Chapter 3: Freakonomics

This chapter was more interesting to me than the second chapter!

I thought, just like the other titles and questions risen about certain topics was very interesting in this case. "Why do drug dealers still live with their moms?" I love how the author takes such simple questions as of this, and makes your really think about it and even does some background research on it. These so simple questions that I even sometimes think of, REALLY make me THINK as to WHY.

One thing I liked about this chapter is that since I never grew up in these types of communities, it really gave me a slight insight on how people feel about living in there, such as when Sudhir Venkatesh went around to Chicago's poorest neighborhood to see how the children thought about living there. It was interesting that his choices he had for their answers were not suitable for their liking, instead they wanted every negative answer rather than a positive one. Now I never grew up in a really nice and rich neighborhood and never had the nicest things, but then again I never lived like some of these children. It really made me think about how grateful I am and how lucky I should be. Anyways, enough about me, and back to the chapter. I always assumed that the higher you went on the chart when it came to drug dealing, the better off you were with money, but never knew that some people got paid extremely as low as they did for how much they are risking their lives. Even though I was always aware of how much drug dealers made, I was shocked at how much once they got way up on the charts.

I feel bad for some of the kids who are drug dealers because from this reading in some cases you can sense that this is not the life that they want to live. The one section gives some statistics about the children living in the ghetto, "56% of the neighborhood's children lived below the poverty line. 78% came from the single-parent homes. Fewer than 5% of the neighborhood's adults had a college degree; barely one in the three adult men worked at all." These statistics really blew my mind and kind of gave me reason as to why these children are in these situations.

The other section that I didn't know some about was the introduction of crack cocaine. As naive as this may sound, I always just assumed that cocaine and crazk cocaine were the same things. It was interesting to read about the difference and how crack cocaine came about. I never knew that one was known to be cheaper than the other. Like when they talked about cocaine was white, pure, and beautiful, while crack cocaine was for more of the poor people and not seen to be as "beautiful and pure" as cocaine.

This reading really made me think, once again. I enjoyed it a lot :)

How if the Ku Klux Klan like a group of real-estate agents??

Since I loved the first chapter so much, my hopes were up very high, but this chapter did not appeal to me as much as the first one. It was definetly hard to read through, but there were some parts of the chapter that I did enjoy!

I found the beginning of this chapter kind of boring when they were explaining the Ku Klux Klan, but it was some what interesting so that part wasn't too hard to get through. I did find it interesting how Kennedy got into the secrets of them and figured out things to announce to the public over the radio. I thought it was clever of him to break into their group and release all this secret information to everyone, and through this, separating them and started to break them apart.

The part I found more interesting is when they started talking about the internet and how many people can find out SO much that they should not even know because one person releases all this information on a website. I never really thought about the internet this way, I just always took for granted that you could go onto Google and type in anything and you will get hundreds and hundreds of links to click on to find exactly what you are looking for! It is crazy to think about. I really liked one of the quotes said in the book, "Internet has accomplished what even the most fervent consumer advocated usually cannot: it has vastly shrunk the gap between the experts and the public." It is so true when they use the example about people wanting to buy a car and after going somewhere to look for one, can go home and take the price they were offered to buy the car, find a website, and see if the price is reasonable, and can find out much more than just that!

The other part that really interested me was when dating internet sites were discussed. It is crazy to think that some of the most viewed and visited sites are dating sites! It really made me think about society and how people are supposed to be viewed and liked. I say this because it says that almost everyone on their profile say they are really skinnier then they are, especially women. It also talks about men won't look at profiles with girls who have a very low finance, but then again when it is a lot they are often intimidated. And girl's look for guys who have a lot of money. Many of people say they do not look for people of the same race, maybe to seem "open-minded", but when actually researched, almost every person looks for someone who is of their same race.

There are some things that still really made me think in this chapter, but it didn't grab my attention as much as the first chapter is. Although, I am still very eager to read on and see what else the book has in store for me to really think about!

FREAKONOMICS: CHAPTER 1 :) :) :)

I have to say that this was the most interesting reading the whole semester! And after reading several others blogs I can see that I am not the only one who thought this!

I found the opening of this chapter to really grab my attention when it talked about day care, and how they started charging parents $3 every time they picked up their child late. And the thing that got me, is more and more parents continued to pay the $3! I thought for sure that it would have went down. This just showed me how much parents do not realize how important it is for them to be on time for their children, and to me it seemed as if they cared less about their children since they would rather spend extra money they be with them on time. It made me really start to think about incentives, and the three basics of them: economic, social, and moral.

The second thing that really grabbed my attention was when they got on the topic of who all cheats. I like in this when he states, "Cheating may or may not be human nature, but it is certainly a prominent feature in just about every human endeavor. Cheating is a primordial economic act: getting more for less." This to me is VERRRYYY true! I enjoyed the different examples of "cheaters" and the different scenarios in which cheating can occur. Even though sometimes one cheating may seem more wrong than the other, they really are ALL the same. This book really boggles my brain and I like it! It was really cool how they talked about teaching and how it deals with cheating because I am going to school to become a teacher. I liked how they showed the different examples of cheating and how they described to you the differences and how to look for the pattern that they marked in bold.

When they go into the topic of athletes with cheating, it really made me think because in high school I played several sports. And it really raised a good question in my mind-is it better to cheat to win or cheat to lose? I never thought about cheating to lose until after reading this chapter, but since it's not winning, it's hard to think that it is wrong, even though it is.

I also enjoyed how they talked about cheating and stealing. In class we talked about if we would walk by money on the ground would be pick it up if it wasn't ours? Or would be steal and cheat more if we wouldn't get caught and didn't have consequences? Well honestly, I would be lying if I sat here and said that my answer would be no. Not meaning that I definetly would all the time, but it would definetly give me more to think about, which I think it would give many other people the same thoughts as it did to me.

This first chapter REALLY got me into this book..a lot more than I thought it was. I am honestly not one who enjoys reading and does it often, so I was worried about having to read this book, but it is VERY good to read. It makes me think about a lot of things how I never thought about them a lot, and I cannot wait to read the rest!

Steph :]