The Economic Effects Of Constitutions
The authors of The Economic Effects of Constitutions use econometric tools to study what they call the "missing link" between constitutional systems and economic policy; the book is an uncompromisingly empirical sequel to their previous theoretical analysis of economic policy. Taking recent theoretical work as a point of departure, they ask which theoretical findings are supported and which are contradicted by the facts. The results are based on comparisons of political institutions across countries or time, in a large sample of contemporary democracies. They find that presidential/parliamentary and majoritarian/proportional dichotomies influence several economic variables: presidential regimes induce smaller public sectors, and proportional elections lead to greater and less targeted government spending and larger budget deficits. Moreover, the details of the electoral system (such as district magnitude and ballot structure) influence corruption and structural policies toward economic growth.Persson and Tabellini's goal is to draw conclusions about the causal effects of constitutions on policy outcomes. But since constitutions are not randomly assigned to countries, how the constitutional system was selected in the first place must be taken into account. This raises challenging methodological problems, which are addressed in the book. The study is therefore important not only in its findings but also in establishing a methodology for empirical analysis in the field of comparative politics.
Free Trade
This book takes a fresh look at this issue in economic policy. Graham Dunkley provides a critical history of international trade and an alternative analysis to orthodox doctrines about trade policy. He argues that trade, although a natural economic process, has today become much more complex, deregulated and divorced from development than is desirable. He concludes by suggesting elements of a new approach to development and an alternative world trading and economic order.
Australia's Money Mandarins
The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) led a fairly conservative existence until the early 1980s when the economy experienced waves of financial market deregulation and general economic liberalization. This book tells the story of monetary policy and the political role of the Reserve Bank over the past two decades. It reveals how the bank has been used as a "political football", describes conflicts with the government and the Department of Treasury, and how the bank finally adjusted to political turmoil and managed to assert a level of independence in the 1990s.
One-Armed EconomistOn the Intersection of Business and Government
One-Armed Economist represents a personal, if eclectic, approach to public policy. Weidenbaum avoids doctrinaire positions, be they Keynesian or monetarist or supply side or libertarian. This distillation of Weidenbaum's wide range of writings on public policy issues over the last four decades draws on his practical experience in government and business as well as his academic research over that extended period.The volume covers six major clusters of policy issues: economic policy, government programs, business decision-making, government regulation, the defense sector, and the international economy. There are chapters on how to achieve a cleaner environment, how to fundamentally overhaul the tax and health care systems, and a defense of Reaganomics. The work examines how public sector activities impact the performance of the national economy. Its coverage includes the role of government as a buyer, a seller, a provider of credit, and a source of subsidy and support. Drawing heavily on his experience as economist for a major military contractor, Weidenbaum shows that the defense industry is the most heavily regulated sector of the American economy and discusses ways to modernize the arcane and wasteful process of procuring weapon systems.He also draws on his work on the hidden costs of regulation on the consumer, showing how to improve the regulatory process so as to achieve national objectives while minimizing the burdens of compliance. The last section is devoted to the international economy, with chapters on the role of the overseas enterprises. One-Armed Economist is a lucid analysis of major public policy issues of our time. As such it will be of special interest to organizations involved in public policy, think tanks, and government policymaking groups, as well as readers interested in fresh perspectives on a broad range of policy issues.
The Principles of Political Economy and Taxation
This landmark treatise of 1817 formulated the guiding principles behind the market economy. Author David Ricardo, with Adam Smith, founded the "classical" system of political economy, a school of thought that dominated economic policies throughout the nineteenth century and figured prominently in the theories of John Stuart Mill and Karl Marx.A friend and colleague of James Mill, Thomas Malthus, and Jeremy Bentham -- each of whom exercised a decided influence on his intellectual development -- Ricardo elevated economic theory to hitherto unprecedented levels of sophistication. His clear and consistent definition of the classical system included the foundation of the tenets of diminishing returns and economic rent, which led to the doctrines known today as distribution theory and international trade theory, or comparative advantage. The Ricardian system continues to influence and inform modern economic thought, and The Principles of Political Economy and Taxation is essential reading for students of the social sciences.
A People’s World
John Madeley has interviewed some of the world's most courageous campaigners and progressive thinkers, discovering their thoughts on globalization and what an alternative to it might look like. His interviewees include: Peggy Antrobus, Walden Bello, Barry Coates, Fiona Dove, Gustavo Esteva, Hazel Henderson, Francois Houtart, Martin Khor, David Korten, Caroline Lucas MEP, Helena Norberg-Hodge, Ann Pettifor, Devinder Sharma, Vandana Shiva, Victoria Tauli-Corpuz and many others. In doing so, Madelely strips bare the myth there are no alternatives to the present economic system. An inspiring and timely book of ideas and practical proposals for those campaigning for a world in which economic systems can benefit the poor, a world that is more just, humane, stable and conducive to the diversity of human cultures.
