Editor’s note: This article was first published in January 2016. Its figure of 7 billion people in the world is a 2016 figure.
Economics can be very boring, especially for non-economists. But the truth is that the laws of economics are present in every area of our daily lives. That would explain the success of SuperFreakonomics: its authors have “manufactured” two bestsellers by making economics fun and intriguing, explaining some things that, as they put it, you didn’t know, and others you probably didn’t know you wanted to know. In fact, I included that book in our list of books that will make you smarter.
And of course, we can also draw some conclusions from these facts; how to apply them is up to each of us.
1. Why are there fewer taxis on rainy days? It’s not what you think
At first, the answer might seem obvious: there are fewer taxis on rainy days because more people call for them, and with more demand, supply runs short. In other words, it’s harder to get a taxi because almost all of them are taken.
But according to the authors of SuperFreakonomics, that idea is wrong. Through certain studies, they concluded that although demand for taxis is higher on rainy days and drivers could earn a lot more money, taxi drivers actually work less. More people want a taxi, but there are far fewer drivers, because many have already gone home.
Most taxi drivers set themselves a daily earnings target, and once they reach it, they stop working. Not very smart, but apparently this approach is more common in the trade than you might think.
In other words, if a taxi driver normally has to work 10 hours on any given day to earn €60, on a rainy day he could earn that €60 in four hours. But instead of using that day to double or triple his daily earnings, he decides to go home early and gain more free time rather than more money.
Not much business sense, but respectable. So if you’re ever looking for a taxi in the middle of a downpour and you’re out of luck, remember… it’s not that more people are riding in taxis, it’s that most of the drivers are at home.
2. Prostitutes with pimps earn more than independent prostitutes
The figure of the pimp has, these days, become somewhat prostituted (note the irony). When we use the word pimp, negative connotations come to mind, along with the image of a man who exploits women, but the truth is that the figure hasn’t always had those negative connotations.
Suppose you have a business and you hire me on commission. For every product I sell, you give me a commission. For every customer I bring you, you give me a commission. Well, a prostitute has a business in which she sells or rents out a product (her body), she needs customers and, in many cases, protection. She also needs marketing, and often a PR person.
And that was the role of what we know as the pimp: a protector and a PR agent. Of course, there will always be the exploiter and abuser who gives pimps a bad name.
Why does a prostitute with a pimp earn more than an independent one?
According to the authors of SuperFreakonomics, research on the street revealed that prostitutes with pimps charged more per service than independent ones. First, because the pimp took care of finding customers, tried to charge them the highest possible price, and didn’t always accept every kind of client. Above all, he was a PR man who often had good contacts.
In addition, prostitutes with pimps suffered far fewer assaults on the job, because clients knew they were protected.
The authors tell the story of a brothel where the prostitutes working for its owner ended up literally millionaires thanks to the madam’s marketing strategy, which turned her girls into a luxury brand. Something very hard for an independent prostitute to achieve.
Prostitutes working for a madam in a prestigious brothel always earned much more than independent prostitutes and had more security at work.
That is why the biggest blow we could deal to the criminal gangs would be to legalise prostitution. That way we would have independent prostitutes working of their own free will, and legitimate businesses devoted to prostitution. Either way, the country’s economy would benefit from something that will never cease to exist.
3. The way to stop climate change would be to stop eating meat
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard this theory. Some scientists are convinced that carbon dioxide is not the problem for the ozone layer, because plants convert carbon dioxide into oxygen.
According to the study, the main problem is methane. It may sound like a joke, but many agree that animal flatulence (which contains methane) and the processes needed to feed livestock are more harmful to the environment than all vehicle pollution combined.
Seven billion people in the world demand huge amounts of food, and for the great majority that includes meat. As humans cut down on meat consumption, the damage to the environment would improve considerably. And probably our health too.
The book also answers other questions, such as why the lowest death rates tend to coincide with doctors’ strikes, why suicide bombers should buy life insurance (although we already explained this point when we wrote about the man who designed an algorithm to identify terrorists), or why chemotherapy is used to treat certain types of cancer when it has been shown not to be the solution for those cancers.
We’ll finish with one more curiosity that has nothing to do with economics.
4. The story of Oedipus wasn’t about hating your father and desiring your mother
In psychology, the Oedipus complex is used to explain a certain jealousy towards our father arising from an attraction to our mother (I know, it’s a bit more complex than that). In fact, if we ask someone who Oedipus was, most will answer: “He was a guy who killed his father to marry his mother.” But that wouldn’t be entirely correct. At least, it’s not the message the story was trying to convey.
Mythology used Oedipus as a way of explaining that we cannot escape our fate.
When Oedipus was born, an oracle foretold that the child would kill his father and marry his mother, so his parents ordered him killed as soon as he was born. But the man charged with killing him didn’t have the heart to do it and left him tied to a tree in a remote place.
Another couple found Oedipus and decided to adopt him. When the boy grew up, he began to hear rumours about the prophecy hanging over him: that he would kill his father and marry his mother.
Oedipus believed his adoptive parents were his real parents, so when he received confirmation that the prophecy was true, he decided to flee so as not to harm his father or commit incest with his mother.
On the journey he undertook to escape, he came across four men on the road and got into a quarrel with them. They drew their swords, and Oedipus killed them.
He reached the city, where he met a widow and fell in love with her. And he married her.
Later he found out that one of the four men he had killed was his real father, and the woman he had married was his real mother.
So he killed his father without knowing it was his father, and fell in love with his mother without knowing it was his mother.
The Greeks really did know how to write a soap opera.
See also: 11 curious facts about money you probably didn’t know
Featured image: Steven Pisano, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr.
