Seeking Simple Solutions

Businesses, not-for-profits, and governments frequently tout the importance of finding solutions to our modern world’s most pressing problems. Billions of dollars are spent each year to eradicate disease, reduce hunger, clean up the environment, stimulate job growth, and a host of other worthwhile and important endeavors. In the bestselling book Super Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, the authors include a fascinating chapter devoted to solving big problems in surprisingly simple ways.

They chronicle how maternity ward deaths were dramatically reduced in the mid-1800‘s when doctors and students began disinfecting their hands properly; how inexpensive fertilizer revolutionized agricultural production and feeds billions of people economically; how discovering oil in Titusville, Pennsylvania saved the whale from certain extinction; how vaccines have nearly eliminated frightening diseases like polio; and how seat belts have prevented thousands of automobile deaths since they were first introduced. If lifesaving, life-altering solutions can be developed from taking a common sense and simple approach, why aren’t we nurturing this way of thinking in the public and private sectors?

The simple answer, from my perspective, is too often about money and power. Low-cost or no-cost solutions don’t benefit shareholders, offer recognition to donors, or garner votes in an election. If a societal problem persists, there will always be a market for not-for-profit and government services. Special interest groups will have a platform to raise money, politicians will have a topic for their sound bytes, and charities will have a reason to exist. Perhaps I’m being a bit too simplistic in my assessment but think about the impact on global warming alarmists if science offered low cost solutions to what has been marketed as a doomsday scenario? You might want to read the book to learn just how close some of these discoveries might be.

Simple solutions lack sex-appeal. They turn the curve on an issue without the usual combination of money spent and recognition gained. Perhaps that is why they are so appealing to my way of thinking. If a community problem like homelessness can only be solved through building shelters, opening food banks, and creating a bureaucracy to support the effort it will always remain an issue at arms length. Unless the people living in the community become engaged in changing the systems that contribute to homelessness the best ideas may never surface. Wouldn’t it be best of we didn’t need shelters and food banks in the first place? But what incentive for creative low-cost solutions exists when other people have created jobs and revenue streams that depend on the problem not being solved?

Next month our local community leaders will convene to learn about a process that can help create low-cost, no-cost solutions to social issues. I’m anxious to participate in this event and to observe what emerges from the discussions. Will we leave our need for control and power at the door? Can we start from scratch in addressing our community’s most pressing needs? Will our complacency prevent us from imagining a better and cheaper solution? Changing other people’s behavior is hard, changing our own mindset and behavior is probably even harder. I wonder if there is a simple solution for that?