The Not So Wild, Wild West
Mention of the American West usually evokes images of rough and tumble cowboys, ranchers, and outlaws. In contrast, The Not So Wild, Wild West casts America's frontier history in a new framework that emphasizes the creation of institutions, both formal and informal, that facilitated cooperation rather than conflict. Rather than describing the frontier as a place where heroes met villains, this book argues that everyday people helped carve out legal institutions that tamed the West. The authors emphasize that ownership of resources evolves as those resources become more valuable or as establishing property rights becomes less costly. Rules evolving at the local level will be more effective because local people have a greater stake in the outcome. This theory is brought to life in the colorful history of Indians, fur trappers, buffalo hunters, cattle drovers, homesteaders, and miners. The book concludes with a chapter that takes lessons from the American frontier and applies them to our modern "frontiers"-the environment, developing countries, and space exploration.
The Bigness Complex
The Bigness Complex confronts head-on the myth that organizational giantism leads to economic efficiency and well-being in the modern age. On the contrary, it demonstrates how bigness undermines our economic productivity and progress, endangers our democratic freedoms, and exacerbates our economic problems and challenges. This new edition has a thoroughly updated variety of issues, examples, and new developments, including government bailouts of the airline industry; regulation of biotechnology; the fiasco of recent electricity deregulation; and mergers and consolidations in oil, radio, and grocery retailing. The analysis is framed in the timeless context of American distrust of concentrations of power. The authors show how both the left and the right fail to address the central problem of power in formulating their diagnoses and recommendations. The book concludes with an alternative public philosophy as a viable guidepost for public policy toward business in a free-enterprise democracy.
After the Bell
This book looks at the social and economic factors of schooling and will prove an intriguing read for sociologists, social economists and policy-makers alike.
World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Glob
The reigning consensus holds that the combination of free markets and democracy would transform the third world and sweep away the ethnic hatred and religious zealotry associated with underdevelopment. In this revelatory investigation of the true impact of globalization, Yale Law School professor Amy Chua explains why many developing countries are in fact consumed by ethnic violence after adopting free market democracy. Chua shows how in non-Western countries around the globe, free markets have concentrated starkly disproportionate wealth in the hands of a resented ethnic minority. These "market-dominant minorities" - Chinese in Southeast Asia, Croatians in the former Yugoslavia, whites in Latin America and South Africa, Indians in East Africa, Lebanese in West Africa, Jews in post-communist Russia - become objects of violent hatred. At the same time, democracy empowers the impoverished majority, unleashing ethnic demagoguery, confiscation, and sometimes genocidal revenge. She also argues that the United States has become the world's most visible market-dominant minority, a fact that helps explain the rising tide of anti-Americanism around the world. Chua is a friend of globalization, but she urges us to find ways to spread its benefits and curb its most destructive aspects.
The Boom and the Bubble
A sustained period of significant growth in the US, however, seemed to save the day against all the odds. So impressive was the surface appearance of this rescue mission that all manner of commentators proclaimed--once again--that a 'new economy' or 'new paradigm' of unlimited and harmonious growth had been forged. Today, as recession looms, the babble about Internet start-ups is exposed as vapid. Yet the pundits are no nearer an understanding of how or why the boom turned into a bubble, or why the bubble has burst. In this crisp and forensic book, Robert Brenner demonstrates that the boom was always a fragile phenomenon--buoyed up by absurd levels of debt and stock-market overvaluation--which never broke free from the fundamental malady of overcapacity and overproduction which continues to afflict the global economy. Carefully dismantling the myths and hype that surround the US boom in terms of profitability, investment, and productivity, Brenner restores the properly international context to the process. He portrays the 'zero-sum' character of the American success, which presupposed the relative weakness of its main German and Japanese competitors: a strategy that has laid huge obstacles in the path of a 'soft landing' to end the current phase of growth. A substantial new Postscript provides and up-to-date analysis of the Bush economic debacle--the crisis of manufacturing, the telecom bust, the record twin deficits, plummeting employment, and the real estate bubble.
