By now, I’d imagine most people with any interest in books have heard of Freakonomics : A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
I forgot where I heard about it initially, but couldn’t be happier that I found it.
I’m a scientist by training, have a Computer Science and Engineering degree from University of Pennsylvania with a minor degree in Psychology.
I’m always fascinated by hidden connections and meanings presented as the result of carefully designed scientific research. It’s not enough for me to just to know what the result of the research is, but how they came up with the research method and whether it’s a valid method in measuring the variables what they set out to measure.
What Freakonomics provides, is taking scientific research methods and apply them to social-economical situations attempting to obtain the insight of what motivate people to do certain things. It’s indeed about asking the right questions, and use the data available to find answers. A lot of times, these answers are counter-intuitive and against conventional wisdom as most revolutionary ideas are.
The economist Steven Levitt, was an expert at asking the right and interesting questions. The result of his research provides insights into such things as “What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestler’s have in common?”, “How is the KKK like a group of Real-Estate agents?”, “What makes a perfect parent?” etc…
The last topic of the book, “What makes a perfect parent” was my favorite part of the book since I’m a new dad myself.
All these questions are very interesting questions, which weren’t usually asked, and usually not by an economist. What makes these questions interesting are the answers that are so outrageously counter-intuitive yet making sense.
One section of the book was very controversial, it’s the part that links the decline in crime rate to the legalization of abortion. I found the book’s argument well formed, yet think it attributed too little of the crime rate drop to “innovative policing” as outlined in Malcolm Gladwell’s
The Tipping Point and Rudolph Giuliani’s Leadership. I’d love to get my hands on the data set and do a more in-depth analysis of this.
The parenting section is indeed an eye-opener. For instance, these eight factors are strongly correlated with a child’s test scores (either positively or negatively)
- The child has highly educated parents.
- The child’s parents have high socioeconomic status.
- The child’s mother was thirty or older at the time of her first child’s birth.
- The child had low birthweight.
- The child’s parents speak English in the home.
- The child is adopted.
- The child’s parents are involved in the PTA.
- The child has many books in his home.
And these And the eight that aren’t:
- The child’s family is intact.
- The child’s parents recently moved into a better neighborhood.
- The child’s mother didn’t work between birth and kindergarten.
- The child attended Head Start.
- The child’s parents regularly take him to museums.
- The child is regularly spanked.
- The child frequently watches television.
- The child’s parents read to him nearly every day.
There lies the genius of the book, it makes things obvious when they are not and back things up with solid data. Read the book to find out more details about each one. Since these data sets are based on ECLS, they only indicate testing score. The authors did point out Bruce Sacerdote’s “The Nature and Nurture of Economic Outcomes” paper that made clear that “By the time the adopted children became adults, they had veered sharply from the destiny that IQ alone might have predicted. Compared to similar children who were not put up for adoption, the adoptees were far more likely to attend college, to have a well-paid job, and to wait until they were out of their teens before getting married. It was the influence of the adoptive parents, Sacerdote concluded, that made the difference.” Clearly, good parenting has wide-reaching effects, just not in the sense people thought originally.
Another interesting section of the book was the names people give their children. I’ve actually made extensive use of the information in the book to name my daughter, you can find out more in this post.
Overall, I find the book fascinating the same way Malcolm Gladwell’s books are, they point out things that are far from conventional wisdom, and digs deeper to unearth hidden relationships that are not obvious. However, as the author pointed out in the Epilogue “… The most likely result of having read this book is a simple one: you may find yourself asking a lot of questions. Many of them will lead to nothing. But some will produce answers that are interesting, even surprising…” And indeed the book did just that.
On scale of 1 to 10, Freakonomics scores a solid 9.
Go out and buy the book, you’ll be glad you did. Also check out the book’s website for more articles and detailed information.