"Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? How did the legalization of abortion affect the rate of violent crime? These may not sound like typical questions for an economist to ask. But Steven D. Levitt is not a typical economist. He is a much-heralded scholar who studies the riddles of everyday life--from...

Shares scientific experiments, findings, and anecdotes that explain the forces that influence daily decisions, leading people to consistently overpay, underestimate, and procrastinate, and offers insights designed to help people stop making the same mistakes over and over again.