We Must Teach High School Students About Money

(This piece was originally published on Medium). 

Reading. Writing. ‘Rithmetic. The Three R’s. Sir William Curtis of London coined this phrase back in 1795, and it quickly spread to the United States. The ability of students to read, write, and perform basic mathematical tasks, is at the core of that knowledge which our society believes students ought to possess by the completion of their primary education.

Judging by recent test results, American students haven’t come close to achieving mastery in these three areas. The United States ranked below 29 other nations in 10th grade math scores, while a 2012 national assessment found that three quarters of eight and twelfth graders don’t write proficiently. The causes of these dismal results have been debated at length, with commentators and researchers exploring causes ranging from poverty and economic inequality to ineffective teaching.

Yet, English and math aren’t the only topics where improved knowledge is critical for future prosperity and success. It is vital for high schools to teach the basics of financial literacy and money management, so that each graduate can make informed, prudent decisions around managing his or her money, as he or she moves into adulthood.

In 2012, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), a private regulatory body dedicated to supervision of the American financial sector, conducted a national survey, exploring the financial literacy of the American public, and delving into spending and saving habits, as well as overall monetary health.

This study offered some troubling results. In one part, respondents were asked a series of five basic questions, to test their knowledge of core economic issues and concepts. These questions explored several topics, ranging from interest rates to investment risk to inflation, which will impact every Americans over the course of their lives.

Just 14% of those surveyed were able to answer all five of these questions correctly, and 39% answered 4 of the five questions correctly (the average number of questions answered correctly was a dismal 2.88). Success in this quiz varied considerably among different demographic groups, with males, older individuals, those with college educations, as well as whites and Asian-Americans, performing significantly better than others.

FINRA’s findings were released in the same year as a study from the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), which examined the financial knowledge of teenagers. Here, researchers measured the financial knowledge of tenth grade students, in 18 nations (or parts of a nation), including the United States, Australia, Russia, France, and the city of Shanghai, China. American teenagers put on a rather average showing, ranking 9th of those nations surveyed, between Latvia and the Russian Federation. Nearly 18% of American teenagers failed to meet a baseline level of financial proficiency, as compared to an average of just over 15% for other nations in the survey.

What is even more problematic about the test results for American students, is the extent to which a youth’s financial literacy is determined by his or her household’s income. Of all the nations surveyed, the US ranked third in terms of how much a student’s knowledge of basic financial matters, is determined by his or her socioeconomic status, and second in the degree to which family wealth affects a teenager’s financial literacy. Only Colombia fared worse in both categories.

American teenagers also face a massive wealth-based gap in access to basic financial services. 70% of teenagers in the top socioeconomic quartile (the wealthiest 25% of households) held bank accounts, compared to just 32% of those in the bottom quartile. This disparity in banking access was the widest in any of the countries which the OECD studied.

These findings suggests a sort of perpetual downwards cycle, where one’s familiarity with matters of finance is in large part determined by birth and family circumstances, while, at the same time, it can rather difficult to build wealth and advance economically, without this sort of knowledge.

Additionally, far too many Americans engage in harmful financial behaviors, which ultimately cost them more money in the long run. According to the FINRA study, less than half of those surveyed pay their monthly credit card bills in full (with over one third paying just the minimum monthly payment), causing them to go deeper in to debt, while incurring additional charges and fees.

Meanwhile, nearly one third of respondents have engaged in some form of non-bank borrowing, such as obtaining payday loans, auto title loans, or making purchases from a “rent to own” store. These financial instruments often carry exorbitantly high interest rates, which greatly elevates overall borrowing costs. Those who are younger, less educated, have lower incomes, and are from minority groups, once again are more likely to engage in these sorts of behaviors.

Americans also exhibit poor savings habits. 44% of households in this nation are either in debt, have no savings at all, or have less than 3 months of savings, if they were to lose their jobs, or face another financial emergency. Of particular concern is the widespread lack of sufficient retirement funds.Nearly one-third of American workers have no retirement savings at all, while the median retirement savings for those aged 55–64 is a meager $14,500. While those in retirement savings plans based through an employer have fared much better (almost half of Americans in these plans saved $50,000 or more), less than one third of workers in small companies, and under 20% of low wage workers, actually work for employers who offer such plans.

