Researchers at the University of Chicago and Stanford measured America’s economic growth per person from 1960 to 2010 and concluded that up to two-fifths of America’s increased prosperity during that time can be explained by better identification and allocation of talent.

The University of Pennsylvania psychologist and political scientist Philip E. Tetlock has found that experts are generally terrible at making predictions about future events. In fact, he’s found that the more prominent the expert, the less accurate their predictions. Tetlock says this is because experts’ views are too locked in—they use their knowl... See more

Schools should prepare people to build things, not just to think things.

Conant wanted to create a nation with more social mobility and less class conflict. He presided during a time, roughly the middle third of the 20th century, when people had lavish faith in social-engineering projects and central planning—in using scientific means to, say, run the Soviet economy, or build new cities like Brasília, or construct a sys... See more

What determines a society’s health is not the existence of an elite, but the effectiveness of the elite, and whether the relationship between the elites and everybody else is mutually respectful.

Intelligence is not the same as effectiveness.

“If someone truly is creative and inspiring,” they write, “it will show up in how they allocate their spare time.” In job interviews, the authors advise hiring managers to ask, “What are the open tabs on your browser right now?”

Mehta and Fine profiled one high school in a network of 14 project-based charter schools serving more than 5,000 students. The students are drawn by lottery, representing all social groups. They do not sit in rows taking notes. Rather, grouped into teams of 50, they work together on complicated interdisciplinary projects. Teachers serve as coaches ... See more

Students who have been treated as smart since elementary school may go off to private colleges that spend up to $350,000 per student per year. Meanwhile many of the less gifted students, who quickly perceive that teachers don’t value them the same way, will end up at community colleges that may spend only $17,000 per pupil per year. By adulthood, t... See more