Emory and UBSLC welcomes ‘Freakonomics’ author Steven Levitt

An economist who’s not good at math is a rare thing. In fact, a recent survey of economists concluded that the single most important attribute for success in the profession is proficiency at math. In fact, 70% said so. Only two percent believe a good working knowledge of the economy is most important.

Steven Levitt, the co-author of Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything with Stephen J. Drubner, admits he’s not good at math. To hear him tell it, it’s a wonder he’s an economist at all.

Perhaps it’s best that he’s not good at math. If he had been, Levitt, named by Time magazine as one of the “100 People Who Shape Our World,” may have been too busy constructing mathematical models to ponder the way the world works.

“I ask questions that real economists would rather not answer,” Levitt told a packed audience of Emory University students gathered for Levitt’s keynote speech as part of the Undergraduate Business School Leadership Conference at Emory’s Goizueta Business School and to cap off the university’s celebration of Founders Day.

Levitt turns conventional wisdom on its head by concocting seemingly offbeat questions and answering them with a mix of common sense and an uncanny ability to detect patterns in data that most people overlook. He wondered why so many drug dealers lived with their moms and decided to find the answer. A father of four, he’s constantly asking what child-rearing tactics work and don’t work.

A big believer in incentives, Levitt used a reward system to potty train one of his daughters. In less than a week, she’d figured out how to “work” her father’s incentive scheme in her favor. If his toddler can figure out how to beat the system, mused Levitt, imagine what policy makers face when trying to develop policies for 350 million people.

Levitt, who received his B.A. from Harvard University [1989] and his doctorate from M.I.T [1994], entertained the students with insightful anecdotes about everything from Canadian junior league hockey to how call girls come up with their prices. As Emory University’s Gary S. Hauk, vice president and deputy to the President said in his introduction of Levitt, “Who knew economics could be so interesting?”—Allison Shirreffs