Courtney

Courtney


 * Listed by due date (summarize every night) : **

//Discussion Director// 1. Do you believe in these worldview incentives on page 11? 2. Currently, we are only a few pages into the book, but do you believe it will be interesting even though they are straying from the typical format of a book and making it more like a “scavenger hunt”? 3. They state “ Cheating may or may not be human nature” Do you believe that cheating is only human nature? (Page 20-21) 4. (page 4) Do you believe in the abortion cause? 5. How do you think they could get the rate of late arrivals back down since the high increase with their economic experiment? ( page 17) //Summary The Hidden Side of Everything// was the title of the introduction, which wraps up the ten following pages. It explains how real estate agents may not be looking out for your best interest. Why money can not buy an election; because it is the appeal of a candidate rather than the amount of money they put towards publicizing. //What do School teachers and sumo wrestlers have in common?// was the title of chapter one giving the reader an in depth look at cheating. Teachers all have incentives to teach well and produce smart children. But if those incentives are too high and the teaching is lacking than the teacher may be able to find a few creative ways to make their test scores better. One example was a teacher actually wrote the answers on the board for her class. When a child went home after a day of testing and said " Mom my teacher was so nice she wrote the answers on the board for us!" that teacher was obviously busted and fired. They also talked about a college professor who gave out a 20 question exam with questions such as "How many points foes a 3 point field goal account for in basketball?" Needless to say this man was fired shortly after. Then they compared the cheating incentives of a teacher to the cheating of sumo wrestlers the facts and statistics for this were a little more scarce but they were able to find one story which really set the record straight. Two sumo wrestlers came forward and gave the names of people who were supposedly cheating and the day before they were to speak at a press conference both were killed. Coincidence? Very Unlikely.
 * Monday 3 (A Day)-p. 20 & ** ** Tuesday 4 (B Day)-p. 40 **


 * Wednesday 5 (C Day)-p. 60 **

//Passage Master..what to look back on...//
(page 45) " The data shows that smaller officers are more honest than big one." Do you agree with this? It reminds me of Fredericksburg Academy and our honor system. We have been having some issues lately, but none of the offices were all 100%.

(page 46) " ..cheating was how they got to be executives." Do you think he is being to skeptical? Again with the Fredericksburg Academy analogy: working to get on SLC or SOFA is not because we all go and rig the ballets. Its because they all worked for it and delivered a great speech that won over the class. But in a public school and you were running for class president is there a higher possibility that they cheated?

(page 49-beginning of Chapter 2) Ulysses S. Grant's quote about the Ku Klux Klan. This is a great quote. I believe that it really sums up the groups work. Ulysses S. Grant was our 18th president. He worked towards building up the republican party in the south which ended in African Americans taking place in an office. He fought against the violence of the Ku Klux Klan.

(page 54) The Chart of lynching of blacks. The decreasing of lynchings surprisingly decreases rather quickly. By 1969 there were only 3. Notice that there were more lynchings when the Klan was " dormant" than when they were active. Why would that be? Do you think the Klan members felt they needed to show their loyalty even when the Klan wasn't active....

(page 58) The quote from the Klan leader I thought this was very interesting. Why did he choose to continue holding the meetings when any one of them could be a spy? And, what are the A.P. and U.P. he mentions?

//Summary// The beginning of this section questions if all people are corrupt. They continue to prove that over 90% of people are not corrupt. Paul Feldman was a man with a dream to sell bagels. He worked in a high ranked position until his company came under new management and then looked at it as an opportunity. An opportunity to sell bagels. He kept a log and paid attention to how many people actually paid for the bagels compared to how many were taken. He found that more people paid in the smaller offices compared to the larger offices. The next section was entitled "//How is the Klu Klux Klan Like a Group of Real-Estate Agents?" they went into the details of the Klu Klux Klan and how people tried to take them down from inside. How Kennedy hated " the small-mindedness" of the group. And, when they finally got a spy inside the meetings the new radio was used to spread all their information. They had a quote from the Klan leader stating that " I might as well call Drew Pearson (a radio talk show host) before I come to the next meeting and give him the information..." Other things like the internet also began to influence the fairness in the world. Life insurance policy's dropped dramatically when a website would compare your prices for you. All these secrets that are now accessible to everyone like the Klans plans and life insurance prices changed the way of living. //

