Ideas 2019
Dispatches from the Aspen Ideas Festival/Aspen Ideas: Health
Economics Is Broken
A former economic adviser to Bill Clinton and Barack Obama argues that the field should be focused on maximizing people’s happiness and fulfillment.
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Andrew Harnik / AP A Linguist’s Case Against Socialism
History has made the term vague and unproductive. Should it be retired?
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Steve Helber / AP The Alt-Right’s Tactical Cruelty
The so-called alt-right is characterized not only by its ideology, but also by the cruelty of its tactics. Trump and his allies embrace those tactics.
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Tom Fowlks / Getty Are Small Private Colleges Worth the Money?
Paying for college is becoming more difficult. So is justifying the full-freight cost of some private institutions.
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Yorgos Karahalis / Reuters Philanthropy Serves the Status Quo
What if powerful foundations pushed for radical, large-scale change?
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Virojt Changyencham / Getty How to Speak to Someone Who’s Suffering
A cancer patient wants the world to understand that bad things can happen to good people.
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John Vachon / Library of Congress The Education Deserts of Rural America
The college-completion gap between rural and urban residents is widening.
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John Minchillo / AP Suicide Isn’t Just a Personal Issue
The U.S. has a long history of misunderstanding mental-health struggles.
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Lucy Nicholson / Reuters A Practical Approach to Police Bias
Can changing officers’ default protocols help change minds?
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Nora Carol Photography / Getty / The Atlantic Corporations’ Social Crusades Often Leave Out Workers
All the good PR in the world won’t raise wages or improve benefits for a company’s employees.
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Andrey_Popov / Shutterstock The Architects Redefining Aesthetics
Building design isn’t just about visual appeal.
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Richard Drury / Getty Why Science Can Be So Indecisive About Nutrition
Years of conflicting studies about certain foods and diets tell us a lot about both our bodies and ourselves.
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Shannon Stapleton / Reuters What Gets Lost When Polls Become the Story
As the 2020 presidential-election season gets under way, many journalists are reflecting on how not to make the same mistakes from the last cycle.
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Isabelle Chauvel / Getty The Infrastructure of Joy
Will building delight into cities make them more cloying or more fun?
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Jeff Chiu / AP How to Remember Everything
The world’s most accomplished memorizers insist their powers aren’t an innate gift, but rather a skill that anyone can hone.
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Romeo Ranoco / Reuters ‘We Have Been Lazy on Hate’
Farah Pandith wants the U.S. government and corporations to do more to combat radical extremists as they recruit Millennials.
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Rogelio V. Solis / AP Electric Cars Still Face a Major Roadblock
To wean drivers off gas vehicles, automakers need to help them develop a whole new understanding of what it means to own a motorcar.
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David McNew / Reuters The Biggest Deterrent to Reporting Child Sexual Abuse
Children’s-rights advocates have been working to fix statute-of-limitation laws that stop victims from coming forward later in life.
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Boeing Boeing Won’t Rename the 737 Max
“We’re not focused on branding and marketing. We’re focused on safety.”
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Rick Wilking / Reuters ‘Don’t Go After Old Uncle Joe Too Fast’
Chris Christie’s debate tips
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Demetrius Freeman How American Women Are Amplifying Their Political Power
“I am not interested in building the capacity of people who are in office that want to take away my health care.”