Recent policy proposals have focused heavily on ways to improve retirement options for those whose employers don’t provide such assistance. Without such reforms, a very large portion of retirees will be heavily dependent on Social Security to cover their daily living expenses (which often isn’t nearly enough to live comfortably on). Today, Social Security comprises more than half of the yearly income for over 50% of retired married couples, as well as nearly three quarters of single retirees.

Those at the younger end of the age spectrum face another major challenge:student loan debt. 71% of today’s college graduates borrowed money to pay for their education (compared with under 50% of graduates two decades ago), with the average debt load for those who completed school in 2015 hitting a record $35,000 (making them the most indebted college graduating class of all time). A spike in borrowing by graduate students, and the extensive use of post-graduate government loan forgiveness programs, is also a source of recent concern.

As with so many other social issues, education is a vital part of altering many of these trends. High school is the ideal place to begin this process. During and immediately after those four years, students will face important choices around obtaining student loans to pay for college, entering the workforce, and thus having some income to spend, save, or invest, opening a bank account, and, upon reaching the age of 18, signing up for a credit card with the help of a cosigner.

These decisions are relevant both in terms of their actual financial impact (as seen with college debt) as well as the habits one forms (patterns of spending and saving of earnings). What high school students learn about money will be carried with them throughout their lives.

What should a complete high school financial education look like? It ought to provide students with a practical understanding of the most important “money questions” which they will face soon after turning 18, and just as crucially, offer a core framework for making these decisions throughout one’s life.

This curriculum should also offer a practical look at the basics of debt and borrowing, both for consumer credit instruments like credit cards, as well as loans to pay for one’s education. In particular, the math behind repayment of students loans ought to be explained in more detail, since it is simple to sign a paper promising to make a monthly payment to Sallie Mae, but somewhat harder to envision the long-term impact of such borrowing, particularly in the increasingly uncertain economic climate of this era.

Students must also learn the basics of budgeting, saving and investing their money (including how tools like savings accounts, 401(k) plans, index funds and other investment vehicles work), and gain an understanding of how setting aside and investing money impacts one’s long term financial future.

As a part of this coursework, it is useful to provide a brief snapshot of the way in which macroeconomic trends, such as inflation and interest rates, can affect one’s finances. All of this knowledge plays an important role in building a strong reserve of savings for retirement, or that inevitable rainy day.

Some might argue that this curriculum is too complex for high school students to effectively digest. Yet, as noted earlier, for much of the American public, matters of money and finance are seemingly challenging to grasp, often with detrimental consequences. Thus, it is crucial to break this cycle, and provide people with a head start, familiarizing them with these issues as early as possible.

If it is reasonable to expect high school students to graduate with working knowledge of core concepts in math, reading and writing, all of which are important for a student’s future, there is no reason to shy away from similarly rigorous expectations in a subject which carries lifelong implications for virtually everyone.

It is important to remember that not all poor financial behavior is caused by a lack of knowledge, or an irresponsible, spendthrift attitude. For many Americans, financial insecurity is a fact of life, a product of earnings that are sometimes insufficient to meet basic living expenses, let alone to withstand an unexpected event like illness, or the loss of a job. Real wage growth (that is, earnings increases after taking inflation into account) for the middle class and working poor has been weak to nonexistent for the past several decades, while housing costs remain as high as ever.

Given this situation, it isn’t surprising that outstanding credit card debt remains at near-record levels , or that many Americans make use of payday loans to meet basic expenses, borrow tens of thousands of dollars to meet ever-rising college and graduate school tuition costs, and save little to nothing for retirement or other contingencies. When meeting the costs of everyday living becomes tougher, use of debt grows more common, and long-term financial planning appears to be a distant, unlikely undertaking.

Until we see sustained middle-class income growth, an improvement in retirement savings options, and creative solutions to reduce educational costs and thus student debt, this situation is unlikely to fully change. Real policy reforms are required.

