Economics and economists have the reputation of being dry, dusty old ideas and men with no more life to them than an Egyptian mummy on display in a museum. But Freakonomics brings fresh life to the subject and at the same time encourages its readers to think outside the box or break the mold of conventional thinking.

A series of six hilarious chapters challenge our assumptions on everything from drug dealers to school teachers to parenting. Using statistics and new interpretations, the authors Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner help us view our world with altered eyes, recognizing that truisms and cliches are not necessarily reflections of reality. In today's world of crashing stock markets and neighborhoods full of foreclosed houses, its good to take a fresh look at economics and the long time assumptions we have all relied upon far too long.

No theme, no logic thread, but some truly original takes on how the world works, from the standpoint of a "rogue economist." Some topics, like how Roe v. Wade is the strongest explanatory variable for America's decrease in crime, just keep coming up, but still, there are lots of common-sense-defying revelations that keep it interesting. For instance, did you know that time spent reading to children does not correlate to improved test scores, but that the number of books in the house does? Did you know that crack-dealing inner-city gangs are run much like corporate America -- except they offer a slightly higher risk of fatality? Whether or not you agree with the authors' conclusions, these, and a slew more of such revelations, make for an entertaining and thought-provoking read indeed.

Everybody knows that economics is about measurement and money and things numerical; that's why most of us find it so damned dull.

But as approached by offbeat economist and Freakonomics co-author Steven D. Levitt, economics is also "the study of incentives": what it takes to get us to do a certain thing--or to not do it, as the case may be. Which makes it human, and therefore fascinating.

This is what I love about this delightful book by Levitt and journalist Stephen J. Dubner: that it comes at things sideways or upside-down or head-on, but never the usual way. I'm still not sold on some of the more radical hypotheses Leavitt coaxes from the data (the link between abortion and falling crime rates being the most widely reviled and quoted), but I'm 100% there on the importance of throwing the numbers against conventional wisdom to see what sticks. The numbers may not always tell the exact truth, but neither do they lie, making them extraordinarily useful in the exploding of myths.

Levitt and Dubner tell fascinating stories about how to combat crappy teaching, bring down the Ku Klux Klan and what happens when you call your kids "Winner" and "Loser" (answer: not necessarily what you'd think on any count). But really, they've written a book celebrating the heart of truth: asking questions, and hacks to stay open to the real answers.

As an interesting side note, the prospect of reading something that seemed like it would rock my world long and hard was too enticing to wait for a library copy to become available, but not enticing enough to get me to part with $26 of my hard-earned money. My break point? A 25¢/day rental from the Beverly Hills Public Library, and pushing the rest of my reading to the bottom of the pile. Some might call that cheap, but I'm betting Levitt would come at it sideways and say that I was already giving up time I'd committed to other reading to explore this book, and therefore it was of great value to me.

And you know what? He'd be right.

Freakonomics addresses many diverse topics. The thing that ties the book together is the interesting kind of questions it examines and the unique blend of intuition, logic, and statistical analysis it uses to answer these questions. This book is enjoyable to read and describes many rather nerdy concepts in easy-to-understand language.

Of the twenty or so topics the book addresses, four were especially interesting to me: rigging of Sumo wrestling matches, cheating by public school teachers on their students' proficiency exams, the drop in U.S. crime rates in the 1990s, and family attributes that correspond to children's educational success. The first two analyses identified statistical anomalies in patterns of wrestling match outcomes and test answers that demonstrated probable corruption in the world of Sumo wrestling and cheating in the Chicago public school system. The third and fourth analyses were the most impressive in the book. Each considered about a dozen variables that might be related (causally or otherwise) to crime rates or educational success and used regression analyses to determine which ones were in fact related.

The analysis of the drop in crime rates in the 1990s is probably Steven Levitt's best known and most controversial work. His analysis shows that four factors were likely responsible for the decrease in crime: harsher prison terms, increased hiring of police, the crash of the crack cocaine market, and the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion decision. Levitt concludes that the first three factors were responsible for approximately 33%, 10%, and 15%, respectively, of the decrease in crime. He does not attach a specific weight to the Roe v. Wade decision, but presumably it accounts for all or most of the remaining 42%. The factors that did not contribute to the decrease in crime included tougher gun laws, increased use of capital punishment, and innovative policing strategies (such as the oft-touted New York City strategy of going after petty crimes to signal that no crimes would be tolerated).

The theory behind the Roe v. Wade contribution is that widespread abortion removed from the population many of the very people (unwanted children) most likely to commit crime when they became teenagers and young adults. This theory has disturbed many people of all political persuasions, apparently because it provides ammunition to both sides of the abortion debate. In addition, some economists have argued that Levitt's analysis has technical errors significant enough to invalidate his conclusions. I don't know whether or not Levitt has effectively responded to these economists. As for the political controversy, Levitt has basically stayed above the fray, stating that, "The numbers we're talking about, in terms of crime, are absolutely trivial when you compare it to the broader debate on abortion. ... So, my own view...is that our study shouldn't change anybody's opinion about whether abortion should be legal and easily available or not. It's really a study about crime, not abortion." (Source: Wikipedia.)

The analysis of family attributes that correspond to children's educational success concludes that six factors are positively correlated with success: the parents are highly educated, the parents have high socioeconomic status, the mother was at least 30 years old at the time of her first child's birth, the parents speak English at home, the parents are involved in the PTA, and the child has many books at home. Two additional factors are negatively correlated: the child is adopted, and the child had a low birth weight. Surprisingly, several factors that conventional wisdom suggests are important to success seem to have little or no relationship to actual outcomes, including whether the child's family is intact, whether the child's mother works before the child enters kindergarten, whether the child's parents frequently read to him/her, and whether the child watches a lot of TV.