Britain in 2010
Was geschieht wohl in Gro?britannien im ersten Jahrzehnt des neuen Millenniums? Die alternde Bev繹lkerung, die Zunahme an Ein-Personen-Haushalten und alleinlebenden Frauen - wie werden sich diese Faktoren auf Wirtschaft und Unternehmenswelt auswirken? Wie wird die Wirtschaft auf die Herausforderung der Internet-Technologien reagieren? Wie kommt es, da? heute mehr Menschen in Indischen Restaurants arbeiten als in den Schiffswerften, der Stahlproduktion und im Bergbau zusammen? "Britain in 2010: The New Business Landscape" diskutiert die Regelm瓣?igkeiten und Unregelm瓣?igkeiten in der sich 瓣ndernden Sozialstruktur Gro?britanniens. Bis zum Jahr 2010 wird die traditionelle Familienform nicht l瓣nger die gesellschaftliche Basis sein; 1001 neue Lebensstilformen werden die herk繹mmlichen Alters- und Einkommensgruppen ersetzen; egozentrische, ma?lose und hedonistische B羹rger werden, von traditionellen Verpflichtungen befreit, zu rastlosen Konsumenten. "Britain in 2010" ist eine einzigartige Zukunftsvision zu Gro?britanniens Unternehmenslandschaft in einer Zeit beispielloser M繹glichkeiten. Autor Richard Scase ist Europas f羹hrender Prognose-Experte im Bereich Gesch瓣ftsszenarios. Als produktiver Autor und ber羹hmte Fernsehpers繹nlichkeit hat er die Diskussion 羹ber die Auswirkungen sozio繹konomischer und globaler Trends auf die Entwicklung von Unternehmensstrategien ma?geblich vorangetrieben.
The Crisis in Economics
Economics can be pretty boring. Drier than Death Valley, the discipline is obsessed with mathematics and compounds this by arrogantly assuming its techniques can be brought to bear on the other social sciences. It wasn't going to be long, therefore, before students started complaining. The vast majority have voted with their feet and signed up for business and management degrees, but in the past two years there has grown an important new movement that has decided to tackle those who think they run economics head-on. This is the Post-autistic Economics Network. The PAE Network started in France and has spread first to Cambridge and then other parts of the world. The name derives from the fact that mainstream economics has been accused of institutional autism, ie. qualitative impairment of social interaction, failure to develop peer relationships and lack of emotional and social reciprocity. In short, economics has lost touch with reality and has become way too abstract. This book charts the impact the PAE Network has had so far and constitutes a manifesto for a different kind of economics - it features key contributions from all the major voices in heterodox economics including Tony Lawson, Deirdre McCloskey, Geoff Hodgson, Sheila Dow and Warren Samuels.
Scotland: the Story of a Nation
The definitive history of Scotland, "told as a tale from its beginnings up to now" (The Observer). Hailed as a "vast, superb history [that] relates Scotland's past over a dozen millennia" (Kirkus Reviews), Magnusson draws on a great deal of modern scholarship to redefine a nation's history. He charts the long struggle toward nationhood, explores the roots of the original Scots, and examines the extent to which Scotland was shaped by the Romans, the Picts, the Vikings, and the English. Encompassing everything from the first Mesolithic settlers in 7000 B.C. to the present movements for independence, Scotland: The Story of a Nation is history on an epic level, essential reading for anyone interested in the rich past of this captivating land.
The Community Economic Development Handbook
The step-by-step guide to turning any neighborhood around A weak local economy can be strengthened. A run-down neighborhood of boarded-up storefronts, litter-strewn sidewalks, high unemployment, and poorly-maintained housing can be transformed. An entire community can be lifted up. Mihailo (Mike) Temali knows this first-hand. He has spent nearly twenty years working in community-based economic development, helping cities as diverse as St. Paul, Minnesota, and Santiago, Chile. In this concrete, practical, jargon-free handbook, he describes a proven way to make any community a better place to live. Comprehensive, realistic, and easy-to-use If you don't already have a community economic development (CED) organization in place, Temali tells you how to set one up. Then he defines four pivot points that are crucial to neighborhood economies: 1) Revitalizing your commercial district; 2) Developing microbusinesses; 3) Developing your community workforce; and 4) Growing good neighborhood jobs. He explains how to choose your first pivot point, then guides you through the process of tackling each one. True stories of successful CED provide inspiration. Sidebars explore related issues: dealing with gentrification, finding potential partners, supporting microentrepreneurs, and more. Other CED professionals share their insights in "From the Field" notes. Appendices point you toward useful resources, show you how to use the Internet to research your regional economy, and include dozens of worksheets that will help you move from reading about CED to doing it. The Community Economic Development Handbook is precisely what you need to turn your neighborhood around!
India Unbound: From Independence to the Global Information Age
India today is a vibrant free-market democracy, a nation well on its way to overcoming decades of widespread poverty. The nation's rise is one of the great international stories of the late twentieth century, and in India Unbound the acclaimed columnist Gurcharan Das offers a sweeping economic history of India from independence to the new millennium. Das shows how India's policies after 1947 condemned the nation to a hobbled economy until 1991, when the government instituted sweeping reforms that paved the way for extraordinary growth. Das traces these developments and tells the stories of the major players from Nehru through today. As the former CEO of Proctor & Gamble India, Das offers a unique insider's perspective and he deftly interweaves memoir with history, creating a book that is at once vigorously analytical and vividly written. Impassioned, erudite, and eminently readable, India Unbound is a must for anyone interested in the global economy and its future.
