CHAPTER 1 DUE DATE

ATTENTION METRO STUDENTS:

YOU MUST SUBMIT YOUR RESPONSES TO THE CHAPTER 1 QUESTIONS by Sunday 2/19 then you must give thoughtful responses to 2 other students by Wednesday 2/22.

Reminder both the answers to the questions and your comments to other students must be thoughtful and demonstrate knowledge of the economic concepts discussed in the chapter.

Chapter 6 Perfect Parenting, Part II; or: Would a Roshanda by Any Other Name Smell as Sweet?

http://www.inmagine.com/searchterms/parents.html

Core Competencies


This chapter raises a rather intriguing question,“What’s in a name?” Once you have read and carefully
studied this chapter you should be able to complete the following tasks which,taken together,answer
this and related questions.


Students should provide thoughtful answers to the following questions on Graham's Blog. Students must then thoughtfully respond to at least 5 answers provided by at least 2 other students.


1. What do the experiences of Winner Lane,Loser Lane,and Temptress tell us about the likely
relationship between a child’s name and his/her prospects for success in life? Are these examples
sufficient for us to draw any definitive conclusions? Why or why not?


2.Explain what Roland G.Fryer was trying to get at when he decided to explore the following
question:is distinctive black culture a cause of the economic disparity between blacks and
whites or merely a reflection of it?

3. Why is the California birth certificate data set so valuable from the economist’s perspective?
In particular,what type of data does it include that would be of interest to economists? Why
are the variables you listed so useful/valuable?


4. What do the California names data tell us about the similarity between the names black parents
and white parents gave their children up until the early 1970s and in the period of time since then?


5. Summarize the degree of uniqueness of names given to black girls and black boys revealed in the
California names data.What do the authors cite as the most likely cause of this phenomenon?


6. Summarize the characteristics of a black parent who is most likely to give his/her child
a distinctively black name.


7. Explain how an “audit study” is used to determine whether having a very “white” name
or a very “black” name matters.


8. Are the results of audit studies regarding the effects of a person’s name on that person’s
prospects for success reliable? If not,why not?


9. According to the analysis of the California names data,does a person with a distinctively black
name have,on average,a worse life outcome than a person with a distinctively white name?
If so,is it the fault of the name? If not,explain what the data are telling us.


10.Is there a discernible pattern in how certain names move through the population over time?
If so,describe it.


11.Is a low-income parent more likely to choose the name of a celebrity or the child of an
upper-income family for his/her own child.Why?


12.According to the California names data,what are many parents trying to signal when they
choose a particular name for their child?

Chapter 5 What Makes a Perfect Parent?

JW_032106_0193 Blend Stock Photos Royalty Free Photograph

Core Competencies



This chapter helps to answer the age-old question;“What makes a perfect parent?” Once you have
read and carefully studied this chapter you should be able to complete the following tasks which,taken
together,answer this and related questions.


Students's should provide thoughtful answers to the following questions on Graham's Blog and then give thoughtful responses to 5 answers posted by at least 2 other students in the class.


1. Why are parents more susceptible to “fearmongering” than other people?


2. What market forces give rise to parenting books that appeal to a parent’s fears and inadequacies
rather than books which present an objective and evenhanded articulation of the state-of-the-
science of good parenting?


3. How does the information in this chapter regarding the contradictory and confusing assemblage
of information from parenting experts support the major theme of this book
(Hint:incentives matter)?


4. Based on the example of perfect parenting in this chapter,provide examples that illustrate how the
combination of asymmetric information and fear can lead to inefficient outcomes.


5. When looking at statistical data over a period of time,what does “correlation” mean? How is
it different from “causation?”


6. What tool does an economist use to make sense of data which include many variables? In general
terms,how does regression analysis sort out the data?


7. Describe the difference between normative and positive analysis.What can you learn about
the utility of this distinction from this chapter on perfect parenting?


8. Describe,in general terms,the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS)? Who conducted it,
who was the target of the study,and what was the purpose of the study?


9. According to the data in this chapter,what are the main differences between a school which
overwhelmingly has black students versus a school which overwhelmingly has white students?


10.Academically,how well does an average black student do in a “bad” school? How is this different
from an average white student in a “bad” school?


