Cutbacks


Management decided that the workers were drinking too much tea. Specifically, the various types of tea that sat in the cabinet in the break room, which Management paid for. Management decreed that from now on there would be fewer choices of teas. There would only be black and green, caf and decaf. And no honey. That cost too much, too. The idea was that with fewer choices, people would drink less tea. Or if they missed their favorite flavors, they would purchase their own.
The financial outcome has not yet been determined. The question persists: Why does Management assume that people will buy and bring their own? Why wouldn't it assume that in these austere times, the workers would be frugal, sighing and drinking the same amount of tea as before, accepting the fewer choices?

It could turn out that Management will pay the same as it always has for tea, except that more of the budget will go toward basic tea and none for herbals and relative exotica.