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Showing 21 - 40 of 12572 items
By Sulaiman Hakemy. 2017
South Korean economist Ha-Joon Chang used his 2003 work Kicking Away The Ladder to challenge the central orthodoxies of development…
economics, using his creative thinking skills to shine new light on an old topic. Creative thinkers are often distinguished by their willingness to challenge received ideas, and this is a central aspect of Chang’s work on development. Before Chang, the received wisdom was that developing countries needed the same kinds of economic policies and institutions as developed countries in order to enjoy the same prosperity. But, as Chang pointed out, the historical evidence showed that First World economic success was, in fact, due to exactly the kinds of state intervention that modern development orthodoxy shuns. Western affluence is the product of precisely the kinds of state control – of protectionism and the setting of price tariffs – that developed countries have since denied the developing world in the name of economic freedom and ‘best practice.’ By insisting that Third World nations should adopt these economic policies themselves, argued Chang, the West is actually stifling Third World economic prospects – kicking away the ladder. His carefully reasoned argument for a novel point of view was closely based on the critical thinking skill of producing novel explanations for existing evidence, and led many to question development orthodoxies – sparking a rethink of modern development strategies for less-developed countries.By William J Jenkins, Camille Morvan. 2017
Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman’s 1974 paper ‘Judgement Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases’ is a landmark in the history of…
psychology. Though a mere seven pages long, it has helped reshape the study of human rationality, and had a particular impact on economics – where Tversky and Kahneman’s work helped shape the entirely new sub discipline of ‘behavioral economics.’ The paper investigates human decision-making, specifically what human brains tend to do when we are forced to deal with uncertainty or complexity. Based on experiments carried out with volunteers, Tversky and Kahneman discovered that humans make predictable errors of judgement when forced to deal with ambiguous evidence or make challenging decisions. These errors stem from ‘heuristics’ and ‘biases’ – mental shortcuts and assumptions that allow us to make swift, automatic decisions, often usefully and correctly, but occasionally to our detriment. The paper’s huge influence is due in no small part to its masterful use of high-level interpretative and analytical skills – expressed in Tversky and Kahneman’s concise and clear definitions of the basic heuristics and biases they discovered. Still providing the foundations of new work in the field 40 years later, the two psychologists’ definitions are a model of how good interpretation underpins incisive critical thinking.By Nick Broten. 2017
Thomas Robert Malthus’ 1798 Essay on the Principle of Population helped change the direction of economics, politics, and the natural…
sciences with its reasoning and problem solving. The central topic of the essay was the idea, extremely prevalent in the 18th and 19th centuries, that human society was in some way perfectible. According to many thinkers of the time, mankind was on a course of steady improvement with advances set to continuously improve society and life for all. Malthus was a skeptic on this point, and, in a clear example of the skill of reasoning, set about constructing and marshalling a strong argument for a less optimistic view. Central to his argument were the laws of population growth and their relationship to growth in agricultural production; in his view the former would always outstrip the latter. This provided a strong argument that society was limited by finite resources – a closely reasoned argument that continues to influence economists, politicians and scientists today, as well as environmental movements. While Malthus’ proposed solutions have been less influential, they remain an excellent example of problem solving, offering a range of answers to the problem of population growth and finite resources.By Sulaiman Hakemy. 2017
Milton Friedman was arguably the single most influential economist of the 20th-century. His influence, particularly on conservative politics in America…
and Great Britain, substantially helped – as both supporters and critics agree – to shape the global economy as it is today. Capitalism and Freedom (1962) is a passionate but carefully reasoned summary of Friedman’s philosophy of political and economic freedom, and it has become perhaps his most directly influential work. Friedman’s argument focuses on the place of economic liberalism in society: in his view, free markets and personal economic freedom are absolutely necessary for true political freedom to exist. Freedom, for Friedman, is the ultimate good in a society – the marker and aim of true civilisation. And, crucially, he argues, real freedom is rarely aided by government. For Friedman, indeed, “the great advances of civilization, whether in architecture or painting, in science or literature, in industry or agriculture, have never come from centralized government”. Instead, he argues, they have always been produced by “minority views” flourishing in a social climate permitting variety and diversity.” In successive chapters, Friedman develops a well-structured line of reasoning emerging from this stance – leading him to some surprising conclusions that remain persuasive and influential more than 60 years on.By Todd Chambers, Rodney A. Carveth, Benjamin J. Bates, Alan B. Albarran, Alison Alexander. 2003
