SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes And Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance

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SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes And Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance

by Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner

3.76 · rating details · 14,750 ratings · 2,010 reviews

The New York Times bestselling Freakonomics was a worldwide sensation, selling more than four million copies in thirty-five languages and changing the way we look at the world.

Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner return with Superfreakonomics, and fans and newcomers alike will find that the freakquel is even bolder, funnier, and more surprising than the firs...more

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Published November 1st 2009 by HarperAudio (first published 2008)

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Sep 06, 2010

Jim rated it

· review of another edition

Mostly more of the same as Freakonomics with riffs on Malcolm Gladwell's books thrown in. The glaring difference is the chapter on climate change which attempts to go waaay beyond the author's expertise in behavioral economics and contains unfortunate misrepresentations of climate science. For a detailed critique, I'd recommend: http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/sci... Still, there's no denying that convincing the public to recognize the need to curb CO2 emissions is an almost impossible tas...more

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Jun 21, 2010

Khaya rated it

Recommends it for: Huge fans of the first "Freakonomics" and/or of Malcolm Gladwell, maybe

Shelves: audiobooks, readablenonfiction

A reluctant 3 stars. I'll give this book the benefit of the doubt and say that it probably would have worked better for me had I read it rather than listening to it. While I love the fact that audiobooks allow me to multi-task, it means that I'm less focused when I'm listening to them. That's fine if it's a book like Savannah Blues but this book demanded more concentration, especially since the writing style was highly tangential to begin with.

Those who read “Freakonomics” are fam...moreA reluctant 3 stars. I'll give this book the benefit of the doubt and say that it probably would have worked better for me had I read it rather than listening to it. While I love the fact that audiobooks allow me to multi-task, it means that I'm less focused when I'm listening to them. That's fine if it's a book like Savannah Blues but this book demanded more concentration, especially since the writing style was highly tangential to begin with.

Those who read “Freakonomics” are familiar with what the authors offer: a conglomerate of light, entertaining facts which offer new ways of looking at things, generally falling under the umbrella of studying the way people respond to incentives, a.k.a. behavioral economics. “Freakonomics” was probably the first book of its kind that I read and I enjoyed it thoroughly; I have since discovered Malcolm Gladwell and no longer find this genre particularly novel although that doesn't diminish my enjoyment.

In fact, there were some interesting and entertaining tidbits here -- the career path of a successful self-employed call girl, the truth behind the "38 bystanders" of Kitty Genovese's murder (a fundamental topic when I studied social psychology – who knew that the facts were misreported?), experiments with teaching monkeys to value currency, etc. Unfortunately some of the other topics bored me, particularly when the authors focused less on behavior and more on science (e.g., global warming and global cooling). The authors often lost me in part because of my own distractibility while listening, but I found that it was hard to come back once I did lose focus.

I highly recommend the first Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything book. Though there's room to quibble with a lot of the authors' claims, it's provocative and entertaining reading. There were moments where this one lived up to the standard set by the first, but overall I can't recommend it with the same enthusiasm.(less)

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Jan 19, 2010

Ann rated it

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Shelves: essays

TABLE OF CONTENTS (close to verbatim):

Intro--In which the global financial meltdown is entirely ignored in favor of more engaging topics:
the perils of walking drunk
the unlikely savior of Indian women
drowning in horse manure
what is freakonomics
toothless sharks & bloodthirsty elephants
things you always thought you knew but didn't

Chapter 1--In which we explain the various costs of being a woman:
LaShanna, part-time prostitute
One...more

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Apr 11, 2011

Ryan Melena rated it

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Shelves: audio-books

Ugh, pop culture trash masquerading as economics (in turn masquerading as hard science).

There were so many glaring flaws in the authors' assumptions, "logic", and conclusions that within just the introduction they had already lost all credibility.

Right up front the authors declare that fears about global warming are overblown because the issue will likely be solved by technological innovation and then offer as proof the fact that cars eliminated the problems cau...more

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Feb 09, 2012

Kerry Nietz rated it

· review of another edition

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It is a quick read, partially because of the subject matter, and partially because it is just over 200 pages long. I think what is especially cool about “Super Freakonomics” is that you never quite know what you’re going to read about next. The chapters deal with seemingly disconnected (but all interesting) topics and even within the course of a single chapter a half dozen different topics might be touched upon. This also means that it isn’t necessary to have read...more

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Dec 08, 2011

Justine rated it

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As a card carrying MBA I hereby admit that in the course of my long and expensive education, I have taken a total of 2 economics courses. One of them was with Kevin Murphy, so I feel like it should get bonus points, but in reality, it just means I was super confused most of the time. I’m not fundamentally opposed or disinterested in this fancy social science—rather, in the wide world of all the subjects in the world, my inner intellectual magpie (lobster biology! Prehistoric humans! Jewish pi...more

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Nov 21, 2011

Kelsey rated it

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Shelves: non-fiction

I liked Freakonomics. I checked this out from the library in hopes that it would be similar. It wasn't.