One example of economics creating change is found in the story about Paul Feldman, the bagel seller. He changed his entire lifestyle to sell bagels. He changed his entire views on people, but this changed helped for economist to look at his data and compared it to determine how corrupt people are. Economics are a major part of the Klu Klux Klan. They have to know how to buy, sell, and plan events. Economics is defined as the social study of production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. So, in order for the KKK to operate they had to be able to be productive economically. This rebellious group drove Kennedy and Ulysses, two former presidents to work towards change. They had to understand what would make or break the KKK in order to decrease the amount of lynchings. Understanding the social aspects of production in the KKK helped them to make steps forward.
 * //How do economics drive history/create change?// **

**Thursday 6 (D Day)-p. 80** //Discussion Director// 1. Page 68: Did you guess the two sided words correctly? 2. Have you ever used a false internet source ( Wikipedia perhaps)? 3. Do you ever see anyone who makes you wonder about their discrimination views? 4. Have you told a stranger your secrets? 5. What were Snyder’s incentives to lie about the amount of deaths in America each second due to homelessness? 6. How different are the two types of fears referred to on page 64 (fear of the KKK and fear of illness)? // Summary: // Our third section continues with the basis of fear and deception. KKK puts fear into people’s minds worrying them that they may be killed just like real estate agents make their clients feel like without them they are hopeless. Real estate agents also use deception towards the buyers. They have made a list of five terms correlated to a lower sales price which are: fantastic, spacious, charming, great neighborhood, and the exclamation mark! Though these all sound fine they are not specific, because there are no specific great traits. So, the agent is deceiving their client creating an ad that looks absolutely FANTASTIC, but they are also deceiving the buyer with an ad that makes the house seems so CHARMING. They then go into discrimination. Once people began to stray from colored segregation and the KKK began disintegrating then different types of discrimination began to arise. In a game show // The Weakest Link // they proved that old women and Asians were being kicked off quicker and earlier than others. Was there reasoning behind this? These people could have just happened to be the ones who deserved the boot. But the authors really question people’s integrity if they are truly willing to show their true favoritism on live television. // Essential Question : Economics drive history by creating change within societies. For example, in this reading it went over how discrimination changed over time. People’s views on others differentiated and we learn from history how not to act towards others of a different race. //

//Connector & Researcher
 * Friday 7 (E Day)-p. 100 **

 __**conventional wisdom**__: typically unexamined ideas or explanations that are accepted as true.

__**Hollywood statistics:**__ about 8,000 per square mile 60% white 46% white, non hispanic 9% asian 4% african american 1% Native American 7% two or more races-- odd that they haven't talked about people with more than one race they only refer to people with one distinct identity // __//**Economics** //__//: procution, distribution, and consumption of goods v.s. // __//**illegal drug trade** //__//: manufacture, distribtuion, sale of drugs.