Yet, teaching responsible financial behavior early on, will allow more people to at least partially avoid the dire consequences of inadequate fiscal discipline, and poor money management skills. We can help the many Americans who face a range of economic challenges, make their situation somewhat more manageable. This isn’t a complete solution, but it is certainly a part of any real steps towards greater economic empowerment, and a better overall standard of living.

Reading, Writing, and ‘Rithmetic? All are important skills to have. But, it’s also far past time to add financial literacy to that list. Such knowledge is undeniably crucial for a productive and stable existence.

Let's Fall Down

No child ever rode a bike, hoping to fall down and scrape a knee. Few of us ever answer a question in the classroom, or attempt to solve a challenge at work, thinking it would be nice to end up with the wrong answer, or stumble upon a series of initially unworkable solutions. Yet, from a willingness to experiment, struggle, and face setbacks and failures which we learn from, we can ultimately develop deeper knowledge of a subject. In the workplace, such an approach allows people and organizations to create and innovate, which will increase the odds of a business surviving and thriving well into the future. Lastly, developing a deep familiarity with this learning and work approach will help employees ensure greater career success in their workplaces.

A recent learning experiment, led in Singapore by Manu Kapur of the National Institution of Education of Singapore, found that “productive failure” may be the most effective approach to learning math. In this study, teachers worked with two groups of students, one of which was taught a concept through a traditional lecture method, while the other group was provided with no instructions or guidance, and instructed to work through the same problem in small groups, failing, and ultimately learning, as they went along. In the end, the teacher for this latter group held a “consolidation lecture” to rehash and review concepts gleaned from the students’ work. These pupils struggled quite a bit early on, but ultimately displayed greater mastery of topics covered, than those who learned through the traditional methods of lecture followed by practice.

In a similar experiment, Kapur found that students who learned through an approach of struggle and experimentation (with minimal initial instruction from their teachers), formed a deeper understanding of concepts they had learned, and a stronger ability to solve unique or challenging problems of the same subject type, than those who were merely taught, and subsequently tested for their mastery. Kapur and his colleagues hypothesized that the process of struggling towards an answer activated those parts of the brain which are geared towards more in-depth learning, forcing students to ultimately form a more meaningful understanding of topics they were presented with.

Other studies have shed further light on how mistakes and failure can improve educational outcomes. John Hattie of the University of Melbourne, Australia, conducted groundbreaking research into what makes schools succeed, and learned that one very effective ingredient for academic success is when “Errors and trust are welcomed as opportunities to learn.” Psychologists Nate Kornell, Matthew Hays and Robert Bjork of UCLA, discovered that if students were presented with challenging, unfamiliar questions on a test, which they attempted to work through (but were unable to complete successfully), and were then presented with immediate feedback as to the correct answer, they were more likely to retain the information studied, than if they were lectured in the topic beforehand, and followed by completing an exam. The authors summarized these findings as demonstrating that “Incorrect responses..with well-timed feedback…can actually provide the opportunity for more powerful learning.” . Scientific American further described these findings as showing that “learning becomes better if conditions are arranged so that students make errors.”

Learning through experimentation, challenges, mistakes, and eventual success, is also vital for long-term success in life, because it imbues a student with the persistence and resilience needed to fight through the challenges and setbacks which they will inevitably face in their personal journey.

Pioneering research from Angela Lee Duckworth at the University of Pennsylvania has found that grit, along with self-control, is a major predictor of long-term success. In Duckworth’s understanding, grit is defined as “being able to sustain your passions, and also work really hard at them, over really disappointingly long periods of time…really pursuing something against all odds.” If students are pushed, from an early age, to understand that struggle, challenge, and initial failure are a part of both learning and life, they can grow more resilient and determined, both as students and human beings. Creating such a learning environment, which doesn’t offer easy answers, but rather, demands critical thinking, is a key means of ensuring that this happens.

