Freakonomics Revised and Expanded Edition

A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

Steven D. Levitt , Dubner, Stephen J. 저자(글)

William Morrow & Company · 2020년 05월 19일

책 소개

The legendary bestseller that made millions look at the world in a radically different way returns in a new edition, now including an exclusive discussion between the authors and bestselling professor of psychology Angela Duckworth.

Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? Which should be feared more: snakes or french fries? Why do sumo wrestlers cheat? In this groundbreaking book, leading economist Steven Levitt—Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago and winner of the American Economic Association’s John Bates Clark medal for the economist under 40 who has made the greatest contribution to the discipline—reveals that the answers. Joined by acclaimed author and podcast host Stephen J. Dubner, Levitt presents a brilliant—and brilliantly entertaining—account of how incentives of the most hidden sort drive behavior in ways that turn conventional wisdom on its head.

작가정보

저자(글) Steven D. Levitt

Steven D. Levitt is a professor of economics at the University of Chicago and a recipient of the John Bates Clark Medal, awarded to the most influential economist under the age of forty.

저자(글) Dubner, Stephen J.

Stephen J. Dubner, an award-winning journalist and radio and TV personality, has worked for the New York Times and published three non-Freakonomics books. He is the host of Freakonomics Radio and Tell Me Something I Don't Know.

목차

• Chapter Page
  An Explanatory Note xxiii
  In which the origins of this book are clarified.
  Introduction: The Hidden Side of Everything 1
  In which the book's central idea is set forth: namely, if morality represents how people would like the world to work, then economics shows how it actually does work.
  Why the conventional wisdom is so often wrong
  How "experts"-from criminologists to real-estate agents to political scientists-bend the facts
  Why knowing what to measure, and how to measure it, is the key to understanding modern life
  What is 'freakonomics," anyway?
  Chapter 1 What Do Schoolteachers and Sumo Wrestlers Have in Common? 15
  In which we explore the beauty of incentives, as well as their dark side-cheating.
  Who cheats? Just about everyone
  How cheaters cheat, and how to catch them
  Stories from an Israeli day-care center
  The sudden disappearance of seven million American children
  Cheating schoolteachers in Chicago
  Why cheating to lose is worse than cheating to win
  Could sumo wrestling, the national sport of Japan, be corrupt?
  What the Bagel Man saw: mankind may be more honest than we think.
  Chapter 2 How is the Ku Klux Klan Like a Group of Real-Estate Agents? 51
  In which it is argued that nothing is more powerful than information, especially when its power is abused.
  Spilling the Ku Klux Klan's secrets
  Why experts of every kind are in the perfect position to exploit you
  The antidote to information abuse: the Internet
  Why a new car is suddenly worth so much less the moment it leaves the lot
  Breaking the real-estate agent code: what "well maintained" really means
  Is Trent Lott more racist than the average Weakest Link contestant?
  What do online daters lie about?
  Chapter 3 Why Do Drug Dealers Still Live with Their Moms? 85
  In which the conventional wisdom is often found to be a web of fabrication, self-interest, and convenience.
  Why experts routinely make up statistics; the invention of chronic halitosis
  How to ask a good question
  Sudhir Venkatesh's long, strange trip into the crack den
  Why prostitutes earn more than architects
  What a drug dealer, a high-school quarterback, and an editorial assistant have in common
  How the invention of crack cocaine mirrored the invention of nylon stocking
  Was crack the worst thing to hit black Americans since Jim Crow?
  Chapter 4 Where Have All the Criminals Gone? 115
  In which the facts of crime are sorted out from the fictions.
  What Nicolae Ceausescu learned-the hard way-about abortion
  Why the 1960s was a great time to be a criminal
  Think the roaring 1990s economy put a crimp on crime? Think again
  Why capital punishment doesn't deter criminals
  Do police actually lower crime rates?
  Prisons, prisons everywhere
  Seeing through the New York City police "miracle"
  What is a gun, really?
  Why early crack dealers were like Microsoft millionaires and later crack dealers were like Pets.com
  The superpredator versus the senior citizen
  Jane Roe, crime stopper: how the legalization of abortion changed every-thing.
  Chapter 5 What Makes a Perfect Parent? 147
  In which we ask, from a variety of angles, a pressing question: do parents really matter?
  The conversion of parenting from an art to a science
  Why parenting experts like to scare parents to death
  Which is more dangerous: a gun or a swimming pool?
  The economics of fear
  Obsessive parents and the nature-nurture quagmire
  Why a good school isn't as good as you might think
  The black-white test gap and "acting white"
  Eight things that make a child do better in school and eight that don't.
  Chapter 6 Perfect Parenting, Part II; or: Would a Roshanda by Any Other Name Smell as Sweet? 181
  In which we weigh the importance of a parent's first official act-naming the baby.
  A boy named Winner and his brother, Loser
  The blackest names and the whitest names
  The segregation of culture: why Seinfeld never made the top fifty among black viewers
  If you have a really bad name, should you just change it?
  High-end names and low-end names (and how one becomes the other)
  Britney Spears: a symptom, not a cause
  Is Aviva the next Madison?
  What your parents were telling the world when they gave you your name.
  Epilogue: Two Paths to Harvard 209
  In which the dependability of data meets the randomness of life.
  Bonus Matter 213
  "The Probability That a Real-Estate Agent Is Cheating You …" 215
  Selected "Freakonomics" Columns From The New York Times Magazine 233
  A Q&A with the Authors 261
  Notes 269
  Acknowledgments 295
  Index 297

출판사 서평

“Provocative… eye-popping.” — New York Times Book Review: Inside the List

“If Indiana Jones were an economist, he’d be Steven Levitt… Criticizing Freakonomics would be like criticizing a hot fudge sundae.” — Wall Street Journal

“The guy is interesting!” — Washington Post Book World

“The funkiest study of statistical mechanics ever by a world-renowned economist... Eye-opening and sometimes eye-popping” — Entertainment Weekly

“Steven Levitt has the most interesting mind in America... Prepare to be dazzled.” — Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink and The Tipping Point

“Principles of economics are used to examine daily life in this fun read.” — People: Great Reads

“Levitt dissects complex real-world phenomena, e.g. baby-naming patterns and Sumo wrestling, with an economist’s laser.” — San Diego Union-Tribune

“Levitt is a number cruncher extraordinaire.” — Philadelphia Daily News

“Levitt is one of the most notorious economists of our age.” — Financial Times

“Hard to resist.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Freakonomics is politically incorrect in the best, most essential way.... This is bracing fun of the highest order.” — Kurt Andersen, host of public radio's Studio 360 and author of Turn of the Century

“Freakonomics was the ‘It’ book of 2005.” — Fort Worth Star-Telegram

“An eye-opening, and most interesting, approach to the world.” — Kirkus Reviews

“An unconventional economist defies conventional wisdom.” — Associated Press

“A showcase for Levitt’s intriguing explorations into a number of disparate topics…. There’s plenty of fun to be had.” — Salon.com

“One of the decade’s most intelligent and provocative books.” — The Daily Standard

“Freakonomics challenges conventional wisdom and makes for fun reading.” — Book Sense Picks and Notables

“The trivia alone is worth the cover price.” — New York Times Book Review

“An easy, funny read. Many unsolvable problems the Americans have could be solved with simple means.” — Business World

“Economics is not widely considered to be one of the sexier sciences.... Steven D. Levitt will change some minds.” — Amazon.com

기본정보

ISBN	9780063032378 ( 0063032376 )
발행(출시)일자	2020년 05월 19일
쪽수	352쪽
크기	130 * 196 * 23 mm / 249 g
총권수	1권
언어	영어