Steven D. Levitt's Freakonomics

Economics is defined as the study of financial trends. Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner examines the hidden side of everyday events that Levitt has studied throughout his career. Levitt has found that unconventional ways of collecting data and measuring data are occasionally the correct way to put the world in terms that we can all understand. Levitt, with the aid of Dubner, can find a correlation between any two things. For example, the reason why crime suddenly dropped in the 1970’s is the opposite of what many would expect. Many turn to the logical explanations, such as an increase in law enforcement or higher paying jobs. Neither of those are the actual reason why crime suddenly dropped so dramatically, though.
Levitt also states that teachers cheat due to the incentive of making more money in the form of performance bonuses. The author also contends that sumo wrestlers throw matches since they are most likely being bribed and there are no negative outcomes to losing that round. Also in the book Freakonomics, it states that parents pick up their children later than they have before from a daycare due to a fine for late pick-ups was put into place and they no longer feel guilty about leaving their child a little later now that they are paying for the extra care. Every single one of these actions are done because of some form of incentive, whether it be a moral incentive, economic incentive, or a social
Most often, the personal desire of the professional will be that of money. An example of this would be an interior design specialist. They may push the client to purchase more expensive items and persuade them to buy things that the client generally does not need solely to make more money in commissions. The design specialist will use their reputation along with information obtained while on the job to manipulate the client into spending more than needed. This satisfies the professionals desire for greater wealth. An example that Levitt directly states in the book is of a real estate agent. Real estate agents will not put in enough effort to wait for the highest bid to come along because the time taken will outweigh any profits that could be made by the agent. The book Freakonomics is generally a very informative with little bias in the work. Both sides of the argument would be presented in almost in all situations. Levitt did assume that social incentives would mostly be undermined by economic or moral incentives. The nonlinear development of the book does make it somewhat difficult to understand for individuals with little prior knowledge on the