Here's what I think went wrong: the authors were more interested in shocking readers than with informing them. Freakonomics felt like the authors had come to sincere conclusions about data that was surprising yet true (or at least they believe it to be so; I know lots of people dispute it). Superfreakonomics felt like the authors dug up very little data and presented it in a way to ...more

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Sep 24, 2011

Justine rated it

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If you liked 'Freakonomics' then you will enjoy this sequel. I couldn't help but chuckle at some of the quirky economics-driven [read incentive vs cost/penalty] insights revealed in this book, such as:

* Letting a friend walk home drunk being infinitely more dangerous than letting him drive home drunk;
* Pimps being more valuable than real-estate agents;
* People who would have died from heart disease are now living long enough to die from cancer instead;
* A disproportiona...moreIf you liked 'Freakonomics' then you will enjoy this sequel. I couldn't help but chuckle at some of the quirky economics-driven [read incentive vs cost/penalty] insights revealed in this book, such as:

* Letting a friend walk home drunk being infinitely more dangerous than letting him drive home drunk;
* Pimps being more valuable than real-estate agents;
* People who would have died from heart disease are now living long enough to die from cancer instead;
* A disproportionate number of parents dying in the week after the Australian estate tax was abolished in 1979;
* Thomas Jefferson and John Adams 'expiring' within 15 hours of each other on 4 July 1826, exactly 50 years after the ratification of the US Declaration of Independence (the anniversary being the incentive);
* The Law of unintended consequences being the most potent of laws in existence, exemplified by such instances as:
- Americans intentionally cutting down trees on their properties to not attract endangered animals, thus defeating the Endangered Species Act;
- Germans resorting to flushing uneaten food down the toilet to avoid trash tax; and
- A spike in Irish backyard trash burning leading a tripling of people who'd set themselves on fire while doing so, just to avoid garbage tax.

The last chapter's focus on global warming is an eye-opener while the story about how doctors were contributing to significant incidences of patient deaths (even up to 1999) simply by not washing their hands is alarming! The epilogue, with its attention on monkeys, is hilarious!!

In their introduction, the authors make a very interesting point, which is "When the solution to a given problem doesn't lay right before our eyes, it is easy to assume that no solution exists. But history has shown again and again that such assumptions are wrong. [H]umankind has a great capacity for finding technological solutions to seemingly intractable problems ... It isn't that the problem isn't potentially large, it's just that human ingenuity - when given proper incentives - is bound to be larger." Let's hope this continues to prevail.(less)

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Sep 14, 2011

Lindsey rated it

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I'll be honest and say that I didn't make it past the first chapter-partially because Brian stole it and partially because I didn't care to finish it. I thought that in his last book that he had some pretty unconventional conclusions from the information he came across but he didn't try to talk you into anything and he had respect for the other point of view. In the first chapter he talks about how being a prostitute is the best way for a woman to make good money. He quotes his "study subj...more

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Aug 28, 2011

Jesse rated it

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the first few chapters were just a continuation of the first book in terms of ideas, tone and excecution; thus, i was feeling pretty satisfied that i was reading such a book and becoming more of a "cold-blooded economist", than a "warm-blooded humanist" (or whatever condescending, self-congratulatory phrases they used were). and then these guys got derailed, in a very sad, strange and self-defeating way. they did this weird about face, where in one chapter they talk about...more the first few chapters were just a continuation of the first book in terms of ideas, tone and excecution; thus, i was feeling pretty satisfied that i was reading such a book and becoming more of a "cold-blooded economist", than a "warm-blooded humanist" (or whatever condescending, self-congratulatory phrases they used were). and then these guys got derailed, in a very sad, strange and self-defeating way. they did this weird about face, where in one chapter they talk about the law of unintended consequences and then - in the very next chapter - they talk about solving global warming (the phrase they consistently used, instead of the more accurate global climate change) by spraying sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere. seriously. and after i picked my jaw up off the floor - because i mean talk about unintended consequences - i listened to them list there reasons why this would be a good idea and why other people (you know actual climate scientist, as opposed to inventors and economists) were afraid of this idea because of some ingrained dogma. and they did all this while consistently misrepresenting facts, stating easily falsifiable quotes without challenge, and dissing al gore, noble prize winner. did i mention they didn't talk to actual climate scientists. this was another stange aspect of this chapter: while in other sections they used large amounts of data to come to their conclusions, in this chapter they talked with the folks at "intellectual venture" and presented everything they said as truth without: 1)checking their statements for factual accuracy, 2)checking for logical fallacies and specious arguments, or 3) talking with a disinterested or antagonistic party to try and understand the full scope of the idea. if i took their chapter at face value, i would think that the solution for global climate change was simple cheap and without scary consequences, but a real easy (and fast) google search showed me the many mistakes that they made. they started their climate change chapter by presenting the "gobal cooling scare" of the 1970's as something that was scientifically agreed upon and reported in trade journals, when in reality (again, a quick google search) there were publications in popular magazines (with natgeo being the most "scientific", but not exactly peer-reviewed), and scattered papers that were never conclusive and there was nothing even close to the scientific consensus that we have today about human induced global climate change. the story about cooling in the 70's is something you hear alot from global warming skeptics, which is concerning when you read it in a book by so-called "cold-blooded economists", a simple look at the meta-analysis will show you there was no scientific conclusion about the 1970's "global cooling".

