Conversation Arts: Civility, Incivility, and Persuasion, Favorites: Annual Top Ten, Middle East, Israel, Monologues from Russ
An Economist Looks at Europe
I. False Front Economic man orders his affairs so as to maximise his satisfaction, but we cannot always tell what satisfies him. American Sovietologists have written millions of words explaining the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union by its failure to satisfy the Russian consumer. The Russian people got supposedly fed up with queuing for .. MORE
Featured Article
“Farmers and their lobbyists persuaded Congress to set up the U.S. Popcorn Board in the 1990s on the grounds that ‘popcorn is an important food that is a valuable part of the human diet.'” Our Washington political leaders seem to be running like lemmings toward a fiscal Armageddon that Greece has recently reached. According to .. MORE
Book Review, Liberty Classics
A Liberty Classic Book Review of Economic Sophisms, by Frédéric Bastiat.1 “The worst thing that can happen to a good cause is, not to be skillfully attacked, but to be ineptly defended.” —Frédéric Bastiat, Economic Sophisms (1845). No one defends the cause of free trade against protectionism, individual freedom over central planning, and opportunity contra .. MORE
Labor Mobility, Immigration, Outsourcing
Economics of Crime
Free Markets
Conversation Arts: Civility, Incivility, and Persuasion
Books: Reviews and Suggested Readings
Economics of Crime
Incentives
International Macroeconomics
Incentives
econtalk-podcast
Behavioral scientist Katy Milkman of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania talks about her book How to Change with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. What can we learn from research in psychology and behavioral economics about breaking the habits we want to change? Is that research reliable? And should Russ Roberts accept being overweight or .. MORE
econtalk-podcast
According to neuroscientist and philosopher Sam Harris, rationality is the key to safeguarding everything we cherish, and its only true enemy is dogmatic inflexibility. Harris speaks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the views that have made Harris famous, teasing out the often mind-blowing subtleties of his religious and cultural critiques. They discuss what Harris has .. MORE
Labor Market
One of the ideas that economists are most sure of is that when the price of something rises, other than due to something that shifts the whole demand curve, the quantity demanded falls. Conversely, when the price of something falls, the quantity demanded increases. This is not controversial in economics. Moreover, it’s so clear .. MORE
Incentives
“Follow the money” is a phrase used in many detective shows and political thrillers. Look for how the villain spent money on or received money from, and there is your culprit. The same is true when examining economic and political decision-making. In today’s world, it is common to talk about rent seeking behavior on the .. MORE
Explore the lasting legacies and
continued relevance of our classic titles.
Philip H. Wicksteed (1844-1927) wrote the The Common Sense of Political Economy, Including a Study of the Human Basis of Economic Law (Macmillan and Co., Limited, St. Martin’s Street, London) in 1910.The edition presented here is the first edition, which was widely used as an economics textbook in classrooms in the United Kingdom and the .. MORE
Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973) first published The Theory of Money and Credit in German, in 1912. The edition presented here is that published by Liberty Fund in 1980, which was translated from the German by H. E. Batson originally in 1934, with additions in 1953. Only a few corrections of obvious typos were made for .. MORE
The Fortunes of Liberalism1 collects a wide-ranging number of Friedrich. A. Hayek’s articles, reviews, addresses, and even obituaries—35 in total—spanning all seven decades of his scholarly career from the 1920s to the 1980s. To call this collection eclectic is an understatement, but the unifying theme is Hayek’s perspective on thinkers who have some connection to .. MORE
A Liberty Classic Book Review of The Reason of Rules: Constitutional Political Economy, by Geoffrey Brennan and James M. Buchanan.1 Geoffrey Brennan and James Buchanan’s The Reason of Rules is remarkable. It is an important book, and the questions that the authors wrestle with are massive. When so much academic work feels as though it .. MORE
VIDEO
A professor at the Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago in the 1960s and a primary figure in Chicago School Economics and in the field of Law and Economics, Harold Demsetz has contributed original research on the theory of the firm, regulation in markets, industrial organization, antitrust policy, transaction costs, externalities, and .. MORE
VIDEO
Anthony de Jasay, a regular columnist for Econlib, was one of the most original and independent thinkers on the relationship between the individual and the state. Through his published works, he challenged the reigning paradigms justifying modern democratic growth. His deeply challenging theoretical works include The State, an analysis that views the state as acting .. MORE
Econlib Videos
Conversations with some of the most original thinkers of our time
The Reading Lists by Topic pages contain some suggested readings organized by topic, including materials available on Econlib. Brief reviews or descriptions are included for many items.
Supplementary materials for popular college textbooks used in courses in the Principles of Economics, Microeconomics, Price Theory, and Macroeconomics are suggested by topic.
These free resources are appropriate for teachers of high school and AP economics, social studies, and history classes. They are also appropriate for interested students, home schoolers, and newcomers to the topic of economics.
It was, according to accounts filtering out of the White House, an extraordinary scene. Hank Paulson, the U.S. treasury secretary and a man with a personal fortune estimated at $700m (£380m), had got down on one knee before the most powerful woman in Congress, Nancy Pelosi, and begged her to save his plan to rescue .. MORE
“Reaganomics” was the most serious attempt to change the course of U.S. economic policy of any administration since the New Deal. “Only by reducing the growth of government,” said Ronald Reagan, “can we increase the growth of the economy.” Reagan’s 1981 Program for Economic Recovery had four major policy objectives: (1) reduce the growth of .. MORE
“ Capitalism,” a term of disparagement coined by socialists in the mid-nineteenth century, is a misnomer for “economic individualism,” which Adam Smith earlier called “the obvious and simple system of natural liberty” (Wealth of Nations). Economic individualism’s basic premise is that the pursuit of self-interest and the right to own private property are morally defensible .. MORE
-Israel Kirzner
-Adam Smith Full Quote >>
-Frederic Bastiat Full Quote >>