Book Review: FREAKONOMICS: A HIDDEN SIDE OF EVERYTHING

Realize that everything connects to everything else.  Leonardo Da Vinci
You just need to connect the dots. Steve Jobs

                                         

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GENERE                Non-Fiction- Economics

AUTHOR               Steven D Levitt  & Stephen J.Dubner

PAGES                  350

YEAR OF PUBLISH 2005

RELATED BOOKS   The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Lean In Women, Work, and the Will to  Lead, Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap

 

Freakonomics approach is similar to conventional economics by taking variables and mapping it with the issues, what suits and whatnot.  But the freaky part are those variables. They are taken beyond the conventional school. No economist can think of such an upside-down perspective. Issues such as,- "falling of crime rates after introduction of abortion law, secrets of real estate agents, why drug dealers stay with their mothers? what prostitutes can teach us about economics, cannot be taught in formal education, hahaha looks laughable, isn't ?.

Mr. Levitt targets the basics- INCENTIVES, in the environment of competition and scarcity. Incentives never grow organically. It is created, with a motive- morally or financially. People cheat to get those incentives. So, are those motives are ever fulfilled? With some examples, he explains how to find defaulters. I found it interesting, looked like criminal investigation-Sherlock !!!. 

 

The final chapters were far more amusing and somewhat troubling. It was related to parenting and the future of their children. The author argued that unlike conventional wisdom of "child being sent to good an institution will definitely have a bright future", doesn't hold reality. With his field research, he concludes that children's future is much more governed by the traits of their parents. Some of the other pick up of the topics were naming of children vs their success in the future.

The overall idea of Freakonomics is a very playful way of understanding causality-cause and effect. The approach is literally a ROGUE. Nobody discusses such topics yet it impacts our lives. I could have written the summary, describing a few of his examples but somehow didn't felt this time. There are things that the educational curriculum cannot generalize or standardize to make a syllabus. These things seem to be exclusive but are soo deep-rooted to be extracted by people other than authors. yeah yeah, there are and will be exceptions ;).

A similar book I read was Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nikolas Taleb.It was more oriented towards probability economics, was also a fun read.

 

 

 

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