this chapter made me pause, and wonder about the whole freakonomics phenomenon. when i read the first book, i was astonished at how many things they discovered that were caused by simple adjustments to human incentives, or were just sitting there in the data the whole time and they were the ones smart enough to find the pattern. but now it makes me wonder how much of their "data" and "conclusions" were just a presentation of one side of the arguement. because just the way they use the phrase "cold-blooded economist" makes it sound like if you don't agree with their conclusions it must be because you are irrational and don't see the workd for what it really is: one large incentive experiment (which i don't wholly disagree with). but maybe the authors are missing their own incentives: having a new york times bestseller and becoming known for irreverant, yet spot on conclusions that others just "fail to see" - these are very strong incentives. just look at james frey, people will do alot to be famous and be seen as a genius. i'm not saying that this is what they did, just that if i learned anything from these books, it is to find out where the incentives come from and there you will usually find your causation. maybe the pressure to live up to the success of their first book got to them, or maybe they wanted to try and show how you could solve the world's biggest problem with a simple, cheap solution. or maybe, against all odds (and most climate scientists) they actually believe all that they wrote to be true. but i can't see how people this intelligent would take a problem this complex and ignore the power of unintended consequences – of which they just wrote – and take the word of just one company (for-profit, I might add), consult zero climate scientists and pretend that they have some sort of actual solution to climate change. following incentives on this one, it’s hard to conclude anything else but a selfish desire to appear clever, forward-thinking, and best-selling - and using a seriously dangerous problem to do so. and this is sad, from two guys who really can do great work.
(less)

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Jul 29, 2011

Grampa Brown rated it

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I really enjoy reading books that challenge you to question conventional wisdom. If you like Malcolm Gladwell I definitely recommend this book. HOWEVER, many of the topics are covered it Gladwell's books The Tipping Point, Blink, and Outliers, so be prepared to hear some regurgitation (the brutal murder in queens with 38 onlookers who didn't call the cops, how the month you were born greatly affects your ability to play professional sports, and many others that have been covered in other more ...more

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Jun 28, 2011

Trpnstn rated it

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coming from a research background heavy in statistics, I immediately recognized the interpretive errors contained in Freakenomics. Initially I found it amusing to see the absurd conclusions made through cherry picking outlier results based on correlational and/or poorly designed research studies. Half way through the book, I got bored but continued through just so I could quote my concerns first hand during debates with the many non-scientists that became so excited about the book. The second...more

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Jun 14, 2011

D Rhoades rated it

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subtitled: Global Colling, Patriotric Prostituties and why Suicide Bombers shoudl buy LIfe Insurance

For those of you who read their first book, Freakonomics, which was a best-seller for months and months, this book is just as fascinating as the first. One of the authors is an economist by trade; the other is a journalist. This combination makes for some fascinating reading. Interesting facts and stories, combined with great writing. Excellent! Engrossing non-fiction--I love that.
...moresubtitled: Global Colling, Patriotric Prostituties and why Suicide Bombers shoudl buy LIfe Insurance

For those of you who read their first book, Freakonomics, which was a best-seller for months and months, this book is just as fascinating as the first. One of the authors is an economist by trade; the other is a journalist. This combination makes for some fascinating reading. Interesting facts and stories, combined with great writing. Excellent! Engrossing non-fiction--I love that.

While the first book discussed the real economic facts of gang life and drug selling (not a good economic choice let alone the danger, risk, etc.), the new book discusses prostitution. What I really enjoy about these books organization is that a chapter may start discussing the economics and facts of one subject, then it wanders off into subject 2 and then subject 3 and then, whammo, it brings you back to the first subject and ties them all together in a most interesting way. They talk about the lowest form of prostitution (black girl who does it part time along with 3 other jobs--and at the lowest possible rates) all the way up to a professional woman turned call girl. Pretty interesting stuff. It really is. They make everything super interesting.

