When Freakonomics.com was launched in 2005, it was essentially a blog (c’mon, blogs were a thing then!). The first Freakonomics book had just been published, and Stephen J. Dubner and Steven D. Levitt wanted to continue their conversation with readers. Over time, the blog grew to have millions of readers, a variety of regular and guest writers, and it was hosted by The New York Times, where Dubner and Levitt also published a monthly “Freakonomics” column. The authors later collected some of the best blog writing in a book called When to Rob a Bank … and 131 More Warped Suggestions and Well-Intended Rants. (The publisher rejected their original title: We Were Only Trying to Help. The publisher had also rejected the title Freakonomics at first, so they weren’t surprised.) While the blog has not had any new writing in quite some time, the entire archive is still here for you to read.
An article in today’s Wall Street Journal asserts that, while various life skills seem to deteriorate as people get older, our skill at making personal-finance decisions doesn’t peak until the ripe age of 53. “Baseball players are said to peak in their late 20’s,” writes David Wessel. “Chess players in their mid-30’s. Theoretical economists in their mid-40’s. But in ordinary . . .
Pennsylvania State University has set up a prediction market for the weather, letting two groups of students bet against professional forecasting services like AccuWeather in trying to predict the temperature in different locations. “To date, the weather markets have been as accurate as the major public forecasting services,” says the Penn State press release, which is printed below in its . . .
A few days a week, I bring my daughter to nursery school on the East Side of Manhattan. (On the other days, I bring my son to kindergarten; next year, they will blessedly attend the same school.) We live on the West Side, and usually take the bus across town. It is a busy time of day. At the bus . . .
America’s universities are producing an awful lot of economists these days. Too many? Well, if Levitt is successful in getting rid of tenure (don’t bet on it), there will certainly be some teaching openings. Otherwise, newly minted economists may wish to consider the career path of David Teece. Teece is a 58-year-old Berkeley professor who, noting that the legal system . . .
After misinterpreting the data on the side-impact crash tests it ran on child car seats, Consumer Reports is changing its methodology on such tests, enlisting the help of experts in the field instead of acting with total independence. (Here is our earlier take on child car seats.)
I’ve blogged before about my suspicions that the ban on electronic devices on airplanes is the product of a regulator with an overactive imagination, which is an opinion that upsets a lot of blog readers, so let’s take it another direction. Everyone knows you shouldn’t use cell phones in hospitals for fear of disrupting life-save hospital equipment. Right? According to . . .
Here’s a very interesting review of a very interesting-sounding new book on Mark Twain, by Peter Krass. The review, published in the Wall Street Journal, was written by one of my favorite business journalists, Roger Lowenstein, who has written good books on Warren Buffett and Long-Term Capital Management and good recent articles on immigration and on the history of the . . .
Is illegal downloading responsible for the music industry’s woes? Felix Oberholzer-Gee and Koleman Strumpf say nope. The I.R.S. will give you a pile of money if you help them catch a big tax cheat. Too bad they weren’t this generous with John Szilagyi, who was one of their own. These three guys look pretty thrilled to have produced the first . . .
Elizabeth Wurtzel, the author of Prozac Nation and Bitch, now attends Yale Law School, where she has learned to hate AutoAdmit, the online university blab shack. As with many online slanders, the ones on AutoAdmit tend to molder for a long time, which means that a newly minted lawyer may have to deal with an unseemly Google fingerprint (which, unlike . . .
If you are going to murder someone, be sure to not leave your fingerprints behind all over Google, as this woman apparently did. Her searches included “how to commit murder,” “undetectable poisons,” and “fatal digoxin doses,” as well as searches on local gun laws. And while I don’t mean to heap even more dishonor on Walgreens, guess where she bought . . .
I have been on a mission to convince firms to do simple experiments that will give them feedback regarding the decisions that they make. Just as with people (as Anders Ericsson studies), firms cannot learn without feedback. It turns out, however, that it is not easy for people in companies to see the wisdom in experiments. Which is why I . . .
I assume that I was not the only person who was astounded when some details of Khalid Sheik Mohammed’s confession were made public the other day. Although there are many reasons to doubt the veracity of his claims, if he is responsible for even half of what he says, how much does it change the American perception of the ongoing . . .
In a post yesterday, I asked why people comment on blogs. Not surprisingly, there were a lot of comments on the post. To summarize: 1. A great many of you don’t want to comment unless you have something original and worthwhile to say. Also, it’s time-consuming to comment at all, much less wade through the previous comments to make sure . . .
