Book Description

Covering the broad sweep of modern economics and strategy research, this comprehensive book broke new ground in its original edition by applying modern economic principles to study the firm's strategic position. Completely updated and revised, this new edition integrates recent insights from the theory of the firm, industrial organization, and strategy research, while building upon a strong theoretical and empirical foundation familiar to academics working in economics and strategy.
New co-author Scott Schaefer adds his expertise on organizational economics
New chapters on performance evaluation and strategic fit
Hundreds of examples ground theory in the everyday activities of the firm and show how the economic principles of strategy actually work
A unique, modern treatment of topics ... Read more

Reviews (15)

Strategy is more than blah, blah, blah
This book offers a very modern approach on strategy, including economics foundations and numeric solving of the different strategic concepts analyzed. The book is not for everyone, you need to have basic knowledge on business management, economics and math. As an MBA manager and academic, the book gave me new vision and a strong base on the strategy concepts. I recommend this book for every MBA student and manager.

Very comprehensive overview
This is the best overview of the economics behind firm strategy you can find. The coverage of the book is impressive. All economic principles are discussed in an accessible way, although you should have some understanding of basic microeconomics. Compared to a standard textbook in industrial organization the advantage of this text is a focus on real world issues and a vast amount of case studies. If you're in strategy and you like the views of Porter, Ghemawat and Nalebuff, this is the book for you.

A book that reasons the strategies
Many business books provide models of competition, innovation, etc. without adequately reasoning how the models were reached. Whereas they provide solutions to a problem - they do not provide the understanding of how the solution is reached.
However, this book provides a sound reasoning for every model on the basis of microeconomics. Even apparently abstract concepts like organization structure are explained on the basis of economics. I personally feel that the concepts covered in this book have been ingrained in my mind.

Clearing the fog in tackling corporate strategy
For those who have become disenchanted with the faddish rhetoric of corporate strategy, and seek more rigorous analytical grounding than offered in most "inspirational" business books, this text by three faculty members of Northwestern University and of Purdue University is refreshing.

The text recapitulates the key tools of micreconomic theory in a masterful introductory chapter which covers cost theory and game theory. The rest of the book is structured around the four classes of issues which the authors see as the essence of strategic analysis: firm boundaries, market and competitive analysis, position and dynamics, and internal organization.

The text is full of excellent examples and mini case studies from a wide range of industries.

I have not found it easy to find many other texts which achieve this balance of analytical rigor and practical business-oriented empirical focus.

Great treatment of strategy
This book treats strategy from a strong grounding in micro economics. Forces strategic thinking to be grounding in fundamentals unlike a lot of hand waving you see in other books. Highly recommended ... Read more

Book Description

Brad Schiller's text, The Microeconomy Today, 9/e, is noted for its three great strengths: readability, policy orientation, and pedagogy.His accessible writing style engages students and brings some of the excitement of domestic and global economic news into the classroom.Schiller emphasizes how policymakers must choose between government intervention and market reliance to resolve the core issues of what, how, and for whom to produce.This strategic choice is highlighted throughout the full range of micro, macro, and international issues.Every chapter ends with a policy issue that emphasizes the markets vs. government dilemma.And Schiller packs his chapters with the facts of economic life-real stories, not fables.This is a book that teaches economics in a relevant context and with careful pedagogy.Schiller 9e is for students motivated by real-world policy issues who want to become economically literate.This is a book students actually READ.Schiller is also known for its cutting-edgeand current coverage of today’s issues. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Microeconomy for undergraduate
Excellent feature of this book is the aplication part that shows real impacts or examples of theory in reality. I have bought this book to accompany my Economics by Collander and it was good choice. If you want to test your knowledge - buy yet Economic Concepts (ISBN 0070455910). You will do the best for your understanding. ... Read more

Reviews (22)

A Must Read
Having just finished Lakshman Achuthan and Anirvan Banerji's "Beating the Business Cycle" I have come away informed on what business cycles are and why they are important from both a business and personal perspective. The style of the the book was easy to read and entertaining while it demystified a subject that has been left to the experts for far too long. I feel much more secure to make any future finanicial decisions. The charts and graphs were really helpful. I appreciated the depth of "Beating the Business Cycle" and its accessibility. It is a fine art to treat simple ideas deeply and deep ideas simply which is what this book has done.