For those of you who don't like long books, its about 200 pages. The end has notes and an index, so its really a pretty short book and fast read.

One are talks about hurricanes (of more interest to me now that I live in Houston). Moreover about the brilliant man who has a "cheap and simple", relatively speaking, way to eliminate hurricane behavior of the oceans. Not that they would really want to eliminate them entirely. After all, the rain is needed. But they could use his method to dial down the intensity so that Katrina would be a very heavy storm but not an earth-shattering flood and windswept destruction. AND this is all interesting. They are great writers.

Near the end they write about global warming. I dare to say that whatever your opinions, beliefs or knowledge on this matter, this chapter will up-end what you thought you knew. He talks about this experiment company near Bellevue, WA that is owned by, not surprisingly, former Microsoft big-wigs and some of the smartest people in the world. They take on what the media says and what scientists of varying opinion say, and give some really interesting information about global warming, cap-and-trade and more. And they write about it in an accessible way. They write about economics from a point of view of "what motivates people to do what" and cite statistics and numbers and studies. So when they talk about global warming, they talk about things that can be done, from research (won't do any spoilers here), versus the Al Gore method of trying to change human behavior. I would say the main thread of this book is that people are motivated to do things that help them. They're not so motivated to do things to help you, the guy next to me, for example. So the carrot-and-stick approach isn't really immediately rewarding, shall we say, with people being people. He lists some actual things that are possible to do, to address various climate issues. The one thing I really had an issue with was his suggestion about using coal-fired plants output to shoot up in the air--well, you'll have to read the book. But I worry about the possible mercury poisoning from such a scenario. So I won't say that I have a 100% belief in the things they propose or write about. However, I will say that I am somewhat relieved that some really smart people are thinking about these things and working on simpler solutions--solutions that don't require changes in people's behavior--something that they demonstrate, in several different ways, is a very, very difficult thing to do.

Anyway, I hope I have made it sound boring and scientific, because its funny, provocative and fascinating. I highly recommend this book and think it would make GREAT discussion material.(less)

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Jun 11, 2011

John-Philip rated it

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Shelves: electronic-books-i-license, economics

A few years ago I read Freakonomics. I loved the stats and conclusions so much I started considering studying behavioral economics. Not long ago they released a sequel, SuperFreakonomics. It's my first book for Kindle and it was gifted to my by a friend on Christmas Eve. (If you don't have an e-reader I highly recommend it!)

Like the first book, its common theme is finding out the real reason for why people do the things they do - usually by following the money. The most memor...more

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Mar 28, 2011

Nick rated it

· review of another edition

Interesting tidbits. Engagingly written. A fun, quick, interesting read.

It was fun to read about all of this data analysis, as I'm starting to do that myself at work.

p31:

More than 150 years ago, the French economist Frederic Bastiat wrote "The Candlemaker's Petition", said to represent the interests of ... "Generally Everything Connected with Lighting."

These industries, Bastiat complained, "are suffering from the ruinous competition of a fo

...more

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Feb 02, 2011

Evan rated it

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Okay, I haven't finished the book yet. I plan to. But I have to say, within the first example of freakonomics in this book, I realized it was going to have the same problems as the last one: i.e. it would completely eschew any interest in morality or consequence or even tangible data in favor of getting shocking results.

The drunk driving vs. drunk walking example. Basically, through some flimsy conjecture (assuming 1 in every 140 miles walked is walked drunk...just because that's the r...moreOkay, I haven't finished the book yet. I plan to. But I have to say, within the first example of freakonomics in this book, I realized it was going to have the same problems as the last one: i.e. it would completely eschew any interest in morality or consequence or even tangible data in favor of getting shocking results.

The drunk driving vs. drunk walking example. Basically, through some flimsy conjecture (assuming 1 in every 140 miles walked is walked drunk...just because that's the ratio of miles driven drunk to driven sober, despite the fact that there's no evidence that ratio should or does translate to walking), they claim that it's actually safer for you to drive drunk than walk drunk. And all I can think is, someone's going to read this without seeing the flaws in their logic (they don't consider, for example, the benefits of walking with friends instead of alone, which limits your chance of endangerment, while driving drunk with friends only increases the consequences of your idiocy) and is going to decide that, from now on he should drive drunk instead of walking. And that idiot is going to kill someone, and it will all be only because Levitt and Dubner wanted to end up with a conclusion that was freaky enough to sell.

