The Why Axis: Hidden Motives and the Undiscovered Economics of Everyday Life (37 page)

9
. Uri Gneezy, Stephen Meier, and Pedro Rey-Biel, “When and Why Incentives (Don’t) Work to Modify Behavior,”
Journal of Economic Perspectives
25, no. 4 (2011): 191–210.

10
. See Roland G. Fryer Jr., Steven D. Levitt, John A. List, and Sally Sadoff, “Enhancing the Efficacy of Teacher Incentives Through Loss Aversion: A Field Experiment,” NBER Working Paper 18237 (July 2012).

11
. See “Teacher Salary in Chicago Heights, IL”,
Indeed
,
http://www.indeed.com/salary/q-Teacher-l-Chicago-Heights,-IL.html
(last accessed March 28, 2013).

12
. See John A. List, Jeffrey A. Livingston, and Susanne Neckermann, “Harnessing Complimentarities in the Education Production Function,” University of Chicago mimeo.

Chapter 5: How Can Poor Kids Catch Rich Kids in Just Months?

1
. See Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner,
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
(New York: William Morrow, 2005), Chapter 5: What Makes a Perfect Parent?

2
. Joe Klein, “Time to Ax Public Programs That Don’t Yield Results,”
Time
, July 7, 2011,
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2081778,00.html#ixzz1caSTom00
.

3
. For a more complete description of the GECC project, see Oliver Staley, “Chicago Economist’s ‘Crazy Idea’ wins Ken Griffin’s Backing,”
Bloomberg Markets
(April 2011): 85–92.

4
. The academic manuscripts are currently in process, with the first prepared study as: Roland Fryer, Steve Levitt, and John A. List, “Toward an Understanding of the Pre-K Education Production Function.”

Chapter 6: What Seven Words Can End Modern Discrimination?

1
. In the United States, asking such questions would be illegal. This, of course, doesn’t mean that US employers don’t use such information when making hiring decisions.

2
. See “General Orders #11,” Jewish-American History Foundation,
http://www.jewish-history.com/civilwar/go11.htm
(last accessed March 28, 2013). Abraham Lincoln rescinded the order.

3
. “History of Antisemitism in the United States: Early Twentieth Century,” Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_antisemitism_in_the_United_States#Early_Twentieth_Century
(last accessed March 28, 2013).

4
. Press Release,
NobelPrize.org
, October 13, 1992,
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/1992/press.html
.

5
. Among adults twenty-five years old and older, 10.6 million US women have master’s degrees or higher, compared to 10.5 million men.

6
. See Kerwin K. Charles and Jonathan Guryan, “Prejudice and Wages: An Empirical Assessment of Becker’s
The Economics of Discrimination
,”
Journal of Political Economy
116 (2008): 773–809.

7
. Jeffrey M. Jones, “Record-High 86% Approve Black-White Marriages,” Gallup, September 12, 2011,
http://www.gallup.com/poll/149390/Record-High-Approve-Black-White-Marriages.aspx
(last accessed March 28, 2013).

8
. The economics literature refers to this kind of discrimination as “statistical discrimination.” See Kenneth Arrow, “The Theory of Discrimination,” in Orley Ashenfelter and Albert Rees, eds.,
Discrimination in Labor Markets
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1973), 3–33.

9
. Aisha Sultan, “Data Mining Spurs Users to Protect Privacy Online,”
The Bulletin
(Oregon), September 29, 2012,
http://www.bendbulletin.com/article/20120929/NEWS0107/209290322/
.

10
. See “Web Sites Change Prices Based on Customers’ Habits,”
CNN.com
, June 25, 2005,
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/LAW/06/24/ramasastry.website.prices/
(last accessed March 28, 2013).

11
. This work and the following builds on John’s earlier research published in the 2000s. See John A. List, “The Nature and Extent of Discrimination in the Marketplace, Evidence from the Field,”
Quarterly Journal of Economics
, 2004, 119 (1), 49–49.

12
. Read more at M. J. Lee, “Geraldo Rivera Apologizes for ‘Hoodie’ Comment,” Politico, March 27, 2012,
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0312/74529.html#ixzz1qusQkm6A
(last accessed March 28, 2013).