For me, the biggest surprise in the list of non-correlated variables was the apparent unimportance of intact families. A great deal of social science research contradicts this finding. For example, boys who grow up in homes without fathers are more likely to drop out of school. They also have higher rates of substance abuse, arrest, and incarceration. It would be interesting to hear Levitt's critique of this research. I also wonder if there is a problem with the scope of Levitt's data. The Early Childhood Longitudinal Study from which he draws his data tracks educational outcomes only through fifth grade. Perhaps the impacts that broken families have on children are more acute after fifth grade.

Despite these fascinating analyses, I had a few disappointments with the book. For starters, some of the topics that it addressed seemed so unremarkable that I wondered how they made it into the book. Two of the conclusions presented in the book were ones I had reached on my own, before reading the book. One was the conclusion that a real estate agent's incentives are not aligned with a house seller's incentives. (An agent maximizes his/her income by selling as many houses as possible, not by squeezing the last dollar out of a particular sale.) The other was the conclusion that the internet caused term life insurance premiums to fall (not to mention the prices of countless other goods and services).

I also noticed a couple of instances of sloppy thinking. For example, the analysis of family attributes that correspond to children's educational success concluded with some wild generalizations, including: "it isn't so much a matter of what you do as a parent; it's who you are;" and "[child-rearing] technique looks to be highly overrated." The authors admit that they are over generalizing "a bit," but it's more like a giant leap. First, as the authors acknowledge, bad parenting matters a great deal, hence the theory that Roe v. Wade decreased crime rates. Second, parenting is about much more than successful educational outcomes; it is also about physical, emotional, behavioral, social, moral, spiritual, and character development. Third, the set of things that constitutes "what you do" and the set of things that constitutes "who you are" are not discrete sets; they overlap in a big way.

Finally, I grew tired of the subtext that seems to run through this book, namely, that economics is some sort of master science that can explain and predict just about anything. The basic tools of the book -- curiosity, intuition, logic, thinking outside the box, and statistics -- are not peculiar to economics. Also, the book frequently ignores the uncertainties of statistical analysis. For example, there is no discussion of the level of significance of the many correlations that are described. Ironically, the book repeatedly issues warnings about trusting experts, for example, "The typical parenting expert, like experts in other fields, is prone to sound exceedingly sure of himself."

But overall I enjoyed this book and found the topics it examined interesting.

(Note: This review is based on the 2005 edition of Freakonomics.)

Freakonomics addresses many diverse topics. The thing that ties the book together is the interesting kind of questions it examines and the unique blend of intuition, logic, and statistical analysis it uses to answer these questions. This book is enjoyable to read and describes many rather nerdy concepts in easy-to-understand language.

Of the twenty or so topics the book addresses, four were especially interesting to me: rigging of Sumo wrestling matches, cheating by public school teachers on their students' proficiency exams, the drop in U.S. crime rates in the 1990s, and family attributes that correspond to children's educational success. The first two analyses identified statistical anomalies in patterns of wrestling match outcomes and test answers that demonstrated probable corruption in the world of Sumo wrestling and cheating in the Chicago public school system. The third and fourth analyses were the most impressive in the book. Each considered about a dozen variables that might be related (causally or otherwise) to crime rates or educational success and used regression analyses to determine which ones were in fact related.

The analysis of the drop in crime rates in the 1990s is probably Steven Levitt's best known and most controversial work. His analysis shows that four factors were likely responsible for the decrease in crime: harsher prison terms, increased hiring of police, the crash of the crack cocaine market, and the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion decision. Levitt concludes that the first three factors were responsible for approximately 33%, 10%, and 15%, respectively, of the decrease in crime. He does not attach a specific weight to the Roe v. Wade decision, but presumably it accounts for all or most of the remaining 42%. The factors that did not contribute to the decrease in crime included tougher gun laws, increased use of capital punishment, and innovative policing strategies (such as the oft-touted New York City strategy of going after petty crimes to signal that no crimes would be tolerated).

The theory behind the Roe v. Wade contribution is that widespread abortion removed from the population many of the very people (unwanted children) most likely to commit crime when they became teenagers and young adults. This theory has disturbed many people of all political persuasions, apparently because it provides ammunition to both sides of the abortion debate. In addition, some economists have argued that Levitt's analysis has technical errors significant enough to invalidate his conclusions. I don't know whether or not Levitt has effectively responded to these economists. As for the political controversy, Levitt has basically stayed above the fray, stating that, "The numbers we're talking about, in terms of crime, are absolutely trivial when you compare it to the broader debate on abortion. ... So, my own view...is that our study shouldn't change anybody's opinion about whether abortion should be legal and easily available or not. It's really a study about crime, not abortion." (Source: Wikipedia.)

The analysis of family attributes that correspond to children's educational success concludes that six factors are positively correlated with success: the parents are highly educated, the parents have high socioeconomic status, the mother was at least 30 years old at the time of her first child's birth, the parents speak English at home, the parents are involved in the PTA, and the child has many books at home. Two additional factors are negatively correlated: the child is adopted, and the child had a low birth weight. Surprisingly, several factors that conventional wisdom suggests are important to success seem to have little or no relationship to actual outcomes, including whether the child's family is intact, whether the child's mother works before the child enters kindergarten, whether the child's parents frequently read to him/her, and whether the child watches a lot of TV.

For me, the biggest surprise in the list of non-correlated variables was the apparent unimportance of intact families. A great deal of social science research contradicts this finding. For example, boys who grow up in homes without fathers are more likely to drop out of school. They also have higher rates of substance abuse, arrest, and incarceration. It would be interesting to hear Levitt's critique of this research. I also wonder if there is a problem with the scope of Levitt's data. The Early Childhood Longitudinal Study from which he draws his data tracks educational outcomes only through fifth grade. Perhaps the impacts that broken families have on children are more acute after fifth grade.