Understanding the Digital Economy
The rapid growth of electronic commerce, along with changes in information, computing, and communications, is having a profound effect on the United States economy. President Clinton recently directed the National Economic Council, in consultation with executive branch agencies, to analyze the economic implications of the Internet and electronic commerce domestically and internationally, and to consider new types of data collection and research that could be undertaken by public and private organizations. This book contains work presented at a conference held by executive branch agencies in May 1999 at the Department of Commerce. The goals of the conference were to assess current research on the digital economy, to engage the private sector in developing the research that informs investment and policy decisions, and to promote better understanding of the growth and socioeconomic implications of information technology and electronic commerce. Aspects of the digital economy addressed include macroeconomic assessment, organizational change, small business, access, market structure and competition, and employment and the workforce.
Whom the Gods Would Destroy, or How Not to Deregulate
This book assesses the current status of the public utility deregulation movement in the United States.
Upside Down: A Primer for the Looking-Glass World
In a series of mock lesson plans and a "program of study" Galeano provides an eloquent, passionate, funny and shocking expos矇 of First World privileges and assumptions. From a master class in "The Impunity of Power" to a seminar on "The Sacred Car"--with tips along the way on "How to Resist Useless Vices" and a declaration of the "The Right to Rave"--he surveys a world unevenly divided between abundance and deprivation, carnival and torture, power and helplessness. We have accepted a "reality" we should reject, he writes, one where poverty kills, people are hungry, machines are more precious than humans, and children work from dark to dark. In the North, we are fed on a diet of artificial need and all made the same by things we own; the South is the galley slave enabling our greed.
Mystery of Capital
A renowned economist argues for the importance of property rights in "the most intelligent book yet written about the current challenge of establishing capitalism in the developing world" (Economist) "The hour of capitalism's greatest triumph," writes Hernando de Soto, "is, in the eyes of four-fifths of humanity, its hour of crisis." In The Mystery of Capital, the world-famous Peruvian economist takes up one of the most pressing questions the world faces today: Why do some countries succeed at capitalism while others fail? In strong opposition to the popular view that success is determined by cultural differences, de Soto finds that it actually has everything to do with the legal structure of property and property rights. Every developed nation in the world at one time went through the transformation from predominantly extralegal property arrangements, such as squatting on large estates, to a formal, unified legal property system. In the West we've forgotten that creating this system is what allowed people everywhere to leverage property into wealth. This persuasive book revolutionized our understanding of capital and points the way to a major transformation of the world economy.
The Millionaire Mind Paperback
Unlock the surprising traits and habits that fuel real wealth--not flashy lifestyles. Based on deep research into how self-made millionaires think, work, and live, this book shatters myths about success and outlines a roadmap for building lasting financial freedom through mindset, discipline, and smart choices. After its first publication, Dr. Thomas J. Stanley's second best-seller, The Millionaire Mind, spent over four months on The New York Times' bestseller list, rising to position #2, and has sold over half a million copies. Here is the first paperback edition of Stanley's second groundbreaking study of America's wealthy. The Millionaire Mind explores a population of millionaires who have accumulated substantial wealth and live in ways that openly demonstrate their affluence. Studying the ideas, beliefs, and behaviors that enabled these millionaires to build and maintain their fortunes, Dr. Stanley provides a fascinating look at who America's financial elite are and how they got there: What were their school days like?How did they respond to negative criticism?What are the characteristics of the millionaire's spouse?Is religion an important part of their lives?The author uncovers the surprising answers to these and similar questions, showing readers through concrete examples just what it is that makes the wealthy prosper when others would turn away dejected or beaten. The Millionaire Mind is the logical follow-up to The Millionaire Next Door. Written in Dr. Stanley's signature approachable and anecdotal style, it answers universal questions with solid statistical evidence. An insightful, thought-provoking book for entrepreneurial minds and anyone looking to better understand the truly affluent, change their own mindset around finances and lifestyle, and set themselves up for success.
Nature of Economies
From the revered author of the classic The Death and Life of Great American Cities comes a new book that will revolutionize the way we think about the economy. Starting from the premise that human beings "exist wholly within nature as part of natural order in every respect," Jane Jacobs has focused her singular eye on the natural world in order to discover the fundamental models for a vibrant economy. The lessons she discloses come from fields as diverse as ecology, evolution, and cell biology. Written in the form of a Platonic dialogue among five fictional characters, The Nature of Economies is as astonishingly accessible and clear as it is irrepressibly brilliant and wise-a groundbreaking yet humane study destined to become another world-altering classic.
