The #MakeMeSmart Question: Why input is my favorite word.

Hello, My name is Kyle Wilcox. I'm from Indianapolis, Indiana.

This is my answer to the Make Me Smart Question: What's something you thought you knew, but later found out you were wrong about?

I used to think there was free food. As a kid I just showed up to church events, school events, and family gatherings and I ate the food. I didn't think about it. The illusion of free food is an even bigger deal when you get to college because you're either eating in the cafeteria or you're scrounging for free food.

Over the years I looked back and realized that the food wasn't free after all. My grandma and other family members planned the Thanksgiving dinner. The little old ladies in my church spent hours the night before making food for the church picnic. Not only did they spend money at the grocery store, but they spent their time and love on that food.

In short, making food requires input. In fact, everything requires input. That's why input is my favorite word. No person, no family, no company, no organization, no society, no country, or government can exist without input. In the back of my mind, I always kind of thought that non-profits just ran on love and goodwill, but they don't! Even non-profit public radio stations require input.

And here's the other thing about input. It's not a one and done deal. Everything that lasts, requires continuous input. For example, everyone knows that having a garden is going to take a lot of work and that work will be spread out over the seasons of the year. Just like a garden, anything you want to start is going to take continuous input. An event, a podcast, a business; they all require you to keep pouring into them.

Finally, all economies and societies rely on input. Hunting and gathering, feudalism, mercantilism, capitalism, socialism, and communism. It doesn't matter what system you try to create, you have to follow the law of inputs. Perhaps this is why the free market of capitalism has an advantage over the other systems. Capitalism by default admits that there is a price for everything. Price is the markets way of alerting us how much input is required. Socialism and communism are just trying to pretend that everything is free when it's really not.

And let's not for get that a democracy take input. And liberty and justice for all, takes input. It's not going to happen on it's own. It's up to us.