There's a benefit to academic conjecture. It is worthwhile probing things that don't normally get probed. But when you take that academic conjecture, and you put it in a shiny best-selling package and pretend that you've done all the math well enough to draw a firm conclusion, there are also consequences. And if you're going to claim that driving drunk is safer than walking home, you should probably double-check all the steps that got you there (I am not an economist, nor am I a logician or a mathematician--the fact that I can find a few missing steps in their calculations means they either forgot to show their work, or they just didn't do it, because they got the answer they wanted).

I find it kind of ironic, by the way, that Levitt's so concerned with car seats and seat belts...or maybe that's just him being smart. If you're going to unleash a wave of pop-sci reading drunk drivers, I guess you would want to make sure your seat belts and car seats were pretty awesome.

(Another note: if someone is creating an algorithm on how to find terrorists by whether or not they buy life insurance, as a morally responsible person, shouldn't you, I don't know, not give the terrorists tips on how to avoid getting caught? I mean, if you publish that stuff in an academic journal, it's one thing, but aren't you basically just undoing any good work the creator of the algorithm has done and giving the terrorists an edge they don't so much need? And for...I'm blanking on how this might be altruistic in any sense...oh right, you're just a normal person, driven by profit. Ever think that economists use that line so they can be sociopaths and still claim to be normal?)

There's some interesting stuff in here. There's some great work that's gone into this book (most of which, honestly, is other peoples' research with the numbers crunched by Levitt). But this book requires a very tight filter to weed out the guesses and hyperbole from the actual economics. And Levitt and Dubner don't include that, even in the deluxe edition.(less)

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Jan 24, 2011

Blog on Books rated it

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They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and for the authors of the blockbuster series “Freakonomics,” the pictures, graphs and charts contained in their new illustrated edition are proof of that concept big-time.

“SuperFreakonomics: *The Super-Deluxe, Super Illustrated Edition Thereof,” (yes, that’s its title!) prides itself on comparing and contrasting empirical data grabs against information from seemingly unrelated categories to create thought-provoking mash-ups of information ...moreThey say a picture is worth a thousand words, and for the authors of the blockbuster series “Freakonomics,” the pictures, graphs and charts contained in their new illustrated edition are proof of that concept big-time.

“SuperFreakonomics: *The Super-Deluxe, Super Illustrated Edition Thereof,” (yes, that’s its title!) prides itself on comparing and contrasting empirical data grabs against information from seemingly unrelated categories to create thought-provoking mash-ups of information (Prostitutes vs. Santa Clauses, as an example) designed to turn traditional thinking on its ear. By actually illustrating the results of these concepts, the two authors have created an easy to use, in-your-face analysis of trends from health care to highway safety to make the reader re-think popular misconceptions while learning all manner of obscure but interesting information about the world around them. It’s much the same as the original version, but this time with pictures – lots of pictures (and graphs, charts, diagrams, etc.)

Global warming vs. meat consumption, a better model for ER facilities, drunk driving vs. drunk walking, and product price discrimination are but a few of the myriad topics covered in this colorful, 281-page edition. While looking at the past as well as possibilities for the future (e.g. cooling the earth with a ‘chimney to the sky’), it’s sometimes hard to discern if the authors are serious or pulling a mickey with certain aspects of their analysis. (They even openly admit that “many of our findings may not be all that useful.”) But this, of course, is the appeal of their books. Are they serious? Perhaps only time will tell. In the meantime, Levitt and Dubner have succeeded wildly in getting their readers to think and to look at problems from a host of different comparative points of view.

Early in the book, they have a list of topics that the book doesn’t cover. (Average ratio of Facebook friends to real friends, why songs you like least are the ones you remember the most, salad dressings that never caught on, the actual price of all the tea in China.)

Sounds to us like a blueprint for Volume Two. (or is it Three?)(less)

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Jan 09, 2011

Josh Meares rated it

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I really enjoyed this sequel to Freakonomics. Levitt's unflinching and dispassionate analysis of often highly charged political issues is always enlightening. I sometimes wonder at the validity of his statistics, but he's the professional, not me.

In this book, in particular, I like the fact that he is really able to highlight the essential fallibility and humanity of the police force when dealing with prostitutes. Too often, we put our armed forces and protective services on such a ped...more

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Jan 06, 2011

Brian rated it

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Shelves: economics, sociology

Similiar in approach to the first book, challenging conventional wisdom. We assume reasons for outcomes that really aren't even close to the actual reasons on various different occurances in life.

Why aren't people stopped from walking while drunk when they are 8 times more likely to get killed walking than driving? Hmmm what is the government doing about walking?

Did cars save the ozone, the answer may be one that will surprise all you treehuggers.

