & Safety work?
Packing and Slack
Packing refers to how people under scarcity organize and utilize their limited resources with intense efficiency and focus.
What does “packing” get you?
Hyper-efficiency: People become good at extracting maximum value from limited resources
Creative problem-solving: Scarcity forces innovative solutions and resourcefulness
Intense focus: Like packing a suitcase perfectly, every bit of available resource gets utilized
Short-term optimization: People become at solving immediate problems with their available means
Packing is a huge cognitive strength! Which is probably why tech companies optimizing for efficiency and
productivity deliberately introduce scarcity into their systems.
Packing and Slack
Slack refers to unused capacity, buffers, or margins that provide resilience and flexibility in a system.
What does “slack” do for you?
Error tolerance: Room for mistakes without catastrophic consequences
Flexibility: Ability to handle unexpected demands or opportunities
Reduced fragility: Protection against small shocks becoming major crises
Mental bandwidth preservation: Less cognitive toll is needed to constantly optimize every decision
So what’s the issue?
The issue is that scarcity inherently eliminates slack.
Packing and Slack
What does this mean?
Without slack, packing becomes mandatory: Every resource must be perfectly utilized
Perfect packing is unsustainable: It requires constant vigilance and leaves no room for error
Small failures cascade: Without buffers, minor problems become major crises
The bandwidth tax increases: More mental energy goes to constant optimization
The Paradox
Scarcity makes you better at short-term efficiency (packing) but eliminates the slack you need for long-term stability and well-being
The issue is that scarcity inherently eliminates slack.
Shocks in an Overtaxed System
Shock refers to unexpected disruptions that overwhelm a system already operating at capacity with no slack.
What characterizes a “shock”?
Unpredictable timing: Shocks arrive when least expected or convenient
Disproportionate impact: Small disruptions cause larger problems when there's no buffer
Cascade effects: One shock typically triggers multiple additional problems
Recovery difficulty: It is hard to bounce back when already stretched thin
Furthermore... Shock vulnerability can make sustainable planning feel futile because
disruptions seem inevitable (“the business of escalations”)
But this creates a self-fulfilling prophecy of continued instability
SCARCITY MINDSET
Myopic Responses Distant concerns become blurry and unclear while immediate needs appear crystal clear
and urgent. Future consequences are deprioritized in favor of immediate relief.
Long-term thinking is impossible when consumed by immediate needs.
Trade-Off Thinking A constant state of weighing competing
needs and making difficult either/or choices. Decisions become zero-sum calculations,
where gaining something means sacrificing something else.
Cognitive Decline and Stress Responses Elevated cortisol responses result in “fight-or-flight” activation, “black and white” thinking, hypervigilance
around future scarcities, mood volatility, learned helplessness, impacted sleep, and memory encoding
and recall disruptions.
Hyper-focus on scarce resource (Tunneling)
Reduced cognitive capacity
(Bandwidth Tax)
Multi-tasking and short-
term thinking (Borrowing)
The “Impossible Tradeoffs” Dilemma
The “Business of Escalations”
What is the “Scarcity Trap”?
What is “The Scarcity Trap” In short, it is a situation where a person’s behavior contributes to the continuation of their scarcity.
Self-reinforcing cycle: Scarcity creates behaviors (tunneling,
poor decisions, borrowing from the future) that actually worsen the original
scarcity, trapping people in a downward spiral.
Bandwidth consumption: Managing scarcity uses up mental
capacity, leaving less cognitive resources for planning, self-control, and
good decision-making.
Elimination of slack: Scarcity removes all buffers and margins for error, making people
vulnerable to cascading failures when small problems arise.
Focus trade-off: While scarcity creates intense focus and efficiency in the short term, it eliminates the flexibility and resilience needed for
long-term stability.
Behaviors that seem rational and like they will resolve the scarcity situation actually serve to perpetuate the scarcity.
We will always fall prey to the scarcity trap. We’re wired for it. Expect it, and plan for it.
Scarcity Trap 101
Scarcity traps emerge from several interconnected reasons, stretching back to the core scarcity mindset.
It is a complicated affair – a patchwork of delayed commitments and costly short-term solutions that need to be constantly revisited, revised, and managed.
Critically, when we’re in a scarcity trap, we do not have the bandwidth to plan a way out of it!
And all of this is compounded by our failure to use the precious moments of abundance to create future buffers.
And when do make plans, we often lack the bandwidth needed to resist temptations and persist in our efforts.
Moreover, the lack of slack means that we no capacity to absorb shocks.
Bandwidth tax reduces cognitive
capacity and executive control. With reduced bandwidth, decisions
become more impulsive and short-
term oriented.
Neglect of concerns outside
of “the tunnel” results in other
important but less pressing matters
receive less attention.
On the Bright Side...
The scarcity mindset offers a more open and empowering framing: Because scarcity is a contextual outcome, it more flexible and therefore, responsive to remedies.