Power- Employment- and Accumulation
This is a collection of original essays by leading critical economists and policy analysts addressing the importance of social structures and institutions to the functioning of real-world economies and the formulation of economic policy.
Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Pa
A vivid narration of the history of the tulip, from its origins on the barren, windswept steppes of central Asia to its place of honor in the lush imperial gardens of Constantinople, to its starring moment as the most coveted--and beautiful--commodity in Europe. In the 1630s, visitors to the prosperous trading cities of the Netherlands couldn't help but notice that thousands of normally sober, hardworking Dutch citizens were caught up in an extraordinary frenzy of buying and selling. The object of this unprecedented speculation was the tulip, a delicate and exotic Eastern import that had bewitched horticulturists, noblemen, and tavern owners alike. For almost a year rare bulbs changed hands for incredible and ever-increasing sums, until single flowers were being sold for more than the cost of a house. Historians would come to call it tulipomania. It was the first futures market in history, and like so many of the ones that would follow, it crashed spectacularly, plunging speculators and investors into economic ruin and despair. This colorful cast of characters includes Turkish sultans, Yugoslav soldiers, French botanists, and Dutch tavern keepers--all centuries apart historically and worlds apart culturally, but with one thing in common: tulipomania.
Wealth of Nations
Adam Smith's masterpiece, first published in 1776, is the foundation of modern economic thought and remains the single most important account of the rise of, and the principles behind, modern capitalism. Written in clear and incisive prose, The Wealth of Nations articulates the concepts indispensable to an understanding of contemporary society; and Robert Reich's Introduction both clarifies Smith's analyses and illuminates his overall relevance to the world in which we live. As Reich writes, "Smith's mind ranged over issues as fresh and topical today as they were in the late eighteenth century--jobs, wages, politics, government, trade, education, business, and ethics." Introduction by Robert Reich - Commentary by R. H. Campbell and A. S. Skinner - Includes a Modern Library Reading Group Guide
Natural Capitalism
Hawken ("The Ecology of Commerce") and Amory and Hunter Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute, an environmental think tank, have put together an ambitious, visionary book advocating "natural capitalism." Based on the principle that businesses can be good for the environment, "Natural Capitalism" shows how leading-edge companies are practicing "a new type of industrialism" that is both more efficient and more profitable, while simultaneously protecting the planet and creating jobs. Natural capitalism is a way of thinking that seeks to apply market principles to all sources of material value, most importantly natural resources. The authors have two related goals: first, to show the vast array of ecologically smart options available to businesses; second, to argue that it is possible for society and industry to adopt them.
From Third World to First
Few gave tiny Singapore much chance of survival when it was granted independence in 1965. How is it, then, that today the former British colonial trading post is a thriving Asian metropolis with not only the world's number one airline, best airport, and busiest port of trade, but also the world's fourth-highest per capita real income? The story of that transformation is told here by Singapore's charismatic, controversial founding father, Lee Kuan Yew. Rising from a legacy of divisive colonialism, the devastation of the Second World War, and general poverty and disorder following the withdrawal of foreign forces, Singapore now is hailed as a city of the future. This miraculous history is dramatically recounted by the man who not only lived through it all but who fearlessly forged ahead and brought about most of these changes. Delving deep into his own meticulous notes, as well as previously unpublished government papers and official records, Lee details the extraordinary efforts it took for an island city-state in Southeast Asia to survive at that time. Lee explains how he and his cabinet colleagues finished off the communist threat to the fledgling state's security and began the arduous process of nation building: forging basic infrastructural roads through a land that still consisted primarily of swamps, creating an army from a hitherto racially and ideologically divided population, stamping out the last vestiges of colonial-era corruption, providing mass public housing, and establishing a national airline and airport. In this illuminating account, Lee writes frankly about his trenchant approach to political opponents and his often unorthodox views on human rights, democracy, and inherited intelligence, aiming always "to be correct, not politically correct." Nothing in Singapore escaped his watchful eye: whether choosing shrubs for the greening of the country, restoring the romance of the historic Raffles Hotel, or openly, unabashedly persuading young men to marry women as well educated as themselves. Today's safe, tidy Singapore bears Lee's unmistakable stamp, for which he is unapologetic: "If this is a nanny state, I am proud to have fostered one." Though Lee's domestic canvas in Singapore was small, his vigor and talent assured him a larger place in world affairs. With inimitable style, he brings history to life with cogent analyses of some of the greatest strategic issues of recent times and reveals how, over the years, he navigated the shifting tides of relations among America, China, and Taiwan, acting as confidant, sounding board, and messenger for them. He also includes candid, sometimes acerbic pen portraits of his political peers, including the indomitable Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, the poetry-spouting Jiang Zemin, and ideologues George Bush and Deng Xiaoping. Lee also lifts the veil on his family life and writes tenderly of his wife and stalwart partner, Kwa Geok Choo, and of their pride in their three children -- particularly the eldest son, Hsien Loong, who is now Singapore's deputy prime minister. For more than three decades, Lee Kuan Yew has been praised and vilified in equal measure, and he has established himself as a force impossible to ignore in Asian and international politics. From Third World to First offers readers a compelling glimpse into this visionary's heart, soul, and mind.
