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OrangeJello, LemonJello, and Shithead have yet to catch on among the masses, but other names do. How does a name migrate through the population, and why? Is it purely a matter of zeitgeist, or is there some sensible explanation? We all know that names rise and fall and rise—witness the return of Sophie and Max from near extinction—but is there a discernible pattern to these movements? The answer lies in the California data, and the answer is yes. Among the most interesting revelations in the data is the correlation between a baby’s name and the parent’s socioeconomic status. Consider the most common female names found in middle-income white households versus low-income white households. (These and other lists to follow include data from the 1990s alone, to ensure a large sample that is also current.) Most Common Middle-Income White Girl Names 1. Sarah 2. Emily 3. Jessica 4. Lauren 5. Ashley 6. Amanda 7. Megan 8. Samantha 9. Hannah 10. Rachel 11. Nicole 12. Taylor 13. Elizabeth 14. Katherine 15. Madison 16. Jennifer 17. Alexandra 18. Brittany 19. Danielle 20. Rebecca Most Common Low-Income White Girl Names 1. Ashley 2. Jessica 3. Amanda 4. Samantha 5. Brittany
6. Sarah 7. Kayla 8. Amber 9. Megan 10. Taylor 11. Emily 12. Nicole 13. Elizabeth 14. Heather 15. Alyssa 16. Stephanie 17. Jennifer 18. Hannah 19. Courtney 20. Rebecca There is considerable overlap, to be sure. But keep in mind that these are the most common names of all, and consider the size of the data set. The difference between consecutive positions on these lists may represent several hundred or even several thousand children. So if Brittany is number five on the low-income list and number eighteen on the middle-income list, you can be assured that Brittany is a decidedly lowend name. Other examples are even more pronounced. Five names in each category don’t appear at all in the other category’s top twenty. Here are the top five names among highend and low-end families, in order of their relative disparity with the other category: Most Common High-End White Girl Names 1. Alexandra 2. Lauren 3. Katherine 4. Madison 5. Rachel Most Common Low-End White Girl Names 1. Amber 2. Heather 3. Kayla 4. Stephanie 5. Alyssa And for the boys:
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FREAKONOMICS A Rogue Economist Expl
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The conversion of parenting from an
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“How old are you, Steve?” he as
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irth and put the child up for adopt
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$10,000—is a mere $150. If you ea
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per year—which sounds like a lot
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greater moral plane in which man op
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there so much crime in modern socie
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off pig blood as their own. They mi
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subtle ways to inflate students’
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The best way to get rid of cheating
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It is true that sports and cheating
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7-7 WRESTLER’S PREDICTED WIN PERC
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Once upon a time, Feldman dreamed b
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agels cost one dollar each, cream c
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“kuklux,” a slight mangling of
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y the Ku Klux Klan. Kennedy saw the
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more lynchings of blacks between 19
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Kennedy couldn’t wait for the fir
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perfectly good year-old cars, and t
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Armed with information, experts can
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Fantastic Granite Spacious State-of
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It would be naïve to suppose that
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Elderly players, meanwhile, are vic
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terribly important. The richer a ma
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But if you can question something t
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But if you were to have spent a lit
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Just as things were looking their b
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Page 81 and 82: percent. Rudolph Giuliani, however,
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Page 103 and 104: samples of twenty children from eac
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Page 107 and 108: Doesn’t: The child attended Head
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Page 137 and 138: SUPREME COURT JUSTICE LOUIS D. BRAN
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incentives and self-interest and Mo
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corrupt judging of “On Behalf of
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Wade, Henry Wade, Wyn Craig Waksal,
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HarperCollins Publishers (Australia
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