Chapter 7: Be Careful What You Chose, It May Be Used Against You!

1
. At firms with more than 20,000 employees, 24 percent vary premiums based on whether someone smokes, as do 12 percent of companies with 500 or more workers. See “Smokers, Forced to Pay More for Health Insurance, Can Get Help with Quitting,”
Washington Post
, January 2, 2012. See also, “Firms to Charge Smokers, Obese More For Healthcare,”
Reuters
, October 31, 2011.

2
. “Kenlie Tiggeman, Southwest’s ‘Too Fat To Fly’ Passenger, Sues Airline,”
Huffington Post
, May 4, 2012,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/04/kenlie-tiggeman-southwests_n_1476907.html
.

3
. See Andrew Dainty and Helen Lingard, “Indirect Discrimination in Construction Organizations and the Impact on Women’s Careers,”
Journal of Management in Engineering
22 (2006): 108–118.

4
. “Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals, 1933–1945,” United States Holocaust Memorial Museum,
http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/hsx/
(last accessed April 27, 2013).

5
. “The Black Church,”
BlackDemographics.com
,
http://www.blackdemographics.com/religion.html
(last accessed March 28, 2013).

6
.
All in the Family
, Season 2. Accessed on YouTube, March 25, 2013,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_UBgkFHm8o
.

7
. See Uri Gneezy, John A. List, and Michael K. Price, “Toward an Understanding of Why People Discriminate: Evidence from a Series of Natural Field Experiments,” NBER Working Paper 17855 (February 2012).

8
. Richard H. Thaler, “Show Us the Data. (It’s Ours After All.),”
New York Times
, April 23, 2011,
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/24/business/24view.html
.

Chapter 8: How Can We Save Ourselves from Ourselves?

1
. You can watch the video on YouTube if you’re desperate to discover what happens next. Perhaps you’ve already seen it—it was national news, after all. We wouldn’t suggest it.

2
. The RAND Health Insurance Experiment randomized nearly 6,000 people into different levels of cost-sharing. The experiment is still incredibly influential, and it was frequently cited in the health care debates of 2010. Perhaps the best sign that experimentation is back is that Oregon recently finished a study where researchers randomized individuals into Medicare. For a discussion of the results from the first year of that experiment, see Amy Finkelstein, Sarah Taubman, Bill Wright, Mira Bernstein, Jonathan Gruber, Joseph P. Newhouse, Heidi Allen, Katherine Baicker, and the Oregon Health Study Group, “The Oregon Health Insurance Experiment: Evidence from the First Year,”
Quarterly Journal of Economics
127, no. 3 (2012): 1057–1106.

3
. For more information, see “Kanye West,” Wikipedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanye_West
(last accessed April 2, 2013).

4
. See Dana Chandler, Steven D. Levitt, and John A. List, “Predicting and Preventing Shootings Among At-Risk Youth,”
American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings
101, no. 3 (2011): 288–292.

5
. “Jaime Oliver Misses a Few Ingredients,” School Nutrition Association Press Releases, March 22, 2010,
http://www.schoolnutrition.org/Blog.aspx?id=13742&blogid=564
.

6
. John A. List and Anya C. Savikhin, “The Behavioralist as Dietician: Leveraging Behavioral Economics to Improve Child Food Choice and Consumption,” 2013, University of Chicago working paper.

7
. Paul Rozin, Sydney Scott, Megan Dingley, Joanna K. Urbanek, Hong Jiang, and Mark Kaltenbach, “Nudge to Nobesity I: Minor Changes in Accessibility Decrease Food Intake,”
Judgment and Decision Making
6, no. 4 (2011): 323–332.

8
. An important effort to increase the supply of such organs is the pathbreaking research of Stanford economist Al Roth, who received the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2012, in part for his contribution to the design of matching algorithms of live donors with people who need transplants. Roth and his colleagues show that simple changes to the procedure used to allocate the organs can make a big difference in outcomes.