The Sovereign Individual
Two renowned investment advisors and authors of the bestseller The Great Reckoning bring to light both currents of disaster and the potential for prosperity and renewal in the face of radical changes in human history as we move into the next century. The Sovereign Individual details strategies necessary for adapting financially to the next phase of Western civilization. Few observers of the late twentieth century have their fingers so presciently on the pulse of the global political and economic realignment ushering in the new millennium as do James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg. Their bold prediction of disaster on Wall Street in Blood in the Streets was borne out by Black Tuesday. In their ensuing bestsellar, The Great Reckoning, published just weeks before the coup attempt against Gorbachev, they analyzed the pending collapse of the Soviet Union and foretold the civil war in Yugoslavia and other events that have proved to be among the most searing developments of the past few years. In The Sovereign Individual, Davidson and Rees-Mogg explore the greatest economic and political transition in centuries -- the shift from an industrial to an information-based society. This transition, which they have termed "the fourth stage of human society," will liberate individuals as never before, irrevocably altering the power of government. This outstanding book will replace false hopes and fictions with new understanding and clarified values.
The Worldly Philosophers: The Lives, Times And Ideas Of The Great Economic Think
The bestselling classic that examines the history of economic thought from Adam Smith to Karl Marx--"all the economic lore most general readers conceivably could want to know, served up with a flourish" (The New York Times).The Worldly Philosophers not only enables us to see more deeply into our history but helps us better understand our own times. In this seventh edition, Robert L. Heilbroner provides a new theme that connects thinkers as diverse as Adam Smith and Karl Marx. The theme is the common focus of their highly varied ideas--namely, the search to understand how a capitalist society works. It is a focus never more needed than in this age of confusing economic headlines. In a bold new concluding chapter entitled "The End of the Worldly Philosophy?" Heilbroner reminds us that the word "end" refers to both the purpose and limits of economics. This chapter conveys a concern that today's increasingly "scientific" economics may overlook fundamental social and political issues that are central to economics. Thus, unlike its predecessors, this new edition provides not just an indispensable illumination of our past but a call to action for our future.
The Wealth and Poverty of Nations
The Wealth and Poverty of Nations is David S. Landes's acclaimed, best-selling exploration of one of the most contentious and hotly debated questions of our time: Why do some nations achieve economic success while others remain mired in poverty? The answer, as Landes definitively illustrates, is a complex interplay of cultural mores and historical circumstance. Rich with anecdotal evidence, piercing analysis, and a truly astonishing range of erudition, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations is a "picture of enormous sweep and brilliant insight" (Kenneth Arrow) as well as one of the most audaciously ambitious works of history in decades.
The Economics of Life: From Baseball to Affirmative Action to Immigration, How Real-World Issues Affect Our Everyday Life
From economics Nobel Laureate Gary Becker and historian Guity Nashat Becker comes this collection of the economist's popular BusinessWeek columns. These 138 essays have fueled numerous debates, touching on hot-button issues from crime to organization of sports. The Beckers' surprising--and uncompromising--positions on drugs ("legalize them"), immigration ("auction off immigration slots"), welfare ("curtail it sharply"), and other topics provide a provocative commentary on our times.
One World, Ready or Not
From Simon & Schuster, One World Ready or Not is William Greider's exploration of the manic logic of global capitalism. Reflecting the viewpoints of politicians, workers, CEOs, and middle managers, the author of Who Will Tell the People assesses the global economy, points to problems of unregulated capital and labor, and proposes solutions the U.S. must take to lead the world economy onwards
Costs and Benefits of Greenhouse Gas Reduction
Little will be done in the near future to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The divisions between European and American policymakers and between developed and developing countries will take many years to bridge.
Choice- Welfare and Measureme
Choice, Welfare and Measurement contains many of Amartya Sen's most important contributions to economic analysis and methods, including papers on choice, preference, rationality, aggregation, and measurement. A substantial introductory essay interrelates his diverse concerns, and also analyzes discussions generated by the original papers, focusing on the underlying issues.
The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money
Distinguished British economist John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946) set off a series of movements that drastically altered the ways in which economists view the world. In his most important work, The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money (1936), Keynes critiqued the laissez-faire policies of his day, particularly the proposition that a normally functioning market economy would bring full employment. Keynes's forward-looking work transformed economics from merely a descriptive and analytic discipline into one that is policy oriented. For Keynes, enlightened government intervention in a nation's economic life was essential to curbing what he saw as the inherent inequalities and instabilities of unregulated capitalism.
