Asia Shelton
Mrs. Langstaff
Hnrs Economics
Critical Analysis
March 11, 2013
Freaky Economimcs Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? Why am I asking you all of these seemingly irrelevant questions? Well I’ll tell you why, because to economists Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, these questions aren’t irrelevant at all. “The conventional wisdom is often wrong” (Levitt Dunbar 14) so Levitt looks at the economy in a very unconventional way. Often times, the study of economics is seen as dry, boring, and consisting of mind numbing numbers, uninteresting financial trends, and statistics. Yet in Freakonomics Levitt and Dubner make it interesting, and dare I say, funny. They show us that economics is the study of incentives and how people get what they want, or need, and especially when other people want or need the same thing. I’m very fond of the idea that there is no one cause for an effect. I believe that there are multiple tiny causes that build up over time and then suddenly, and oddly to many people’s surprise, you have this looming and terrible effect. So I was a bit put off at how Levitt only offers one cause for some of the arguments he tries to make. He even says himself in the introduction that, "If you learn how to look at data in the right way, you can explain riddles that otherwise might have seemed impossible.” (Levitt Dunbar 14) Yet, it seems as though he’s only looked at the data in one way. For example, the writers claim that there is only one cause for the decline in crime rate, and that is the Roe vs. Wade decision that gave a women’s right to an abortion. Even though they make a good argument to back up their claim he only analyzes the situation on a national level. Did he ever think