Thomas Sowell, one of our greatest contemporary economists and social theorists, turns ninety-five years old today. As he celebrates his birthday, I would like to reflect on a few of the lessons I have learned from his work.

If forced to summarize Sowell’s many articles, books, and interviews in a single sentence, one might turn to Hosea 4:6: “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” In an age dominated by emotionalism and what Sowell termed “moral melodramas,” evidence-based arguments and logical reasoning are often disregarded. Sowell’s work stands out as an oasis in this barren intellectual landscape, continuing to guide thoughtful people towards truth—or at least towards a process of approaching it.

One of the first lessons I learned from Sowell is the importance of sustained critical thinking and the habit of continuous questioning. In his work, he practiced both rigorously. For instance, he often wrote about how disparities between groups are far more complicated than what common parlance would have one believe. In several of his books, he compares income levels between two different groups. Suppose that observation reveals that incomes in Group A are much lower than in Group B. It can be tempting to attribute such disparities to specific historical injustices—slavery, for example. But, as Sowell cautioned, before accepting that disparity equals discrimination, what he called the “reigning non sequitur of our times,” it might be wise to consider what other factors could be causing the disparity.

For Sowell, one easy check for such alternative causes is to look at the median age of each group. Median age can vary drastically by group and strongly correlates with income. Sowell asks, “Why should anyone expect a nation where half the population are infants, young children and teenagers to have the same work experience and education—the same human capital—as a nation where half the population is 40 years old or older?” This seems obvious when we think about it, but many refuse to entertain these other factors. Predictably, such demographic differences result in unequal economic outcomes, but trying to eliminate these differences ignores the reality that underscores them. As Sowell reminds us, it is hardly unjust to say that teenagers have lower incomes than forty-year-olds.

Beyond median age, Sowell applied this same rigorous scrutiny to a range of issues, taking into account the complex web of factors that must be considered when examining disparities and inequalities. In comparing African and European development, Sowell notes the dramatic difference between their respective coastlines. The European coastline is not only longer but is also shaped in a way that provides more protected inlets for ships. Sowell draws attention to the fact that these unequal coastlines—to say nothing of the many other geographic differences—are bound to influence trade, transportation, and economic development and ultimately affect outcomes. For Sowell, “No part of reality is more intractable than geography, or more oblivious to our desires for equality.”

Sowell’s work serves as an important reminder that wisdom lies not only in having extensive knowledge but in recognizing the limits of that knowledge. Despite his brilliance, Sowell was wary of the illusion of total understanding, especially when it came packaged as perfect answers or grand “solutions” for societal problems. Too often these “solutions” come from presumptuous “anointed” elites making decisions on behalf of the “benighted” masses. In The Vision of the Anointed, Sowell shows how such top-down “solutions”—from the war on poverty, to public health and criminal justice reform—often worsen the very problems they aim to fix, with consequences paid by the intended beneficiaries rather than the policymakers behind them.

Sowell’s critique of minimum wage laws illustrates this point. While intended to protect workers from exploitation, these laws often end up hurting young, inexperienced job seekers. Faced with higher labor costs, employers are less likely to hire workers who require training. As a result, the “solution” of minimum wage laws imposed a significant barrier for teenagers—especially black teenage males—who bore the cost of unemployment during a pivotal period of their lives when work experience is as important as idleness is destructive.  

Sowell insists that in recognizing the limits of our knowledge, we must come to terms with the reality of costs: “There are no solutions; there are only trade-offs.” Every choice—whether in the pursuit of justice or anything else—involves weighing costs.

Sowell wrote volumes on this theme, and while it’s difficult to condense this concept, I believe the birth of one’s child helps to crystalize it. I remember holding my first child in 2022, in the aftermath of George Floyd’s tragic 2020 death and the rioting that ensued that summer. In this moment, I was alive to the problematic world that the “zealots” of social and cosmic justice had made. These so-called “advocates” of justice had created “a society in which some babies are born into the world as heirs to grievances against other babies born the same day—blighting both their lives.” Before any measurable “content of their character,” my daughter and these other children were condemned by the “color of their skin” to guilt or victimhood, a far cry from Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream.

Sowell believes that “life does not ask us what we want. It presents us with options.” We may seek a world of cosmic justice, but prioritizing abstract ideals over practical reality ignores the very real costs involved. Sowell continually points out the societal price of pursuing a noble ideal of social or cosmic justice with no awareness of downsides. 

Finally, Sowell taught me how easy it is to be “often wrong but never in doubt.” He understands the human condition to be marked by imperfection—one in which error is easy and certainty is dangerous. I believe that Sowell would agree with Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s claim that “the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.” Without acknowledging this reality, we are trapped thinking that “problems exist only because other people are not as wise or as caring, or not as imaginative and bold, as the anointed.” This mentality leads to even worse problems since it takes away people’s ability to think and make decisions for themselves, and instead allows the anointed elites—who are “often wrong but never in doubt”—to think and decide for us.

Such was the case for black students at MIT. Pointing to the “solution” of affirmative action, Sowell notes that while black students at MIT were in the ninetieth percentile in math proficiency on average, other students at MIT were in the ninety-ninth percentile. “The outcome was that 24 percent of these extremely well-qualified black students failed to graduate at MIT, and those who did graduate were concentrated in the lower half of their class,” he writes. Black students who were almost certainly way better at math than you or I but not quite at the level of MIT math struggled or failed because others wanted to right some historical injustice. “In most American academic institutions, these same black students would have been among the best students on campus,” Sowell argues. Citing data from medical licensing and bar exams, Sowell points to the value of students attending a college “where the other students had education preparation similar to their own,” whether elite or not. For him, “helping” students by placing them in a school above their ability actually hurt such students.   

These are only a few of the many lessons Thomas Sowell has taught me. His work covers a vast range of topics, and in this essay I’ve barely scratched the surface of his depth of evidence, logic, and reason. Anyone seeking clarity in these difficult times would be wise to read Sowell carefully. Commenting on the economist George J. Stigler, Sowell once noted that his “wit was the wit of distilled wisdom.” The same can be said of Sowell, although Sowell’s wisdom far outran his wit. Those content to allow the destruction wrought by a lack of knowledge will continue to ignore Sowell. But for those following the example of Thomas Sowell, we may hope that our wisdom outrun our wit, and our knowledge outrun our destruction.