I’m not sure why, since I don’t think anyone should or does care, but every year I indulge myself by posting Kentucky Derby picks. In contrast to the last two years, my computer model has some strong predictions for this year’s Derby. The two horses I like best from a betting perspective (i.e. the ones I think actually have a . . .
Remarkable facts from a new paper by James Habyarimana and William Jack of the Center for Global Development: The World Health Organization (2004) reported that 1.2 million people died from road traffic injuries in 2002, 90 percent in low- and middle-income countries, about the same number as die of malaria. In addition, between 20 and 50 million people are estimated . . .
Photo: DeusXFlorida Coke has a new ad that declares that only two people know Coke’s secret formula, and if something happened to one of them, the formula would be lost forever. It then goes on to talk, facetiously, about all the terrible things that would happen to the world if something bad happened to one of the two men and . . .
Congratulations to Emmanuel Saez, winner of this year’s John Bates Clark medal given to the most influential economist under the age of 40 by the American Economic Association. Emmanuel’s work focuses on issues of inequality and taxation. He has made both theoretical and empirical contributions. I remember vividly the first time I met Emmanuel. I think it was 1998. I . . .
Other than winning the Nobel Prize, getting the John Bates Clark medal is the best thing that can happen to an economist. Without question, winning the Clark medal in 2003 totally changed my life. It was because of the Clark medal that Dubner came out to interview me, and eventually Freakonomics was born. The Clark medal used to be awarded . . .
Winner became a lifetime criminal; Loser a detective in the NYPD. The story of these two brothers matched the findings of my academic research with Roland Fryer, which found no impact of a child’s name on her life.
Here’s an article in today’s Financial Times about a class on business experimentation that John List and I taught at the Booth School of Business. It does a nice job of laying out our philosophy regarding data and experiments. Thankfully, the reporter did not mention that most of the students hated the class.
Business Week‘s cover story slams macroeconomists. Dilbert doesn’t think much of economists either:
A few months ago, Princeton economist Angus Deaton offered his vision for development economics. In his piece, he rails against the movement toward relatively atheoretical, randomized experiments, calling for closer ties between theory and empirics. “The great economists should be trying to do something that is harder.” Now, in an excellent new paper, Harvard economist Guido Imbens fires back. Imbens . . .
Here is a nice profile of Sudhir Venkatesh, who is a co-author, friend, and Freakonomics blogger.
I told you this was an easy one. A few days back, I asked why the park near my house was cleaner than ever before. It took only three comments (congratulations to Donny, the winner) to get the right answer: the International Olympic Committee was coming to Chicago. I happen to live about six blocks from Washington Park, which will . . .
If you can predict the future better than other people, you will soon become rich. If you can know better than other people what is happening right now, that is almost as good. After all, if no one else finds out the truth until a month after the fact, the present might as well be the future — nobody knows . . .
A thoughtful piece in the Washington Post on Ben Bernanke is extremely laudatory about his new approach at the Fed. I still worry that in the end that the government will have spent trillions too much to fight a recession and that economic growth will suffer for decades. There is a real principal-agent problem at work here. If the government . . .
Photo: wili_hybrid It’s been a while since we did a Freakonomics quiz. Here is an easy one. The first correct comment wins Freakonomics schwag: Today, the park near my house was cleaner than I have ever seen it. Why?
Photo: Lorri37 My friend Tim Groseclose passed along this interesting passage from the book Scratch Beginnings by Adam Shepard. The premise of the book is that the author, having just graduated from college, sets out to see if — starting with the clothes on his back, a sleeping bag, and $25 — he can build that into a furnished apartment, . . .
I’ve long squawked about how ridiculous the airline “safety” rules and procedures are.
Sully recently embarrassed me with his water landing, but at least the data on the danger of electronic devices is coming down on my side.
I don’t usually turn to magicians for commentary on economic policy (maybe I should), but I enjoyed this piece immensely. Storytelling is an art — one which Jillette has obviously mastered.
Newspaper headlines earlier this week reported a dramatic 19 percent decline in housing prices based on the Case-Shiller index of real-estate prices. Stan Humphries, writing on the Zillow blog, notes that Zillow’s price index didn’t fall as much as Case-Shiller. The difference is that Zillow’s index does not include foreclosures, but Case-Shiller does. Humphries notes that a staggering percentage of . . .
If Josh Freese‘s music exhibits as much creativity as his marketing, he should have a hit record on his hands. Freese, who was part of Devo in a previous life, has just released a new album. While $10,000 might sound like a lot to pay for a copy of the CD, at that price he will also go on rides . . .
Some ideas are just so great I am left in awe. Photo: Christopher Harting As Emily Singer writes in Technology Review that drug-resistant tuberculosis is an important problem, especially in poor countries. After you get TB, you are supposed to take antibiotics for six months to prevent drug-resistant strains of TB from arising. The problem, however, is that the antibiotics . . .
I blogged yesterday about my theories as to why KFC seems to have bad customer service, even though the chain gives so much lip-service to customers. If you can’t provide good restaurant service, how about doing public service instead? As part of a new marketing campaign, KFC has offered to fill potholes in city streets in return for being allowed . . .
Photo: emile I’ve loved the chicken at KFC ever since I was a kid. My parents were cheap, so KFC was splurging when I was growing up. About twice a year my pleading, perhaps in a combination with a well-timed TV advertisement, would convince my parents to bring the family to KFC. “What is so ironic about the poor service . . .
Tom Hundley had a long piece in the Chicago Tribune on Sunday describing the influence of the University of Chicago on Barack Obama. The most interesting part comes near the end, where law professors Cass Sunstein and Richard Epstein spar over whether Obama really believes in free markets. Sunstein says, “As Nixon went to China, Obama will go to deregulation.” . . .
For the last few years, Time magazine has compiled a list of the 100 people who “shape our world.” In the past, they’ve made some pretty questionable choices. Economists have not figured very prominently on the previous lists; there has been roughly one economist in the top 100 per year, including people like Jeff Sachs and Larry Summers. This year, . . .
The first sign of middle age has hit home with my wife: she can no longer read small print up close and has to resort to the “reach,” where she extends her arm as far as she can to read books. That same fate probably soon awaits me as well, which makes me glad I am not Thai. I’ve never . . .
Courtesy of Greg Mankiw‘s blog, here is a link to Ed Glaeser‘s interesting critique of the Dr. Seuss story The Lorax on the New York Times‘s Economix blog.
The American Society for Aesthetic Cosmetic Surgery released its annual statistical report this week. It makes for surprisingly interesting reading. The headline is that total procedures (surgical and non-surgical) fell by 12 percent between 2007 and 2008. If anything, that decline strikes me as small. In economic terms, cosmetic surgery would be thought of as a luxury durable good that . . .
Nearly two years ago, I blogged about my fear of global pandemic and how I thought Google might be the thing that saves us by providing an early warning system. Since that time, Google.org has instituted a system that provides real-time measurement of flu queries. (By the way, Google flu trends shows that this was not a bad year at . . .
Aaron Zelinsky is a Yale law school student with a knack for coming up with interesting ideas. Last year, I blogged about his proposal for fighting steroid use in sports if the governing bodies really cared. Now, on the Huffington Post, he has an interesting angle on how the federal government might stop the A.I.G. bonuses that have everyone so . . .
Economist Al Roth has an interesting blog post that describes how one altruistic kidney donor saved 10 lives. Here’s how it worked.
One of the things Roth has been working
on, given the repugnance many noneconomists feel about paying for organs, is creating chains of organ donations. Many people who need kidney transplants have a donor who is willing to donate one, but who is not a good match for the recipient.
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