Superfreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance - Hardcover

Levitt, Steven D; Dubner, Stephen J

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060889578 ISBN 13: 9780060889579

Publisher: William Morrow & Company, 2009

Synopsis

Freakonomics lived on the New York Times bestseller list for an astonishing two years. Now authors Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner return with more iconoclastic insights and observations in SuperFreakonomics--the long awaited follow-up to their New York Times Notable blockbuster. Based on revolutionary research and original studies SuperFreakonomics promises to once again challenge our view of the way the world really works.

About this title

Review:

Levitt is a master at drawing counter-intuitive conclusions . . . great fun . . . Superfreakonomics travels further than its predecessor (Tom Standage, Sunday Times)

There's material here not just for one conversation, but for several (Daily Mail)

A humdinger of a book: page-turning, politically incorrect and ever-so-slightly intoxicating, like a large swig of tequila (The Times)

Levitt and Dubner's zeal for statistical anomalies is as undimmed as their eye for a good story . . . lie back and let Levitt and Dubner's bouncy prose style carry you along from one peculiarity to the next (Sunday Telegraph)

Diagrams, charts and photos alongside the original text explain how things like the Endangered Species Act endangered species and why real people don't behave like people in labs. It's a very cool edition of a very smart book. (BBC Focus)

The new illustrated version of Superfreakonomics, the world's No 1 best-seller - written by economist Steven Levitt and journalist Stephen Dubner - uses the dull subject of economics to analyse unusual subjects with astonishing effect. (The Sun)

Journalist Stephen J Dubner and his co-author, the economist Steven D Levitt, have enraged everyone from climate-change activists to child-safety campaigners by applying rational economic thinking to emotive subjects. (Emily Dugan The Independent on Sunday)

From the Back Cover:

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

Four years in the making, SuperFreakonomics asks not only the tough questions, but the unexpected ones: What's more dangerous, driving drunk or walking drunk? Why is chemotherapy prescribed so often if it's so ineffective? Can a sex change boost your salary?

SuperFreakonomics challenges the way we think all over again, exploring the hidden side of everything with such questions as:

• How is a street prostitute like a department-store Santa?
• Why are doctors so bad at washing their hands?
• How much good do car seats do?
• What's the best way to catch a terrorist?
• Did TV cause a rise in crime?
• What do hurricanes, heart attacks, and highway deaths have in common?
• Are people hard-wired for altruism or selfishness?
• Can eating kangaroo save the planet?
• Which adds more value: a pimp or a Realtor?

Levitt and Dubner mix smart thinking and great storytelling like no one else, whether investigating a solution to global warming or explaining why the price of oral sex has fallen so drastically. By examining how people respond to incentives, they show the world for what it really is - good, bad, ugly, and, in the final analysis, super freaky.

Freakonomics has been imitated many times over - but only now, with SuperFreakonomics, has it met its match.

About this edition

• Publisher: William Morrow & Company
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0060889578
• ISBN 13: 9780060889579
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288