Thursday, October 18, 2007

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores The Hidden Side Of Everything (Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner)

[****] ISBN: 9780060776138 (audio) ISBN: 9780060731328 (hardcover)

Steven Levitt has a warped mind. He is the rogue economist of the title, and he manages, by having such a unique perspective about so many things, to really make you think about how you see the world. And it's not just that he's just being contrarian in his world view. He applies genuine science, mathematics, and statistics to answer hard questions about the world. The unique part comes from the questions he is asking, the way he asks them, and the way he applies the science, etc. to answer them. I came away convinced that the so-called common wisdom is obviously wrong in many cases and so very easy to subvert. With the other Stephen (of the New York Times) joining in to help with the writing, these two are essentially the Mythbusters of economics (and, by implication, sociology).

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