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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Economics in Two Lessons: Why Markets Work So Well, and Why They Can Fail So Badly

Economics in Two Lessons: Why Markets Work So Well, and Why They Can Fail So Badly

Quiggin, John

Hardcover

Business GeneralEconomics

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 0691154945
ISBN13: 9780691154947
Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr
Published: Apr 23 2019
Pages: 408
Weight: 1.50
Height: 1.40 Width: 5.70 Depth: 8.60
Language: English

A masterful introduction to the key ideas behind the successes--and failures--of free-market economics

Since 1946, Henry Hazlitt's bestselling Economics in One Lesson has popularized the belief that economics can be boiled down to one simple lesson: market prices represent the true cost of everything. But one-lesson economics tells only half the story. It can explain why markets often work so well, but it can't explain why they often fail so badly--or what we should do when they stumble. As Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Samuelson quipped, When someone preaches 'Economics in one lesson, ' I advise: Go back for the second lesson. In Economics in Two Lessons, John Quiggin teaches both lessons, offering a masterful introduction to the key ideas behind the successes--and failures--of free markets.

Economics in Two Lessons explains why market prices often fail to reflect the full cost of our choices to society as a whole. For example, every time we drive a car, fly in a plane, or flick a light switch, we contribute to global warming. But, in the absence of a price on carbon emissions, the costs of our actions are borne by everyone else. In such cases, government action is needed to achieve better outcomes.

Two-lesson economics means giving up the dogmatism of laissez-faire as well as the reflexive assumption that any economic problem can be solved by government action, since the right answer often involves a mixture of market forces and government policy. But the payoff is huge: understanding how markets actually work--and what to do when they don't.

Brilliantly accessible, Economics in Two Lessons unlocks the essential issues at the heart of any economic question.

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