From Roe v. Wade’s effect on crime to the similarities between real estate agents and the Ku Klux Klan, the author of “Freakonomics” has yet to find a topic too risqué.
The OSU community has the opportunity to hear from economist Steven Levitt tonight at 7 in the Wes Watkins Center.
The SGA Speakers Board is sponsoring the event, which is free and open to the public.
“Freakonomics” became a cultural phenomenon when it was released in 2005, earning kudos from critics and readers alike. The book spent more than two years on The New York Times Bestseller List, and more than 3 million copies have been sold worldwide, according to Levitt’s biography.
When Levitt published a paper linking a rise in abortion to a drop in crime, he ignited a firestorm of controversy that catapulted conservatives and liberals into fits, according to his biography.
Putting theoretical economics to practical use, Levitt reaches startling conclusions about the real world.
“I’d like to put together a set of tools that lets us catch terrorists,” Levitt said in his biography. “I mean, that’s the goal. I don’t necessarily know yet how I’d go about it. But given the right data, I have little doubt that I could figure out the answer.”
Levitt is a professor in the University of Chicago’s economics department. He received tenure after only two years and earned the American Economic Association’s prestigious John Bates Clark Medal, given to the country’s best economist younger than 40.
“If Indiana Jones were an economist, he’d be Steven Levitt,” according to an article in The Wall Street Journal.
Levitt specializes in cheating, corruption and crime. Levitt and co-author Stephen Dubner are working on another book, tentatively titled “Superfreakonomics.”
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