freakonomics

Reason, May 2003; and Richard Morin, “Scholar Invents Fan to Answer His Critics,”
Washington Post, February 1, 2003. / 133–34 Lott’s gun theory disproved: See Ian Ayres
and John J. Donohue III, “Shooting Down the ‘More Guns, Less Crime’ Hypothesis,”
Stanford Law Review 55 (2003), pp. 1193–1312; and Mark Duggan, “More Guns, More
Crime,” Journal of Political Economy 109, no. 5 (2001), pp. 1086–1114.
THE BURSTING OF THE CRACK BUBBLE: For a discussion of crack’s history and
particulars, see Roland G. Fryer Jr., Paul Heaton, Steven Levitt, and Kevin Murphy, “The
Impact of Crack Cocaine,” University of Chicago working paper, 2005. / 134 25 percent
of homicides: See Paul J. Goldstein, Henry H. Brownstein, Patrick J. Ryan, and Patricia
A. Bellucci, “Crack and Homicide in New York City: A Case Study in the Epidemiology
of Violence,” in Crack in America: Demon Drugs and Social Justice, ed. Craig Reinarman
and Harry G. Levine (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), pp. 113–30.
THE “AGING POPULATION” THEORY: See Steven D. Levitt, “The Limited Role of
Changing Age Structure in Explaining Aggregate Crime Rates,” Criminology 37, no. 3
(1999), pp. 581–99. Although the aging theory has by now been widely discounted,
learned experts continue to float it; see Matthew L. Wald, “Most Crimes of Violence and
Property Hover at 30-Year Low,” New York Times, September 13, 2004, in which
Lawrence A. Greenfield, director of the Bureau of Justice Statistics, says, “There is
probably no single factor explanation for why the crime rates have been going down all
these years and are now at the lowest level since we started measuring them in 1973. It
probably has to do with demographics, and it probably has to do with having a lot of very
high-rate offenders behind bars.” / 135 “There lurks a cloud”: See James Q. Wilson,
“Crime and Public Policy” in Crime, ed. James Q. Wilson and Joan Petersilia (San
Francisco: ICS Press, 1995), p. 507.
THE ABORTION-CRIME LINK: For an overview, see John J. Donohue III and Steven
D. Levitt, “The Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime,” Quarterly Journal of
Economics 116, no. 2 (2001), pp. 379–420; and John J. Donohue III and Steven D.
Levitt, “Further Evidence That Legalized Abortion Lowered Crime: A Response to
Joyce,” Journal of Human Resources 39, no. 1 (2004), pp. 29–49. / 136 Abortion studies
in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia: See P. K. Dagg, “The Psychological Sequelae of
Therapeutic Abortion—Denied and Completed,” American Journal of Psychiatry 148, no.
5 (May 1991), pp. 578–85; and Henry David, Zdenek Dytrych, et al., Born Unwanted:
Developmental Effects of Denied Abortion (New York: Springer, 1988). / 137 The Roe
v. Wade opinion: Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973). / 138 One study has shown that the
typical child: See Jonathan Gruber, Philip P. Levine, and Douglas Staiger, “Abortion
Legalization and Child Living Circumstances: Who Is the ‘Marginal Child?’” Quarterly
Journal of Economics 114 (1999), pp. 263–91. / 138 Strongest predictors of a criminal
future: See Rolf Loeber and Magda Stouthamer-Loeber, “Family Factors as Correlates
and Predictors of Juvenile Conduct Problems and Delinquency,” Crime and Justice, vol.
7, ed. Michael Tonry and Norval Morris (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986);
also, Robert Sampson and John Laub, Crime in the Making: Pathways and Turning
Points Through Life (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993). / 139 So does
having a teenage mother: See William S. Comanor and Llad Phillips, “The Impact of