We wrote recently about identity thieves. One of them is probably already working on this guy — a lottery winner who had the misfortune of having his picture published in the local newspaper, a picture in which all his personal information was visible, including his Social Security Number. (Hat tip: Jim Romenesko)
On most websites or blogs, the ratio of readers to commenters is gigantic. On this blog, a post that garners 40 or 50 comments is considered quite a bit, even though there are many thousands of readers. The stream of comments can take many shapes, depending on the nature of the post. And, once again depending on the nature of . . .
Several weeks ago, I was talking to a physician in Houston, the sort of older gentleman family doctor you don’t see much of anymore. His name is Cyril Wolf. He’s originally from South Africa, but other than that, he struck me as the quintessential American general practitioner of decades past. I’d asked him a variety of questions — what’s changed . . .
In the U.K., it’s been discovered that five percent of medical-school applicants cheat on their application forms by plagiarizing material in their personal essays. It is hardly news, of course, that students will cheat (or, for that matter, teachers). Consider the following snapshot from Google Trends, which compares search queries for “term paper” (in blue) and “animal rights” (in red). . . .
A while back, I posted here about the San Francisco Chronicle‘s new audio feature called “Correct Me If I’m Wrong,” which turns irate readers’ voicemail messages into brief podcasts. The first podcast featured a caller who was deeply disturbed by the Chronicle‘s use of the seemingly redundant phrase “pilotless drone.” This first message was so over-the-top that I wondered if . . .
That is the proposal being considered in the South Carolina Senate. Prisoners would receive up to 180 days of time served for donating an organ or bone marrow. The following exchange of quotes from an A.P. article pretty much sums up the positions of nearly every debate over how organ donation should be incentivized: Mary Jo Cagle, chief medical officer . . .
The Times has just announced that college students (or, for that matter, anyone with an .edu e-mail suffix) can have free access to the entire contents of the newspaper’s website, including the previously gated TimesSelect material. This strikes me as a huge move, and one that will reverberate throughout every discussion of the new business model/s for journalism. [Addendum: As . . .
I went to high school with a guy named Dave Kansas. We were good friends even after I beat him out for the honor of being the worst starting point guard ever on any varsity high school basketball team. He went on to become a reporter for the Wall Street Journal. One night more than a decade ago we were . . .
Zell Miller got into trouble with the media a few days back when he made the following statement, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution website: … former U.S. Sen. Zell Miller made a little news this week in Macon when he declared that abortion has contributed to the military’s manpower shortage, the Social Security crisis, and the flow of illegal . . .
Zell Miller got into trouble with the media a few days back when he made the following statement, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution website: … former U.S. Sen. Zell Miller made a little news this week in Macon when he declared that abortion has contributed to the military’s manpower shortage, the Social Security crisis, and the flow of illegal . . .
The other day, I wrote to say that I’d be warming up for Bill Clinton, again, and solicited your questions for him — many of which, as you can see here, were pretty good. I was particularly fond of this one, from “BennyM”: Does the American public get such lackluster politicians because we’re so cynical and disengaged? … or… drumroll . . .
Is this a safer version of Purell? At least people probably won’t drink it. Following on this discussion of remotely piloted aircraft, here is news of a tamper-proof autopilot system designed to thwart terrorists. More advice from a burglar on where not to hide your money, guns, or drugs. Following on this discussion of household urinals, here is one economist’s . . .
Our Chinese publisher has sent along word that Freakonomics has won an award in China. Here is the certificate. According to Jesse Coffino-Greenberg, a Chinese translator friend, it says: Certificate of Honor Guangdong Economics Publishing House The publishers of “Freakonomics” are hereby awarded the 2006 “New Path Prize” for finance publications. Jesse explained that he came up with “New Path . . .
The March 11, 2007, Freakonomics column in the New York Times Magazine asks this question: Who really cares about identity theft? Dubner and Levitt clear up some misconceptions about the subject and get a guided tour of a hacker chat room where credit-card numbers, passwords, and PIN’s are bought and sold. This blog post supplies additional research material.
That is the question we ask in our most recent column in the New York Times Magazine. Along the way, we try to clear up some misconceptions about the subject, and get a guided tour of a hacker chat room where credit-card numbers, passwords, and PIN’s are bought and sold. Below is some of the research cited in the Times . . .
I am giving a lecture later today (though not at TED) and the speaker immediately after me is President Clinton. I’ve warmed up for him before. I realize this is short notice, but: if I have the chance to chat with him for a few minutes before his talk, what do you think I should ask him? Or, I guess . . .
A news report from thespoof.com: CHICAGO. The University of Chicago, known for its free-market approach to economics, today announced that it will select its next tenured faculty member in the “the dismal science” through a reality TV competition modelled on shows such as “Survivor” and VH1’s “The (White) Rapper Show”. “We’re a competitive bunch,” said department chair Philip Reny, “and . . .
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