11.According to the data developed from the ECLS,what is more important regarding a child’s success
on standardized tests:what a parent does for a child or what a parent is? In your opinion,what
might be an explanation for such a strange conclusion?


12.According to the data developed from the ECLS,having lots of books in the home is correlated
with higher scores on a child’s tests,reading to the child nearly every day is not.If a parent were
only interested in having his or her child achieve higher scores on standardize tests,what would
you imagine his or her benefit/cost considerations to be when it came to the purchase of books
and this use of his or her time?


13.According to the data developed from the ECLS,a low birth weight is correlated with lower test
scores on standardized tests,but the attendance by a child in the Head Start program is not.If you
were a government official with limited financial resources,how would this inform your decisions
regarding the allocation of government funds?

Chapter 4 Where Have all the Criminals Gone?

Foto search Stock PhotosRF Royalty Free


Core Competencies
This chapter raises a rather intriguing question,“Where have all the criminals gone?” Once you have
read and carefully studied this chapter you should be able to complete the following tasks which,taken
together,answer this and related questions.


Students are to provide thoughtful answers to the questions below and give an equally thoughtful response to at least 5 questions from 2 other students. Please place all answers on Graham's Blog.


1. In economic terms,what was Nicolae Ceau_escu’s rationale for banning abortion in Romania,
i.e.,how did he see banning abortion befitting the Romanian economy?


2. Describe the incentives Ceau_escu used to increase the birth rate in Romania.Were these
incentives effective? Explain.


3. As a result of Ceau_escu’s policies,what happened to the average quality of life in Romania?
Provide an economic explanation for the change that occurred.


4. Describe the general behavior of the crime rate in the United States between 1970 and 1999,i.e.,
indicate whether it was increasing or decreasing from year to year.


5. List each of the explanations of the drop in the crime that occurred in the 1990s that are evaluated
by Levitt and Dubner.


6. Of the explanations you identified in the previous question,which ones do not appear to in fact
be valid? Which ones do appear to in fact be valid?


7. The argument linking the drop in crime to the robust economy in the1990s would seem to be
quite strong.Provide a brief explanation of what the data have to say about the viability
of this explanation.


8. What rationale do some criminologists offer for the argument that imprisonment rates should be
lowered as part of the effort to reduce crime in the United States? Was their logic sound? If not,
what fallacy did they commit?


9. What does the available evidence have to say about whether increased reliance on prisons
is a viable explanation for the drop in crime in the 1990s?


10.What does the available evidence have to say about whether increased reliance on capital
punishment is a viable explanation for the drop in crime in the 1990s?


11.Explain how an increase in the number of police officers could cause the crime rate to decline.
Does the evidence support this explanation of the drop in crime in the 1990s? Explain.


12.Many observers maintained that the drop in crime in the 1990s was at least in part due to the
adoption of innovative policing strategies.Focusing on the experience in New York City,what do
the data tell us about the viability of this assertion? Should we then conclude that smart policing
is not a good thing? Why or why not?

Chapter 3: Why Do Drug Dealers Live with Their Mothers

afrostoshelltoes.com


This chapter answers a surprising question;“Why do drug dealers still live with their moms?” Once
you have read and carefully studied this chapter you should be able to complete the following tasks
which,taken together,answer this and related questions.

Each student should place their answers to these fundamental questions on Graham's Blog and respond to 5 responses by at least 2 other students.  Reminder: responses to fellow students should be thoughtful not inane!

1. What is “conventional wisdom?” What are some ways that “conventional wisdom” comes into being?

2. Explain why challenging the “conventional wisdom” with regard to a sticky social issue may
be difficult to do.

3. Considering this chapter’s analysis of the transformation of Listerine from an antiseptic to
a cure for halitosis,what can one conclude about the effect of advertising on  market demand
for a good or service?

4. Explain how the incentives of police departments and the public media gave rise to explanations
of the rising crime rate in the 1980s that were totally wrong.

5. Describe,in general terms,the organizational structure of the Black Disciples street gang.How is it
similar to the organizational structure of most business?

6. Explain how four years of financial records of the Black Disciples street gang found their way into
the hands of a University of Chicago graduate student.

7. How did J.T.,a branch leader of a Black Disciples street gang,acquire and maintain a regional
monopoly over crack cocaine within the territorial domain of the gang?

