The dollar has taken serious hits recently, not only continuing to fall against the euro but being caught even by the Canadian loonie. From the long view, however, the dollar’s current woes are simply another step in the long and tumultuous history of paper currency in the U.S. Stephen Mihm, a professor of history at the University of Georgia and . . .
As Levitt has noted in the past, media bias is a hot topic among some economists. Typically the bias is reflected in a paper’s reporting (as Dubner pointed out here). But can newspapers also influence public opinion based on their coverage of economic matters? That’s the question addressed in the working paper “Partisan Bias in Economic News: Evidence on the . . .
Every year, thousands of law school graduates leap into the nerve-wracking and costly process of preparing for the bar exam. The bar consists of two days of testing (three in California) on memorization and comprehension of specific areas of law. Failure is hardly uncommon: various estimates place the passage rate at roughly 70 percent, while the failure rate in California . . .
Political scandals are a bit like the weather: there’s always something brewing. But of all the congressmen and senators whose careers have fallen apart in recent years, few have done so as spectacularly as Randall “Duke” Cunningham, the Republican congressman from California who in 2006 was sentenced to eight years and four months in prison after F.B.I. investigators discovered that . . .
In March, Dubner and Levitt tackled the realities of identity theft. Now, with phishing scams getting ever cleverer, state government databases leaving sensitive private information accessible to the world, and identity thieves expanding their schemes into Web giants like Facebook, it’s worth asking: how will the problem of identity theft be solved? Technology innovators have been plugging away, of course, . . .
Levitt and Dubner have blogged quite a bit about the growing literature on happiness studies. Meanwhile, the media has been abuzz recently over the relationship (or possible lack thereof) between happiness and wealth. Enter Angus Deaton, a professor of economics and international affairs at Princeton. Deaton has a published new paper, “Income, Aging, Health and Wellbeing Around the World: Evidence . . .
Is data taking over the world? Ever wonder how Amazon knows what books you’ll like before you do? Melissa Lafsky discusses Yale law professor Ian Ayres’ fascinating new book, “Super Crunchers: Why Thinking-By-Numbers Is the New Way to Be Smart.”
While VH1 debuts a reality show on picking up women, researchers gather data on the psychology of retaining your partner once she’s safely hooked.
Organ donation is heading from a bogus reality show to the big screen: An A.P. article reports that Paris Hilton has landed a role in the movie Repo! The Genetic Opera, a so-called “horror rock” musical that’s “set in a plague-ravaged future where people can purchase new organs on the installment plan from a corporation called Geneco.” Hilton will play . . .
Sin in the Second City, a new book by Karen Abbott, offers an in-depth look at the prostitution trade in turn-of-the-century Chicago. In particular, Abbott focuses on the Everleigh sisters, two madams who ran a high-class brothel on South Dearborn Street that earned them extraordinary wealth and international fame. Abbott agreed to answer our questions about her book. Q: Could . . .
Discover magazine examines the attempts by physicists to break down the Planck scale, “a region where distances and intervals are so short that the very concepts of time and space start to break down.” So far, all tries have been unsuccessful, leading more than one physicist to conclude that, “at the most fundamental level of physical reality,” time may not . . .
Here’s even more reason to take a deep breath and let anger slide: The American Psychological Association Journal has published a study led by Smith College psychologist Benita Jackson testing whether a relationship exists between levels of hostility and lung function — the reduction of which can lead to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, one of the leading causes of death . . .
For those seeking a little variety in the name department, the U.K. Times ranks the fifty “craziest celebrity baby names,” including such gems as “Aurelius Cy,” “Fifi Trixibell,” “Moxie CrimeFighter” and “Jermajesty.” Lucky for them, none of the featured celebrity parents live in Malaysia. Reader John Wilson alerted us to his blog, WhereIsJohnWilson, which documents his quest to have his . . .
Tomorrow morning — at 12:01 AM, to be precise — Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will go on sale. While coverage of the event has been crammed with reports of lawsuits over early shipments, outrage over Internet spoilers, and protests over potential Sabbath desecration, there’s also been plenty of Freakonomic-ish news in the Potter realm. Here’s a summary: A . . .
Los Angeles Times real estate columnist Peter Viles writes of a tale from would-be homebuyer and blogger Kate in the Valley, who hatched the following money-saving plan while making an offer on a home: Traditionally, when you buy a house you just give the purchase money to the seller and the seller pays the 5% commission out of that. But . . .