Despite these fascinating analyses, I had a few disappointments with the book. For starters, some of the topics that it addressed seemed so unremarkable that I wondered how they made it into the book. Two of the conclusions presented in the book were ones I had reached on my own, before reading the book. One was the conclusion that a real estate agent's incentives are not aligned with a house seller's incentives. (An agent maximizes his/her income by selling as many houses as possible, not by squeezing the last dollar out of a particular sale.) The other was the conclusion that the internet caused term life insurance premiums to fall (not to mention the prices of countless other goods and services).

I also noticed a couple of instances of sloppy thinking. For example, the analysis of family attributes that correspond to children's educational success concluded with some wild generalizations, including: "it isn't so much a matter of what you do as a parent; it's who you are;" and "[child-rearing] technique looks to be highly overrated." The authors admit that they are over generalizing "a bit," but it's more like a giant leap. First, as the authors acknowledge, bad parenting matters a great deal, hence the theory that Roe v. Wade decreased crime rates. Second, parenting is about much more than successful educational outcomes; it is also about physical, behavioral, social, moral, spiritual, and character development. Third, the set of things that constitutes "what you do" and the set of things that constitutes "who you are" are not discrete sets; they overlap in a big way.

Finally, I grew tired of the subtext that seems to run through this book, namely, that economics is some sort of master science that can explain and predict just about anything. The basic tools of the book -- curiosity, intuition, logic, thinking outside the box, and statistics -- are not peculiar to economics. Also, the book frequently ignores the uncertainties of statistical analysis. For example, there is no discussion of the level of significance of the many correlations that are described. Ironically, the book repeatedly issues warnings about trusting experts, for example, "The typical parenting expert, like experts in other fields, is prone to sound exceedingly sure of himself."

But overall I enjoyed this book and found the topics it examined interesting.

(Note: This review is based on the 2005 edition of Freakonomics.)

I purchased this book as a gift for my fiance. He really enjoyed and appreciated it. Now it's my turn to read it!

I really enjoyed the contents of the book, but I was very disappointed with its physical condition. The pages were of uneven size and appeared to be cut with a blunt edge. Not a book to be put on your display bookshelf...

I found this work to be enlightening and curious. I would recommend this book and the CD's to anyone who has an open mind and wants to really understand social strata and sociology anomalies. It is makes you thing how many more trends have occurred and we have been misdiagnosing there real cause. Get the book, listen to the CD and keep an open mind.

Five stars for the quality of writing as far as interest and readability, as well as good awareness of the misuse of statistics. Three stars for bias, and ironically, the misuse of statistics.

Being a double major in both Economics and Finance I have been forced to read many textbooks in the area of economics. These textbooks are filled with examples that are dull and unrealistic. After reading Freakonomics written by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, I have a whole new understanding of economics. My understanding is now much deeper than the basic supply and demand curve that I have learned in the past. It is now at such a micro level that I can understand the relationship that a sumo wrestler and a school teacher have or why the Ku Klux Klan is like a group of Real- estate agents. All of this was learned throughout the novel Freakonomics.
The author Steven Levitt is known as one of the greatest economists under forty and after reading this book I can totally understand why. He presents the material in a way that makes you want to keep reading the book for hours at end. Each chapter that he writes focuses on a very specific economic issue and ends up making you an expert in that area in twenty minutes or however long it takes you to read the twenty page chapter. Not only are the topics that he talks about interesting but he is able to tie together two totally different groups of people or ideas together in a way that you could only imagine. For example, how could a person even think about saying that a school teacher is similar to a sumo wrestler and have enough information to back up the idea. To be honest I was really a skeptic until I read the chapter. If you read the book you will find out that the underlying reason why a teacher and sumo wrestler are similar is because they both cheat to get ahead. A sumo wrestler might throw a match to help out his fellow wrestler make it to the next stage where he will win more prize money. A teacher might help their students on standardized exams by changing their scantron sheets or putting answers on the board solely to get a pay raise by the school. The underlying theme is that these two groups of people that are totally different from one another on so many levels really have the same goal which is to make more money.
The one thing that makes Freakonomics different from a normal economics text book that I enjoyed most was the fact that the author uses all real life examples. I understand that this book is suppose to read like a novel rather than a text book, but the examples are the reason that makes this book far superior than any other that I have previously read. Some of the titles of his chapters are: "Why do drug dealers still live with their moms," "Where have all the criminals gone," and "What makes a perfect parent." All of these chapters focus on the same key idea by incorporating three or four real life examples. In the chapter, "Why do drug dealers still live with their moms?" Levitt talks about how it is hard for drug dealers to make money and how only a handful of them actually can make a really living out of dealing drugs. I found it interesting that eighty five percent of the people that deal drugs have another job as well. This is because dealing gives you street credit and protection from other dealers or gangs. I really could not believe that most people deal drugs just for protection. If that fact is amazing in itself can you believe that drug dealers have death benefits as well? If you die while dealing drugs your family gets two years of what your salary would have been. Drug Dealers are truly in their own little world. Throughout this chapter he talks about real life scenarios that have actually happened to his friends that have gone undercover. Everything that he talks about in his book even the chapters that are the most outlandish are backed up by cold hard facts.
The material in Freakonomics is presented in a way that makes any reader from any background able to understand the material. You do not have to have an economics or a business background to understand what he is getting at. All you have to have is an open mind. Levitt made this book to satisfy all skeptics. He makes claims that on the surface are very hard to believe even some that are beyond your wildest dreams but by the end of the chapter you understand where he is coming from and how he got there. That is the best part of the book in my opinion. Levitt really does a great job mapping out a thought process for his readers which enables them to ultimately come up with there own thesis on each of the subjects that he presents.
Overall, Freakonomics was really a great book to read. If I were the head of the economics department at SMU I would make all first year economic students read this book. It would not only make them start thinking like an economist but would really help spark their interest. If I were to rate this book I would give it the highest possible ranking. It does everything that it sets out to do and more. This book really reaches all audiences in so many levels. Where else could you learn about why a drug dealer still lives with his mother or why a sumo wrestler is like a school teacher? The answer can only be found in Freakonomics.

