1st Edition
Economic Principles and Problems A Pluralist Introduction
Economic Principles and Problems: A Pluralistic Introduction offers a comprehensive introduction to the major perspectives in modern economics, including mainstream and heterodox approaches. Through providing multiple views of markets and how they work, it leaves readers better able to understand and analyze the complex behaviors of consumers, firms, and government officials, as well as the likely impact of a variety of economic events and policies.
Most principles of economics textbooks cover only mainstream economics, ignoring rich heterodox ideas. They also lack material on the great economists, including the important ideas of Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Thorstein Veblen, John Maynard Keynes, and Friedrich Hayek. Mainstream books tend to neglect the kind of historical analysis that is crucial to understanding trends that help us predict the future. Moreover, they focus primarily on abstract models more than existing economic realities. This engaging book addresses these inadequacies. Including explicit coverage of mainstream economics and the major heterodox schools of economic thought—institutionalists, feminists, radical political economists, post-Keynesians, Austrians, and social economists—it allows the reader to choose which ideas they find most compelling in explaining modern economic realities.
Written in an engaging style and focused on real-world examples, this textbook brings economics to life. Multiple examples of how each economic model works, coupled with critical analysis of the assumptions behind them, enable students to develop a sophisticated understanding of the material. Digital supplements are also available for students and instructors. Economic Principles and Problems offers the most contemporary and complete package for any pluralist economics class.
PART I: Economics: A Pluralist Definition
Chapter 1. What is economics?
Chapter 2. Scarcity, choice and opportunity cost
PART II: The evolution of economic ideas and systems
Chapter 3. The evolution of pre-capitalist economic systems
Chapter 4. Adam Smith and the rise of capitalism
Chapter 5. Karl Marx and the dark ages of capitalism
Chapter 6. Thorstein Veblen and monopoly capitalism
Chapter 7. Keynes and mixed market capitalism
Chapter 8. Modern economic systems
PART III: Markets, Supply and Demand
Chapter 9. Markets and how they work
Chapter 10. Applications of supply and demand
Chapter 11. Consumers and supplier behavior
PART IV: Market structures and corporations
Chapter 12. Different types of market structures
Chapter 13. Short-run and long-run costs of production
Chapter 14. Perfect competition and competitive markets
Chapter 15. Monopoly and monopoly power
Chapter 16. Monopolistic competition
Chapter 17. Oligopoly and strategic behavior
Chapter 18. Corporations and their role in society
Part V: Government intervention in microeconomic markets
Chapter 19. Market failure and government failure
Chapter 20. Economics of the environment and climate change
Chapter 21. Public goods and services.
Part VI: Labor markets and inequality
Chapter 22. Working for a living: the labor market
Chapter 23. Inequality, a key modern issue
Part VII Macroeconomic issues and problems
Chapter 24. Modern macroeconomics
Chapter 25. Macroeconomic wellbeing
Chapter 26. Unemployment and price instability
Part VIII Macroeconomic models
Chapter 27. Aggregate demand and aggregate supply
Chapter 28. The Keynesian aggregate expenditure-income model
Part IX: Stabilization policy
Chapter 29. Fiscal policy, debt and deficits
Chapter 30. Money, banking and the financial sector
Chapter 31. Monetary policy
Chapter 32. Crises, financial and otherwise
Part X. Growth and global interconnectedness
Chapter 33. The sources of economic growth
Chapter 34. International trade and integration
Chapter 35. International finance and open economy macroeconomics
Glossary of Key Terms and Concepts
Index
Biography
Geoffrey Schneider is Presidential Professor of Economics at Bucknell University, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. He is an award-winning teacher, author or co-author of six books and numerous scholarly articles, and executive director of the International Confederation of Associations for Pluralism in Economics.
