This textbook is based upon a philosophical method of logical deduction from basic principles such as scarcity, individual choice and subjectivism. This textbook attempts to show that all complex phenomena of economic theory such as prices of consumer goods and factors of production, saving and consumption, interest and profit, can be explained by the same primitive psychological principles of scarcity and substitution on the margin that could be used to describe economizing Robinson Crusoe on a desert island or two cavemen catching fish or exchanging apples for oranges. This textbook distils the essence of economic science prevailing in price theory before the 1930s, which the authors’ argue is superior to currently popular mainstream theory into a readable and student-friendly textbook format.
This is an introductory textbook written in the tradition of Menger, Bohm-Bawerk, Mises and Hayek, instead in the tradition of Alfred Marshall and John Maynard Keynes, as almost all modern textbooks are. The authors offer a text not predicated on physics envy; on an attempt to liken economics to the physical sciences, on the basis of “empirical evidence”, statistics and verification.
Author(s): Walter E. Block, Ivan Jankovic
Series: Springer Texts in Business and Economics
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 256
City: Singapore
Acknowledgments
Contents
1: What Is Economics?
1.1 Beginning of Economic Analysis: Action, Choice and Opportunity Cost
1.2 Economic Goods, Consumption and Production
1.3 Method of Economics
2: Exchange and Demand
2.1 Interpersonal Exchange – Barter
2.2 Indirect Exchange – Monetary Economy
2.3 Demand and Marginal Utility
2.4 Elasticity
3: Price Determination
3.1 How the Equilibrium Price Is Determined
3.2 Market Disequilibria
3.3 Speculative Price Determination
4: Capital and Interest
4.1 Interest Rate Determination
4.2 The Concept of Present Discounted Value
5: Production Theory: Factor Prices
5.1 Marginal Productivity and Interest
5.2 Malthus’ Error and Mises’ Butler Theorem
5.3 Pricing
5.4 Interest and Rent
6: The Business Cycle
6.1 The Functioning of the Time Market
6.2 Insufficient Aggregate Demand and Excessive Saving
7: Competition and Entrepreneurship
7.1 Static Models – Price Taker and Price Searcher
7.1.1 Price Searcher
7.2 Dynamic Theories of Competition
8: Monopoly and Anti trust
8.1 Special Privilege
8.2 Concentration Ratios
8.3 Monopoly Price
8.3.1 Refusal to Deal and Exclusive Dealing
8.3.2 Tying and Product Bundling
8.3.3 Price Discrimination
8.3.4 Predatory Pricing or Undercutting
8.3.5 Cartels
8.3.6 Merger Control
9: Theory of the Firm
9.1 Takeovers
9.2 Insider Trading
9.3 “Corporate Social Responsibility”
10: International Trade
10.1 Absolute Advantage
10.2 Comparative Advantage
10.2.1 The Effects of Tariffs
10.3 Unilateral Free Trade
11: Price Controls
11.1 Price Ceilings
11.2 Rent Control
11.3 Minimum Wage Law
11.3.1 Monopsony
12: Market Failure Theories
12.1 Public Goods
12.2 Externalities
13: Public Choice
13.1 Public Choice
13.2 Model
13.3 Why Do the Worst Tend to Get on Top?
13.4 Rational Ignorance of Voters
13.5 Bureaucracy
13.6 Rent Seeking
13.7 Conceptual Unanimity
13.8 Individualism and Collectivism
13.9 Ruling Class
References
14: Economics of Labor Markets and Distribution
14.1 The Distribution of Income
14.2 Social Justice
14.3 The Economics of Discrimination
14.4 Prejudices
References
15: Political Economy of Risk Control
15.1 Peltzman Effect
