Free for the Downloading
If you are looking for a good introduction to using statistical reasoning in the social sciences, you can do far, far worse than reading Edward Tufte's Data Analysis for Politics and Policy. Reading it before firing up a statistical package will help you better understand what statistical tests mean and how they ought to be applied.
Through the magic of the Internet, it is available for free from Tufte's own website.
Labels: Edward Tufte, free things, statistics
Political Decontrol of the Economy
One of the findings in this little book is that American presidents try to have recessions happen late enough in their terms so that the economy is in full recovery entering a quadrennial election.
It looks to me that the Bush administration may have set up its second-term recession a bit too late: the reset points for a huge amount of adjustable-rate mortgage happen in the next 16 months, with November 2007 being the pinnacle.
Labels: adjustable rate mortgages, Edward Tufte, oops