Can't beat "beating the Business Cycle"
Although I have not finished the book, I am finding it informatve, entertaining and an invaluable tool for understanding the ebb and flow of the economy. Lakhman Achutan and Anirvan Banerji have writen a book that enables those of us without an MBA to gain insight with practical, usable tools. Hearing some of the advice of the so called "financial experts", and seeing how off base they were, it seems as if they could benefit from reading the book as well.

It¿s About Time!
I've heard of these guys on and off over the years, and after reading their book I finally feel that I have a framework for approaching the dismal science of economics that seems so inconsistent when I listen to the experts of TV or newspapers. I commend the ECRI researchers for staying the course over decades and not selling out to mainstream economics or Wall Street. It is very important to have a "reality check" like the Weekly Leading Index, and I was pleasantly surprised by the free subscription to their weekly report that comes with the book. Even better - the latest report shows that the Leading Home Price Index is holding up!

an engaging read about economic ups and downs
I'm in business, but I didn't know a great deal about cycles of growth and contraction in the economy. This short book gave me a readable overview by two economists who caught the end of the 90's boom when most thought it would go on forever.

I'd recommend it to anyone who's hoping to see the next bend in the road for our economy.

Smaller Wheels, Still Turning....
It is the nature of free market economies to progress rhythmically through periods of expansion and contraction. It is one of a few interesting observations made by the authors of BEATING THE BUSINESS CYCLE that the intensity of these cycles in the U.S. has moderated over time. Booms and busts have become less common. Recessions rather than depressions, thankfully, are more likely to occur. We have a number of "automatic stabilizers" at work to absorb the shock of general and pervasive slowdowns in the economy. Those stabilizers operate through the mechanics of monetary and fiscal policy. The Federal Reserve controls the flow of money through the economy with the tourniquet of interest rates. The "misguided certainty" that leads to excessive optimism or irrational pessimism by corporations, businesses, and individuals can be tempered by prudent monetary action. At the same time social security, tax policy, unemployment insurance, and bank deposit insurance are some of the ways individuals have been protected from the potentially devastating effects of a negative turn in the economy. So there is reason to believe that the cycles have become less pronounced.

Periodically an excessive optimism leads to the illusion that the business cycle has been eliminated, that the economy can grow steadily without retrenchment, without the need to eliminate its own inefficiencies. Mark Twain knew the "gilded age", the 1920's saw a "new era" at a "plateau of prosperity", and the 1990's marveled at a "new economy" with information systems and supply management software that could control excesses (e.g. inventory) before they stalled the economy. Ultimately the business cycle is produced by an imbalance of supply and demand. But it is human psychology extrapolating from the successes or failures of recent past experience that fails to see the imbalances building in the economy before a pivotal shift undermines a previously successful investment or business strategy. Renewed caution follows optimism, risk aversion follows speculation, and the cycle repeats.

Readers will not find completely satisfying answers to "beating" (viz. profiting from) the business cycle in this short study, because its primary purpose is to introduce readers to the subscription advisory services of the Economic Cycle Research Institute (ECRI). This explains the sometimes self-congratulatory tone of having accurately predicted recent shifts in economic activity both here and abroad. As a stand alone work of merit on the topic the authors might consider a brief glossary of key terms and concepts for a future edition. ... Read more

Book Description

This easy to read, accessible, macro-first principles book engages readers with familiar real-world examples and applications that bring economics to life. Its 18 chapters focus on those topics that are at the heart of economics, making the volume concise, yet complete. The authors follow an Explore & Apply theme to demonstrate how economics are a part of everyday life and how it can be a useful tool in making personal decisions and evaluating policy decisions.Notable coverage includes consumer and producer surplus, utility and consumer decision, as well as government and market failure.For a working knowledge of microeconomics. ... Read more

Book Description

Microeconomic Analysis has been a fixture of graduate programs in economics for fifteen years. It has held this position because it has the authority, the clarity, and the breadth necessary for a classic text. This new Third Edition continues to supply the building blocks of microeconomic analysis: a thorough treatment of optimization and equilibrium methods, coupled with numerous examples of their application.

The Third Edition expands on the earlier editions in two ways. First, the existing coverage has been rewritten and rearranged. Second, new chapters have been added on game theory, oligopoly, asset markets, and information economics. The rearrangement follows the model of Hal Varian's Intermediate Microeconomics: a number of short chapters, each devoted to a single topic. In fact, the topical division is as close as possible to that of the undergraduate text. This makes it easy to review undergraduate material before moving on to graduate material. The new chapters highlight significant developments in microeconomic theory in the last ten years at a level that is accessible for first-year graduate students.

