Circling the Drain: Can the Euro Be Saved, Or Is It Doomed? A Freakonomics Quorum
…good reasons to have a joint currency in the EU. My view is that the EU largely exists for political reasons. In this regard, a joint currency was a natural…
Cat Bohannon’s new book puts female anatomy at the center of human evolution. She tells Steve why it takes us so long to give birth, what breast milk is really…
Jonathan Levin is an academic economist who now runs one of the most influential universities in the world. He tells Steve how he saved Comcast a billion dollars, why he…
Also: is there such a thing as too much science? With special guest Luis Von Ahn.
A new thrill ride can cost an amusement park $20 million or more — but roller coasters attract customers like nothing else. Zachary Crockett must be at least this tall…
Also: How do you recover from a bad day?…
…good reasons to have a joint currency in the EU. My view is that the EU largely exists for political reasons. In this regard, a joint currency was a natural…
America’s favorite statistical guru answers our FREAK-quently Asked Questions, and more.
An all-star team of behavioral scientists discovers that humans are stubborn (and lazy, and sometimes dumber than dogs). We also hear about binge drinking, humblebragging, and regrets. Recorded live in…
He was once the most lionized athlete on the planet, with seven straight Tour de France wins and a victory over cancer too. Then the doping charges caught up with…
Can exercising your body boost your brain’s stamina? Are some people just born lazy? And why did Angela stop reading “Us Weekly”?…
…talent. While the American major sports have the NCAA as their feeder system, do you think this is a project the NBA could use, where they could develop local talent?…
…Steps, a political-satire singing troop, have even spoofed the proliferation of TV ads promoting drugs to treat increasingly bizarre diseases, like Restless Leg Syndrome. The economic incentives are all wrong…
David Segal had a wonderful piece in The Times on Sunday pointing out a missing market in theft protection. “Tracking down cellphones is not rocket science.” Corporations like Amazon and…
…studies of HIT in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia revealed some complications. “In Pittsburgh, medications were given too frequently because the computer used standardized dosing times to order medication (as opposed to…
…most recent NFL season, Peter King of Sports Illustrated predicted that Green Bay would meet Pittsburgh in the Super Bowl. Sadly for me, his prediction of a Pittsburgh victory didn’t…
…with college degrees in 1970. Boston reinvented itself? by connecting scientists, like the decidedly freaky Itzhak Bentov (who invented both diet spaghetti and the steerable catheter) with entrepreneurs, like the…
The Ford Motor Company is ditching its legacy sedans, doubling down on trucks, and trying to steer its stock price out of a long skid. But C.E.O. Jim Hackett has…
Youth baseball — long a widely accessible American pastime — has become overrun by $10,000-per-year for-profit travel leagues. Zachary Crockett peers inside the dugout….
Youth baseball — long a widely accessible American pastime — has become overrun by $10,000-per-year, for-profit travel leagues. Zachary Crockett peers inside the dugout.
There are more than twice as many suicides as murders in the U.S., but suicide attracts far less scrutiny. Freakonomics Radio digs through the numbers and finds all kinds of…
…lost 10.4%, Pittsburgh lost 8.6%, Toledo lost 8.4% See a trend? Looks like more of the same as the American Rust Belt continues to fade. This isn’t to say that…
More than 1 million people die worldwide each year from traffic accidents, but there’s never been a safer time to drive.
We explore the science, scalability, and (of course) economics surrounding the global vaccine race. Guests include the chief medical officer of the first U.S. firm to go to Phase 3…
…had about 1.5 million reasons to console themselves if said parent died on the first day of 2009 rather than the last day of 2008. With this incentive, it’s not…
…or died. Hard to say exactly what a boo sounded like back then. Maybe more of a shout, a jeer, or a whistle, rather than the extended, cow-like booooooo we…
…the test here), respondents did worse in 2012 than in 2009. The average number of correct answers fell to 2.9 in 2012 from 3.0 on the test in 2009. Unfortunately,…
We now have more access to TV, movies, and streaming entertainment than anytime in history. So what do we actually know about what all that screen time does to us?…
Most people don’t enjoy the simple, boring act of putting money in a savings account. But we do love to play the lottery. So what if you combine the two,…
Conventional programs tend to be expensive, onerous, and ineffective. Could something as simple (and cheap) as cognitive behavioral therapy do the trick?
