MetaFilter posts tagged with freakonomics

“Easy read” should not mean “easy write.”

RogerB — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 13:07:42 -0800

One of the delights of the books and the blog is the authors’ willingness to play with ideas and consider alternative explanations. But unquestioning trust in friends and colleagues combined with the desire to be counterintuitive appear in several cases to have undermined their work. They—and anyone who wishes to convey economics and statistics to a popular audience—just need to take the next step and avoid, in any given example, privileging one story over all other possibilities.

Freakonomics: What Went Wrong?

Daddy Issues

emjaybee — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 09:27:01 -0800

The Daughter Test. Steven Levitt of Freakonomics decides he's ok with the government restricting things if they're something he wouldn't want his (extremely cute) daughter to do. Kevin Drum responds. Ross Douthat responds. Feminists are squicked. Andrew Sullivan has a roundup as well.

“For a good blow job, a man will do just about anything. What can I do with that knowledge? I have no idea.”

lunit — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:51:06 -0800

How Tech Tools Transformed New York's Sex Trade is an article by Sudhir Venkatesh demonstrating the results from a survey of 290 sex workers in New York about financial matters. Venkatesh and Stephen Leavitt did a similar study in Chicago, posted to Metafilter previously. More information about Venkatesh's research on sex work on his website.

The "No-Lose" Lottery

Jonathan Harford — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 07:43:01 -0800

A simple idea: take an ordinary savings account, but instead of paying interest to account holders, hold a lottery to see who gets the lump sum. Freakonomics Radio investigates Prize-linked savings (PLS) accounts (Part 1, Part 2), which combine two things that seem completely at odds with each other: saving money and gambling. In Highland Park, MI, PLS accounts have been very successful at converting "non-savers" into "savers". Why hasn't it caught on in the US? It's illegal in most states, of course.

Superfreakonomics: It's getting hot in here.

afu — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 20:22:58 -0800

The Freakonomics follow up, Superfreakonomics, contains a chapter on climate change that lives up to the best selling contrarian style of authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner. However actual climate scientists were not pleased with the chapter. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, the book "repeats tired global cooling myths," "unfairly trashes climate models" and "advocates rolling the dice on unproven technology" among other faults. They have also been accused of misquoting climate scientist Ken Caldeira. Levitt and Dubner respond to their critics, Global Warming in SuperFreakonomics: The Anatomy of a Smear. Full critique from climate progress 1 2 3 4 5

A boy named Sue and a girl named Marijuana Pepsi

jaimev — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 09:06:21 -0800

By high school, her name was cool to many. "They were like, 'Oh yeah. Man, I wish I had your name. I love that. I'm going to name my kid after you.' I hear that so much and I go, Lord, please don't do that to that child." --Marijuana Pepsi Jackson [via] Just like Winner and Loser Lane, bad names really don't have an impact on your life.

Insert your favorite euphemism

aliceinreality — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 12:26:00 -0800

Rose George wants you to start talking about waste. And no, she isn't concerned with your recycling habits, your fluorescent light bulbs, or the packaging on your electronics. She's concerned with your, ahem, human waste. Ms. George has written a book on the way both first and third world societies deal with sewage, and now Freakonomics is talking with her about it.

So, how do you spell it?

jourman2 — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 03:37:24 -0800

Freakonomics coauthor/blogger writes about a "spelling mistake" the Economist made in a recent issue. He is corrected within 5 minutes. The Economist responds to his "correction".

This is how we do it.

plexi — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 07:44:09 -0800

"We like to play gladiator. You know what I mean? Let two gangs beat each other up without weapons, and the winner gets to deal on the corner. Or, we grab a bunch of muggers, or maybe two crews who steal cars, and tell them, “Okay, you all fight each other — the one still standing gets to avoid jail.” I know: it sounds awful, but believe me, this really works."

Cops tell Freakonomics "the things that cops do to keep the peace that no one wants to know about.”"

The world's oldest profession in the Windy City.

Sticherbeast — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 12:49:50 -0800

Steven Leavitt and Sudhir Venkatesh, of Freakonomics fame, investigate prostitution. According to the working paper [pdf], prostitutes in Chicago are more likely to sleep with the police than get arrested by them.

Some Light Reading

jourman2 — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 17:20:31 -0800

Hatred and Profits: Getting Under the Hood of the Ku Klux Klan (50 page pdf). Steven Levitt, of freakonomics fame, along with Roland Fryer, has just released a new academic paper that assesses the rise and fall of the KKK from a variety of perspectives. From one of the authors ...It details the rise and fall of the Klan in the 1920s. Incredibly, the Klan had millions of members at that time, and most of them were reasonably well-educated. Based on a variety of data sources, we argue that, despite its size and education levels, the group nevertheless had little measurable impact on society or politics...

Freak Out!

william_boot — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 13:03:51 -0800

The Freakonomics boys have migrated their popular blog to the New York Times. One of their first postings on this new home? Cool Ideas For Terror Attacks. Much lively and angry discussion ensues!

Geek fight

psmealey — Thu, 03 May 2007 10:05:18 -0800

Freaks and Geeks keeping it real. [TNR login=metafilter pwd=metafilter] In late March, New Republic columnist Noam Scheiber posted an article strongly criticizing, among other things, Chicago Economics Professor Steve Levitt's "cute and clever" approach to the dismal science, now famously known as Freakonomics. Levitt replied last week with a post of his own. And now, Scheiber has appears to want some more of this.