In his 1869 book on The subjugation of womenwrote the economist and political philosopher John Stuart Mill that he had “rejected the idea that it was surely known that there is any natural difference in the average strength or direction of the mental capacities of the two sexes, much less what that difference could be. difference.” Whatever the differences, the political implications should still be what Mill thought.
An article in The Economist suggests that women may be better doctors than men. It cites a number of recent medical studies that conclude that female physicians achieve better medical outcomes in terms of patient survival and hospital readmissions (“Are women better doctors than men? Research suggests yes”, August 7, 2024). The data includes hundreds of thousands of medical records in Canada and the United States. The Economist notes that they were retrospective studies, which are less reliable than the controlled and randomized studies. For example, it could be that female doctors included in the studies, for whatever reason, are assigned the least severe cases, which would be controlled in a study in which doctors are randomly assigned to patients.
But why is it important to know whether women or men are better doctors? The question seems odd, except perhaps to hospitals, clinics, and medical groups who, if discrimination were allowed by law, would be interested in hiring the most efficient physicians—which would push female physicians’ salaries above those of their less efficient male counterparts are printed. Since sex discrimination is illegal in hiring (we would now say ‘sex discrimination’, which has the advantage of avoiding a culturally hated three-letter word, but I’ll stick with Mill’s terminology), there should be be another reason why the question was asked become a research agenda.
In a free society, the question of whether men or women are better doctors would have no philosophical or political implications, regardless of genetic or social causes. (Once the assumed productivity difference is priced into wages, it would also be of little interest to business, because prices would provide sufficient information.) The question would be no more important than whether left-handed or right-handed doctors are better.
Now it seems pretty obvious, doesn’t it, that women are genetically more empathetic and caring than men. The Economist suggests that information about the relative competence of men and women as physicians would help male physicians change what they are not doing well. But then you would think that the same kind of research for other social groups – for example, white doctors versus black doctors or left-handed doctors versus right-handers – would be just as useful. Why isn’t that the case? Certainly, such studies further reinforce the cage of group identities, but this should not be a problem for our group-loving intellectual establishment, apart from the fact that some groups are more beloved than others.
I obviously agree that whatever research question one chooses to investigate is his own business, although the question is whether the researcher should force others to fund his research. I’ve discussed this issue in a few previous EconLog posts, for example about how fake scientific journals are helped by government funding of higher education. Freedom of inquiry is the only way to know as best as possible that no important question has been neglected.
Given the zeitgeist of our time, we may wonder whether the studies on the relative efficiency of male and female doctors would have been published if they had discovered that male doctors are better. Or perhaps such studies have been buried by professional and academic journals? Imagine the headline in the press: “A government-sponsored study claims men are better doctors than women”! Mrs. Grundy (whose views have changed with the times) would be rolling in her grave. In this area, as in others, a free market for ideas is essential to the search for truth.
Let’s return to John Stuart Mill and how he… formal freedom for women to compete with men in all professions, a more enlightened approach than the compelling one we are now used to. In The subjugation of womenas I wrote previously on this blog, Mill argued that the emancipation of women would benefit everyone in society (or, should we say, would conform to general rules beneficial to all) by allowing everyone to contribute contribute to the activities in which he or she is involved. perform best. Mill viewed discrimination against women as harmful or unnecessary. It was harmful if it prevented women from competing and proving that they were better or as good as their male counterparts. It was redundant if women could not or did not want to compete in certain jobs or tasks, such as garbage collectors. Mill saw no reason to prevent women, especially with discriminatory laws, from competing in any field, but also no reason for the government to help them. What is important is the formal freedom to compete, whatever the outcome, whoever turns out to be better at responding to market preferences.
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Those who have struggled with DALL-E will understand my frustration. The statue was to show male and female doctors on each side of a wall. But the bot didn’t understand. For example, for over an hour I tried to get him to replace the standing woman on the men’s side with a male doctor, or at least replace the woman’s head with a man’s head. I tried to teach the robot the secrets of life and the basics of anatomy. I finally gave up. Here is the image, in all its robotic imperfection.