Via Marginal Revolution: the U.K. Times reports that, while the installation of speed cameras has led to far more tickets being issued and licenses canceled in France,?French drivers are circumventing the laws by selling their good driving points to speeders.?Those with poor driving records can and will pay another driver?up to 1,500 Euros to substitute his or her own points . . .
Steven Peisner, whom Dubner and Levitt wrote about recently in a column on identity theft, has made a career out of trying to stop people from hacking or otherwise stealing valuable information from websites. So Peisner’s ears perked up when he learned of Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott‘s announcement on May 31 that Texas now requires companies to shred documents . . .
Can a charitable act truly be called charitable when the contributor wants or expects a reward? In a new study, Princeton economics professor Harvey Rosen and Stanford graduate student Jonathan Meer examined this question using a specific case of incentivized charity: alumni donations. They found that the size and frequency of an alumnus’s contributions to his alma mater rise in . . .
A landmark study has been published by Northwestern statistics professor Bruce Spencer offering statistical and empirical data on the accuracy of U.S. jury verdicts. His method involved comparing the decision of a jury with the decision of the judge hearing the case, accomplished by having the judge fill out a questionnaire during jury deliberations. The data pool consisted of 290 . . .
Tomorrow marks the iPhone’s official release to the public, in what will be one of the most hyped and anticipated product debuts in history. So far we’ve seen prediction markets making odds on everything from sales figures to the likelihood of spontaneous combustion. But what of the aftermath? Will economists, psychologists, sociologists and other researchers pick up where the tech . . .
There’s been plenty of buzz this week over a paper by U.C. Berkeley PhD. student Danah Boyd, who argues that Facebook users are more socioeconomically advantaged than those on MySpace. According to Boyd, the Facebook crowd “tend[s] to come from families who emphasize education and going to college … They are primarily white, but not exclusively. They are in honors . . .
Via Marginal Revolution: In his quest to explain the male-female wage gap in business, academia, and other fields, the economist M. Daniele Paserman studied the role that gender plays in competitive environments. Where’d he get his data? From professional tennis matches. Paserman argues that male athletes are generally more adept at handling high-pressure situations. With iPhone frenzy reaching a peak, . . .
Included in the hubbub leading up to the final Harry Potter installment is a prediction exchange in which participants bet on whether Harry lives or dies — although betting has now been influenced by an anonymous Web spoiler claiming insider knowledge that the hero doesn’t meet an untimely doom. Gelf magazine has an interview with the economist Uri Gneezy, who . . .
June 25 is LEON Day, explained as follows by ButlerWebs’ Holiday Guide: “LEON is NOEL spelled backwards. It is now six months until Christmas.” Also known as 1/2Xmas.
Via the Wall Street Journal: Employers are starting to experiment with using Second Life to conduct job interviews. Candidates can create avatars and set up meetings at virtual job fairs in which they “communicate with executives of prospective employers as though they were instant-messaging.” Popular Science has released its annual “Ten Worst Jobs in Science” list, topped by Hazmat Diver, . . .
Reporters have been abuzz recently over the release of a document revealing that, in 1994, the U.S. military asked for $7.5 million to develop a bomb filled with aphrodisiac chemicals intended to cause “homosexual behavior” that would “affect discipline and morale in enemy units.” Now, Jon Ronson of the U.K. Guardian writes of another leaked Air Force report containing additional . . .
June 21 is Recess At Work Day, described on its Web site as “your day to relive your youth, create team spirit, increase employee morale and just have some fun.” Otherwise known as Drop in Productivity Day.
We’ve written quite a bit about the science of happiness. Now a study by Nattavudh Powdthavee, a research officer at the University of London’s Institute of Education, has taken the debate a step further, assigning monetary values to intangibles like good health and better relationships. He argues that more time with loved ones merits a $179,000 happiness-equivalent raise, while marriage . . .
Here’s a new way to improve the emergency room experience: Hospitals nationwide are starting to issue meal vouchers, movie passes and MLB tickets to emergency room patients who’ve been made to wait a long time for care. Other hospitals, meanwhile, are eliminating waits entirely by allowing patients to check in from their beds. (Hat tip David Brick.) Reader Fred Telegdy . . .
June 19 is World Sauntering Day, described by HolidayInsights.com as “a day to saunter here and there, wherever you go” — with “sauntering” defined as “not a walk, jog, trot, or run. Sauntering is a form of strolling. Sauntering is a very casual, yet stylish, form of movement from point A to Point B.”
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