An age-old conundrum regarding raising children is the issue of nature versus nurture.

That is, do genes determine a child’s success in life, or is it the environment in which that child is raised?

Or, even more fundamentally, is intelligence genetic, or can education increase IQ?

James J. Heckman, a Nobel Prize-winning economist from the University of Chicago, poses his own variant of this question.

It’s not an issue of nature versus nurture, but rather what kind of nurture.

In a departure from what one usually expects to hear from an economist, Heckman’s life’s work is about the importance of early education and the great return on investment of early education and intervention in a child’s life. By early, we’re talking about from birth to five years old. Per Heckman, the earlier the intervention, the greater return on investment.

Heckman emphasizes that it’s not just what is taught but also who does the teaching. He emphasizes the importance of family and parents, and, from what I discern, he seems to particularly........

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