Principles of Economics
British economist Alfred Marshall (1842-1924) was one of the founders of the "neoclassical" school in which economists studied both wealth and human behavior to understand why we make the choices we do. First published in 1890, Principles of Economics stands as Marshall's most influential work. This abridged edition offers a general introduction to the study of economics, dealing mainly with normal conditions of industry, employment, and wages. It begins by isolating the primary relations of supply, demand, and price in regard to a particular commodity. Following his study of science, history, and philosophy, Marshall argues that, while fragmentary statistical hypotheses are used as temporary aids to dynamic economic concepts, the central idea of economics must be that of a living force and movement, and its main concern must be with human beings who are impelled, for better or worse, to change and progress.
Learning from "Learning by Doing"
This book by a Nobel laureate in economics begins with a brief exposition of Kenneth J. Arrow's classic paper "The Economic Implications of Learning by Doing" (1962). It shows how Arrow's idea fits into the modern theory of economic growth, and uses it as a springboard for a critical consideration of spectacular recent developments that have made growth theory a dynamic topic today. The author then develops a new theory that combines learning by doing (identifying it with the concept of "continuous improvement") with a separate process of discrete "innovations." Learning by doing leads to a fairly smooth reduction in labor required per unit of output, tied to the rate of gross investment in new capital equipment. Innovations arrive at random; when one of them happens, the labor requirement takes a jump downward. This new model, simple as it is, does not lend itself to self-contained solution. The author accordingly presents the results of a series of computer simulations that exhibit the variety of paths the new model economy can follow, showing, among other things, that early good luck can have a persistent effect. The book concludes with some general reflections on policies for economic growth, drawn not from any one modeling exercise but from general experience with a variety of growth models. Of the four chapters of this book, the first two were presented as the Kenneth J. Arrow Lectures at Stanford University in 1993. The computer simulations were specially done for inclusion in this book. The final chapter on policies for economic growth was first presented as the Ernest Sturc Lecture at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington in 1991.
Political Economy of Fairness
Political Economy of Fairness covers the main advances of fairness theory, providing a vocabulary of concepts and terms that will allow more efficient and informed communication about policy.How should the government balance the aims of justice and economic efficiency when intervening in the economy? In Political Economy of Fairness Edward Zajac seeks not only to raise the level of the fairness-economic efficiency debate, but to show both the importance and the difficulty (illustrated by the ongoing struggle of the Supreme Court to put meaning into the Sherman and Clayton antitrust acts) of getting the economic theory right in executing fairness-motivated policy. He also reveals both the pervasiveness of government interference in the marketplace and the generality of the stakeholders-fairness-efficiency paradigm as an organizing framework for identifying and analyzing the interaction of the major elements in the policy debates. Political Economy of Fairness covers the main advances of fairness theory, providing a vocabulary of concepts and terms that will allow more efficient and informed communication about policy. It explains these sometimes quite difficult concepts in clear language with maximum appeal to intuition and little mathematics and reviews the experimental work of economists as well as the more standard approaches of moral philosophers.Part I looks at how economists understand and commonly define the concepts of efficiency, costs, prices, exit/entry, externalities, public goods, firms, risks and incentives, and principal-agent theory. Part II reviews fairness theory, including the basic elements of the theories of John Rawls, Robert Nozick, utilitarianism, and superfairness, and the extensive work of experimental economists to develop positive theories of fairness. Part III covers economic theories of regulation and government intervention, introducing the different concepts of taxation, cures for market failures, theories of public choice, and rent seeking. Zajac concludes this part by observing that incentive-compatible regulation appears to economists as the most promising approach to government intervention.The book closes with several case studies that illustrate recurrent themes in regulation and policy. The case studies include progressive taxation, unfair pricing (cross-subsidization and predatory pricing and dumping), mergers and acquisitions, and health, safety, and environmental regulation.
Economic Justice
During the first half of the twentieth century, John A. Ryan developed and promoted moral arguments for reforming the economy of the United States. He was an advocate of minimum wage legislation and child labor restrictions, and he was very much involved in Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal. Closely connected with lawmakers, Ryan's influence has been extensive in American public policy. This volume brings to readers pertinent selections from Ryan's classic works. It will be particularly relevant to today's readers concerned about the place of religious faith in economic policy.The Library of Theological Ethics series focuses on what it means to think theologically and ethically. It presents a selection of important and otherwise unavailable texts in easily accessible form. Volumes in this series will enable sustained dialogue with predecessors though reflection on classic works in the field.