Aspects of Duckworth’s findings have been put into practice by prominent educators like Dominic Randolph of the prestigious Riverdale Country School in New York, who argues that “The idea of building grit and building self-control is that you get that through failure…and in most highly academic environments in the United States, no one fails anything.” Meanwhile, David Levin of the KIPP charter school network found that persistence was among the key traits in determining whether former KIPP students finished college, and has found ways to cultivate these traits in KIPP’s curriculum.

By developing a school culture which makes use of the findings of Manu Kapur, or Nate Kornell and his colleagues, we can mold not just better students, but stronger, more resilient people, who see that life will present them with stumbles and struggles, which can be surmounted, as long as they keep discovering and trying. That’s vital for eventual triumph well beyond the classroom, and is a far more useful approach than simply giving students direct instructions, and expecting linear progress (something adult life is strangely reluctant to permit).

A mindset of experimentation, and a willingness to fail (and learn from it) can also have a significant impact in the world of business, allowing companies to progress and grow. Amazon offers an instructive case study in how this happens. In discussing how he built his company, founder and CEO Jeff Bezos argued that “If you double the number of experiments you do per year, you’re going to double your inventiveness.” Towards this end, Amazon has tested projects ranging from television advertising to the service which eventually became Amazon Prime.

Some of these undertakings were failures. Amazon attempted a web search service called A9 as well as sales auctions, and found that neither gained long-term traction. Bezos said he was fine with not having these experiments succeed, noting that “If you decide that you’re going to do only the things you know are going to work, you’re going to leave a lot of opportunity on the table.” Bezos expounded further on this philosophy by arguing that a company which conducts a variety of experiments (and measures their results, thus ensuring learning), is more likely to succeed, despite some failures: “Now there are a couple of other things that are essential for innovation and invention that are not as fun. One of them is you have to have a willingness to fail…if you have a willingness to fail, then what you can do is you can ramp up your rate of experimentation.” Clearly, Amazon’s remarkable growth has been driven in major part by this mindset.

Google offers yet another fascinating example of experimentation and failure in action. An analysis by tech blog The Next Web found that 36% of all the products which Google tested or launched (usually through an experimental, beta approach) between 1998 to 2010 were subsequently shuttered. The Next Web praised this experimental approach, arguing that Google’s success “is partially due to throwing a fist full of darts, and seeing what sticks.” Former Apple executive Michael Mace expands on this discussion. Mace believes that Google’s experimental approach is a product of it’s leadership consisting largely of engineers, who hold a deep belief in the power of the scientific method’s ideals of hypotheses, controlled experimentation, and decisions based on data, In a sense, Mace believes, Google functions as “a big bundle of short-term science experiments.”

Perhaps the most well-known example of Google’s exploration-driven culture, discussed in the firm’s 2004 IPO letter, was the concept of having Google employees spend 20% of their time working on projects that “they think will most benefit Google.” Google admitted that “most risky projects fizzle”, but they saw value in such failure, noting that it was often “teaching us something.” Some of those projects, including Gmail, AdSense, and Google News, ended up being major wins for the company.

In the workplace, a culture which allows for innovation through experimentation isn’t merely useful to future growth, but actually, critical for survival. Professor Mark Perry of the University of Michigan — Flint noted that just 12.2% of the corporate giants which appeared on the Fortune 500 in 1955 remained on the list in 2014. Research from Tom Steiner of Baldwin Bell Green and John Davis of Harvard Business School drew even more stark conclusions. A successful American company started in the 1950’s could expect to live for 53 years, while a similarly promising firm, formed in the 1970’s, would last for a much shorter 32 years. For a strong company started in 2010, it’s projected lifespan was a meager 17 years. As Steiner and Davis see it, corporate life cycles will become “shorter and more brutish.”

In this cutthroat environment, businesses must always have new products, services, and strategies in the pipeline, and figure out which of these fresh sparks will best advance their long-term position. Otherwise, they’ll find they’ve been rendered irrelevant, which is a sure sign of impending doom.

