Postcards From The Edge

Postcards From The Edge

"There's an economics term (it's also used in game theory) called "common knowledge." Olken says that's what they were trying to get to with Raskin. It's a social state where everyone knows the rules of the program and everyone knows that everyone else knows the rules."

"It's not rocket science," says Banerjee. "There's a certain tendency among both social scientists and policymakers to assume that the solution to a complex problem has to be complex, and I don't think that's always true."

Unfortunately, this is less likely to work in regimes where Violence is paired with Corruption/Incompetence, and also less likely to work in complicated systems. For example, the Know Your Rights Campaign in the United States, which is more a Privilege Test than a working set of rules
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2018/07/10/627355954/how-postcards-solved-the-problem-of-disappearing-rice

Comments

  1. Rick Wayne (Author)July 11, 2018 at 10:32 AM

    Interesting. What's crazy to me is that it only went up 26%. I mean, that's a nice boost, but that means they went from ~50% delivery to ~63% delivery.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Drew McCarthyJuly 11, 2018 at 10:36 AM

    Well, Common Knowledge is a good starting point, but it isn't the final answer. Good enough to mend some incompetence and minor corruption. Not enough to eliminate large scale abuse.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Rick Wayne (Author)July 11, 2018 at 10:44 AM

    Sure. I'm just trying to imagine the scope of blatant lies and intimidation that must be occurring where more than 1 out of every 3 bags isn't getting where it needs to go even in a situation where everyone has the facts, and, as the article says, everyone knows everyone has the facts.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Lia SchollJuly 11, 2018 at 12:47 PM

    Why doesn't anyone use the word "fewer" anymore?

    ReplyDelete

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