Nicholas Gruen and Tom Slee follow up — and generalize from — my post the other day about the details of proposals for presumed-consent organ donation in Britain. Here’s Nicholas:
bq. But for a long time I’ve observed the poor functionality of economics which often gets itself hung up on what’s in the textbooks, rather than trying to use the concepts, principles and techniques enunciated there as a _first jumping off point_ and a tool kit to try to solve problems keeping in mind that the solving of problems will almost always involve a high degree of (non-disciplinary) commonsense.
And here’s Tom:
bq. The common thread is that the big decisions and big ideas make less of an impact than the low-level, detailed specifics of each situation. … It’s a small step from there to saying that people at the top of large organizations (whether they be governments or countries) have surprisingly little influence and that we should not pay much attention to broad pronouncements and grand visions. It’s people dealing with everyday problems that we should pay attention to.
, which is probably the best, and certainly the most accessible, evaluation of the various school improvement efforts addressing the gap in achievement between children from different socio-economic groups. (He’s speaking at Grainger Hall 2120, at 6pm — I strongly recommend our Madison readers to attend).