Being immersed in this culture of experimentation and learning is crucial to the well-being of the workforce as a whole. The Great Recession decimated millions of jobs, and caused trillions of dollars in aggregate wealth loss for American households. With mergers and acquisitions activity near an all-time peak, employees across many industries face the possibility of being eased out, as a part of efforts to cut costs and improve efficiency. The rise of artificial intelligence , machine learning and robotics may well promise numerous benefits for mankind as a whole, but it also puts a multitude of jobs at greater risk of elimination over the next several years.

Given these circumstances,, there are several strategies which employees ought to master, in order to up their odds of being gainfully employed in the future. One is the ability to quickly master new skills, whether it be a software program or management approach. If, from an early stage in their educational lives, employees learn through the methods discussed earlier, they’ll be more capable of forming deep, lasting mastery of a topic, and will internalize a view that learning something new requires determination, persistence, and falling down a few times.

What’s more, employees who have been immersed in experimental environments at work, will bring to their jobs a mindset of exploration, curiosity, and intelligent risk-taking. With that outlook, these employees can add tremendous value for their employers (just as some Google employees did with their 20% time), and perhaps even start their own businesses in the future, and not depend on the paycheck and whims of their bosses.

The choice is clear. If we wish to grow, as students seeking to become masters of a particular domain, or in our careers, whether working for a big company or launching own startups, we must embrace a mindset of experimentation, persistence, and the life lessons which are derived mainly from mistakes, stumbles and failures. Perhaps Mark Zuckerberg said it best: “The biggest risk is not taking any risk… In a world that changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.” So, let’s get to it. Scrape a knee or hang up an elbow. Try to solve a problem you aren’t totally familiar with. Make a mistake, and learn from it. Get up, and dust yourself off. It only makes us better.

The Mixed Legacy of Edward Snowden

(Attribution: www.nsa.gov)

2013 was quite a year for Edward Snowden. The former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor’s leaks of classified intelligence documents, beginning in The Guardian in June of that year, shed a bright light onto the federal government’s sprawling surveillance state, and in particular, the actions of the NSA .

The world learned that NSA monitored the phone usage patterns (known as metadata) of millions of Americans,by obtaining secret court orders which allowed them to collect customer data in bulk, directly from telecom firms like Verizon. Meanwhile, under the PRISM program, the NSA gained access (again through closed court orders) to the emails, Internet searches, and other online activities of millions of Web users across the globe, including an untold number of Americans. Additionally, Snowden revealed the  interception of data transfers between storage centers of Yahoo and Google, which allowed the agency to become privy to a variety of highly sensitive information.

Snowden also exposed critical information about American intelligence operations abroad. His leaks contained details around American efforts to hack email accounts of Iranian subjects of interest, as well as missions to gain access to computers and files of suspected Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan, Yemen and Africa. Snowden disclosed the details of close, widespread intelligence coordination between the governments of the US and Saudi Arabia, as well as efforts to learn more about Pakistan’s nuclear program, and information which indicated that nearly every phone call in the Bahamas and Afghanistan, is monitored by the NSA.

Speaking with the South China Morning Post in June 2013, Snowden announced that the NSA had engaged in hacking operations against Tsinghua University (one of mainland China’s top institutions of higher education), as well as the Hong Kong headquarters of Pacnet, a company whose fiber optic cables ensure Internet connectivity throughout Asia.

Perhaps even more controversial were the facts Snowden disseminated concerning American monitoring of allies. The world learned that the NSA had spied on computer networks of European Union offices in New York and Washington DC, and intercepted the telephone calls of Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany. Foreign embassies in the United States were also targets of American intelligence efforts, with more than 38 missions being monitored in some form. Many of the embassies surveilled were those of friendly nations like Greece, India and Mexico.

Snowden’s actions had a significant judicial and political impact. Just under two years after Snowden’s initial exposure of information, President Obama signed a bipartisan bill which Congress drafted, to reform metadata collection by the NSA, while a federal appeals court panel in New York found that the NSA’s telephone metadata collection program was not legally authorized (although another appeals court panel, based in Washington DC, declined to reach the same conclusions). President Obama himself acknowledged Snowden’s impact, admitting that, despite his criticism of Snowden’s actions, the debate it prompted would “make us stronger.”

