Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Million-Dollar Murray

Malcolm Gladwell wrote an interesting article for The New Yorker about the problem of what to do with the chronically homeless. He tells the story of Murray Barr whom he estimated used more than a million dollars in medical services during his ten years on the street. It would have cost less to give him his own apartment and a full time caretaker.
“It cost us one million dollars not to do something about Murray.”

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Gladwell wrote books called "The Tipping Point" and "Blink" that are interesting.

Arloa Sutter said...

Yes, I've read them both and highly recommend them. Especially the Tipping Point. I have the Harvard Rapid Cognition Test mentioned in Blink as a link on the right.

Westy said...

Very intriguing article. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts, Arloa.
You can check out my own rundown of the article here.