frugality

Use it up
Wear it out
Make it do
Or do without

We can't afford to spend any more money on equipment. It would be too expensive to have it repaired, we'll have to make do. In my company's perpetual assessment of what we can afford, human labor is assumed to be without value. It's not that they don't pay people's salaries. It's just that an awful lot of managers can look at a 2-person job that might take 3 hours less time with a $5 tool, and think, "Great! We can save $5 here!" It's not even like the situation we sometimes faced in grad school, where the $5 simply wasn't there to be had. It's a matter of values and priorities.

I've spent^H^H^H^H^wasted a lot of the past 2 days dealing with the shortage of basic hand tools. Most days, I work with the instruments in the laboratory, and I adjust them with the tools we keep in the lab toolbox. But now I'm working with another instrument, in a room at the other end of the building. When I need to clean it, I have to get the little brush, and the spray bottle of water, and the little pliers from the lab. And the trowels and funnels for refilling the reservoir. These are instruments that people use several times every day -- I thought there must be tools for cleaning and adjusting them nearby, but I was wrong. Every time someone uses the instrument, there's another search for the tools, or at least an interruption of work to walk across the building and borrow tools that belong elsewhere.

I don't know what makes a community response to scarcity. I've been in several medium-sized groups like this, 50-200 people who know each other and are making some kind of common cause even if they didn't exactly choose to be together. Some groups share freely, or trade. Others hoard. Others have most of the individuals turning very secretive, so they don't feel like community anymore. I guess that's a response to hoarding and theft, but it's sad.