If you have ever been curious as to how Sumo wrestlers cheat or if you wanted to know the details of how abortion has reduced crime then this snippet of easy to read economics is for you. The flashy, colorful and fun examples were obviously written for the layman. The details are limited though cataloged appropriately so each can be looked up if the reader wants to dive deeper elsewhere. There is a hint of political told-you-so in some of the stories that debunk conventional wisdom concerning crime rates and class structure but they would hardly be offensive to interested onlookers. The freak in me loves it when an author says, "You might want to skip this section," because that is usually when the story gets good. In terms of entertainment, Freakonomics was worth the taste and since you can swallow it whole in a couple days there really isn't any good reason not to open wide.

I was apprehensive about this one. It had all the makings of a book I would loathe. Two authors, a catchy, goofy title, simplistic analyses. The only thing this one lacked to make its literary cliché complete was Oprah's stamp of approval.

It should be a wonder then that I enjoyed this book as much as I did. Chapters like the incendiary attack on the real estate profession, the stark comparison between the celebrity dreams of Hollywood starlets and Ghetto drug traffickers with about equal return on time invested and the survey of parental educational backgrounds and the names with which they curse their kids made for some fascinating reading. But nothing was more interesting than the comparison between reduction in crime rates and legalization of abortion even if the authors fall into their own post hoc ergo propter hoc trappings.

Yes it was simplistic. Yes some econ geeks will be screaming "correlation vs. causation." Yes, Leavitt is no David Ricardo. But if it's Ricardo you want, go drink some afternoon tea with the rest of your humorless friends since you probably won't get any of the satire in this book anyway.

Very interesting. I expected to hunker down and "learn something" with this book, but found that I read through it as fast as a mindless fiction novel. Topics and thoughts put forth by the author are controversial for sure. His theory about abortion and crime rates is certain to ruffle feathers. But I believe that his conclusions are theories, not necessarily proven truths about why certain phenomena exist in our society. And while I think at first glance his ideas sound discriminating, I can tell he is compassionate about people and interested in understanding how groups of people are affected in a "big picture" kind of way. I definitely learned something about the business of drug marketing. I see this book as less economics and more sociology, although the author himself and sociologists would disagree. It was a very interesting book.

Whether or not you agree with the conclusions, the logic on display in Freakonomics is thought-provoking. At the very least, it gives a fascinating insight into some very off-the-wall topics. Part sociology, part economics and part political game theory, it never gets too deep into any theory for the non-academic. The chapter on the economics and motivations of a drug gang is the highlight of the book, IMHO. Even the weakest chapters don't disappoint.

The writing style is easily accessible and entertaining. While I don't agree with some of the conclusions, you never get the sense that the authors are arguing in bad faith.

Well worth the money and the time you'll spend in reading it.

I read this book and then passed it along to someone else - it is a great book and very funny - most people I have spoken to - don't finish - don't go in with the right attitude - but it is a way to compare how society looks at certain things for what is right and wrong - good or bad - when you understand the premises of the book - then you get it right away - have fun with this book - don't let the author's career choices scare you - they have a great sense of humor.

Some of the notions that the author presents as fact in this book have been debunked. This author has no credibility any more.

The books was well written, but I'm not really sure how much I've learned from it.

Author Steven Levitt is a recently graduated chef from the Culinary Institute of Elitist Capitalism, AKA The University of Chicago. Freakonomics is a kind of nouvelle cuisine version of economic modeling and game-theory as practiced by the disciples of Milty Friedman, but rather little of the book is spent on economic recipes per se, once the basic assertion has been made that "incentives' are the yeast that cause all human behavior to rise. Rather, Levitt puts everything from soup kitchens to swimming pools through the blender of statistics -- the very sort of statistical analysis used by the authors of The Bell Curve and discredited by Stephen Jay Gould in the book The Mismeasurement of Man, the very sort of statistics that can be used to prove that the older you get in Miami, the more likely you are to be Jewish.

Levitt's basic dough: Start with John Stuart Mill and every other 19th C liberal social theorist. Knead thoroughly into a sticky paste. Add a handful of candied fruit in the form of the more radical 19th C postulators - Fourier, Henry George, Bellamy, and Karl Marx as understood before the Russian Revolution. Soften the dough with as much Thorstein Veblen as you can remember. Spice it with generous amounts of scorn for "them" - anthropologists, psychologists, and others who think that human behavior is shaped by more impulses than acquisition and that specific cultural 'memes' play a role. Half-bake the dough in a journalistic oven with the temperature set on SELL. Frost the loaf with an icing of Ayn Rand super-individualism. But don't expect the finished cake to be much different from cakes you've eaten before. There's nothing new in Freakonomics except the smirky style.

Honestly, many readers might find this book stimulating, or over-stimulating, depending on their prior convictions. Go on! Read it! But read it with the same skepticism you'd apply to the gospel of any other religion than your own - Shinto, Islam, Swedenborgian, Leninist, Maoist. This is a book where the reader will be easily tricked into mistaking polemics for proof.

This is an entertaining look at economics and gave valid views on how our systems works.

First of all I totally agree that stupid, promiscuous, nasty girls (henceforth referred to as SPNG) are liable to have criminal sons and more SPNG daughters (all things being genetic). So that making abortion available to such women would decrease crime in the long term (by preventing the birth of criminal boys). However, other studies show that Clever, Virtuous and Kind girls (henceforth referred to as CVKG are (and my own observations of my peers reinforces) are more likely to use contraceptives (although they have sex at a later age and with more thought) and upon the failure of contraceptives are most likely to have abortions. Whilst SPNGs are more likely to have the child, go on government welfare, and have a huge number of children to various Criminal men. So pro choice=fewer ambitious/CVKG type children being born. In conjunction with government welfare this means that many SPNG type mothers having criminal sons.