9
. Eric J. Johnson and Daniel Goldstein, “Do Defaults Save Lives?”
Science
302 (2003): 1338–1339,
http://www.dangoldstein.com/papers/DefaultsScience.pdf
.

10
. See Dean Karlan and John A. List, “Nudges or Nuisances for Organ Donation,” 2012, University of Chicago working paper.

11
. See “Federal Advisory Committee Draft Climate Assessment Report Released for Public Review,” US Global Change Research Program,
http://ncadac.globalchange.gov/
(last accessed April 2, 2013).

12
.
http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/univ/download/CFL_Fact_Sheet.pdf?9ed9-3f06
(last accessed July 24, 2013).

13
. See Robert Cialdini, “Don’t Throw in the Towel: Use Social Influence Research,”
APS Observer
, April 2005.

14
. See David Herberich, John A. List, and Michael K. Price, “How Many Economists Does It Take to Change a Light Bulb? A Natural Field Experiment on Technology Adoption,” 2012 University of Chicago working paper.

Chapter 9: What Really Makes People Give to Charity?

1
. “American Giving Knowledge Base,” Grant Space,
http://www.grantspace.org/Tools/Knowledge-Base/Funding-Resources/Individual-Donors/American-giving
(last accessed April 27, 2013).

2
. This research has led us to establish the Science of Philanthropy Initiative (SPI) at the University of Chicago in order to explore the underpinnings of philanthropy by employing an interdisciplinary approach that includes strategic partnerships with the fundraising community. SPI is supported by a $5 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation. Please see
http://www.spihub.org
for more information.

3
. Since John had no resources to run these experiments, it also helped that he could use the sports card collection that he amassed as a kid to pay his experimental participants.

4
. While this might seem like a great idea if you are a would-be administrator, it does have some downsides. One is that every person in the department will decide that his or her area should be chosen. People who study the economics of trade want that as the niche area; those who do labor economics think that labor is the best choice, and so on.

5
. Prior to this leadership role, John had only coached the men’s and women’s water ski teams.

6
. The paper was published as John A. List and David Lucking-Reiley, “The Effects of Seed Money and Refunds on Charitable Giving: Experimental Evidence from a University Capital Campaign,”
Journal of Political Economy
110 (2002): 215–233.

7
. John A. List and Daniel Rondeau, “Matching and Challenge Gifts to Charity: Evidence from Laboratory and Natural Field Experiments,”
Experimental Economics
11 (2008): 253–267.

8
. Other economists, most notably our friends Jan Potters, Martin Sefton, and Lise Vesterlund, have found similar insights from laboratory experiments.

9
. Kent E. Dove,
Conducting a Successful Capital Campaign
, 2nd edition (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2000), 510.

10
. Dean Karlan and John A. List, “Does Price Matter in Charitable Giving? Evidence from a Large-Scale Natural Field Experiment,”
American Economic Review
97, no. 5 (2007): 1774–1793.

11
. As a condition of the experiment, we agreed to keep the name of the organization anonymous, so we can’t tell you which organization it was.

12
. These brackets denote a shorthand (to avoid having to type out the full letter three times for your sake and ours).

13
. We essentially rolled a four-sided dice for every one of the 50,000 houses. If we rolled a “1,” we assigned that household to Group 1, which was offered a 1:1 match. If we rolled a 2, we assigned the household to Group 2, and offered it a 2:1 match. If we rolled a 3, we offered the household a 3:1 match, and Group 4 was our control group.

14
. This result fits well with our intuition.

15
. Harry Bruinius, “Why the Rich Give Money to Charity,”
Christian Science Monitor
, November 20, 2010,
http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Guide-to-Giving/2010/1120/Why-the-rich-give-money-to-charity
.

16
. See the excellent research by economists Rachel Croson, Catherine Eckel, Phil Grossman, Stephan Meier, and Jen Shang showing such insights.

17
. See Craig E. Landry, Andreas Lange, John A. List, Michael K. Price, and Nicholas G. Rupp, “Toward an Understanding of the Economics of Charity: Evidence from a Field Experiment,”
Quarterly Journal of Economics
121 (May 2006): 747–782.