Economics: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)

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Introduces key economic factors and concepts such as individual choices, national policies, efficiency, equity, development, sustainability, dynamic equilibrium, property rights, markets, and public goods.

wp2016_17.rdf, Universita' degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Scienze per l'Economia e l'Impresa. Economic Writing on the Pressing Problems of the Day: The Roles of Moral Intuition and Methodological Confusion," I probably would not have been as disappointed with this book as I was had the title not included such misleading words as "Introduction" and "Economics". Economics has the capacity to offer us deep insights into some of the most formidable problems of life. Here, Dasgupta goes beyond the basics to show it's innate effects on our history, culture, and lifestyles. Colonization is a possible answer. Historians have shown that, from the 16th century, European powers have extracted natural resources from the colonies – including cheap (read, slave) labour – but have mostly invested the proceeds domestically. Of course, one should ask why it is that the Europeans managed to colonize the tropics; why colonization didn’t take place the other way round. As noted earlier, Jared Diamond has offered an answer. That said, many of the most prominent of those ex-colonies have been politically independent for decades now. During that time real income per head in the rich world has increased over and over again. With the exception of a few striking examples in South and South East Asia, though, most of the ex-colonies have either remained poor or become poorer still. Why? [Emphasis added]...This then goes on to analyze the productivity of institutions (smells like Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty).

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Up-to-date and progressive, this short book is written by an internationally recognized authority in the field. It’s difficult to explain how limited liberal economics is when you do not have the words to describe the real world. Here are some words:

Colonialism/imperialism is directly mentioned once: Why didn’t the poor world take advantage of their resource endowments to enrich themselves in the same way?Yes, sarcasm; the world is reduced to a poorly-lit alley and the author only examines what is under the street light: economic growth (GDP), standard of living (HDI), demography ( population growth, ugh...), trust (how to model it), communities, markets (including the central planning vs. free market "debate", market failures, etc.), institutions (in particular science and technology), households and firms (including property rights, risk), modelling sustainable economic development, modelling social wellbeing, and even the game theory of voting (framed as if this is an adequate intro to “democracy”, how liberal reformist can we get?!). The Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World Grass Root Collective Action for territorially integrated food supply chain: A Case Study from Tuscany," Shows how economics uncovers and explains these processes, and how it can form solutions and policies. Michelle Baddeley, Professor in Economics and Associate Dean (Research and Development), University of Technology Sydney

As an 'introduction', this book is an extremely heavy read for anyone not already intimately familiar with economics (and even then, it would probably still be a tough book to get through). The author covers such a wide array of topics so fast, that it's difficult to see how they might possibly tie together. Even the examples the author gives require a double-take (at least in my case they did). Class (i.e. class analysis) remain forever opaque in (modern) liberal economics (remember, this was actually foundational to the Classical liberals), with 2 inconsequential mentions: As for calling this an 'economics' book, I really think that is open to interpretation. It was abundantly clear to me that the author had an agenda when writing this book and was not shy about it. I don't necessarily agree or disagree with her viewpoints, but books that are supposed to be references to technical subjects like economics shouldn't have the facts clouded with opinion and rhetoric.

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The book shows an economist thinking and practicing his discipline in a way a lay reader can, with effort, understand rather than offering an overview. The book helped me understand how an economist works. Dasgupta helped me see different ways of thinking about important matters, which is a worthwhile accomplishment and the goal of a "very short introduction". Ah yes, all the poor need to do is “do business” and this magically produces wealth which magically distributes to the poor to uplift their standard of living. Because Western Europe just did business for 300 years (1500-1800) before their domestic (yes, let's not even consider the colonies/slaves) masses recovered enough from the capitalist Enclosures to actually improve their standard of living (which it turns out was mostly from collective action to build social Commons, esp. public health/sanitation): Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World A little learning is a dangerous thing"; and a "very short introduction" does not have to be easy. Dasgupta's book is not written "for dummies" and it does not present its subject in the manner of an introductory textbook. Instead, Dasgupta offers the lay reader an example of how economists define problems and issues and try to solve them. In other words, the book offers the reader an example of how to "think like an economist". This gives the book a dense character. Dasgupta develops his own way of approaching and his position of questions of economics, neither of which might be fully shared by all members of his profession. These pro-capitalist economists consolidated around a new framework (of classless selfish individuals and harmonious equilibriums, a utopia more fanciful than communism) which they labelled as "Neoclassical" economics, today's "mainstream economics". This is why modern Marxist economists (ranging from The Bubble and Beyond to Anwar Shaikh) refer to "Neoclassical" as "anti-Classical". At the outset, Dasgupta makes two broad worth noting. First, he ties in economics with politics and, especially with ethics. Unlike some scientists who might try to minimize ethical, philosophical questions, Dasgupta is quite clear that ethical commitments are a driving force behind economics and politics. The second point involves Dasgupta's approach to economic questions. He rejects a historical, "narrative" approach because of the difficulty of supporting one proposed "narrative" over another. Dasgupta's approach is heavily analytical and quantitative, relying on mathematical modeling, statistics, and game theory. He tries to identify and weigh the factors involved in economic growth.