Title: Freakonomics APA Reference: Levitt, S. D. & Dubner, S. J. (2006). Freakonomics (revised and expanded edition). New York: HarperCollins books. Summary: If Indiana Jones were an economist, he’d be Steven Levitt . . . a maverick treasure hunter who relies for success on his wit pluck and disregard for conventional wisdom. Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? The authors usually begin with a mountain of data and a simple question. Some of these questions concern life-and-death issues; others have an admittedly freakish quality. My Comments: I liked the book’s approach: ask the question why, then see if data supports it. The authors have opportunistically gained access to some obscure data sets, such as the business records of a crack-selling gang, and the testing records of the Chicago school system (which just happened to implement school integration by a method perfect for ecomomic analysis). They use their data to dig to the root cause of a few interesting questions, and the book flows well from the readers perspective. But to me it seemed to be several disjointed papers worked into book format. The authors likely received similar comments after the earlier edition, and have put a couple qualifiers in this one saying “this book really has no central theme”. The bonus material in the back is actually at least 25% of the book’s volume – a series of short pieces that are each good reading. Wielding statistics is really tricky, but their conclusions are compelling. I would have prefered to see less emphasis on naming of children and more on the impact of other individual decisions on collected societal norms. Things like driving records, voting, recycling rates, even holiday shopping trends. Perhaps in the next book! But it certainly got me thinking, and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it too.
Title: Freakonomics
APA Reference: Levitt, S. D. & Dubner, S. J. (2006). Freakonomics (revised and expanded edition). New York: HarperCollins books.
Summary: If Indiana Jones were an economist, he’d be Steven Levitt . . . a maverick treasure hunter who relies for success on his wit pluck and disregard for conventional wisdom. Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? The authors usually begin with a mountain of data and a simple question. Some of these questions concern life-and-death issues; others have an admittedly freakish quality.
My Comments: I liked the book’s approach: ask the question why, then see if data supports it. The authors have opportunistically gained access to some obscure data sets, such as the business records of a crack-selling gang, and the testing records of the Chicago school system (which just happened to implement school integration by a method perfect for ecomomic analysis). They use their data to dig to the root cause of a few interesting questions, and the book flows well from the readers perspective. But to me it seemed to be several disjointed papers worked into book format. The authors likely received similar comments after the earlier edition, and have put a couple qualifiers in this one saying “this book really has no central theme”. The bonus material in the back is actually at least 25% of the book’s volume – a series of short pieces that are each good reading. Wielding statistics is really tricky, but their conclusions are compelling. I would have prefered to see less emphasis on naming of children and more on the impact of other individual decisions on collected societal norms. Things like driving records, voting, recycling rates, even holiday shopping trends. Perhaps in the next book! But it certainly got me thinking, and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it too.
Comment by ebeale — May 13, 2007 @ 6:16 pm