A story told on pp. 8-11 of SuperFreakonomics – about the plague of horse manure, the introduction of the automobile (an “environmental savior”), and the resulting carbon emissions — has been turned into (of all things) a Mercedes-Benz commercial.
The conclusion couldn’t be any starker: “Indiana lawmakers say the state’s driver education program isn’t working, citing a fractured system administered by three separate agencies and statistics that put the program’s usefulness in doubt.”
According to a new working paper by Ron Kaniel, Cade Massey, and David T. Robinson (abstract here; PDF here), the answer is yes, at least if you’re an MBA student looking for a job.
We recently took note of the “unbranding” movement, in which Firm A might seem to damage Firm B by sending Firm B’s product to an undesirable endorser. The example of the day was Snooki and her Gucci purse. There would seem to be no limit to the unbranding opportunities in the modern world. How about, say, politics? The Times headline says it all – “Republican Runs Street People on Green Ticket” — but Marc Lacey’s article is well worth a read.
The Freakonomics movie that premiered this spring at the Tribeca Film Festival is released to the public today — but only on iTunes (and on some Video on Demand cable systems), nearly a month before it hits theaters.
In the SuperFreakonomics Virtual Book Club, we invite readers to ask questions of some of the researchers and other characters in our book. Last week, we opened up the questioning for “Ian Horsley,” a banker who’s been working with Steve Levitt to develop an algorithm to catch terrorists. His answers are below. Thanks to Ian and to all of you for the questions.
In the Wall Street Journal, Jean Guerrero writes an interesting article about how cities are fighting street crime by the simple act of leaving the lights on deeper into the night. (Other cities have tried Barry Manilow music, with some success.) But leaving the lights on all night doesn’t always jibe with a city’s budget plans — or its global-warming conscience.
From a new CDC report: “To monitor the extent to which tobacco use is shown in popular movies, Thumbs Up! Thumbs Down! (TUTD), a project of Breathe California of Sacramento-Emigrant Trails, counted the occurrences of tobacco use (termed “incidents”) shown in U.S. top-grossing movies during 1991-2009. This report summarizes the results of that study, which found that the number of tobacco incidents depicted in the movies during this period peaked in 2005 and then progressively declined.”
Vice President Joe Biden says he’s willing to place a bet that Democrats will retain their majorities in the House and Senate. But is that a smart idea?
We recently solicited your questions for Bill Barnwell, a Football Outsider and one of the many authors of the new Football Outsiders Almanac. Here are his replies, which cover everything from miracle turnarounds to the role of injuries to his own background.
Last month, roughly two years into a global financial maelstrom, the U.S. Congress passed a financial-reform bill. It was more than 2,300 pages long, addressing everything from derivatives to consumer financial products to oversized banks. We asked a few clever people a simple question.
This week we’re offering up “Ian Horsley.” By day, he is employed in the anti-fraud department of a large British bank; but in his every spare moment for the past few years he has been working hard in collaboration with Steve Levitt to build an algorithm that can identify potential terrorists by their retail banking data.
We are a bit late in passing on the news, but the trailer for the forthcoming Freakonomics film has been released.
My friend was just telling me about a recent dream in which she was naked at a party and it reminded me of my similar dreams of being naked at school. It’s such a common trope in American culture that it made me wonder if people in other cultures have it too. Do more open/less prudish cultures like maybe Brazil have it as a common dream? What about much more conservative cultures, like in the Middle East — do they have a much more reserved version of it?
Bill Barnwell of Football Outsiders is here to answer any football questions you might like to throw at him.
I expect to have a conversation with Nassim Nicholas Taleb, author of Fooled by Randomness and The Black Swan, in the next couple of days. He’s a very smart and talkative fellow, and I suspect he would fit into a Freakonomics Radio podcast very well.
From Dan Okrent’s recent Q&A about Prohibition: “No factor played a larger role in the repeal of Prohibition than the government’s desperate need for revenue as the country fell into the grip of the Depression.” In short: governments who hate vice suddenly hate it much less when cash flow is slow. And we are seeing that again today.
Last week, we solicited your questions for Daniel Okrent, the author of Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition. He has answered your questions with gusto. Big thanks to Okrent and all of you for turning in another great Q&A.
Fred Brooks, the computer scientist who 35 years ago wrote the still-relevant The Mythical-Man Month, has written a new book, The Design of Design, and Kevin Kelly interviews him in Wired.
Three interns at Intellectual Ventures have made a rap video.
In “Binge Drinking & Sex in High School” (abstract here; PDF here), Jeffrey S. DeSimone argues that “binge drinking significantly increases participation in sex, promiscuity, and the failure to use birth control, albeit by amounts considerably smaller than implied by merely conditioning on exogenous factors.”
A reader named Karisa Cloward, a school teacher, needs your help. Her dilemma calls to mind earlier blegs about roommates/rent and dividing up a loved one’s earthly goods.
In Hollywood, a lot of people make a good living by making TV pilots that never end up on the air. (There’s also a strong market for writing film scripts that are never turned into films.) According to Variety, roughly one-third of pilots end up on the air; here’s a primer about the process. With each pilot costing hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars, that’s a lot of money spent so that a handful of TV executives can give something a thumbs-down and consign it to the trash.
A new paper says yes.
A new paper reviews war costs in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The author of Last Call answers your questions.
A salad spinner centrifuge that can diagnose anemia.
Another dangerous driving habit.
Gary Shteyngart promotes his new book.
The economic impact of hosting major sporting events.
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