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The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost - How can this poem can be relate to economic concept? Can you give me your insights about what you've understood in this poem?

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cRU Chy answered

It certainly is possible to read into The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost as if it were a commentary on economics.

First look at the text:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And sorry I could not travel both 
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; 

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same, 

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back. 

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
I think the common mistake people make when reading this poem is to assume Frost is advising that people "chose the path less taken" when they reach a fork in the road.

Rather, he is looking back at the choice he made from the future: saying that both roads were equally viable - and that whatever he chooses, there would have been regrets.

So he will look back at this decision, and say he took the path less chosen, as that will justify the decision he made.

How does that apply to economics? Well, I would say that economics is all about making a choice... a leap into the unknown, and then politically spinning it so that your choice was the honorable one, regardless of the outcome. 

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