Agreed, the formation of this habit and expectation is a main danger of adjusting effort to barely scrape by. If it works well enough, to be rewarded for passing (or even excelling) according to a standard, then it can become the default approach. Though it may be good enough to complete a task, it may not be the optimal approach in other aspects of life. For that matter, the current standard or average may not even be up to the level that we actually want to accomplish.
Agreed, the formation of this habit and expectation is a main danger of adjusting effort to barely scrape by. If it works well enough, to be rewarded for passing (or even excelling) according to a standard, then it can become the default approach. Though it may be good enough to complete a task, it may not be the optimal approach in other aspects of life. For that matter, the current standard or average may not even be up to the level that we actually want to accomplish.