To really reduce crime would not be pro choice-after all every human instinct is towards reproduction and if your life is empty because you are a stupid SPNG you will have more children than a highly ambitious CVKG.

Proposal:

Offer plasma televisions, DVD players etc with greater incentives per repeat abortion amongst SPNG type women. After enough abortions the cervix becomes incontinent and they will no longer be able to carry a baby to term thus decreasing the SPNG's ability to reproduce in the future.

And when a CVKG seeks an abortions give them educational type benefits (or incentives that are of no value to a SPNG) to give the child up for adoption. Obviously we don't want the CVKG to keep the baby as this would harm her education and career, so adoption is the best possible solution. This increases the number CVKG type children being born and thus increases the number of intelligent people. Whilst decreasing crime by discouraging reproduction amongst SPNG.

Sadly in the western world the characteristics that make someone a SPNG are the characteristic that make someone poor-who wants to work with someone or employ someone who is stupid, Promiscuous and Nasty?

This book has gotten heated reviews from highly focused economic centric minds. Taken for what it is... a very entertaining series of articles with shocking facts and conclusions, the book makes you think about the motivators of human behavior.

Themes: Cheating, Crime, Poverty, Incentives, Testing and finally Causality.

The Chapter Titles grab you. The Chapters can be read in smaller increments.

Very entertaining and enjoyable.

I am pregnant and loved the section on choosing a child names.
I liked the Head Start and Public School perspectives...

Very neat... but approach it as a "fluffy" read, not a book to be cited in your PhD or Master thesis.

Do you think economics is boring? Do you struggle to understand economic principles? If you answered yes to either question, then check out Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. These two economists apply their knowledge to such a wide variety of subjects that it is hard to keep up.

For example, did you ever wonder why drug dealers live with their moms or what schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Levitt and Dubner address these and other equally unusual topics. By applying well-known, basic economic principles to unique circumstances, the authors help readers better appreciate the complex world of money matters. You'll have so much fun reading this book that you won't even realize you're learning something about economics.

Considering the success of Freakonomics (it reached the number two spot on the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list), it is not surprising that Freedomnomics: Why the Free Market Works and Other Half-Baked Theories Don't by John R. Lott, Jr. was published a short time later. Freedomnomics, as the front cover tells us, is a rebuttal to Freakonomics and more. Although not as popular or as well written, Freedomnomics scored points with me because I am a firm believer in capitalism and the free market society. I also found some of Lott's economic research to be intriguing. For instance, in the chapter on women's suffrage and the growth of government, Lott tracks changes in government spending both before and after women finally obtained the right to vote.

Freedomnomics does not rehash all of Levitt and Dubner's material, but it does attempt a point-counterpoint on several topics, including abortion and crime in the United States. Read both books and make your own decision about who is right and who is wrong.

In The Affluent Society, economist John Kenneth Galbraith wrote that new ideas "need to be tested" against the "inertia and resistance" of "conventional wisdom." That is: what everyone KNOWS TO BE TRUE may, in fact, not be true at all. The problem wrote Galbraith, is "We associate truth with convenience - with what most closely accords with self-interest and personal well-being or promises best to avoid awkward effort or unwelcome, dislocation of life. ... Therefore, we adhere, as though to a raft, to those ideas which represent our understanding" - even if our understanding is limited at best.

"Conventional wisdom," adds fellow economist, Steven D. Levitt in Freakonomics [ - thought I'd never get there, didn't you!? - ] is often shoddily formed and devilishly difficult to see through, but it can be done." He continues: "It would be silly to argue that the conventional wisdom is NEVER true. But noticing where the conventional wisdom may be false - noticing, perhaps the contrails of slopping or self-interested thinking - is a nice place to start asking questions."" See: Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game a "true story" in the spirit of Freakaonmics. What's it about? 1. Questioning ASSUMPTIONS, and 2. seeing through them in order to 3) arrive at winning results.

In The Affluent Society, economist John Kenneth Galbraith wrote that new ideas "need to be tested" against the "inertia and resistance" of "conventional wisdom." That is: what everyone KNOWS TO BE TRUE may, in fact, not be true at all. The problem wrote Galbraith, is "We associate truth with convenience - with what most closely accords with self-interest and personal well-being or promises best to avoid awkward effort or unwelcome, dislocation of life. ... Therefore, we adhere, as though to a raft, to those ideas which represent our understanding" - even if our understanding is limited at best.

"Conventional wisdom," adds fellow economist, Steven D. Levitt in Freakonomics [ - thought I'd never get there, didn't you!? - ] is often shoddily formed and devilishly difficult to see through, but it can be done." He continues: "It would be silly to argue that the conventional wisdom is NEVER true. But noticing where the conventional wisdom may be false - noticing, perhaps the contrails of slopping or self-interested thinking - is a nice place to start asking questions."" See: Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game a "true story" in the spirit of Freakaonmics. What's it about? 1. Questioning ASSUMPTIONS, and 2. seeing through them in order to 3) arrive at winning results.

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, is a most unusual and fascinating book--co-written by an economist and a journalist.

Freakonomics does not have a unifying theme. But what the authors attempt to do is to strip "a layer or two from the surface of modern life and" see "what is happening underneath." They look upon this book as a "sort of treasure-hunt," combining economic analytical tools with "freakish curiosities." Thus the name, Freakonomics.


Freakonomics covers an array of diverse topics including cheating and incentives, teachers and sumo wrestlers, drug dealers and criminals, Ku Klux Klan members and real estate agents and parenting. The authors discuss how increased information has brought down the Ku Klux Klan, and lowered the prices of term life insurance and burial caskets. Much of the book is used to dispel myths. For instance, most drug dealers aren't making big bucks and often still live with their moms. Or that the dramatic drop in crime in the 1990s can be attributed to the passage of legalized abortion in the 1970s as a result of Roe vs. Wade.