The authors...more

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Dec 15, 2010

Loren rated it

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Shelves: economics

“In the United States especially, politics and economics don’t mix well. Politicians have all sorts of reasons to pass all sorts of laws that, as well-meaning as they may be, fail to account for the way real people respond to real-world incentives.”

Wow…. Either these people are extremely naïve or they are the worst of serious system junkies. If I need to sit and dissect that statement for you and all the levels of Manchurian bullshit, then there’s really no helping you. I especially ...more

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Dec 10, 2010

J.j. Wylie rated it

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When Freakonomics was published in 2006, I gulped it down in a single sitting. Then I dipped back into it, savoring its provocative blend of anecdote and analysis. Although I've always been intrigued by the 'dismal science' of economics, in Freakonomics, I was also entertained, especially with Levitt & Dubner's unusual choice of examples ranging from Sumo wrestling to drug-dealing to the effects of legalized abortion on crime rates. Because of this, I check out the Freakonomics Blog on a daily b...more

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Nov 15, 2010

Jeff Kessler rated it

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Most economics books talk about Supply and Demand, Price Elasticity, and Opportunity Cost. SuperFreakonomics! by Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner is not one of those books. Instead, the book discusses economics from the perspective of the common-man.

The book focuses around overarching questions that, while very interesting, are quite obscure in their answer. This format makes for gargantuan chapters that, while easy to begin, are hard to finish. Despite the long chapters, the book i...moreMost economics books talk about Supply and Demand, Price Elasticity, and Opportunity Cost. SuperFreakonomics! by Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner is not one of those books. Instead, the book discusses economics from the perspective of the common-man.

The book focuses around overarching questions that, while very interesting, are quite obscure in their answer. This format makes for gargantuan chapters that, while easy to begin, are hard to finish. Despite the long chapters, the book is fairly easy to read (so long as any pauses in the reading are done at the end of a chapter). The style and tone of the book are best be described as a subway book: one that is better suited to be read once and left on the seat for someone else to read.

The book’s subtitle, “Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance,” is a subtitle that creates more hype and media attention than is due. While the book does discuss prostitution and our economy, it does not mention “Patriotic Prostitutes” until the last paragraph of the chapter. In addition, some of the book’s information is either wrong or misleading. While the book’s subtitle included mention of “Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance,” the book talks about the reasons why suicide bombers should not buy life insurance. This unjustly draws the reader’s attention, only for them to find that the opposite is described. This leaves the reader unsatisfied after nearly every chapter.

Standing alone, this book would be forgotten in the back of the bookstore’s economics section. However, its predecessor, The New York Times Best-Seller Freakonomics!, gives the book much more distinction than is due. While the format of the two books is the same, the sequel lacks the “Hidden Side of Everything” that is described in the first book. When choosing another book, it would be better to find one that has as much insight as the original rather than this sequel. If anything, this edition detracts from the famous Freakonomics! name. While some may consider this book to be worth reading, it is certainly not comparable to the style, flow, and enchantment of Freakonomics!.(less)

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Nov 09, 2010

Karen rated it

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The sequel is better than the original.

My favorite chapter was "The Fix is In--and It's Cheap and Simple."
pg. 133: "It is a fact of life that people love to complain, particularly about how terrible the modern world is compared with the past. They are nearly always wrong. On just about any dimension you can think of--warfare, crime, income, education, transportation, worker safety, health--the twenty first century is far more hospitable to the average human tha...moreThe sequel is better than the original.

My favorite chapter was "The Fix is In--and It's Cheap and Simple."
pg. 133: "It is a fact of life that people love to complain, particularly about how terrible the modern world is compared with the past. They are nearly always wrong. On just about any dimension you can think of--warfare, crime, income, education, transportation, worker safety, health--the twenty first century is far more hospitable to the average human than any earlier time."
pg. 141: "The most amazing thing about cheap and simple fixes is they often address problems that seem impervious to any solution." Examples: population issues/Agricultural Revolution, whale extinction/drilling for oil, polio/vaccinations, and automobile death/seat belts.

I appreciated the Al Gore chapter for asking questions and discussing Global Warming as a very complex issue, rather than the sensationalized and oversimplified matter the media and politicians seem keen to convince us of. There appears to be some obvious human impact on environment, but the solution is not just a matter of driving less. Funny quote on pg. 167: "It is generally believed that cars and trucks and airplanes contribute an ungodly share of greenhouse gases. This has recently led many right-minded people to buy a Prius or other hybrid car. But every time a Prius owner drives to the grocery store, she may be canceling out its emission-reducing benefit, at least if she shops in the meat section. How so? Because cows...are wicket polluters. Their exhalation and flatulence...emit methane, which by one common measure is about twenty-five times more potent as a greenhouse gas than the carbon dioxide released by cars (and, by the way, humans)." Ha! I was, however, pretty skeptical about geoengineering solutions like "Budyko's Blanket," but I certainly appreciate that people are looking at this issue's solution from other angles. Vaccines and hand-washing used to seem pretty ridiculous, too. We'll see!