Rather than personal traits, an individual’s actions or “failings” are the outcome of environmental conditions brought on by scarcity.
And these conditions can often be managed!
“The more we understand the dynamics of how scarcity works upon the human mind, the more likely we can find ways to avoid or at least alleviate the scarcity trap.” (p. 144)
This situation may sound or feel hopeless, but consider the alternative explanation...
“The inefficient worker is inefficient because they’re lazy or
they lack skills.”
Designing for Scarcity
Scarcity Mindset
The subjective sense of having more needs than
you have resources.
Scarcity literally and fundamentally changes the way you think by focusing your attention on the thing you lack, resulting in counterproductive (yet
predictable) behaviors.
As a short-term survival strategy, we are biologically wired to fall into this mindset. We cannot escape it!
A situation where a person’s behavior contributes to the
continuation of their scarcity.
Scarcity Trap
Behaviors that seem rational and like they will resolve the scarcity situation
actually perpetuate the scarcity, trapping us in short-term, limiting
thinking patterns.
It is hard to break out of a scarcity trap without being aware that we are in one and planning a way out.
QUICK RECAP
Resource Constraints (Real)
Resource Constraints (Perceived)
Psychological Reorientation
Cognitive Bandwidth Limitations
Absence of “Slack”
Institutional Design Failures
What Creates Scarcity?
The most obvious cause is an actual shortage of critical resources (money, time, etc.), which triggers the scarcity response in our psychology.
In some environments - and particularly those in tech - a simulated or perceived shortage of resources will trigger the same scarcity response. Remember - scarcity is a subjective experience.
Our minds automatically reorient toward managing acute scarcity, an evolutionary response that helped our ancestors survive immediate threats.
Humans have finite mental processing capacity. When scarcity consumes mental bandwidth, other cognitive functions suffer regardless of willpower or character.
A lack of "slack" (reserve capacity or buffer) is critical. Without slack, even small problems can trigger cascading failures as there's no margin for error.
Many systems and institutions are designed without accounting for bandwidth limitations, creating environments that amplify rather than mitigate scarcity effects.
Understanding scarcity’s origins can help us design solutions to address them.
Two Quick Callouts
“Abundance Mindset”
Scarcity is entrenched in T&S work
Cultivating an “abundance mindset” is often identified as the solution to scarcity. This isn’t wrong, but it does put all the responsibility on individuals to manage
scarcity’s effects. And individuals can only do so much if their system isn’t supporting them. Designing for scarcity must happen at the system level if
individual efforts are going to succeed.
This means scarcity can never be fully eliminated. The goal cannot be “eliminate scarcity” in your systems and teams. The actual goal is mitigation. The question is:
“How can better recognize and mitigate the impacts of scarcity in our work?”
Scarcity Mindset
Takeaways
KEY POINTS
2. The Behaviors That Feel Rational Under
Scarcity Often Make Things Worse
3. Slack Is More Valuable Than Optimization
4. Small Interventions Can Break Big Cycles
5. Design for Bandwidth Limitations, Not Perfect Rationality
6. Scarcity Is Contagious and
Context-Dependent
1. Scarcity Fundamentally Changes How Your Brain Works
Scarcity Management in Trust & Safety
Institute "deep work" or “focus” blocks of time where team members can't be interrupted for non-urgent issues
Create rotation schedules so no one person handles crisis response for extended periods
Use time-blocking to separate reactive work from proactive work, and build in breaks for context switching
Create personal decision trees for common scenarios to reduce cognitive load during high-stress moments
1. Scarcity Fundamentally Changes How Your Brain Works
Mitigation: Understand how scarcity works and impacts
everyone. Protect cognitive capacity.
Establish clear escalation paths and decision-making processes to prevent team members from getting overwhelmed by complex decisions
Leaders Individuals
Practice the "pause rule" - take 10 minutes before responding to urgent requests to avoid tunnel vision
Scarcity Management in Trust & Safety
2. The Behaviors That Feel Rational Under Scarcity Often Make Things Worse
Mitigation: Design interventions to interrupt self-
reinforcing scarcity response behaviors.
Build "pre-mortems" into project planning where teams imagine failure scenarios and plan responses in advance
Establish regular "zoom out" sessions where teams step back from daily fires to assess larger patterns and solutions
Keep a "future self" log - before making quick fixes, write down what long-term problems this might create
Set weekly reviews to identify which urgent tasks could have been prevented with earlier planning
Create metrics that track leading indicators (policy clarity, team capacity) and not just lagging ones (incident volume, SLAs)
Leaders Individuals
Conduct root cause analyses and implement a "stop doing" list - actively identify activities that feel productive but don't address root causes
Scarcity Management in Trust & Safety
3. Slack Is More Valuable Than Optimization
Mitigation: Build slack into your work, your teams, and
your thinking wherever possible.