U.S. economists review the economic structures of media economics and provide descriptions of practices within the particular sectors of American…
media. The overall value and structure of the domestic and international communications industry is presented from a mainstream perspective in a series of four contributions, while the remaining nine papers provide overviews of the economics of daily newspapers, books and magazines, broadcast and cable television, Hollywood, radio, advertising, and Internet media. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)Rivoli (international business, Georgetown U.) starts in Texas, researching the cotton plantations and the history of American cotton, then travels…
with the cotton to China, watching the work go on at bottom dollar, then traces cotton's troubles at the border in terms of trade policy and the implications of the 2005 ending of protectionism. Finally, he follows the path of used cotton clothing from the U.S. to developing nations. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)By Eric Lybeck. 2017
One of the primary qualities of good creative thinking is an intellectual freedom to think outside of the box. Good…
creative thinkers resist orthodox ideas, take new lines of enquiry, and generally come at problems from the kinds of angles almost no one else could. And, what is more, when the ideas of creative thinkers are convincing, they can reshape an entire topic, and change the orthodoxy for good. Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s 2007 bestseller The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable is precisely such a book: an entertaining, polemical, creative attack on how people in general, and economic experts in particular view the possibility of catastrophic events. Taleb writes with rare creative verve for someone who is also an expert in mathematics, finance, and epistemology (the philosophy of knowledge), and he martials all his skills to turn standard reasoning inside out. His central point is that far from being unimportant, extremely rare events are frequently the most important ones of all: it is highly improbable, but highly consequential occurrences – what he calls Black Swans – that have shaped history most. As a result, Taleb concludes, improbability is not a reason to act as if a possible event does not matter. Rather, it should inspire the opposite reaction.By Robert B. Reich. 2011
A brilliant new reading of the economic crisis--and a plan for dealing with the challenge of its aftermath--by one of…
our most trenchant and informed experts.When the nation's economy foundered in 2008, blame was directed almost universally at Wall Street. But Robert B. Reich suggests a different reason for the meltdown, and for a perilous road ahead. He argues that the real problem is structural: it lies in the increasing concentration of income and wealth at the top, and in a middle class that has had to go deeply into debt to maintain a decent standard of living.Persuasively and straightforwardly, Reich reveals how precarious our situation still is. The last time in American history when wealth was so highly concentrated at the top--indeed, when the top 1 percent of the population was paid 23 percent of the nation's income--was in 1928, just before the Great Depression. Such a disparity leads to ever greater booms followed by ever deeper busts. Reich's thoughtful and detailed account of where we are headed over the next decades reveals the essential truth about our economy that is driving our politics and shaping our future. With keen insight, he shows us how the middle class lacks enough purchasing power to buy what the economy can produce and has adopted coping mechanisms that have a negative impact on their quality of life; how the rich use their increasing wealth to speculate; and how an angrier politics emerges as more Americans conclude that the game is rigged for the benefit of a few. Unless this trend is reversed, the Great Recession will only be repeated. Reich's assessment of what must be done to reverse course and ensure that prosperity is widely shared represents the path to a necessary and long-overdue transformation. Aftershock is a practical, humane, and much-needed blueprint for both restoring America's economy and rebuilding our society.From the Hardcover edition.For twenty years, Stanley Bing has offered insight, wisdom, and advice. In one essential volume, here is all you need…
to know to master your career, your life, and, when necessary, other weaker life formsBy Shannon C Stimson, Thomas Robert Malthus. 2018
Malthus’s Essay on the Principle of Population remains one of the most influential works of political economy ever written. Most…
widely circulated in its initial 1798 version, this is the first publication of his benchmark 1803 edition since 1989. Introduced by editor Shannon C. Stimson, this edition includes essays on the historical and political theoretical underpinnings of Malthus’s work by Niall O’Flaherty, Malthus’s influence on concepts of nature by Deborah Valenze, implications of his population model for political economy by Sir Anthony Wrigley, an assessment of Malthus’s theory in light of modern economic ideas by Kenneth Binmore, and a discussion of the Essay’s literary and cultural influence by Karen O’Brien. The result is an enlarged view of the political, social, and cultural impact of this profoundly influential work.By Qingzhi Huan. 2010
This volume consists of analyses by experts from both the West and the East on the up-to-date development of Eco-socialism…
