Freakofinal

Freakonomics is a book like no other. It looks at aspects of our society that no one would have thought to look at before, from the names of children to the information attack against the KKK. The authors argue that data is all one needs to explore some of the greatest mysteries of our society. It is easy to hypothesize about the catalyst required to bring down crime, but only the data can show the true reason for this drop. Although I would contend that no matter how much  data we possess, it cannot explain all the mysteries in our world, but it can bring us closer to understand our basic patterns.

 A fascinating section of this book, was the discussion on children's names. All parents like to believe that a children's name has a profound affect on the child's life. If a child has the wrong name, it could hinder them adulthood, or if given the right name, it could give them the extra push to make it big. Freakonomics examined this claim, and came away with the realization that names have very little effect on a child's success. I have a a very standard name which has neither helped nor hindered me, but I was almost named Jasper. Upon hearing this, I was practically relieved at surviving almost being named a name I consider stupid. Something as subjective as a name choice had actually caused me distress. Jasper isn't even that bad a name! Jasper Terreden or Jake Terreden will almost certainly be irrelevant in my life, and yet to this day, after reading the book, I still express gratitude for not being named Jasper. I suppose no matter how much data we are exposed to, we stick to our beliefs, there is something uniquely human about that.

When we think about where we want to end up in life, drug dealer does not usually top our list. Yet drug related gang membership has risen over the past decades, and the authors took a look at a particular gang in Chicago. A student at the University of Chicago, spent months studying the gang, and learning about their inner workings. At one point, he got his hands on a ledger that outlined the entire gang's economic operations. What he discovered was that these gangs had very similar economic systems to our modern capitalist system. A few people at the top of the pyramid have very lucrative jobs while the majority struggle to make three dollars an hour. People working for Amway or the Black Disciples have almost identical lives. They are told if they work hard enough, then they will be among the elite, but many are inevitably disappointed. It was fascinating to see that no matter what part of society we come from, much of what we experience is similar to that of people around the globe.

One experience that a huge portion of our population has in common is the raising of a child. All people wonder how much of an effect they have on a child. Freakonomics examined this issue and came upon  a very interesting finding. What really affected a child's life was not what a parent does, but who a parent. A child with a rich parent, is more likely to be successful in life than one whose parents read to them every night. This can be somewhat disheartening to parents. No matter what they do, it is their life that will affect their child's. Although some parents may be disappointed that their actions will not have a large effect on a child, I like to believe that what really makes a good parent, is a good person,  which is actually a very encouraging sign.

Taken as a whole, I can understand why this book was so revolutionary. It attacked issues no one dared to touch and broke them down so anyone can understand them; that is the beauty of this book. The intended audience is anyone with an open mind and an interest in their society. This wasn't written for intellectuals, it was written for a person who is trying to see the world differently, and I think we all are trying to do that. I would recommend this book to anyone who is curious about how the world works. It is an easy read, and does not talk down to the reader, but rather invites them to see the world as they do; showing them patterns that no one had noticed. It definitely deserved the accolades granted to it.    
   

Economic Punctuation

Although in a book about economics punctuation is not a vital aspect, it can go a long way to creating a solid argument. In a section about the correlation between abortion and the crime rate, the authors must be absolutely clear in their use of facts and observations so that the readers do not come away with an incorrect assumption. Punctuation can go a long way towards creating a clear and concise argument. The section goes as follows:

"One factor to look for would be a correlation between each state’s abortion rate and its crime rate. Sure enough, the states with the highest abortion rates in the 1970s experienced the greatest crime drops in the 1990s, while states with low abortion rates experienced smaller crime drops. (This correlation exists even when controlling for a variety of factors that influence crime: a state’s level of incarceration, number of police, and its economic situation.) Since 1985, states with high abortion rates have experienced a roughly 30 percent drop in crime relative to low-abortion states. (New York City had high abortion rates and lay within an early-legalizing state, a pair of facts that further dampen the claim that innovative policing caused the crime drop.) Moreover, there was no link between a given state’s abortion rate and its crime rate before the late 1980s—when the first cohort affected by legalized abortion was reaching its criminal prime—which is yet another indication that Roe v. Wade was indeed the event that tipped the crime scale."

There were two main aspects that stood out in this excerpt. First were the two parenthetical phrases. These points of clarification provide the context required to create such an argument; giving a complete picture of the situation. The first phrase dispels a possible claim that the low crime rates could have been affected by each state's law enforcement situation. The second phrase relates back to an example used earlier to show that the claim that "innovative police strategies" was the cause of the crime drop is, in fact, false. Finally, the dashes at the end of the passage, each provide a stopping point for the reader to stop and consider the statement. These provide a final punch to the passage, which finishes with a rock solid statement, backed up by all the information provided in the passage.