Snowden’s work has also impacted the public’s understanding of privacy. Polling from Pew Research Center found that 80% of those surveyed believed that Americans should be “concerned about the government’s monitoring of phone calls and Internet communications,” while more than 90% believed that consumers have lost control over how their personal information is “collected and used by companies.” At the same time, Snowden’s actions have been rather polarizing, with public opinion sharply divided around whether his disclosures, and eventual defection to Russia, were appropriate.

American technology firms have also been affected. Many foreign companies have raised concerns that due to the NSA’s data collection efforts, their information may not be safe in the hands of US-based firms like Microsoft, IBM and Google. As a result, cloud storage services, and other data management functions offered by American software companies, face significant competitive challenges. Technology consulting and research firm Forrester estimates that the US information technology business could lose as much as $180 billion in potential business, by 2016, due to such concerns.

In considering whether what Snowden did was correct, there is an important dichotomy to keep in mind. What Snowden exposed about the NSA’s actions, as directed towards Americans, was both laudable, and badly needed. However, his leaks about American surveillance activities abroad, was misguided, and somewhat blind to the realities of today’s geopolitical environment.

To understand why Snowden’s actions were, in part, an act of fealty to the Constitution, let’s examine the NSA’s metadata program.  As the Second Circuit Court of Appeals noted in it’s May 2015 ruling, which found the NSA’s collection of telephone metadata from Verizon, AT&T and other firms was not authorized by Congress (and thus illegal), a wide variety of personal information can be revealed here. By knowing with whom an individual makes and receives calls, the government can learn about that person’s relationship status, political and religious affiliations, and overall living patterns. What’s more, thanks to software advances, massive amounts of metadata can be collected and analyzed with relative ease.

Additionally, the PRISM program, which allowed the NSA to gain direct access to emails, Internet searches, and other data, from the servers of Microsoft, Google, and other technology behemoths, was a major breach of privacy. Through PRISM, the NSA gained access to emails, searches, and audio and video chats of millions of people across the globe. While the program was officially directed at foreign targets, with so-called “minimization” procedures in place to avoid spying on Americans, the data of American citizens could be “inadvertently” mined with no real consequences.What’s more, intelligence leaders will not reveal how many Americans were actually spied on during this process.

The standard required to authorize this type of surveillance was rather lax; the NSA merely had to have a “reasonable belief” that the target they were intentionally monitoring was a foreign national; if so, the door to a wider range of monitoring was open. This process could, repeated many times, touch many Americans who didn’t do anything wrong. While all of these acts were broadly authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), FISC is a rather opaque body, with minimal external oversight, and a propensity for approving nearly all surveillance requests by the NSA.

All of the judges who serve on FISC are selected solely by Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, and typically have the same professional background (current federal judges). In deciding whether to permit specific surveillance actions (such as the collection of telephone metadata from Verizon, or the operation of the PRISM program by the NSA), these judges only heard arguments from lawyers for the federal government. The court never has a chance to consider the views of those who advocate for the legal protections which the citizenry is entitled on. The outcomes of this review process have been remarkably favorable to the NSA’s ever-expanding surveillance operations: From 1999 to 2012, a staggering 99.7% of all FISC surveillance request were approved.

These facts, considered in whole, paint a rather troubling picture. We have the NSA collecting and analyzing a wide range of personal information on a daily basis, sweeping in untold numbers of Americans. These activities are being conducted with little in the way of real supervision from either the FISC court or Congress (in fact, there’s been much debate around whether James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, lied to Congress about the extent of the NSA’s operations). In a domestic sense, the NSA seems to be much like what Friedrich von Schrötter once said of Prussia, “not a country with an army, but an army with a country.”

Under these circumstances, Edward Snowden faced two choices. He could continue to collect his ample salary, and lived a life of relative tranquility. Or, he could uphold the oath he took while employed by the government, where he pledged to “defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” Given what we know about the NSA’s actions (especially the Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruling), there is a strong argument that at least some of the NSA’s actions were not only illegal but unconstitutional. Under those circumstances, Snowden acted properly in making Americans aware of their government’s conduct. If we accept his claims, which have been at least partially corroborated, that he repeatedly voiced his concerns to officials within the NSA, prior to leaking documents, then those actions appear even more justified, as Snowden had seemingly few internal options to ensure NSA compliance with the Constitution.