I loved reading about motives in the altruism chapter.

I didn't find the prostitution chapter all that shocking, but I think some people would.

This book is certainly intended for entertainment, and it did just that.(less)

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Oct 17, 2010

Jennifer rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

2 words that describe the book―Freaky Economics (Duh!)

3 characters I met

* Nathan Myhrvold, a former Microsoft executive, is one of the co-founders of Intellectual Ventures (IV)—an invention company that has come up with a variety of creative and affordable fixes for a variety of problems, ranging from hurricanes (they could literally stop them!) and global warming. It boggled my mind that a group of people like those found at IV exist—and they’ve found solutions for huge prob...more2 words that describe the book―Freaky Economics (Duh!)

3 characters I met

* Nathan Myhrvold, a former Microsoft executive, is one of the co-founders of Intellectual Ventures (IV)—an invention company that has come up with a variety of creative and affordable fixes for a variety of problems, ranging from hurricanes (they could literally stop them!) and global warming. It boggled my mind that a group of people like those found at IV exist—and they’ve found solutions for huge problems that are available RIGHT NOW! Learning about why these solutions are not being implemented was fascinating as well as a bit upsetting.

* Allie—a self-made woman who runs her own profitable business, which just happens to be as a $300 an hour prostitute. We meet Allie in the chapter on the economics of prostitution, which explains (among other things) why oral sex got so cheap. (During this particular chapter, you could be forgiven for thinking “Would being a prostitute really be such a bad job?” But, as you read on, you’ll quickly be relieved of this idea.)

* Keith Chen, an associate professor of economics at Yale, who attempted to find out “What would happen if I could teach a bunch of monkeys to use money?” What he finds is fascinating—and allowed Chen to have the distinction of seeing the “first instance of monkey prostitution in the recorded history of science.” I TOLD you this book was about freaky economics!

4 things I liked or disliked about the book

* I was a huge fan of the first Freakonomics book so when I saw there was a follow-up, I knew I had to read it. As with the first book, Superfreakonomics is packed with interesting information. However, I found it to be more scattered and less cohesive than the first book. At times, it was hard to remember that this book had anything at all to do with economics. It often felt more like a “check out the weird research this guy did!” Yet I’d still recommend it. As far as economics books go, you won’t find many that are more accessible or engaging.

* I liked how the topics ranged all over the place. Consider this partial list of topics covered in the book: the perils of walking drunk, prostitution, the male-female wage gap, the worst month to have a baby, the trickle down effects of September 11th, telling a good doctor from a bad one, how to postpone death, the Kitty Genovese murder, the roots of altruism, kidney donation in Iran, the Endangered Species Act, dead whales, the history of seatbelts, hurricanes, global warming, the Club versus LoJack, why hand washing matters, and (of course) monkey prostitution.

* Although I liked the wide range of topics covered, this did result in a scattershot feeling. Lots of stuff is discussed, but the text jumps from one to the other so quickly that I had a hard time remembering what I was reading or had read. In fact, going back to write this review some months after reading this book, I kept thinking to myself “I don’t really remember that. They talked about kidney donation in Iran? Oh yeah … that was interesting. Kitty Genovese? Who was that? Oh…that’s right. Now I remember.” Yet, despite this flaw, it was still a fast and interesting read.

* Of all the things I read about in this book, the one that made me crazy was that there are solutions for major problems that could be implemented RIGHT NOW but aren’t due to a variety of political and economic reasons. I’m sure residents of Florida, Louisiana and other areas plagued by hurricanes would be quite interested in learning about the low-tech, low-cost technology that could potentially prevent hurricanes from forming and wreaking havoc.

5 stars or less for my rating:

I’m giving the book 4 stars. Just like the first Freakonomics book, this book was a fast-paced and interesting read. If you detest economics and couldn’t imagine voluntarily reading a book about economics, I’m here to tell you should make an exception for this series. Although the book felt a bit scattered and less focused than the first book, I’d still recommend it. If you’re a fan of accessible non-fiction, this book is a must read. And, if you have the misguided idea that non-fiction books are boring or dry, this book will change your mind. I mean, it talks about MONKEY PROSTITUTION!(less)

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Oct 09, 2010

Hinch rated it

· review of another edition

SuperFreakonomics continues the thread established by its predecessor, Freakonomics. In the course of exploring an array of topics including global warming, prostitution, and the safety virtues of child car seats, it seeks to broaden our definition of economics. We are encouraged to reconsider an "economist", the traditional label for a student of mathematical and monetary theory, as one whom forms conclusions, not based on convenience or expectation, but rather on the critical evaluat...more

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Sep 08, 2010

Chad Warner rated it

· review of another edition

Recommended to Chad by: Kelly Meulenberg

Shelves: non-fiction

This book takes a thought-provoking and often humorous look at the microeconomics of our human lives. It explores incentives and disincentives, correlation and causation. I can't clearly articulate why, but I liked this book better than the original Freakonomics.