The Power of Morality

While reading Freakonomics, I came upon a section, that was quite interesting. It described the story of a man named Paul Feldman. He was previously a weapons cost analyzer for the Navy, but he quit his job to sell bagels. However, his bagel business was not run like a normal bagel business. He would go around to corporate buildings and leave a box of bagels with a collection box, and leave. At the end of the day he would return and pick up the leftover bagels along with the money. Many people considered this honor based system of economics would never work, but not only did it succeed, but it surpassed what he was making; working for the Navy. The interesting part of this enterprise was that Paul did not need a 100% or even a 90% return to make money, all he needed was an 87% return. This defied all common assumptions about economics. There were no incentives or disincentives to steal from Paul besides one's own morals, but here he was, getting an 87% return on his bagels. What this proved was that a person's sense of morality can have a profound affect on an economic outcome.
 

This section spoke to me because I have regularly witnessed these stores based on an honor system, and I have always been surprised that these businesses stayed up and running. One specific example was when I was at a farm stand in Deerfield. They were selling much more valuable commodities than a bagel, and there was nothing there except a collection box. At the time, I could not believe that a business like this was still in business because I had such a low opinion of humanity that I couldn't believe that such a enterprise could survive the corruption of society. I asked my mom why didn't people just steal and she said that "it would be wrong." While I was there, no one stole anything (probably because there were other people there) and today I still see it in business. Both the story in the book and my experience reinforce the idea that morality can coexist with modern economics. The common assumption about morality, was that it was a nice feeling, but it would never work in such a cut throat society. Of course, there are professions out there that are run by back-stabbing barons who only work for the guy they see in the mirror every morning, but this is not the only type of business. People can make money off of people's morality, which is an exciting discovery for the future of our race.

Freakotemplates

In almost all non-fiction books, the authors will use a set of templates to convey their message. These templates can be used for many different purposes including introducing a quote, or presenting a counter-claim; Freakonomics is no different. Although the subject matter is quite unique, the strategies used discuss this subject can be found in many other books.

 The type of template Freakonomics uses most extensively is the placing of a naysayer in the argument. The controversial claims made by the authors in this book would inevitably create opponents, and the authors take great pains to address these claims. One example comes at the end of a chapter addressing the existence or morals in economics. The author claims, rather controversially, that an economic system can be based on people's morals, and can thrive on human conscience. He then states "This outcome (success of an honor system based bagel business) may surprise some people---including Feldman's economist friends." This quote uses a template to explain why this study is so important to our understanding of society. Unless the author explains to the people why this finding is such game-changing discovery. Otherwise, this would have been pushed aside as just a somewhat interesting story, and not a statement about modern economics.

 The author rarely points out specific naysayers, but brings them up in the form of physical questions. When discussing the hierarchy of gangs in Chicago and the distribution of wealth among the members, the author creates a naysayer by asking "Who cared if the crack game was a tournament that only a few of them could win" This naysayer allows the author to address a possible point of contention within the context of the argument. Here, there is specific person or group of people who he addresses, but it comes in the form of a hypothetical question. He could have easily stated "Some may say that there is no significance to the crack tournament, but I disagree" the former just flowed better in his argument.

Although Freakonomics discusses many different issues, their way of discussing them remains relatively constant. There is very little use of direct quote sandwiches, but the use of naysayers is quote prevalent in the book, most likely because of the provocative claims made throughout the book. Naysayers are required to tell the reader that the author understands the reservations people may have about the claims, and with claims that not only break the mold, but ignore the mold all together, a naysayer is vital to bring the book back down to a place where people can understand it.  

Rhetoric in Freakomics.

The book Freaknomics was written on the basis that statistics can change accepted assumptions. People can believe that real estate agents work for the seller only or that sumo wrestling is without corruption, but by merely examining the data related to these issues, it becomes clear that these assumptions are not always the case. In order to prove these assumptions incorrect, data must be supplied, and lots of it. Because data is used so extensively throughout the book, it comes as no surprise that logos is the primary rhetorical device. It is somewhat difficult to convince a person that a beloved sport like sumo wrestling is wrought with corruption without giving hard data, although emotions could arise as a by-product of making these controversial claims. By citing all the data, the author's build their ethos with the reader and further convinces them of their claims. Honestly, if a person looked at the amount of data they do their head would explode. The amount of data combined with their conclusions from this data combine to create such a conclusive and airtight argument, that it becomes very difficult to refute the claims. The following passage is an example of how they use both logos and ethos create an argument.      

"If morality represents the way we would like the world to work and economics represents how it actually does work, then the story of Feldman's bagel business lies at the very intersection of morality and economics. Yes, a lot of people steal from him, but the vast majority even though no one is watching over them, do not. This outcome may surprise some people--including Feldman's economist friends, who counseled him twenty years ago that this honor system scheme would never work. But it would not have surprised Adam Smith. In fact, the theme of Smith's first book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments  was the innate honesty of mankind. 'How selfish soever man may be supposed,' Smith wrote 'there are evidently some principles in his nature,which interests him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it, except the pleasure of seeing it.'"

