SuperFreakonomics

By Steven D. Levitt and Stephen Dubner.

HarperCollins; 288 pages; $36.99

In 2005 rogue economist Steven Levitt and journalist Stephen Dubner partnered to write Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. Filled with interesting topics on teachers who cheat, self-serving realtors, and crack-selling boys living with their moms, it was a blockbuster, remaining on the top seller list of the New York Times for several months.

Fours years later, the authors have brought us the squeal: SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance.

How does SuperFreakonomics measure up the original?

Standing on the shoulders of their previous success, the authors here take on topics that are much bolder. The perils of drunk walking. How much does a prostitute make? Do you make more money if you have a sex change? What about a cheap way to cool the globe?

The book intriguing and amusing at the same time, just like its predecessor. It turns out, a prostitute makes between $16,000 to $300,000 a year. You do make slightly more money if you change your sex from female to male (but not the other way around.) And yes, there are several cheap ways to cool the globe.

That being said, SuperFreakonomics, albeit based on solid academic research, was written for pleasure reading. For a critical reader, some assumptions are just too easily made.

For example, the authors claim that drunk walking is more dangerous than drunk driving based on the assumption that people walk drunk at the same rate driving drunk on a per-mile basis (1 in 140). Because people in America drive so much more than they walk, on a per-mile basis, despite the absolute number of death the authors concluded that drunk walking is more dangerous.

To the critical eye, the conclusion seems arbitrary and convenient.

Other topics appear poorly integrated into the book as  a whole. Some of the amusing tidbits pop up as if the book were a cocktail party. “Why do oral sex become so cheap?” “The introduction of TV in the US leads to increase in crime.” Neither topic fits particularly well with the chapters they were in.

On the otherhand, most of the stories are impressively insightful. For example, on the topic of altruism and selflessness, the author concluded that the human behaviour changes with scrutiny (knowing that they’re being watched) and is influenced by a dazzling complex of incentives, social norms, framing references, and past experiences. I couldn’t help but smile when reading about donating to public-radio stations, something that I have done often.

It may be altruistic when you donate $100 to your local public-radio station, but in exchange you get a year of guilt-free listening (and, if you’re lucky, a canvas tote bag). U.S. citizens are easily the world’s leaders in per-capita charitable contributions, but the U.S. tax code is among the most generous in allowing deduction for those contributions.

I too have enjoyed the canvas tote bag and happily claimed a hefty deduction on my tax return.

In all fairness, the book provides ordinary readers with access to serious economic discussions on supply and demand, consumer surplus, and unintended consequences that they might not find elsewhere. If there’s one thing the authors should have done, they should have added two more chapters to satisfy my curisity.

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