“I love being the person who doesn’t know anything” - Why Steven Levitt has swapped academia for podcasting

Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford

Pushkin Industries

Society & Culture, History

4.7 • 6K Ratings

🗓️ 11 April 2025

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

20 years ago, a book called Freakonomics became an instant bestseller and worldwide sensation. Tim Harford got his hands on the first copy that Steve Levitt ever signed... and promptly sold it on eBay. In this Cautionary Conversation, the pair are reunited to discuss the Freakonomics phenomenon, why Levitt left the hostile world of academia, and how simple changes could revolutionise everything from education to organ donation.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Pushkin.
0:08.8	Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again.
0:12.1	More Americans listen to podcasts than add supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora.
0:16.3	And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined.
0:20.4	Learn how podcasting can help
0:21.5	your business. Call 844-844-I-Hart. 20 years ago, I was working on the final draft of my first book,
0:28.8	The Undercover Economist, when my publisher sent me a worried email. There's this new book about to come out,
0:35.4	he said. It's also about economics and it looks like
0:38.0	it's going to scoop you. That might be a problem. But I wasn't worried. If the book was a success,
0:42.9	it would just make economics seem cool. And anyway, how big a success could an economics book be?
0:50.1	At the time I lived in the US and I'd been doing some writing for the Financial Times. So I pitched the idea of flying to Chicago to interview the economist
0:58.6	whose work was at the heart of this book.
1:01.6	It was my first ever interview and little did either of us know that his work
1:06.5	was about to become one of the biggest books of the decade.
1:10.4	I walked away from the interview
1:11.6	with a copy. To Tim, the first book I've ever signed. You can probably get at least $9.50 on eBay,
1:19.9	Steve Levitt. The book co-authored with Stephen J. Dubner was called Freakonomics, and it combined
1:26.1	pop culture with economics.
1:28.0	It was a global smash hit.
1:29.5	It spawned several sequels, a documentary film and a podcast.
1:33.5	And 20 years after our first meeting, I am reunited with Steve Levitt.
1:38.7	Steve, welcome to cautionary tales.
	...

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