In this paragraph, the author draws a parallel between economics and morality through the use of mainly logos and ethos. The first part of the paragraph represents a heavy use of logos. The use of "if this is true...then this is also true" is a classic example of logos. The second part of the paragraph takes a much more ethical approach. First, the author puts a naysayer; giving a voice to the other side of the issue. What makes this a powerful point of ethos is that this naysayer or rather these naysayers are real people who have a personal relation to the person cited. Next the use of a quote is a very effective use of ethos, and quoting the world famous economist Adam Smith takes the argument to another level. By quoting the man whom people assume would disagree with the statement and having his quote agree with their argument, makes a persuasive argument.

The First Fifty Pages

The book opens by describing the unprecedented drop of crime in the mid 1990s. Leading up to 1996, people were predicting a huge rise in the rate of crime that 1995 would look like "the good old days" according to experts, the absolute best case scenario we could hope or was a 15% increase in crime. However, when 1996 rolled around, crime began to drop, not just slightly, but rapidly. Experts came up with many explanations for this phenomena including a tough on crime approach, and better police tactics. The author claims that while these were important, they were not the overarching catalyst for this drop. According to him, the real reason for this drop in crime was the landmark decision of Roe v. Wade twenty years prior. This decision, according to the author, ceased many children who would most likely be born into more destitute situations from being born. This anecdote was meant to introduce the reader to the stream of thought that inspired this book. By looking at data, we can discover trends in our society that were previously un-explainable. Questions like how do we discover cheating, or what incentivizes a real estate agent can be answered by merely looking at the data.
   
         
              The first chapter of the book looks at morales and cheating. The first story looks at a day care in Israel that was dealing with the problem of waiting for late parents. To alleviate this problem the managers of the day care instituted a three dollar fine if a parent was more than ten minutes late. Surprisingly, the amount of  late pickups actually increased. To parents, the fact that they only had to pay three dollars to expunge the guilt of showing up late, made them feel that it was not a big problem and could show up late. This story was meant to show that a conventional belief I.E. a fine will cause a behavior to stop, is not always the case, and can be inherently flawed. Then, the author writes about reaches the meat of the chapter, which is cheating. The first example the author uses, is the problem of cheating on standardized tests. The focus was primarily directed at a public elementary school in Chicago where students in sixth grade were receiving higher scores in sixth grade than any other grade. These jumps in test scores caught the attention of Arne Duncan who retested the trouble spots, and found the classrooms with cheating teachers and promptly fired them. The author then draws a parallel between this situation and the one in Japan where it is believed that sumo wrestlers were throwing matches to help their fellow wrestlers. This time, they looked at the percentage of victories that a wrestler's status was in the balance, and the findings showed that the wrestler on the bubble won a disproportionate amount of times compared to their record compared to their competition's. Despite this clear data, there has been little action dealing with these claims of throwing matches. The final example looks at the sale of bagels. A man who had begun selling bagels at his job at one point quit his job and went around selling bagels to companies all around. What he found was he percentage of people took a bagel without paying, (he just dropped off the bagels and a payment box and left) was correlated to many different factors including weather, size of company, and time of the year. A person's sense of morality can be directly affected by outside forces.

                Overall, this book has been blowing my mind. The part that was especially interesting was the section about the day care center. The book takes instances that we would not pay attention to, and strips away the assumptions and gives us the cold hard facts. Although, the one problem I find with the book, is with its focussing on the bigger picture, it takes away from an individual's perspective. I personally would have found it interesting for the author's to focus on why one individual makes a decision, and use the data to explain this decision, but this is just nit-picking. I would recommend this book to everyone interested in the workings of their society.

       

Why Freakonimics?

Going into this assignment, I was confident in the style of book I wanted to read. I was at the time reading two other books The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas, and Blood Red Sunset by Ma Bo, and I wanted a book that deviated from the historical aspect and went more into the theoretical realm. My interest was at first piqued by the autobiography of Malcolm X, but I could not find it, and I was not interested enough to pursue it further. So then, I scoured the list of potential books, and came upon Freakonomics. The book that has sold over 4 million copies worldwide took the world by storm, and by 2014, almost every person has at least heard of the book. Written by Steven Levitt, a professor at the University of Chicago, and Stephen Dubner, a less prestigious author this book took the world by storm, and completely flipped upside-down many basic assumptions about our world. I had previously heard about this book, and had watched a part if the documentary that succeeded its success, but I had not read, so I felt it was about time I joined the masses and read this book. After reading only a small section of the book, I can say that it has me hooked. Within the first 24 pages, Levitt, and Dubner, have made attacked many set notions about our world, which made me excited to read on. I hope to fill this blog with interesting thoughts, which have been stated in ten blogs before this one.