//[|//http://thesite.mobi/drinkanddrugs/drugsafety/thelaw/ifcaughtwithdrugs//]// resource: ////"If You Are Caught with Drugs." ////TheSite.org ////. 2009. Web. 06 May 2010. . // // Summary: // The beginning of this section continued on the idea that publicity is everything. Relating this back to how likable a person is relates to the number of votes he gets and not the amount of money he spent. So, when Listerine mouthwash was having problems selling, they took many approaches to make it marketable. They tried to make people think of bad breath as a bad thing even when people had been dealing with it for all these years. And, in seven years Listerine went from an $115,000 profit to 8 million. They used this as an introduction to the idea of conventional wisdom. This is defined as a term used to describe ideas that are typically accepted as true. It then went into a story about a man named Sudhir Venkatech. This man had an inside look at drug dealing. His data showed that drug dealers are just like organizations. With boards of directors, bosses, and low wages for most. Except this job is the most dangerous job around. Wars can break out between different gangs, shootings are a regular occurrence, and you are selling illegal items, which if caught, will send you right to jail. So the main question was: **Why do they risk it?** That was a much more simple answer than expected. Just like people move to Hollywood for a chance at the big time, or all super star high school athletes try to make it big, in drug dealing if you make it to the board of directors owning five houses is normal. And, you are just as well off as those famous superstars. Most of these people who are in the drug dealing business have grown up around it for their entire lives and they don’t think that they are able to rise up and actually get a real job. They look at being able to rise up in dealing as much more plausible. But unfortunately this is an illegal business so before you rise up the police may come and shut your dream down.
 * What happens if you are caught with drugs?**

// Essential Question: // Economics are able to drive change towards a lifestyle with less crime. For example, economics are what drove drug dealing. They had to buy and sell then on the down low and be able to make a nice profit. Government officials are now able to look back at the different ways these men did business and be able to recognize the different signs for drug dealing and gangs.

**Monday 10 (F Day)-p.120** //Passage Master...looking back... Page 104: "....the crime rate in fact began to fall- so unexpectedly and dramatically and thoroughly that now, from the distance of several years, it is almost hard to recall the crushing grip of the crime wave." This has happened before as well. Economists said one thing and the total opposite happened. I think that this proves that economics and trends are much more difficult to predict. In my opinion, the crime rate fell because there were so many fewer children being born at the poverty line and into the lifestyle of illegal activities.

Chapter Four: The story of Nicolae Ceausescu I thought it was interesting that the women who is suddenly affected were not the ones who revolted. Why was it there children who killed him instead of the angry women who felt violated and wanted to have abortions? It sounds like these people were not even old enough to be having children when they revolted.

Page 108: Crime-Drop Explanation chart Innovative policing strategies are on the top of the list but they stated that the more cops the more crime so does this mean they were able to overcome those statistics? What were some of these new strategies? Most importantly, did you expect to see some of these on this list? Number three is " Changes in crack and other drug markets." But these new advancements with crack had only made the crime rate rise...what caused the drop?

Page 111: "crime rates tend to be hifh when imprisonment rates are high.." This is definitely not logical. Do you think so? The authors do not. So if they had made this completely logical connection to increase in punishment and decrease in crime why would some people try to fight it? //

// Summary: // //What does crack cocaine have in common with nylon stockings?// was the opening question in this passage. Introducing the concept of cheaper the better. Going into the history of crack and how it became more easily to come by and sell opened up the pathway for crime. Why people would risk so much for this life of crime to sell crack. Of course, it was because of the incentives. If people got the top then it would be like "winning a tournament". Money and power would be thrust upon them, so then why was there such a sudden downfall of crime suddenly, when the economists guessed that the crime rate would surely rise up and up. Chapter four was called Where have all the criminals gone? It began with a short story about Nicolae Ceausescu who in 1969 made abortion illegal in Romania. He wanted to run up the population and that's exactly what he did. But due to this abortion plan the children that would not have been more at all actually were the ones who rebelled and gave him a brutal death. On the same day of this man's death crime rate in America had reached the top. But in the 1990's it quickly began to fall. Experts had not called for this and were trying to uncover the reasons as to why. There was a list of reasons made to explain the sudden drop, but none seemed to really prove completely true. A few could explain why they were a contributing factor to the drop but not a full reason. This section ends with the explanation of the death penalty and a quote from U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry A. Blackmun stating " I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death."

