Democracy is a demanding system. It relies on a single, fragile assumption: That its citizens are conscious, educated, and capable of long-term critical thought.
But critical thought is expensive. Biologically speaking, it consumes massive amounts of glucose and mental bandwidth.
The Vote vs. The Meal
Imagine a voter, let’s call him Raj. Raj works two gig-economy jobs. He has a wife and two kids. His rent is late. His fridge is empty.
A politician comes to Raj and says: “I have a complex 10-year economic plan that will eventually lower inflation through fiscal discipline.”
Another politician says: “I will give you free rice today.”
Raj is not stupid. Raj is desperate. His brain is in survival mode. Survival mode creates Tunnel Vision. It prioritizes the immediate biological relief over the long-term societal good. Raj votes for the rice. Democracy weakens.
The Bandwidth Tax
Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir, in their book Scarcity, proved that poverty and constant worry effectively drop a person’s IQ by 13 points. This isn’t about intelligence; it’s about bandwidth.
When you are worried about food, you literally cannot think clearly. You cannot educate yourself on policy. You cannot engage in civil debate. You react; you don’t respond.
The Proposition: To build a robust democracy, we don’t just need better schools or cleaner elections. We need to lower the Friction of Living.
If we can solve the logistics of food—if we can ensure that every citizen, regardless of status, has access to affordable, high-quality nutrition without the mental tax of securing it—we return billions of hours of cognitive capacity back to society.
That time can be used to read. To debate. To learn. To become conscious.
The Question: Is a society truly democratic if its citizens are too exhausted to understand what they are voting for? Can we fix politics without first fixing the pantry?