One chapter that I found especially interesting was "Would a Roshanda by Any Other Name Smell as Sweet?" The authors track trends in naming babies over the last 50 years. Popular names tend to start with the upper classes and filter down over time. My own name, Cynthia, was the 5th most popular name in 1960. Today, mothers who name their daughters Cindy tend to be lower class and haven't completed a high school education. Levitt and Dubner also investigate the popularity of predominantly black names, and how they might be indicators of success or failure.

I never found economics to be that interesting or enjoyable. Too bad that I never had a professor with the talents of Steven Levitt or I might have had a completely different opinion of this often dry subject.

Great book! The authors made economic topics relevant to social situations, some of which I am able to use in my classroom to highlight some key ideas about economics. It's not a boring economics book, it's a nice read that keeps you wanting to turn the page!

The cover promises "Prepare to be dazzled" and I expected so much more. This is a very thin book (double spaced & wide margins, 200 pages in total) and can be read in one day at the beach. You can find some interesting statistics, for example which words work best in real estate ads. But by no means should this book be categorized in Popular Economics on Amazon. Save your money and check out this book from your local library.

I gave it as a gifr for my son majoring in economice... He said "WOW.. I always wanted this book !"

I gave it as a gifr for my son majoring in economice... He said "WOW.. I always wanted this book !"

Just to respond to a review that was extremely critical of this book - Economics is just that STATISTICS WITH A THEORY.

If you took any undergraduate economic classes you'd understand that economics is the formation of theories to explain trends that are portrayed in data. No matter how absurd the theory - with proper support (which Leavitt documents repeatedly) there is absolutely no reason to review this book negatively.

The only kind of person who would review this negatively is someone who is looking for concrete answers in a world where nothing is concrete. This is social science and as a result there are no end all statements - instead there are crafy theories which do extremely well to explain trends in data.

All in all this book was a blast to read!

Computers, not abortion are the reason for the drop in crime in the 90's.
Think about it.

Even if his research interests are cheating, corruption, and crime, Steven D. Levitt - MIT PhD, John Bates Clark Medal winner and father of four - makes a poor rogue. And it is sometimes hard to tell if he is an economist, statistician or sociologist. Other than those minor points, the title is fairly accurate.

Levitt is best known for his controversial argument that legalized abortion was largely responsible for the unexpected drop in US crime rates during the 1990s. But the book covers many other topics. Suspicious patterns of right and wrong answers on multiple choice tests are used to catch cheating (by teachers!). Consistent wins against the odds in crucial sumo bouts put the finger on colluding wrestlers. Real estate agents keep their own homes on the market longer, and sell them for higher prices, than they do with clients' homes. And a retired economist and college educated gang leader happen to keep unusually good records of their respective bagel and crack cocaine businesses.

Like Seinfeld, Freakonomics claims not to be about anything. This disclaimer, however, is somewhat undermined by the list of themes (conveniently highlighted in italics) in the introduction. Themes, moreover, stunning in their banality and vacuity. "Incentives are the cornerstone of modern life . . . The conventional wisdom is often wrong . . . Dramatic effects often have distant, even subtle, causes . . . Experts use their informational advantages to serve their own agenda . . . Knowing what to measure and how to measure it makes a complicated world much less so . . . morality represents the way we would like the world to work, and economics represents the way it does work."

The authors liked the last line so much they could not resist repeating it throughout the book, even when what they are writing shows the exact opposite. Economic incentives can backfire if they weaken social and moral incentives - imposing a small fine on tardy parents at a day-care centre or paying donors for blood. And their explantion of incentives is gruesomely bad:

"If you toddle over to the hot stove and touch it, you burn a finger. But if you bring home straight A's from school, you get a new bike. If you are spotted picking your nose in class, you get ridiculed. But if you make the basketball team, you move up the social ladder." (Followed by three more pairs of totally unrelated opposites.)

Freakonomics is full of interesting stories, even if each finding could be (and has been) questioned individually. (After all, is there anything interesting in the social sciences that has not attracted criticism?) If anecdotes are all you want, the book is great. If you want anything more . . .

Originally published in the Economic Record, March 2006.

This is the most fascinating book I have read this year. I could not resist sending copies to my friends and relatives

For those that don't know, the basic idea behind this book is that it applies economics to weird questions that aren't normally thought of as economics, like:
- Are teachers cheating on standardized exams?
- Are sumo wrestlers rigging matches?
- Will real estate dealers get the best deal for clients? (Hint: they tend to get better prices when selling their own houses than when selling clients' houses).
His results are often intriguing, and this results in a very interesting and readable book. Even people who hated economics in college or swore they would never take it will enjoy this book.

However, it seems like the authors let their own political views bias their work in places. For example, one of their more controversial claims is that abortion led to decreases in crime because the people most likely to be aborted are also the people most likely to be criminals. While this may be intuitive, other economists, such as Dr. John Lott, have largely discredited this finding. One of the many problems with their finding is that the decrease in crime in the 90's (which the authors chalk up to abortion) was greatest among people born before Roe v. Wade, which is exactly the opposite of what you'd expect if their analysis was correct.

Other than their occasional slips to political bias, this book is very well written and makes for a good read, and I recommend it overall.

There are a few people here whining that this book draws ridiculous conclusions, but those people are wrong. The authors draw few, if any, conclusions. They show correlations and posit possibilities, probabilities of causation. They don't, as some dumber people here are suggesting, declare definitively that, say, Roe v. Wade was responsible for the drop in crime 20-30 years later. They simply show a correlation, a connection, for the reader to think about. They also discuss other possible reasons. The only conclusions they draw is when they are able to conclusively show that a suggested reason had no impact.

