The world is in lockdown; real life sucks. So I am taking a break from it — one book at a time. Welcome to my quarantine-reads series, y’all!
Ah, Economics, you sexy sexy thing. Economics as a field is so enigmatic; are you science or art? Are you STEM or Social Science? Are you subjective or objective? I have always found it to be an exciting subject. As someone who’s been a loyal Planet Money and The Indicator fan (hey Cardiff and Stacey), I just really liked the field but felt like a fly on the wall, observing from a distance and just reaching out.
Until recently. Last year I briefly worked with smartass people who were from Econ background, learned stuff from them, and read books that horizon-broadening books. My favorite books were: What Money Can’t Buy by Michael Sandel, Predictably Irrational and The Honest Truth about Dishonesty by Dan Ariely. All of which obviously makes me developed a major crush on Behavioural Economics. (Is that weird if you find a subject sexy?!) Anyway, I digress. Back to Freakonomics, the book people claim to read and secretly wished they read but maybe just got through the first two chapters — I see you, I was you. Freakonomics is to economics books what English food is to the culinary world. Not much, pretty bland theory-wise but not a bad starting point (and good for hangovers). If you’re curious about what Economists do, their woes and worries with data, basics of causation and correlation, findings patterns, and sociological narratives — this is a dope book to pick up. For any seasoned professional in the world of data science, statistics, and economics — you know you can lift more weight, move ahead. I had this book on my clothes shelf, tucked between my running pants (how apt, both of them hardly get used), and I thought, I got nothing better to do than read this pretty boy right now. Read on my review. :)
an absolute classic, Levitt and Dubner, can I have your coffee order next?
I found out their podcast before I knew about the book (weird, I know). The podcast served as a gateway to exciting ongoing research in the field of social sciences and economics — inspiring an enthusiastic freshman. Five years later, I revisit this book, and it’s a different experience. I know more about the field, I have done lateral reading of related publications, and I am better able to appreciate the arguments, especially the simplicity with which they are presented.
It is no surprise that this is one of the best get-to-know-econ for dummies book that teases you with random but intriguing titles and makes you sit through the difference between correlation and causation, teaching what a regression can and cannot tell you, what the data means and how stories are decoded from it.
I think Levitt and Dubner are visionaries in attempting to write this book — for a more noob audience and keeping them engaged through and through. There is an odd comfort in revisiting books of Christmas past and also giving a sense of development and growth — in a time when freedom, struggle, and purpose feel lost.
“Money trees is the perfect place for shade” — oh my bad, that’s Kendrick.
Levitt & Dubner getting real about that academia life.
There are countless research projects for which we couldn’t find the right data, or where the results just turned out not to be very interesting. For every 10 research ideas, only 2 will turn into an academic paper, and only 1 will be interesting enough for a book like this.
While being bipartisan, their take on pro-life vs. pro-choice debate is … well, obvious.
The Supreme Court gave voice to what the mothers in Romania and Scandinavia — elsewhere — had long known: when a woman does not want to have a child, she usually has a good reason for it. For any hundred reasons, she may feel that she cannot provide a home environment that is conducive to raise a healthy, productive child.
other works by these authors 1. SuperFreakonomics, 2009 2. Think Like a Freak, 2014 3. Freakonomics Radio, NPR (my fav): https://www.npr.org/podcasts/452538045/freakonomics-radio
miscellaneous