Smarter Thoughts from the Left Coast
Writing in the Herald of Everett, Washington, economist James McCusker has perhaps the most thoughtful take on the $50 million payoff that I've seen—certainly more so than the Globe or Times.
"Is diversity worth the price?"McCusker asks.
"Clearly," he continues, "Harvard believes in a market-based solution; they plan to buy the diversity they want on the open market. This, however, implies a market-based value to diversity itself, otherwise there is no way to determine whether $50 million is too much, or too little, to spend. Right now, the precise value of diversity is not so important, for $5 million a year is a bargain price to quiet down the row touched off by Summers with his "women in math and science" ruminations. Eventually, however, like all budget items, diversity has to prove its worth in terms of value for the money."
The rest of McCusker's piece is well worth- reading, because he's right, of course. Just how did Larry Summers come up with that $50 million figure? How do you determine how much diversity is too much, if that's possible, and how much is not enough? And how much money does it take to get just the right amount?
Interestingly, McCusker suggests that in trying to answer these questions, Harvard will have to become more corporate, as American companies have been confronting these issues for decades.
Since that's something Summers has been trying to do all along—make Harvard more corporate—this outcome would be no small irony.
