What If Thinking

We get stuck in a rut in our thinking. We simply assume things are the way they are for a reason, and that's good enough. (It's actually necessary to think like this--you can't go around questioning everything all the time.)

For instance, we just assume certain jobs come with tenure. Why? Why should any job come with such a guarantee? If it's such a good idea, should more jobs have it?

Over at the Becker-Posner blog, there's an interesting discussion of the issue.