8. What are monthly costs incurred by J.T.’s unit of the Black Disciples? Which costs would be
considered fixed costs? Which would be considered variable costs?

9. Explain how a “tournament” or “winner take all” labor market works.Why would a street-level
drug dealer be willing to accept low pay and poor working conditions?

10.Give your own examples of a “tournament” type of labor market.

11.How do the incentives of the street-level drug salesman differ from those of the gang leader/
franchise owner? Are they both attempting to maximize the profits of the gang? Why or why not?

12.How did the invention of crack cocaine transform the urban street gang?

13.According to the data cited in this chapter,civil rights laws and a shift in the attitudes in the United
States regarding race helped to improve the status of black society.How did crack cocaine alter
that progress?

14.Based on the examples in this chapter,what does the invention of better and cheaper production
methods do to the price and sales of a good or service?

Chapter 2 How is the Klan Like a Group of Real Estate Agents

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/america-unmasked-the-images-that-reveal-the-ku-klux-klan-is-alive-and-kicking-in-2009-1625732.html


This chapter raises a rather intriguing question,“What do the Ku Klux Klan and Real Estate Agents
have in common?” Once you have read and carefully studied this chapter you should be able to com-
plete the following tasks which,taken together,answer this and related questions.

Place your answers to these questions on Graham's Blog and comment on the answers to 5 questions from 2 of your other classmates.  Your comments should add to the discussion and not be simply inane comments like (good job dude).

1. Describe,in broad terms,how the Ku Klux Klan came into existence and how its level of popularity
varied over time.In addition,identify specific factors that caused the Klan’s popularity to rise or fall.
2. Explain Stetson Kennedy’s role in the Klan’s ultimate decline in popularity in the South,focusing on
the role the dissemination of what the Klan believed was secret information played in that process.

3. Explain what is meant by the term “information asymmetries” and give examples of information
asymmetries we encounter in everyday life.

4. Explain whether,and if so,how,information asymmetries create a competitive advantage
for particular individuals.

5. Explain how such innovations as the Internet have affected the prevalence
of information asymmetries.

6. Explain how information asymmetries facilitated the corporate scandals that occurred
in the early 2000s.

7. Provide examples that illustrate how the combination of an information asymmetry and fear
can lead to inefficient outcomes.Explain how the introduction of the element of fear makes
the problem of the information asymmetry even worse.

8. What evidence do the authors offer to support their claim that real estate agents exploit
an information asymmetry to their client’s detriment? As more clients become aware of
the possibility of such behavior by agents,how might it affect the relationship between the two?

9. Explain how the choice of terms a real estate agent uses to describe a particular property conveys
additional information about the property,and hence the price a potential buyer might be able to
successfully offer the seller.

10. This chapter examines how the economic incentives of a real estate agent may differ from those
of his or her client.What other subject matter experts are often hired by individuals and business-
es? Might they have incentives that differ from those of the clients that hire them?

11. Explain how the information a person has can affect his/her propensity to discriminate.
As part of your explanation,distinguish between taste-based discrimination and
information-based discrimination.

12. According to the voting data from the Weakest Link,which two groups of people are most likely
to be discriminated against in that setting.What type of discrimination is being practiced in each
case? Explain.

13. What do the data say about the characteristics of men and women who participate in
Internet dating sites relative to the characteristics of the broader population?

14. Assuming many of the people who use Internet dating sites are not being truthful when they
describe themselves,what could motivate them to do so,knowing that if they ever actually
met a date face-to-face,the truth would likely come out?

Chapter 1 What do Summo Wrestlers and Teachers Have in Common

chijanofuji.com


This chapter raises a rather odd question,“What do Schoolteachers and Sumo Wrestlers have in
common?” Once you have read and carefully studied this chapter you should be able to complete
the following tasks which,taken together,answer this and related questions.

Each student should submit their thoughtful answers to this question and respond to the answers of at least 2 other students.  Submission answers should contain a response that indicates the student has has a clear understanding of the reading.  Students should comment only on the last question.  Each student must give 2 current examples of cases (include link to article you are using in your case study)in which moral or social incentives and economic incentives are present and if these differing incentives are complementary or competing


What examples can you think of where moral or social incentives and economic incentives are both
present?  Are the different incentives complementary or competing? For each of the cases you cite,
which do you think is the stronger incentive?