A few weeks back, just as I finished up my stint as a journal editor, I asked a former University of Chicago economics professor to serve as an anonymous referee on a paper.
Usually I wouldn’t ask someone in his eighties to be a referee, but the last time I used this fellow (when he was just a young turk in his late seventies), he wrote one of the most insightful referee reports I ever received. He took a paper that I had a hard time understanding, distilled it, and then explained how it could be redone much more simply to accomplish the same goal. I made the authors redo the paper exactly along the lines the referee recommended.
In fairness, the referee should have been a co-author.
Anyway, when I asked the octogenarian economist if he could referee a paper for me, here is the response I received:
Much as I would like to do a review of this paper, my schedule looking ahead for as much as a year is just too crowded. Maybe next time!!
I hope when I am in my eighties “too busy” is the reason I am turning things down!
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Prof. Levitt, you ought not to be surprised. An academic who takes the time to simplify a paper and let’s others take the credit for it while in his 70s would certainly be very busy for the rest of his life. There should be an alternative to the John bates Clark medal for such an Octogenarian.
Eighty is the new sixty! My father (age 88) just got married last week. In the last year he has vacationed in Croatia and Costa Rica as well as numerous places in the US.
I hope I’m as active when I’m that age.
Steve Levitt is one of the great economic genius that our youth today should begin to study. His financial wiz is a tale in growing someone’s business model.
http://www.alexesguerra.com
http://www.recycleworld.info
This blog entry inspires a suggestion: Perhaps a brief explanation of what it means “to referee a paper”? I’m sure a lot of Freakonomics readers know what it is, or can infer it from what you describe here, but a (brief) explanation might be in order for the uninitiated.
Perhaps additionally a more general explanation, for non-academics, of how papers get selected, edited, and published in journals? Again, I don’t think it needs to be extensive, just an outline of the steps in the process.
People might then have a sense of the value academic papers have, when they’re mentioned here (which is frequently).
Steven Levitt,
You said that you normally wouldn’t ask an 80-year-old. I suggest that what some of our elders may now lack in intant recall (it’s slower now) and fast talking, they MORE THAN MAKE UP in distilled wisdom, experience, and knowledge.
If I were a CEO, I would make it a point to hire LOTS of elders. They know about hard work, aren’t afraid to tell it like it is, and have a greater depth of experience and ideas to draw from.
In fact, if it were up to me, you’d have to be at least 50 (preferably 60) to be President. That means you’ve seen the horrors of war, know the folly of man to a certain degree. At least one would hope.
And though I am a strong conservative, I have the utmost respect for Senator Byrd. He, almost alone it seems, understands that the Senate doesn’t work FOR a President, but WITH a President. He “gets” the Constitution. And for any flaws I may see in him, I esteem him as one of very greatest Americans.
Hooray for the old guys!
Just tell us what the paper is about already so I can predict an episode plot for “The Wire”, should they ever bring it back on the air.
Gary Becker? Lucas? Fogel would be busy, but I can’t imagine him refereeing too many papers. The smart money is on Becker.
As much as I want to have lots going on when I’m in my 80s, I’m already thinking about how to minimize how severely my absence will affect the people I case about – and I’m only 46. That is the first thought that popped into my mind when I read this. But I suppose that it’s possible to be quite busy making valuable contributions, without a potential disaster if the contributions stop suddenly.