I think Mark Kleiman is a bit too surprised that his local Borders carries Malcolm Gladwell but not Thomas Schelling, the famed economist whose work The Tipping Point rips off. A Nobel Prize is great and all, but until they start awarding one for rhetoric, economists will remain absent from the front tables. That's why, even though I find Gladwell's work a bit grating, I'm happy he's around. Too few writers use their talents to translate academic ideas or social science insights into a format lay readers can understand, preferring instead to gussy up our half-baked thoughts in lavish imagery. Meritocracy of ideas my ass.
With a Nobel Prize to his name, Schelling's already got his recognition, what he needed was some popularization. Gladwell gave it to him, though not with quite the attribution Schelling deserved. The next step is for more overt pairings like Freakonomics' Stephen Dubner and Stephen Leavitt to replicate themselves. What talented thinkers often need are gifted writers. Economists, for all their obsession with efficiency and marginal utilities, should keep a couple more around.