// essential question: Economics drive history by influencing the crime rates and influencing their sudden bursts and drops. For example, when crack was hard to come by and EXPENSIVE not many people were in the market for one quick, little, expensive fix. But when new innovative ways of making crack cocaine came around. Then drug dealers were able to sell it cheaper and find more potential buyers. This spiked the crime rate all because the drug dealing economy was broadening. //

**Tuesday 11 (A Day)-p. 140 & Wednesday 12 (B Day)-p. 160** //Discussion Director How can intelligent people look at the would so differently? ( This question was taken from page 118 in the book. Yet they barely give an answer, what do you think?)

Do you believe that more guns create less crime?

Do you agree with the scholars abortion points from page 130, even AFTER seeing all the positive affects?

Do you think FA is educationally on the same level as the public schools around here-like in Chicago?

Were you surprised by these statistics about the guns/swimming pools? Did these parenting fears ever affect you as a child? When i was little I was not allowed to go over to my friends with guns, yet i could go and swim....Just like Molly's parents on page 136.. //

//Summary Bratton and Guiliani came into leadership positions in New York City just as the crime rate began to fall dramatically. Bratton gained much publicity for this and he was set on the cover of Time magazine. This led to him being forced to resign, because of the jealousy of Giuliani and other leaders. There were many different reasons as to why the crime rate fell. Two were "tougher gun laws" and "changes in crack and other drug markets". Some people believed that guns if the guns were given out to the correct people then crime would decrease. An example of that was if a teenage girl was armed and she was about to get mugged she could pull it out. Not shoot, but just let the crock leave her alone since she was armed. Others believe that the gun laws need to be strict because what if both of those people had a gun? Or just the criminal? Yet many people sided with the idea of More Guns Less Crim e. The main reason why the crime began to drop so dramatically though was because of abortion.The many children who would have grown up in poverty with the influences of crime surrounding them day by day were not born. So when all these kids would have been at the peaking age of criminal, they were actually never born. It then went into risks. Sandman was a man who created this theory. Risk = hazard + outrage. He said that in many cases outrage overshines the true terror. For example, a swimming pool versus a gun. Children are more likely to fall into a swimming pool and drown then they are to die by gun usage. The question came up wondering if parents were even needed at all then? Of course, parents are needed but how much do they actually affect their children's lives? Chicago did a test to see what factors actually influence a child's test scores. And, the results were surprising. They found that if a child's family is intact it doesn't matter, but if they have highly educated parents it does. If your child has a low birth rate it matters, but if they attended Head Start it does not.

Essential Question:// Economics drove the crime rate up by making illegal drugs easily accessible and then drove it right back down by making the dealers have to fight for lower prices and try to give the best deals around. Eventually making drugs so easy to come by that taking the risk of selling them was no longer a big enough incentive. So it's clear that economics are able to drive criminal history.

Thursday 13 (C Day)-p. 180 //Connector & Researcher// [] (this site gives you the popularity of the child's names and the popular names by birth year...)
 * Top 10 Names for 2009 **||~ Rank ||~ Male name ||~ Female name ||
 * 1 || Jacob || Isabella ||
 * 2 || Ethan || Emma ||
 * 3 || Michael || Olivia ||
 * 4 || Alexander || Sophia ||
 * 5 || William || Ava ||
 * 6 || Joshua || Emily ||
 * 7 || Daniel || Madison ||
 * 8 || Jayden || Abigail ||
 * 9 || Noah || Chloe ||
 * 10 || Anthony || Mia ||

**ECLS:** The early childhood londitudinal study program. They study child development and school readiness. This program gets national data and analyzes it with the family relationships, and growth through eighth grade.

odd names I know: Tree, Shrub

Adoption:
 * 120,000 per year


 * 100,000 abroad adoptions


 * 6/10 people were personally affected by adoptions

[]

