"Studies prove...."

By Thomas Sowell Wednesday, August 9, 2006


Whenever I hear the phrase "studies prove" this or that, it makes me think back to the beginning of my career as an economist at the Labor Department in Washington.
Secretary of Labor Arthur Goldberg was scheduled to appear before Congress to argue in favor of some policy that the Labor Department wanted enacted into law. Down at the bottom of the chain of command, I was given four sets of census data that had not yet been published and was told to analyze these data for a report to go to the Secretary of Labor... MORE ...