A Different Consensus

Even as the U.S. Senate debates a vast new tax and spend regime in the name of fighting climate change, a more instructive argument was taking place in Copenhagen, Denmark. Some of the world's leading economists met earlier this month to decide how to do the most good in a world of finite resources.

Scarcity is a core economic concept. There isn't an unlimited amount of money to be spent on every problem, so choices have to be made. The question addressed by the Copenhagen Consensus Center is what investments would do the most good for the most people. The center's blue-ribbon panel of economists, including five Nobel laureates, weighed more than 40 proposals to improve the world by spending a total of $75 billion over the next four years.

What would do the most good most economically？ Supplements of vitamin A and zinc for malnourished children.

Number two？ A successful outcome to the Doha Round of global flee-trade talks.

Global warming mitigation？ It ranked 30th, or last, right behind global warming mitigation research and development.

On the benefits of freer trade, it was estimated that a successful Doha Round could generate up to $113 trillion in new wealth during the 21st century, at a cost of $420 billion or less from inefficient industries going bust.

Meanwhile, providing vitamin A and zinc would help some 112 million children in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia for merely $60 million a year. The minerals would help prevent blindness and stunted growth—increasing lifetime productivity by an estimated $1 billion. Similar if not quite so bountiful returns apply to investments in iron supplements, salt iodization and deworming, all low-cost measures that the economists in Copenhagen ranked highly.