Demystifying economics

ON a January morning, a few months before my 21st birthday, a medical doctor sat on the edge of my hospital bed and told me about the surgical procedure I was about to undergo. “To do the lobectomy they will do a thoracotomy. You will be turned on your side . . .” I interrupted the doctor and asked her to explain, in simple, understandable English, what it was they were going to do to me.