From Here to Economy: A Short Cut to Economic Literacy經濟學的第一堂課
What is the GDP, and what does it mean? Why does the stock market go down when interest rates go up? What causes a dreaded recession? Economics impacts everyone's life, but most people take on faith what they read in the newspaper. Now, for anyone who doesn't know much about economics, noted economist Todd Buchholz explains it all simply and clearly. With refreshing wit and irreverence, Buchholz takes readers by the hand and reveals the basic rules behind everything from food prices to trade deficits. Instead of complicated graphs and charts he uses examples from contemporary life and popular culture to demonstrate the principles at work. By cutting through the arcane musings of academicians, the jargon of analysts and advisors, and the rhetoric of politicians, he gives us a precise and accessible understanding of economic ideas, actions, and consequences as they actually exist in the here and now. Here are some of the heretofore unintelligible ideas he helps us to understand: what causes or combats inflation, and why it is so feared; what moves stocks and bonds up and down--and how to invest wisely and safely; whether it is good or bad to "protect" America from foreign goods--and what happens when we do and when we don't; what exactly Social Security is, and whether government spending is good or bad--and how dangerous the national debt is or isn't. In today's confusing economic climate, it has never been more important for everyone from homemakers to small-business owners to individual investors and middle managers to understand the forces at work.
Short History of Financial Euphoria
The world-renowned economist offers "dourly irreverent analyses of financial debacle from the tulip craze of the seventeenth century to the recent plague of junk bonds." --The Atlantic. With incomparable wisdom, skill, and wit, world-renowned economist John Kenneth Galbraith traces the history of the major speculative episodes in our economy over the last three centuries. Exposing the ways in which normally sane people display reckless behavior in pursuit of profit, Galbraith asserts that our "notoriously short" financial memory is what creates the conditions for market collapse. By recognizing these signs and understanding what causes them we can guard against future recessions and have a better hold on our country's (and our own) financial destiny.
Fifties
The Fifties is a sweeping social, political, economic, and cultural history of the ten years that Halberstam regards as seminal in determining what our nation is today. Halberstam offers portraits of not only the titans of the age: Eisenhower Dulles, Oppenheimer, MacArthur, Hoover, and Nixon, but also of Harley Earl, who put fins on cars; Dick and Mac McDonald and Ray Kroc, who mass-produced the American hamburger; Kemmons Wilson, who placed his Holiday Inns along the nation's roadsides; U-2 pilot Gary Francis Powers; Grace Metalious, who wrote Peyton Place; and "Goody" Pincus, who led the team that invented the Pill. A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
Valuing Natural Assets
Assessing natural resource damages often requires the use of nonmarket valuation techniques that were developed for use in benefit-cost analyses. Natural resource damage assessment dramatically changes the context for applying them. Two aspects of this context are especially important. First, damages are to be measured by the monetary value of the losses people experience, including their use and nonuse values, because of injuries to natural resources---a process requiring careful delineation of how the injuries connect to the resource's services. Second, a single identified entry---not generalized, anonymous taxpayers---must pay damages based on what is measured, and evaluations of the measurement techniques take place not in agency meeting rooms but in courtrooms. Contributors to Valuing Natural Assets examine the ways in which requirements for damage assessment change how the measures are used, presented, received, and defended. Drawing upon their personal involvement with the process and the research issues it has raised---both in providing analysis for defendants or plaintiffs in damage assessment cases and in writing for academic journals---their chapters reflect individual research programs that temper the rigorous demands of scholarship with the equally demanding standards of litigation.
Innovation and Growth in the Global Economy
Grossman and Helpman develop a unique approach in which innovation is viewed as a deliberate outgrowth of investments in industrial research by forward-looking, profit-seeking agents.Traditional growth theory emphasizes the incentives for capital accumulation rather than technological progress. Innovation is treated as an exogenous process or a by-product of investment in machinery and equipment. Grossman and Helpman develop a unique approach in which innovation is viewed as a deliberate outgrowth of investments in industrial research by forward-looking, profit-seeking agents.
Trade Policy and Market Structure
This sequel to Market Structure and Foreign Trade examines the new international trade's applied side. It provides a compact guide to models of the effects of trade policy in imperfectly competitive markets, as well as an up-to-date survey of existing knowledge, which is extended by the authors' useful interpretations of the results.
Wealth of Nations
Political economy had been studied long before Adam Smith. But Wealth of Nations (1776) established it for the first time as a separate science. Smith based his arguments on vast historical knowledge, and developed his principles with remarkable clarity. What set this work apart was its statement of the doctrine of natural liberty. Smith believed that "man's self-interest is God's providence" - that if government abstained from interfering with free competition, the invisible hand of capitalism would emerge from the competing claims of individual self-interest. Industrial problems would be resolved and maximum efficiency reached. After more than two centuries, Smith's work still stands as the best statement and defense of the fundamental principles of capitalism.