Summary: This sections starts off stating that parents backgrounds matter more than how they raise their children. In chapter six they began to discuss the importance of names. And whether or not they do affect your life. This transformed into the curiosity about names and culture. Fryer was a black economist who devoted his life to finding out the truth behind why blacks seem to have fallen so far behind in so many aspects of life. He went into researching birth certificates that went as far back as 1961. He found the whitest names and the blackest names proving that there was a main distinction. They began studies to find out if your name matters with job interviews. They found that is Deshawn and Jake Williams both sent in an identical resume then Jake was more likely to get a call back. They have been finding ways to make connections between income, education, and names. Which will be continued in the next section…

// Essential Question: Parent's backgrounds influence the name they give their child. If they come from a nice background and are well educated then they will likely receive a normal name no matter their race. But if the parent is a younger, under-educated, black girl then it's likely that she will give her child a clear "black" name. This opens up less doors for the children. Which causes another generation of under-educated, ill paid people. So, the history of these women affects the possibility of change in children's lives to go from under privileged to possible business owner. //

Friday 14 (D Day)-p. 200 //Passage Master// // page 185 " Fryer came to wonder...." I think the question he is asking is something we schould deisguise. "Is distinctive black cultuer a cause of the economics disparity between blacks and whites or merely a reflection of it?" What's your opinion?

Page 186-187 " What kind of parent is most likely to five a child such a distinctively black name?..." This is an interesting question and the answer is even more unique. Do you believe with the answer he gives us, I definitely do. I just had not though about it before.

Page 187 "...If black kids who study calculus and ballet are thought to be "acting white"...." This is an odd concept of "acting" a different color. Do you still concider some things "black people" activities?

There are interesting charts with the list of children's names on page 188. Would you choose one of these names for your child? If so, does that prove the authors right, that parents do choose a name based on what they believe will get them far? Summary: Names changed from Top Ten list to not even being shown on the top 100 list by year. But the reasoning behind that is interesting. It may be because parents want their children to have a "smart" name. Or also because of the trend they found proving that when high income parents use a name it begins to move towards the low income families as well. Providing a "popular" type of chain. The assumption that celebrity names are used among most parents in the U.S. is false. The truth is that parents have too many different incentives for naming their children what they do. They want it to be traditional, or part of the family, or "smart", "high-end", or give them a "successful" name. Just like a man did to his own children. He named one of his children Winner and the next Loser. But this proved nothing, since Loser went on the become a well respected detective and winner won himself a criminal record. The EPILOGUE continued to reiterate the general meanings of the book. Stating that " if morality represents an ideal world, then economics represents the actual world."

Essential Question:// Economics are able to create change within the job industries and make better lives for those living under the poverty line. In which case, some blacks ( or whites, but in the subject of the books i will use just blacks) may be able to build better lives for themselves and create change within their communities or families.

Tuesday 18 (E Day)-p. 220 //Discussion Director Why do you think the numbe rone black boy name appears over 200 more times in 1990 compared to in 2000? // Do you lock doors when you see a homeless man walking along? Why would you do that? Do they really pose as a possible threat? Do you think that some of the questions asked in the book are boarder lining trivial? “Unwantedness leads to crime. Abortion leads to less unwantedness; abortion leads to less crime.” (219)

// Summary Working ourselves into the Bonus Matter we begin to look at the backgrounds of the authors. Steven Levitt is a widely known economist who claims that he knows next to nothing about economics and math, yet he is able to pick out unique questions in a set of data that no one else can find. He is able to come up with such bizarre questions as “Why do black parents give their children names that may hurt their career prospects?” Levitt writes and questions even the sensitive issues, if they make sense to him. For example, Levitt believes that abortion is the cause of less crime. The paper he wrote about this set up a huge uproar amongst everyone. Conservatives, Liberals, Economists all were able to find something wrong with his work. This was his first piece of work which caused a true uproar. // // Essential question: // Levitt is an economist who can drive change by picking out questions which others had not seen before and find hidden truths. His job is not to expose people for their potential lies, but to find the true side to things and see if something needs or creates change. (Example: He believes abortion changes crime rates). The stock market is not something Levitt is a master at, but it does affect change. People may invest a lot of money into the market and have it fall the next day causing a dramatic amount of money to be lost. People can also gain money in the economy helping people swap social classes and change the respect behind their name.

