From a non-hacker: why problems that people want fixed haven't been fixed

Well, this turned out to be too long to post without pastebin.

To summarize the long post, fixing problems requires some knowledge of economics and psychology. Having confidence that you've identified the solution, and explained various strange quirks of human behavior, requires even more knowledge of psychology and which strategies can emerge in human society, but I didn't get into that. Basically, we can fix most problems except long-term energy sources by using this system:

"Work up to 24 hours each week is paid at 1.2 times the normal rate. Work after 24 hours is paid at 0.7 times the normal rate."