Yes, lead poisoning could really be a cause of violent crime

[HiPointDem]

89. 'Freakanomics" is right-wing garbage, Steve Levitt is a right-wing hack, and this lead theory

of violence has the same smell about it.

Levitt is a dyed-in-the-wool Chicago School neoliberal who believes in the sanctity of “the market” and a small government whose function is restricted mostly to protecting property rights. He has used “objective” economic research and mainstream credibility as cover, while attacking teachers’ unions, advocating for the privatization of prison labor, spreading crude climate denialism and promoting rank “free market” ideology that sees human labor as a resource to be extracted for maximum profit. Levitt has also developed a nasty habit of misrepresenting the research of other scientists in order to reach predefined ideological conclusions, and has failed to disclose financial conflicts of interest.

But perhaps the most disturbing thing about Levitt is his enduring interest in researching and “proving” the effectiveness of authoritarian and, some would say, borderline eugenicist policies. Aside from doing studies on the positive effects that incarceration has on society (we benefit to the tune of $15,000 per inmate per year if inmates are packed into overcrowded conditions), he published a paper that argued that an increase in abortion rates among black women in the 1970s was the main reason for a drop in crime in the 1990s. The methodology and data of his research were discredited by other economists, but Levitt stuck to his original conclusion linking race and crime: fewer African-American children correlates to less crime. Levitt’s explanation wasn’t just wrong, it was extremely sinister, reinforcing a racist stereotype of the worst kind with a seemingly modern “scientific” explanation.

http://exiledonline.com/s-h-a-m-e-profile-freakonomics-author-steven-levitt-is-an-anti-labor-pro-prison-milton-friedman-extremist/

While a PhD student at MIT, Levitt published a counter-intuitive masterpiece whitewashing corruption in politics by "proving" that corporate campaign donations do not influence election outcomes. Levitt argued that “campaign money has about one-tenth the impact as was commonly accepted,” according to a 2003 New York Times Magazine profile—a stance that helped land him a tenured job at the University of Chicago.

At the University of Chicago, Levitt's mentor was Gary Becker, another of the “Chicago Boys” who supported Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. Gary Becker developed the theory of “human capital” which treats human labor as just another resource to extract profit from. Levitt's mentor also proposed the creation of a deregulated human-organ commodities exchange, arguing that it would actually help the poor. Levitt said of Becker, "More than any other economist, he has been my inspiration and role model."

In 1999, Levitt co-authored a paper arguing that an increase in abortion rates for black women in the 1970s was the reason for falling crime rates two decades later. "Basically, we had aborted the generation of criminals who would have been active in the 1990s," he told Esquire magazine. His research led to accusations of racial eugenics, according to the New York Times. The study has been debunked and exposed in numerous academic studies over the years—one study by Federal Reserve economists proved Levitt used badly flawed data, forcing Levitt to apologize for the "embarrassing" errors. Nevertheless, Levitt stuck to his original conclusion linking race and crime: fewer African-American children correlates to a drop in crime.

In 1995, Levitt published a paper which "proved" that packing prisoners into increasingly-overcrowded prison cells translates into a net $15,000 positive effect on society per overcrowded cell inmate.

http://shameproject.com/profile/steven-d-levitt/