Maintain 20-30% buffer capacity in team workload planning rather than aiming for 100% utilization or productivity
Create cross-training programs so multiple people can handle critical functions
Block calendar time for unexpected urgent work rather than booking every working hour to 100% planned work
Maintain personal playbooks and templates for common tasks to reduce decision fatigue
Establish "investment time" - dedicated hours each week for tooling, documentation, and process improvement
Leaders Individuals
Build relationships across teams before you need them - invest in social capital during calm periods
Scarcity Management in Trust & Safety
4. Small Interventions Can Break Big Cycles
Mitigation: Start small, “scaffold” or pilot interventions,
and avoid “all or nothing” thinking.
Implement the "rule of three" - after handling the same type of issue three times, create an automated solution or clear process
Develop personal automation for repetitive tasks (e.g., scripts, templates, saved searches)
Create a “decision buddy” system to require quick second opinions for high-impact or ambiguous decisions
Create intake forms that force requesters to provide context, reducing back-and-forth communication
Leaders Individuals
Build early warning systems with alerts before problems become critical (e.g., alert when escalation rates increase, when specific violation types increase, when report queue hits 80% of normal daily processing capacity - not 100% - etc.)
Establish emergency response kits with pre-approved actions for common crisis scenarios (trigger criteria, pre- approved actions, communication templates, escalation triggers and paths, etc.)
Scarcity Management in Trust & Safety
5. Design for Bandwidth Limitations, Not Perfect Rationality
Mitigation: Assume and plan for 70% capacity, and “shape the path” to ease cognitive load.
Use decision matrices and scoring systems for policy decisions rather than lengthy debates
Create escalation triggers with specific criteria rather than rely on subjective judgment calls
Use checklists for complex procedures, especially those done under pressure
Create visual dashboards that highlight what's most important rather than showing everything
Implement "default allow" or "default deny" policies to reduce decision points
Leaders Individuals
Batch similar tasks together to reduce context switching
Scarcity Management in Trust & Safety
6. Scarcity Is Contagious and Context- Dependent
Mitigation: Cultivate psychological safety and open discussions of bandwidth and capacity.
Hold regular "capacity check-ins" where team members can flag feeling overwhelmed without judgment
Create psychological safety for saying "I don't have bandwidth for this right now"
Practice "scarcity interrupts" - notice when you or colleagues start catastrophizing or rushing
Share workload visibility with teammates to prevent hoarding of tasks or information
Model abundance thinking by celebrating long-term investments and process improvements
Leaders Individuals
Use language that assumes positive intent and abundance ("How can we make this work?" vs. "We can't possibly...")
The key insight is to treat scarcity mindset as a predictable system condition that requires structural solutions, not individual willpower or
motivation.
Document cognitive load tasks
Reframe "firefighting" costs
Advocate for "buffer budgets"
Bundle small asks strategically
Use risk-based assessments
Time strategic asks accordingly
Strategic Resource Advocacy
Track how understaffing leads to decision errors, delayed responses, and team burnout with specific dollar impacts Present headcount requests as risk mitigation: "Adding 2 FTEs prevents the $500K regulatory fine risk we're currently managing through heroic individual effort"
Show how chronic understaffing creates technical and process debt that compounds over time. Present resource asks as "trap breaking": "This investment breaks us out of the cycle where we're too busy to fix the things making us busy"
Request 15-20% extra capacity explicitly for unexpected work and system shocks Pitch redundancy as resilience: Argue for backup systems, cross-trained staff, and extra tooling as business continuity investments
Pilot programs: Request small resource investments to prove larger concepts ROI-focused resource requests: "This $50K automation tool will save 200 hours/month, freeing up bandwidth equivalent to half of an FTE"
Additional tips for leaders to advocate for resources within a scarcity-prone system
Frame resource needs around specific risk scenarios rather than general "we need more help" Show leadership what different resource levels enable: "With current resources we can maintain status quo, with 20% more we can be proactive, with 40% more we can be industry-leading"
During Crisis: Focus on immediate tactical needs and document everything for post-crisis strategic asks Post-Crisis: Use retrospectives to show how adequate resources could have prevented or minimized the crisis During Calm Periods: build the case for preventive investments
Resources Scarcity: The New Science of Having Less and How It Defines Our Lives By: Sendhil Mullainathan; Eldar Shafir (2014)
“How the Scarcity Mindset Can Make Problems Worse” NPR interview with Sendhil Mullainathan (2017)
Psychological Responses to Scarcity By: Jiaying Zhao and Brandon M. Tomm (2018)
Scarcity mindset reduces empathic responses to others’ pain: the behavioral and neural evidence By: Wanchen Li , Jing Meng , Fang Cui (2023)
The Scarcity Trap: Why We Keep Digging When We're Stuck In A Hole NPR, “Hidden Brain” Episode (2018)