as a red-green politics within the context of capitalist globalisation. It investigates whether and/or in what sense Eco-socialism can offer a better explanation to the causes of ecological problems than the other Green discourses - such as deep ecology and ecological modernisation theory, and thus has more contributions to make in dealing with the deteriorating ecological crisis throughout the world.By Alan Professor Winters. 1899
By Malcolm Torry. 2016
This book is the first full-length treatment of the desirability and feasibility of implementing a citizen's income (also known as…
a basic income). It tests for two different kinds of financial feasibility as well as for psychological, behavioral, administrative, and political viability, and then assesses how a citizen's income might find its way through the policy process from proposal to implementation. Drawing on a wide variety of sources of evidence from around the world, this new book from the director of the Citizen's Income Trust, UK, provides an essential foundation for policy and implementation debates. Governments, think tanks, economists, and public servants will find this thorough encompassing book indispensable to their consideration of the economic and social advantages and practicalities of a basic income.By Syed Nawab Haider Naqvi. 2003
This book explores in detail the proposition that (private) morality, especially religious morality, is vital for achieving economic well-being and…
human happiness; and that this linkage would be even stronger in an Islamic economy. The book highlights the need for an active interaction between religion, morality and economics in general and in an (idealized) Islamic economy in particular. ProfessorSyed Nawab Haider Naqvihas an MA from Yale University and a PhD from Princeton University. He did his post-doctoral work at Harvard University.By Arie Arnon, Jimmy Weinblatt, Warren Young. 2010
This book combines historical and policy-oriented perspectives on the relevance of the Keynesian approach for economic theory, policy, and crisis…
analysis. The first part focuses on historical, theoretical, and methodological issues, and puts them in context with current developments. The second part focuses on the application of the Keynesian approach to modeling the economy, policy-making, and analyzing the ongoing crisis of the early 21st century. Bringing together contributions by leading macroeconomists such as Laidler, Cukierman, Colander and Boyer, and leading historians of economics such as Hollander, Boianovsky, Marcuzzo, Dimand, Witztum, Young, deVroey and Arnon, the book offers a comprehensive overview of Keynesian economics today. One of the book's most essential features are the commentaries on the papers, which promote a cross-fertilization between macroeconomists and historians of economics, providing, in conjunction with the papers themselves, a balanced outlook on the current relevance of Keynesian economics.By Hans Christoph Binswanger. 2013
This book develops a new theory of the modern economy. Conventional economic theory is (still) based on an essentially static…
notion of equilibrium. In contrast, this book offers an analysis of the economic process based on a truly dynamic approach. It understands modern economic activity as manifesting itself in a growth spiral. There are two main drivers of the dynamics of this spiral: steady money creation in the banking system, on the one hand; and the continuous inflow of energy and raw materials through the exploitation of natural resources, on the other. Both driving forces are generally neglected by the conventional theory. Understanding their role is absolutely essential for preventing our economy from being more and more exposed to financial and ecological crises. This book offers important insights about the functioning of the modern economy and addresses the specialist as well as the interested lay reader.By Robert S. Kaplan, David P. Norton. 2005
By Eswar Prasad. 2013
By Maria Rosaria Della Peruta, Manlio Del Giudice, Elias G. Carayannis. 2014
How have social media in emerging economies evolved differently from the rest of the world? According to studies and anecdotal…
evidence, innovations in the use of social media tools occur more frequently in emerging economies than they do in developed markets. The aim of this volume is to show that in emerging regions (such as China, India, and South America) where the participation of stakeholders in the circuit of social media is more active (i. e. , greater frequency of contacts and creativity in the elaboration of contents), organizations not only are involved in a set of exchange relations with other social actors but are also embedded in a network of dynamic relationships. The authors utilize social network analysis to determine how entrepreneurs in emerging economies identify their most beneficial social contacts and use those contacts to leverage the resources needed for their enterprises, revealing new insights on the process of business creation and economic development in the networked age.By Rashid M Hassan, Eric D Mungatana. 2013
Leaving aside human and social capital for a future volume, the book should be viewed as a crucial first step…
in developing indicators for total wealth in the countries covered by the case studies, which include Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Mozambique and South Africa. These case studies experiment with implementing the SEAA in sub-Saharan nations known to suffer from the 'resource curse': their wealth in resources and commodities has allowed inflows of liquidity, yet this cash has not funded crucial developments in infrastructure or education. What's more, resource-driven economies are highly vulnerable to commodity price mutability. The new measures of wealth deployed here offer more hope for the future in these countries than they themselves would once have allowed for.