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Posts Tagged ‘Steven D. Levitt’

Freakonomics in the Times Magazine: Laid-Back Labor

In their May 6, 2007, column for the New York Times Magazine, Dubner and Levitt wonder: Why do Americans spend so much time and money performing menial tasks when they don’t have to? What’s with all the knitting, gardening, and – as the Census Bureau dubs it – “cooking for fun”? Why do we fill our hours with leisure activities that look an awful lot like work? Click here to read the article and here to comment. This blog post supplies additional research material.


Experimenting with milkshakes?

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 . . .


A Different Kind of Quiz

About six months ago I was at a big conference. I was scheduled to present at 2 PM to an audience of 500 or 1,000 people. Another speaker was on from 1 to 2 PM. I told the organizer I would be back by 1:45 PM, leaving plenty of time before I had to hit the stage. At 1:30 I . . .


Is Levitt a Celebrity? It Depends on Your Definition

A few months ago, after someone claimed I was a celebrity, I offered to test that hypothesis by giving $100 to anyone who identified me spontaneously over the next 30 days. (In the deal I excluded the U of C campus area, because people know me there just because I am a professor.) It was an easy bet to make, . . .


“99 Problems”

An economist at an elite university, wishing to remain anonymous, has written the following rap in honor of Levitt. S/he sent it directly to me (Dubner) to ensure that even Levitt doesn’t know who wrote it. I think you’ll agree it’s sick enough to be worthwhile. Sing it to the tune of Jay-Z’s “99 Problems.” If you’re getting rejected I . . .


A Prophet With Honor

Levitt went home last weekend to visit his family in Minn./St. Paul, and look what happened: the local newspaper got hold of him for a Q&A. (Note: if Levitt were actually awarded the Clark Medal in 1994, as the paper states, he would have been only 27; the actual year was 2004.)


“It’s not called Freakonomics, Donald, it is called Freakonomi”

This season’s show “Apprentice” with Donald Trump ended with Trump asking the winner whether the runner-up, Rebecca Jarvis, should also be hired. The winner said, “The show is called ‘The Apprentice,’ not ‘The Apprenti.’ ” Not particularly important, but first let’s just note that if the plural of apprentice is “apprenti,” then by the same token our book should be . . .


Held Hostage by our Blog

While it is true that Dubner and I sometimes feel that we are held hostage by our blog (in the sense that the constant need to provide new content weighs on us), it has never been our intention to hold reader comments hostage. We had no idea that if a reader comment contained one of hundreds of suspect words (automatically . . .


Just one example of why the Society of Fellows at Harvard made me humble

After I got my Ph.D. in economics, I had the incredible luck to get to spend three years at something called the Harvard Society of Fellows. It is an interdisciplinary academic club which draws top young scholars from across a wide array of disciplines whose only obligation is to do great research and drink expensive wine. One of the people . . .


Want to Write a Best-Seller? Move to Minneapolis-St. Paul

Three of the current top non-fiction books in the U.S. are written by men who were born and/or raised in the Twin Cities: Tom Friedman, Al Franken, and our own Steve Levitt. My guess is that these were the only three guys who didn’t spend their entire childhoods playing hockey. The area’s most famous author is probably F. Scott Fitzgerald . . .


The other Levitt children

Someone asked to see the rest of the Levitt clan. (Click the photo for a larger version.) From left to right: Sophie (1), Nicholas (2), Olivia (5), and Amanda (5). Sophie’s name, for the record, was taken from the list of Freakonomics-approved names in Chapter 6 of the book.


My son Andrew died six years ago today

My son Andrew died six years ago today. He had just turned one. He was born just as the leaves were turning. He died just as the leaves were turning. We played a song from the musical Rent at his memorial service. It always makes us think of him. It goes, in part, like this. 525,600 minutes. 525,600 moments so . . .


Lojack for Bikes?

Several years ago, Steve Levitt and Ian Ayres wrote a paper about Lojack, the silent anti-auto-theft device. They found that crime theft falls overall in areas where even a small percentage of the cars carry Lojack. I got to thinking about Lojack when we received this e-mail the other day from a reader frustrated with the volume of bicycle thefts . . .


Freakonomics in the Times Magazine: Dog-Waste Management

The October 2, 2005, Freakonomics column appeared in the annual New York City issue of the New York Times Magazine. In keeping with the Freakonomic tenet that few topics are too trivial for dissection, Dubner and Levitt turn their attention to the essential New York City issue of dog poop. Click here to read the column. This blog post supplies additional research material.


Crime vs Crime Rate

A host of commenters on my Bill Bennett post get very agitated over the question of “crimes” vs. “the crime rate.” The term “crime rate” implies a denominator, typically “per 100,000 residents.” So the number of crimes can fall, but the crime rate can rise if the population shrinks. Bill Bennett said, “But I do know that it’s true that . . .


News and Notes From All Over

A while back, there was discussion, only half in jest, that Levitt might make a good Supreme Court Justice. Now things have gotten even crazier: he has been nominated (again, only half in jest) by the BBC to help rule the world: click here for the opening page, then the “click to start” tab and then “Economists.” (It is telling . . .


Freakonomics Haiku

Steve Levitt is such a big deal in Chicago that he has been asked to donate an original haiku (!) for a fund-raiser on Wed., Sept. 14. So he went ahead and wrote himself some haiku. Then he felt a little funny being the only haikuist in the Freakonomics family, so he asked me to write one too. And I . . .


Why Levitt Is Wrong (About Book Tours, Not Oil)

Levitt and I don’t have all that many disagreements, at least not in public. But this one’s a little close to home. It began with this post, in which I wondered aloud if the tour was worth the publisher’s money. Steve followed recently with this post, which detailed why, from his perspective, the tour was a waste of his time. . . .


More stories about Sophie and Chinese labor

I wasn’t trying to be pejorative in my last post when I said that in China/Hong Kong there are five people doing the job one American would typically do. I didn’t mean that the five Chinese workers necessarily did no better than the one American worker, it was more a statement about how workers are allocated. At our hotel in . . .


Freakonomics in the Times Magazine: Up in Smoke

In the August 7, 2005, Freakonomics column in the New York Times Magazine, Dubner and Levitt ask a simple question: Whatever happened to crack cocaine? Crack was the scourge of the 1980’s, leading to endless misery and violence. Today, it is rarely mentioned in the news media. Does that mean that crack has vanished? This blog post supplies additional research material.


Wikipedia? Feh!

I know, I know, I know: Wikipedia is one of the wonders of the online world. I hear this regularly, especially from young journalist friends and also in e-mails concerning Freakonomics. A casual mention in our book concerning the derivation of the Chicago Black Sox’ nickname began a debate chronicled here, a debate in which participants regularly cited the Wikipedia . . .


Our California Trip, Pt. I

Last week, we went to California. Our publisher, William Morrow/HarperCollins, had determined that Freakonomics wasn’t selling as well there as elsewhere. It may have been a simple case of late adoption — Levitt and I are based in Chicago and New York, respectively, two cities where the book started strong — but Harper was taking no chances. (For the record, . . .