The problem is, Mr. Snowden didn’t just disseminate information about metadata collection of phone calls involving Americans living in Portland, or reveal how PRISM could lead to the NSA’s monitoring of the emails of innocent residents of Toledo. Rather, he allowed the entire world to learn crucial details about how America conducts it’s foreign and national security policy, particularly in matters which have minimal direct bearing on the rights of Americans themselves.

As noted earlier, Snowden made public information about methods through which the CIA and NSA monitor and target suspected terrorists, as well as their operations to spy on foreign nuclear programs. He leaked details surrounding American hacking efforts which targeted Chinese universities, and informed the entire world that the US government listens to communications emanating from the embassies of it’s friends.

While many Americans may deplore these actions, can we truly say that the constitutional rights of Americans are actually violated through hacking into the computer or private network of a valued terrorist target in northwest Pakistan, or efforts to listen to conversations by Mexican or Indian diplomats based in Washington DC? Even the use of drone strikes abroad, despite real questions about their effectiveness, not to mention civilian casualties, only very rarely target American citizens, and thus don’t directly implicate the legal protections every American is supposed to enjoy.

So, why did Snowden chose to expose these facts? His first public interview, published by The Guardian in June 2013, sheds light on his motives. In this conversation, Snowden stated that he was “..willing to sacrifice all of that because I can't in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they're secretly building... I hope this will trigger among citizens around the globe about what kind of world we want to live in.” Snowden argued that the NSA’s actions were ultimately an “existential threat to democracy.”

Snowden followed up on these comments in a December 2013 interview with the Washington Post, where he set forward the idea that individuals should enjoy a basic right to privacy, and freedom from surveillance, whether or not they were American: “I don’t care whether you’re the pope or Osama bin Laden....As long as there’s an individualized, articulable, probable cause for targeting these people as legitimate foreign intelligence, that’s fine. I don’t think it’s imposing a ridiculous burden by asking for probable cause.” Snowden also indicated displeasure at the NSA’s tapping of the cell phone of Angela Merkel and other leaders of friendly nations, noting that  “It’s the deception of the government that’s revealed...you just lied to the entire country, in front of Congress.”

Based on these statements, it seems clear that Snowden believes people across the globe, American or not, should be largely free from intrusive surveillance.Under this framework, the NSA’s actions, in the absence of compelling justifications (i.e. probable cause), are not permissible

In an ideal world, Snowden’s philosophy would be workable, and there would be no reason for the NSA to engage in some of the actions which we’ve seen over the past several years. Unfortunately, today’s reality is far different. In 2015 alone, Americans have been victimized by several large-scale hacker attacks, including a breach at JP Morgan which jeopardized the personal information of 83 million customers, as well as an attack on the IRS, which let criminals to access the tax returns of more than 100,000 households.

We are now faced with the specter of militant organizations engaging in cyber warfare, as seen with an attack by ISIS, which revealed the contact information of American military personnel. Russia and China have also committed major acts of online theft against the data and intellectual property of American companies.

Meanwhile ISIS controls large swaths of criteria in Iraq and Syria, and has recruited thousands of fighters from around the globe, including the United States and Europe. American citizens have participated in suicide bombings in Somalia, Iraq, and Syria, conducted critical reconnaissance for the November 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks, and hatched serious plots to conduct suicide bombings on subways and landmarks in New York City. We haven’t even touched on the very real threat of terrorist organizations acquiring nuclear or chemical weapons.

In this precarious security environment, Snowden’s wish to extend rigorous privacy protections to every person on the planet, American or not, simply isn’t realistic. Requiring the NSA to find probable cause, in order to read the emails of possible hackers in Beijing, monitor the Whatsapp chats of suspected militants in Sana’a, or listen to phone conversations of weapons smugglers in Khartoum, would be harmful to intelligence-gathering efforts.