The authors keep you guessing. Every time they propose a reasonable explanation for some behavior, you find yourself nodding in understanding. Then a page or 2 later, they reveal an entirely different, often contradictory exp...more

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Aug 16, 2010

Roy rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: unsure architecture majors

It’s a good thing the Freakonomics books (Super and regular) did not come around until after I had chosen my major in college, otherwise there is a very good chance I would now be a macro-economist. I love thinking about why people do things, and how wrong most explanations are for why people do things. Economists are often described as immoral, heartless, impractical libertarians – seriously, sign me up. If they all could write this clearly, without formulas, about events and ideas that are as ...more

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Aug 04, 2010

David rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: random-non-fiction

Like its predecessor, this is an extremely fun book to read. The stories are engaging and interesting. I have driven my wife nuts as I have often put down the book and begun to retell what I just read with a "did you know..." Most interesting is chapter two where we learn why suicide bombers should buy life insurance and chapter five which does not so much question the prevailing doctrine of global warming as tear up the way it is (wrongly) presented to the public to get to the hear...more

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Jul 25, 2010

Simmoril rated it

· review of another edition

It's tough for me to do an in-depth review of Superfreakonomics for a couple reasons: one is that Superfreakonomics isn't so much a 'story' per se, as it is a collection of shorter stories about some of the ways economics can be applied to examine a wide range of real-world problems. This leads into the second reason, which is that I don't want to give away the solutions/explanations of said problems and spoil the book for potential readers.

What I will say about the book is this: Levit...more

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Jul 17, 2010

MacK rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

I often notice that creative types get trapped inside their own heads. Occasionally this elicits brilliant works of staggering genius (see Picasso, Pablo). Occasionally the result is great to the artist and confusing to almost everyone else (see Kauffman, Andy). But the real problem is when a successful artist begins to ponder a follow up work and finds themselves unable to walk the fine line between repeating themselves and being labeled as self indulgent.

While SuperFreakonomics doe...moreI often notice that creative types get trapped inside their own heads. Occasionally this elicits brilliant works of staggering genius (see Picasso, Pablo). Occasionally the result is great to the artist and confusing to almost everyone else (see Kauffman, Andy). But the real problem is when a successful artist begins to ponder a follow up work and finds themselves unable to walk the fine line between repeating themselves and being labeled as self indulgent.

While SuperFreakonomics doesn't exactly suffer from either of these flaws, you can't help but notice that the authors are painfully aware of how difficult it will be to follow up on the epic accomplishment of Freakonomics. Sure there are winning chapters about game theory and incentives, but many of these feel like new ways of framing old topics (in particular the prostitute chapter, which ties in so closely with the previous book's work on drug dealers that it feels more like an after thought than a really compelling example). The most daring innovation is one that the authors themselves have owned up to. The hotly debated Global Warming chapter {please note the pun is unintentional} may well be the result of one or both authors falling in love with a set of ideas and lionizing the thinkers behind them. Wrapped up in their own status as brave souls who tell truth to power, that chapter especially becomes less practical and more theoretical than anything else...and the book suffers for it.

However, no amount of self-indulgent over thinking can take away the fact that these authors truly do revel in illuminating new ideas in new and startling ways. As a teacher who is willing to completely alter an entire lesson plan just to accommodate a new factoid, I'm fine with that. We're meant to keep thinking, keep analyzing, keep guessing and trying to understand what is most mysterious in our world (the game theory sections among baseball card vendors is especially fascinating). If we ever repeat ourselves we must trust that our friends and neighbors will be patient, if we ever become too consumed with our own ideas we must trust that our family and colleagues will tell us to snap out of it and rejoin the real world. For all its faults SuperFreakonomics is still a vital voice in a valuable dialogue. We just need to join in and help it along.(less)

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About Steven D. Levitt

Steven David "Steve" Levitt is a prominent American economist best known for his work on crime, in particular on the link between legalized abortion and crime rates. Winner of the 2003 John Bates Clark Medal, he is currently the Alvin H. Baum Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago, director of the Becker Center on Chicago Price Theory at the University of Chicago Graduate Sc...more

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