Too much information disseminated in the media is baloney, the product of lazy reporting, journalists taking the word of politicians, pundits, and 'experts' and reporting it as the truth without enough research or in-depth analysis. Freakonomics isn't a book to forward a few left-field theories about crime, sumo wrestlers, or teachers. It's a just a demonstration of how set in our ways we are, how worn the paths are in our thinking. Most people, myself included, are not thinking hard enough about things, not looking from enough angles, not asking enough questions.

The book makes this point very effectively, and I'm glad I read it. It's not telling you what you should think, just that you should think more, and differently. Fun!

This would be a dangerous book if Americans werent stupid and corrupt.

Its a page-flipper and definitely interesting.

While reading this book, I remembered something that my father told me when I was about ten. He told me that in the USA a lot of effort was put into gathering data about every imaginable thing. Then two sets of data were compared to see how often one thing occurred at the same time as another. "I will give you an example: they compare how many dishwashers are sold in one month with the test results in mathematics and in biology of the children coming out of the first and fourth grade. Then something like this can come out: the more dishwashers are sold, the better the grades in mathematics of the children in fourth grade but their biology grades seem to stay the same no matter how many dishwashers are sold. The grades of the children of first grade are worse both in mathematics and biology when more dishwashers are sold." "Daddy, it is sooo foolish! What do dishwashers have to do with your math grades?". "Think of it more carefully, it's not at all foolish! It's probably not the most elegant approach, but it surely is useful. By doing this, they are generating theories, a lot of theories. Then they can discard the ones that are useless. This approach might lead you nowhere with several theories, like the one I exaggerated, but at some point it's Bingo!"

Having said this, and although I found the book an easy, entertaining and at times funny reading with some interesting cases and conclusions, I did not find it overwhelming.

I cannot help thinking that the author did not go far enough with his research. I would have liked that the author explained the statistical methods he used, as well as the certainty or error levels obtained, and also what these latter mean.

I am probably biased, but I would like to quote A. Zee, author of several books on quantum physics: "My work always tried to unite the true with the beautiful, but when I had to chose, I usually chose the beautiful." I cannot judge the truth in Levitt's propositions, but I find them extremely ugly. Although he would not propose it and even seems to be against it at the end of the chapter, starting from his supposed facts, logical reasoning would lead us to suggest that in order to reduce criminality, a government would do well promoting abortion among young mothers to be, specially if they are teenagers, have not finished school and belong to an economical lower class (if they are Afro-Americans or Latin it is even more probable that the abortion benefits society in the long run, since people belonging to this races make up for half the criminals). This is reinforced with some studies that reveal that before "Rose vs. Wade" (at a time when only rich women could afford an illegal abortion), abortions had no correlation to criminality indexes. This makes me think of "economics for freaks" or "economics that can freak you out".

If we accept "neglected children" as the first cause for criminality and start from here, then of the 5 whys suggested to find the true root cause of a problem, I am missing 4, why are the children neglected, why are so many unwanted childs conceived? The author mentions one abortion for each 2.25 births!!! Conceptions increased 30% while births decreased 6%!!! He suggests that women probably use abortion as a radical birth control method. Aren't this figures worth a freakonomic study of abortion economics? Are $100 for an abortion cheaper than preventive methods? It's definitely cheaper than more and better sexual education at school, cheaper than better nursing or day care facilities, cheaper than help-groups or even therapy for teenage parents or single mothers, cheaper than better sporting facilities or other programs for teenagers...

Ever wonder if sumo wrestling is rigged? Or maybe pondered the likelihood that the slim wealthy single you met on a dating site is overweight and unemployed? In Freakonomics, Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner take on these questions and more in their fascinating and hilariously funny exploration of the most bizarre phenomena our world has to offer. Using solid research and piercing wit, Levitt and Dubner delve into the inner economic workings of those enterprises that are ignored by stock traders and analysts, and tackle the social issues that are too touchy, or just too weird, to be covered by more traditional writers.

Using the theories of economics, Levitt and Dubner challenge so-called "experts" or talking heads by asking intriguing questions. For instance, in the chapter titled, "Where Have All the Criminals Gone?" various experts are quoted claiming that the reduction of crime in the 1990's was due to several factors: a larger police presence on the streets, an aging population, and/or longer prison sentences. Levin and Dubner dispute these theories and set out to show us that Roe vs. Wade, the legalization of abortion, affected the crime rate more than any other factor. Levitt and Dubner offer the reader compelling statistics to demonstrate that a reduction in unwanted children directly influenced the reduction in crime. In another chapter Levitt and Dubner draw correlations between sumo wrestlers and teachers, showing that they both resort to cheating under pressure, while in yet another chapter we learn why street gang members could run McDonald's.

Some readers may argue with Levitt and Dubner's conclusions, and question the difference between correlation and causation; despite those objections, this is a worthwhile read that encourages the reader to question foregone conclusions. Levitt and Dubner also have a weekly column in the New York Times.

Quill says: Freakonomics will change your view of economics, and the role it plays in everyday life.

Easy read, informative and interesting. Well worth the money as the author puts a spin on many interesting common day occurrences. A fine addition to my library.

Clearly this is the best biography yet written about ex-Mass governor Mitt Romney. Dubner and Levitt somehow got access to the scientists who designed Romney and the laboratory where he was built. Equally fascinating was the process of their deciding what "family" to build for Romney--for instance, beyond constructing the no-brainer wooden, statuesque wife, whether to build him sons, or daughters. In the end, the scientists confidentially concede their surprise and disappointment that Romney, once launched, proved to be even more robotic than he was programmed to be.

Crazyman's Economics

I think it's interesting book and one that people should read to give them a new perspective of economics that doesn't put them to sleep. While one can certainly question some of the conclusions they draw, it starts a debate that isn't limited to academic snobs trying to "out-intellectualize" each other.