Wednesday 19 (D Day)-p. 240 // Connector & Researcher //

Everyone seems to have a hero or someone they look up to. But why? What are their incentives to having a popular hero? They want to be famous so they look up to a pop star or they want to be a great economist so they look up to another well known economist. Either way it's more of an idolization isn't it? People have chosen their hero based on who they wish they were.
 * Gary Becke**r: American economist, Nobel Prize winner. He went to Princeton. He taught at Columbia before returning to work at Chicago. First man to begin work on things under the description of "sociology" like crime, drugs, races, and family.


 * African-American Civil Rights Movement: 1**955-1968: anti- racist organization: Though he may not have been inside the meetings it was still his idea to have a spy, and to tell all about the findings. He also worked on this movement not John Brown.

How much is your vote worth? []Just like the economists said their votes do not matter that much according to this article.

Voting incentives stated by the book: Voting incentives:
 * did justice to your country
 * you think your vote honestly does a lot
 * did your part
 * you think your vote actually makes a difference
 * free Starbucks
 * free krispy kreme
 * free Ben & Jerry's

// Summary: It' s difficult to write this summary, since this section is basically a summary of the book itself. So, this is a summary about a summary. This talks about the work Levitt did and his many questions he has asked such as Cheating in classrooms and the reason for the crime rate drop. It then goes into a brief description of how he stumbled into his career. Even though his teachers looked at him as a zero while working for his Ph.D. he still became very successful. He applied for a position for the Society of Fellows. They loved him and one man even said that he may be one of those people who can just take a question and answer it without the need of a unifying theme. Then they went into another column selected from The New York Times talking about Kennedy. Did he receive too much credit for the KKK destruction? He was caught for stretching the truth in a book about his revealings and many claimed that it was the unknown John Brown who had credit taken from him and bestowed on Kennedy. Why would an economist be embarrassed to be seen at a voting booth? was the question following and we began to read about the different reasons why voting doesn't seem to have a very big incentive for the economist.

Essential Question: How do economics drive history or create change? One way they may drive history is in the polls. In one instance in Buffalo, New York a vote was decided by one. Though this is a rare concept it may still hold true that if all the economists hadn't stayed away from the polls during that election then the election results could have been different. And, maybe the loser could have made bigger, better changes than the winner did. Who knows? //

Friday 20 (A Day)-p. 260 (DONE!!) page 244 " So Nascar's record of zero deaths in five years over six million miles is perhaps not as remarkable as it first sounded." This is comparing Nascar to the normal car on the highway. I do not feel like this is an accurate comparison. Do you? I feel like Nascar does have a great accomplishment since it is so dangerous and quick.
 * // Passage Master

page 245 " ..." Nascar driver has two main goals: To win a race and to not be killed." Are the incentives really high enough for only those two goals?

page 252 " Fear of an audit..." Again like in the book they have fear as an incentive. Do you think that fear is a good incentive when it comes to paying taxes or should people even need an incentive to pay them? Summary: Going through different articles from The New York Times, one of the articles questioned how many lives were saved by the death of Earnhardt. They compared the amount of deaths in Nascar to the number of deaths on the roadways each year since 2001. Another article was about the "gift card economy". Are gift cards really good gifts? Apparently, stores only have around 25% of the gift cards bought redeemed. So is a gift card really a good gift? The verdict is that it depends on the gift receiver and wether or not they would really use it. The last article was about Laid-Back labor talking about incentives were have to work and the different kinds of jobs around. The difference between a farmer and a journalist who lives in New York.

Essential Question:How do economists drive history or create change? Economists may be able to help cars become more safe and save lives for millions of American's by stating facts about the amount of deaths in cars per year. Hopefully, they are able to help car dealers see the dangers and encourage them to make a safer ride. //**