The Last-Mile Problem

Getting the results of research into the hands of people who need them

The ‘last-mile problem’ refers to the challenge of moving products from the most remote warehouse to the customer’s doorstep. The “last mile” is “the most expensive and time-consuming part of the shipping process,” writes Insider Intelligence. And yet it is absolutely critical to the customer’s satisfaction. It doesn’t matter how good your product is, if you can’t get it to the final user.

We have an analogous problem in academia, it seems to me. Academics are really good at many things: coming up with ideas, confronting them with evidence, and building theories. We’re practiced at talking to each other, reviewing each other’s work, sharpening our arguments, and developing our views. We’re skilled at getting our work into journals, where other academics (and the people who review our salaries) can read them.

And yet, we’re not very good at getting our ideas into the hands of the people who need them. The last-mile problem is the challenge of moving ideas from our warehouses (academic journals) to the doorsteps (hands) of the customer (end user). This part of the process may be the most difficult. And our results aren’t going to do much good if they don’t reach the people who can use them.

It’s not as though academics like myself don’t care. Many of us hope our ideas will be of use to people outside of the ivory tower. We end our papers with a note about what the results mean for policy. We express the wish that the suggestions will prove useful. Our grant applications include sections on “impact,” where we explain in what ways our work will benefit society.

It’s just that we have little idea about how to get from here to there – from academic journals, which are often obscure, unreadable, and behind paywalls, to the people who can use them to live better lives or to make the world more just, free, and equal, or whatever. We just don’t know how to overcome the last-mile problem. (Teaching may be an exception, depending.)

There’s an obvious explanation. Academics like myself have little training in solving the last-mile problem. It may not be in our job description. And even if we turn out to be good at it, there’s little recognition to be had that way.

Much of my work the last few years has been focused on solving the last-mile problem. My trade book, How Economics Can Save The World was an effort to reach people who otherwise wouldn’t pick up a philosophy or economics book. I’ve got this substack, which I update irregularly. I try to appear on podcasts when I can, as in this conversation with Chris Williamson:

At the time of writing, our conversation has 43,000 views on YouTube alone.

But still, there is so much to do. The next couple of weeks, I’ll be trying a whole new approach, so stay tuned. In the meantime, if you have suggestions for solutions – however unorthodox – I’d love to hear from you!