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$100 Million to Change the World With a MacArthur
Grant
The MacArthur Foundation just announced that it will
award
$100 million to an organization with the best meaningful (and feasible) proposal to use
that money to solve a pressing social problem.
And there are plenty to choose from: In the U.S., homelessness has
skyrocketed in cities, the
number of heroin
overdose deaths have tripled, and the
maternal mortality
rate is steadily rising, to name a few. But is $100
million enough to “solve” a social problem?
*
announce = 발표하다, 알리다/ award = 수여하다/ feasible = 실현 가능한/ pressing = 긴급한; 거절[무시]하기
힘든/ skyrocket = 급등하다/ heroin overdose = 헤로인 과다복용/ triple = 3배가 되다; 3배로 만들다/
maternal mortality rate = 산모 사망률/ to name (but) a few = 두서너 가지 예만
들자면
$100
million은 사회 문제를 해결하기에 충분한가요?
1. Remember,
Money Doesn’t Have to Be the Root of All Evil
Social problems
can be alleviated with cash but a big impediment to doing so is our moral
psychology: trading values against money can make people
uncomfortable.
2. Money Rarely Solves Complex
Social Problems
The millions of dollars spent annually on law
enforcement have not reduced illegal drug use, for example.
3. Fund Locally Developed, Culturally
Relevant Services
Solutions to problems are best generated by
those most affected. They know best why the problem exists, and what needs to
happen in order to solve it.
4. Group
Incentives Can Be Applied to Social Problems
Money can
stretch surprisingly far when it is offered as a reward to a community,
conditional on group — rather than individual —
outcomes.
Sample
Essay
Remember, Money
Doesn’t Have to Be the Root of All Evil
It may cost more
than $100 million, but many social problems could be alleviated with the
creative infusion of cash. Compensating organ donors could increase the supply
of organs and save thousands of lives annually. Paying opium farmers in
Afghanistan and Latin America to grow something else could bring an even larger
dividend in averted addictions and wars. And why not neutralize opposition to
reducing carbon emissions by reimbursing coal miners, or the entire fossil fuel
industry, for their losses?
A big impediment is our moral psychology.
People hold certain values sacred, and the very thought of trading them off
against other goods (particularly via money) is considered heinous. We see this
in metaphors that equate financial transactions with moral treachery: sellout,
buy off, mercenary, whore. In one study, Israeli and Palestinian extremists
presented with a hypothetical peace deal were more opposed — indeed, incensed —
when it was sweetened with cash compensation from the United States and the
European Union.
Fortunately, human cognition is flexible, and the taboo
surrounding a transaction can be mitigated if the transaction is conceived in
alternative ways. Life insurance was once considered an outrage because it
places a dollar value on human life and allows wives to bet their husbands will
die. The insurance industry reframed it as an act of responsibility by husbands,
who would be fulfilling their duty to their families even when they were dead.
People who are scandalized at the thought of paying organ donors in cash calm
down when the compensation takes the form of tuition credits, health insurance
or a retirement contribution.
As technology and globalization generate
ever-greater surpluses while disrupting traditional livelihoods, the challenge
of reallocating money for moral purposes will become more acute. If profits from
self-driving trucks are shared with unemployed truck drivers, everyone wins.
Negative income taxes, a guaranteed income and charities that give directly to
beneficiaries are probably less corrupting than people think, and offer a
pathway to enjoying the windfall of technological advances in the face of
Luddites and isolationists — but only if we overcome the intuition that money is
the root of all evil.