Over the Christmas holiday, there were many angry and frustrated customers who were told that the packages they had expected to arrive by Christmas eve did not make it on time. Both UPS and FedEx experienced problems with their deliveries. They were overwhelmed by an unexpected surge of last-minute orders and could not get them delivered as promised.
As the refunds and apologies flowed, there also began a groundswell against the victims. Many people declared that they were also at fault for their poor planning or trusting in the promises of the merchants. Virginia Postrel at Bloomberg Online offers a different opinion in her article, "Two Cheers for 'First World Problems'".
A "First World" problem is an inconvenience as opposed to a life-threatening situation. Cholera and malaria strike in the developing world. First world problems are annoyances like bad wi-fi connections or no parking spaces at the mall. Ms. Postrel argues that these complaints are actually positive indicators of progress:
Now think about the Christmas deliveries. Is it reasonable to expect gifts ordered from Amazon.com on Dec. 23 to arrive at your grandkids’ house across the country on Dec. 24? A generation ago no one would have thought so. No one would have expected a mail order to be delivered overnight, especially during the Christmas rush. Just getting it out of the warehouse would have taken a few days. But that has changed....
It took years of sustained efforts by online retailers and delivery services to make overnight orders realistic. It also took dissatisfaction: insanely demanding companies working to please insanely demanding customers -- or, in some cases, to offer customers services they hadn’t even thought to ask for -- as each improvement revealed new sources of discontent.
She goes on to explain that since nothing is perfect, it is natural to expect (and possibly demand) change.
Rising expectations aren’t a sign of immature “entitlement.” They’re a sign of progress -- and the wellspring of future advances. The same ridiculous discontent that says Starbucks ought to offer vegan pumpkin lattes created Starbucks in the first place. Two centuries of refusing to be satisfied produced the long series of innovations that turned hunger from a near-universal human condition into a “third world problem.”
Complaining about small annoyances can be demoralizing and obnoxious, but demanding complacency is worse. The trick is to simultaneously remember how much life has improved while acknowledging how it could be better.
May all your problems be First World!
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