Case · Unit 2 of 5 · 7 min
Two people, one factory closing
A large employer in a small town announces it is closing. A trade policy is being debated in the capital that would, over a decade, likely raise national income while accelerating exactly this kind of closure.
Anna, 54, in the town
- Her father worked there, and so did she for 22 years.
- Everyone she knows will be affected within a year.
- She has watched two nearby towns not recover.
- "Ten years of national growth" is an abstraction; her mortgage is not.
David, 34, in the capital
- He reads the aggregate figures and they are genuinely good.
- He has never watched a town lose its centre of gravity.
- His skills transfer easily; he has moved cities twice.
- "People can retrain" sounds practical because it was for him.
Neither is stupid. Neither is lying. They are weighting differently because they are standing in different places, and each finds the other's weighting incomprehensible precisely because they cannot see the ground the other is standing on.
What understanding unlocks
If David understands Anna, he stops arguing about aggregate growth and starts talking about transition support, timing and who bears the cost. That is a conversation that can actually go somewhere. The argument about whether the policy is "good" cannot.