I bought this book for my Kindle. I read most of it while on the DC metro and I was pleased to find a gal sitting next to me reading the actual book. It is a good one. It will have you questioning most facts and figures you see on a daily basis. I already do not trust the media and this book only made it worse. But, it was lots of fun to read and it really helped me understand how what you think is true on the surface may not really be. I recommend this book in conjuction with "Sway; The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior" They really compliment each other.

-Off to my reading spot!

This book is plainly entertaining. These two authors bring many unrelated situations into juxtaposition, and find the thread that binds them both. And when they do, you will probably chuckle to yourself for not noticing it earlier. And you find that you can do that with many other events that occur in and out of your own life.

Sumo wrestlers and high-school teachers: what do they have in common? They both cheat. And so the basic premise of the book is: every human being is motivated by incentives. Economics studies the workings of this drive that human beings have.

But even with this, the book doesn't seem to have an overarching view of any sort. It's like a collage of observations that an economist with a very good sense of humor and an unorthodox view of the world makes together with a willing journalist who comes along for the ride. Which is probably why this book is simply one of a kind.

This book is plainly entertaining. These two authors bring many unrelated situations into juxtaposition, and find the thread that binds them both. And when they do, you will probably chuckle to yourself for not noticing it earlier. And you find that you can do that with many other events that occur in and out of your own life.

Sumo wrestlers and high-school teachers: what do they have in common? They both cheat. And so the basic premise of the book is: every human being is motivated by incentives. Economics studies the workings of this drive that human beings have.

But even with this, the book doesn't seem to have an overarching view of any sort. It's like a collage of observations that an economist with a very good sense of humor and an unorthodox view of the world makes together with a willing journalist who comes along for the ride. Which is probably why this book is simply one of a kind.

Only one thing became clear while reading this book. As the author(s) put it, journalists need experts as much as experts need journalists. Levitt and Dubner proved that point very well.

Only one thing became clear while reading this book. As the author(s) put it, journalists need experts as much as experts need journalists. Levitt and Dubner proved that point very well.

Twice over the past two years, I have browsed this book in Barnes and Nobles, and twice I decided to pass it up. However, on the third pass, I caught a familiar name as I thumbed through it: Sudhir Vankatest, the now renown Professor of Sociology at Columbia U., whose groundbreaking study of gangs in Chicago (and his editorials in the NYT) had a great impression upon me. As a result of this single name I decided to purchase the book. However, upon reading it, I too must conclude as did other reviewers, that Freakonomics must definitely remain in the category of "light reading" (very light indeed), despite the fact that there is a serious non-trivial aspect to it. One must conclude that this book is the Hors d' oeuvre but not the main course.

What is serious about this admittedly very disorganized collection of what at first sight might seem like disconnected social trivial is that it too manages to "tap" into the same "unconscious economic territory" of everyday human social interactions as do a rash of other recent books like it. For instance, "The Tipping point," "Blink," "Sway," and the "Black Swan, among the ones with which I am familiar. I do not believe that this rash of books all attempting to get at virtually the same human ability to intuit statistical patterns is a coincident at all, but rather a reflection of attempts to fill a glaring gap in sociological analysis, by other more "non-sociological" means.

Other reviewers have hit the nail on its head when they too point out that there is a difference between "correlation" and "causation" as well as that there are also very complex and confounding Heisenberg like effects involved with attempts to study, measure or even gauge human social interactions. As well, it must also be said that when dealing with human social phenomena it is also true that the hidden variables and their interactive effects are often more important than the more obvious and direct (and linear) effects. However, the fact that social phenomena are complex - that is to say, interactive dynamic and non-linear -- is not a reason to avoid analysis altogether.

It seems that since Hubert Blalock's deep foray into statistical analysis of social problems of several decades ago failed to "catch fire," that Sociologists have since tended to retreat into a methodologically defensive position, shying away from any analysis that challenges the conventional wisdom or the status quo, and from any serious quantitative analysis of social problems altogether. This reluctance as much as anything else has turned sociology into a kind of theology of the status quo. One has to look far and wide to find sociological analysis that strays even a bit from the national consensus, or from the "accepted customs" and "conventional wisdom." Given the poor quality of quantitative analysis in the social sciences generally and the dismal failure of qualitative analysis in Sociology in particular, this dereliction of analytical duties strikes me as a kind of negligence bordering on methodological cowardliness. Many of the examples in this book point these difficulties out. Even the title "Freakonomics" leaves room for it to be considered out of the main stream.

Clearly there is a positive correlation between increased abortions and decreased crime, for all of the obvious reasons. But taken out of their context as is done with many of the examples in this book, they become just isolated facts that may or may not have any additional meaning. In such cases the devil that usually lies in the details, now lies within the meaning and interpretation of the respective social contexts. Until and unless these isolated facts are properly situated in their proper sociological, and methodological frameworks and contexts, no matter how tantalizing, they are just that isolated facts without much meaning.

I disagree with the thrust of many of the other reviewer's comments, that because of their complexity, social phenomena are not amendable to scientific study -- as there are definitely creative ways to get beyond the complexity of social phenomena in the same way that was done in the military sciences. One such way is the Systems Analysis of social problems, that is using operations research, computer simulations, etc. to tackle the complexity, the non-linearity and the interactive effects. There are a number of "off-the-shelf" methodologies just waiting to be used in the human sciences. Hubert Blalock's "Path Analysis" for instance is a greatly under utilized method in sociology.

As but another example from my own research, I used a computer simulation shell called iThink and U.S. Census data to study the inner city teen pregnancy problem when it flew off the statistical charts during the period of 1965 to 1985. Contrary to the findings in this book, I found that the abortion rates of the intercity poor began to skyrocket at the same time that inner city crime did. However, so too did a whole host of other related socio-economic indicators, mo