The NSA must be able to mount a comprehensive, proactive defense of American security. Often, that means allowing one piece of intelligence to lead to another, eventually resulting in the sorts of big breaks which prevent and punish deadly acts of violence. The search for Osama bin Laden offers a good case study of how this works. As with so many human matters, information is often imperfect, and of uncertain initial value. Requiring that the NSA be able to show “individualized, articulable probable cause” might block them from casting a watchful eye towards someone who is of seemingly questionable, but ultimately considerable importance. 

Also, given the volume of data being gathered, and the speed at which surveillance events often move, demonstrating probable cause for each act of intelligence collection, would be logistically and legally daunting, slowing the pace of time-sensitive surveillance efforts.

Let’s remember that Osama bin Laden was eventually found by tracking his courier, in part through phone calls made by the courier’s relatives in Kuwait, to various phone numbers in Pakistan. Under Snowden’s formulation, would there be sufficient probable cause to cast such a wide net on a group of people who weren’t actually terrorists themselves, but whose relative might know one? Arguably not, since that isn’t necessarily “individualized” suspicion. As a result, the bin Laden operation, and other vital anti-terrorism missions, might have never been successfully completed.

Of course, listening in on an Al Qaeda operative’s cousin in Kuwait, is probably not nearly so troubling for many Americans as monitoring the phone calls of the German chancellor, or the Greek ambassador to the US. While these actions make us understandably squeamish, it is important to consider that the interests of America and her allies don’t always fully align, and that allies spying on each other is a longstanding practice, across the globe. The relatively muted reaction of some of America's friends in Europe makes this clear.

Taken as a whole, Snowden’s view of foreign intelligence operations, and more generally, our nation’s actions abroad, appears rather naive. It does not appear to take into account the threat landscape that the nation faces, or the significant logistical challenges posed by the universal application of probable cause.

What’s more, his actions pose a real threat to American spying efforts. Both the former director of the NSA, as well as an independent research report from the Henry Jackson Society, have claimed that Snowden’s efforts harmed American intelligence-gathering and anti-terrorism efforts. Sources within the British government have also asserted that the UK was forced to scale back spying operations in Russia and China, due to Snowden’s leaks.

While these claims must be viewed with a healthy dose of skepticism, given the possible biases and of those making such claims, from an intuitive perspective, it makes some sense. It isn’t hard to understand how broadcasting America’s spying practices to the entire world, might put hostile actors or states on guard, making the collection of intelligence more difficult.

Opposition to Snowden’s leaks of foreign intelligence practices, is not an endorsement of blanket secrecy around American policies abroad. Our citizenry should be made aware of the actions which the government takes in their name, as that is the only means to ensure that our actions reflect our values, and that abuses are prevented.

Daniel Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times in 1971, demonstrating that the Johnson administration had lied to not only the public, but also Congress, about the expansion of American involvement in Vietnam. His actions were justified, because his leaks implicated matters of military policy (the US’ secret bombing Cambodia) which were of clear concern for the many Americans whose children were fighting in Southeast Asia. When the government engages in illegal or immoral actions, as was the case with the Iran-Contra affair, the backing death squads in Latin America, or the Abu Ghraib abuse scandal, it is vital for Americans to know what’s happening.

However, listening to the phone or email conversations of foreign nationals, or their leaders, is hardly an instance of corruption, abuse, torture or murder. More than anything, these are tactics for accomplishing a broader goal (protection of American security interests). As such, the NSA and other agencies must be more accountable to Congress (which must exercise greater scrutiny), in terms of ensuring that their actions abroad are in compliance with the letter and spirit of American laws and values. Clearly, that hasn’t been the case in recent years. As a result, real reforms are needed. However, demanding complete transparency, probable cause for foreign surveillance, and revealing methods of spying abroad, is both unrealistic and ridiculous.

As the years pass, the tides of history will continue to color our assessment of what Edward Snowden did. At this time, however, there is a clear split between Snowden’s revelations around the NSA’s conduct at home, where he acted in defense of the Constitution, and what he exposed about the NSA’s conduct abroad, which was ultimately wrong.