Freakonomics
A current, popular library book is Freakonomics: A rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. This New York Times Best Seller has won a few awards: 2006 Book Sense Book of the Year in the Adult Nonfiction category, 2005 Quill award for best business book of the year, and Finalist of the Financial Time/Goldman Sach’s Business Book of the Year. In this book, Levitt and Dubner take a look at society and statistics from a different perspective. For example, Levitt and Dubner evaluate what is more harmful to children: having a pool in their own backyard or having a gun in their house? By comparing fatality rates among children under each of these circumstances, they conclude that a pool is more dangerous since there are more children’s deaths by drowning then by guns. The conclusion is based on annual statistics alone; no moral issues are pulled into the equation. Thus, the book is ideal for raising discussions regarding this and the many other featured topics.
