Comparing versions of Gravino Composition
Showing changes between November 25, 2010 at 9:59:52 pm (crossed out) and September 29, 2021 at 4:45:25 pm (underlined)
Composition
I started talking to my boyfriend, Jose, about composition and recorded a 15 minute interview on my computer. We ended up talking about the book, Freakonomics, which he is currently reading. It got us thinking about what we would do for money. Here's some of our conversation:
Jose: They started off talking about uh, they did this experiment somewhere in Europe at a day care center where all the parents that were late would have to pay a three dollar fine because ppl were always late all the time. And they found out that once they put this three dollar fine instead of ppl not being late anymore people were late more than ever. But because the three dollar fine was just enough to buy off their guilt for being late. If the fine was $300 all the people would be on time.
Jenna: That book isn't very big is it? I mean how many pages is it? I should start reading more.
Jose: I don't know. It's 500 pages on here. But yeah that's why I started buying books on here. It gives me something else to do.
Jenna: Instead of f***ing around on facebook all the time? I just don't want to read because I have to read other stuff that I don't want to read. I think I just have the idea in my head that i dont want to read my textbooks. But if it's assigned for a particular purpose you would think there is a reason they want you to read it.
(This is where I start rambling about Mark Twain and Huckleberry Finn. Not that interesting so I'll skip it except to say that I did find out from my text book that by the end of his life Mark Twain didn't believe that humans were capable of moral action. I was reminded of this during our Freakonomics conversation when Jose said that people will do anything depending on the price they have to pay for it.)
Jose: See here it says, what if the fine was $100? That would likely put an end to the late pick ups. Though it would have also engedered plenty of ill will. Any incentive is inherently a trade off. The trick is to balance the extremes. But there's another problem with the daycare center fine. It instituted an economic incentive. The three dollar penalty for a moral incentive. The guilt the parents were supposed to feel when they came late. For just a few extra dollars each day, parents could buy off their guilt.
Jenna: That's pretty crazy. Now I'm thinking about what I would do for money.
Jose: This is interesting, check this out. So it goes back to the cheating thing. Some cheating leaves barely a shadow of evidence. In other cases the evidence is massive. Consider what happened on a Spring evening at midnight in 1987. 7 million American children suddenly disappeared.
Jenna: What?
Jose: The worst kidnapping wave in history? Hardly. It was the night of April 15th and the IRS had just changed a rule. Instead of merely listing the name of each dependent child, tax filers were now required to privide a social security number. Suddenly, 7 million children- children who had existed only as phantom exemptions on the previous year's 1040 forms- vanished, representing about one in ten of all dependent children in the united states.
Jenna: So people were claming children to get more money from the government because they didn't have to prove it? Whoa, when was that? 1987?
Jose: Yeah, imagine how many years that was going on. Imagine how much extra moeny people were gettting.
Jenna: Wow, that's crazy. 7 million children disappeared. Cheaters.
