Author: Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

Publication Date: 2006

Publisher: William Morrow (Harper Collins Publishers)

Bottom Line:  Why is conventional wisdom so often wrong? This book uses economics to explain hot-button issues including legal abortion's impact on crime rates, the parallels of the Ku Klux Klan to real estate agents, and cheating among sumo wrestlers and schoolteachers alike.

What It Covers: Freakonomics begins with the certainly controversial assertion that it was the legalization of abortion which indirectly lead to the 1990's crime drop in America and not gun control, a strong economy, or innovative policing techniques.  According to the book's author, the simple explanation is that crime was reduced because the pool of potential criminals was dramatically decreased.

Other nuggets of basically unrelated conventional wisdom are considered and dispensed with by economics rather than the morality human nature typically ascribes to them. The chapter on cheating uses the economics of an honor-system bagel service to illustrate this intersection between the two - a lot of people will steal, but most do not even if no one is watching.  Another chapter asks the question: "Why do drug dealers still live with their moms?" and compares gangs to McDonald's franchises.

While the book is written for a general public audience, it examines the folly of many of our government's efforts, such as the dismally poor outcomes of school choice programs and the tendency of the government to spend money on "high dread" issues like preventing terrorism rather than high impact problems like heart disease.  OhMyGov! readers are certain to find plenty of cause for contemplation and outrage in Freakonomics.

About the Authors: Steven D. Levitt teaches economics at the University of Chicago and was recently awarded the John Bates Clark Medal, an award granted to the best American economist under forty.  Stephen J. Dubner writes for the New York Times and The New Yorker.

Excerpts: 

"Imagine that you are a government official charged with procuring the funds to fight one of two proven killers: terrorist attacks and heart disease.  Which cause do you think the members of Congress will open up the coffers for? The likelihood of any given person being killed in a terrorist attack is far smaller than the likelihood that the same person will clog up his arteries with fatty food and die of heart disease...  Death by terrorist attack is considered wholly dreadful; death by heart disease is, for some reason, not."

"The problem with crack dealing is the same as in every other glamour profession: a lot of people are competing for a very few prizes... But criminals, like everyone else, respond to incentives.  So if the prize is big enough, they will form a line down the block just hoping for a chance."

Suggested Backdrop:  Read or listen to during your commute. Due to its format and content of many loosely related topics, it is well suited to stopping and starting.  This reviewer listened to the audiobook version in the car over a two week period and it gave plenty to think about while staring at the tail-lights of DC gridlock.

OhMyGov Rating:  3 out 4 of stars.