Classic features:
* Emphasis on the dual approach to consumer and firm behavior.
* Integration of the modem analytic approach with classical price theory
* Analysis of economic behavior using classical methods of comparative statics, duality, and nonparametric methods.
* Emphasis on analytical techniques that are useful in applied research.

Highlights of the revision:
* New chapter on game theory that provides an appropriate introduction for first-year students.
* New chapter on oligopoly that features many of the recent developments in this area.
* New chapter on asset markets that describes "what every economist should know" about the theory of financial markets.
*New chapter on information economics that provides a unified treatment of incentives and markets in the presence of information asymmetries. ... Read more

Reviews (16)

Tremendous!
If you are hunting for a terrific graduate-level text in microeconomic theory, pick up Varian's 3rd Ed. Microeconomic Analysis. The book is rigorous, but not at all overwhelming, and is replete with the kinds of exciting results that made you major in economics as an undergraduate. Moreover, the book is concise -- the author seems to recognize that taking a long time to explain relatively straightforward concepts is not a way to endear onesself to one's readers. (Unlike a certain very large and cumbersome graduate microeconomics textbooks that came out recently.)

I saw some comments about the book requiring topology. I beg to differ -- while the math requirements are nontrivial, they are not so severe as topology. Anyone with a good background in linear algebra and multivariate calculus will find the book approachable. A course in rigor and proof, such as "Foundations," might be useful, but one can pick up such details from Varian's text itself. Differential equations and Real Analysis help, but are by no means essential.

This is a terrific text for graduate and highly advanced undergraduate economics students. However, I suspect many graduate business students will find the mathematics unweildy and perhaps a bit unnecessary for their purposes.

good introduction
This textbook works wonders for graduates students in field other than economics (law, management science). It gives the concepts; it is easy to read; it is concise. So it useful for those who need to understand the concepts. For economists, Business PhD and all those who need to build on microeconomic concepts, Kreps or MasColell-Whinston-Green textbooks should be REQUIRED reading. This book is just too cursory in treating game theory, social choice, and also general/partial equilibrium. And econometrics and CAPM chapters should be books of their own.

Not good if MWG is your main text
My graduate micro text was Mas-Colell,Whinston, and Green, and I bought Varian hoping it would help fill in some of the gaps since micro wasn't my thing. But Varian didn't help me at all. It explained the very basic content, but those aren't too bad to get from MWG. As for anything not surface level, it didn't help at all. If you're looking for help with MWG, try Kreps or Sundaram.

A Scary Book
Varian did well at his Intermediate Microeconomic Theory book but the Microeconomic Analysis is really a scaring product.I have studied Mathematical Economics by Alpha C. Chiang and also Vairan's Intermediate Micoeconomics but still I am not able to understand This book. I wish varian could be a little sympathetic towards a great number of readers like me who are not mathematics nerds and add some more pages to the book so that he does not have to consistently skip steps ( sometimes 3 steps in a go)while explaining the theory mathematically.

In short there is a complete book missing between Varian's Intermediate and Analysis books.
Hope Varian reads my comments and produces an in between book for me and a lot of my weeping class fellows.

Great book, boring wording
Varian did a great job in explaining microeconomics. I just think that he could do a better job in word picking. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

A very good read
I agree with the other reviewer, Macroeconomics by Williamson is a very well written text. It incorporates a large variety of topics in the general framework very well. Much of what I could say would only be redundent as the other reviewer pointed out the highs for this text. The book is very appropriate for a intermediate undergraduate course.

SW's Macroeconomics is the best macro book on the market!
After reading this book no one will ever complain that macroeconomics lacks micro foundations. This book first explains the microeconomics of intertemporal goods and labor markets and goes on to create an intertemporal general equilibrium economy (with two periods for simple exposition). Then Wiliamson shows how growth theory and business cycle theories are applied in this general equilibrium economy. This is by far the most fun and understandible way to teach undergraduates about growth and business cycles at the intermediate level.

Williamson also lays out "stylized facts" of the business cycle, including comovements, and he critiques different business cycle theories based on whether they can replicate those comovements in the data. This book comes closer than any other intermediate text to replicating how modern macroeconomics is done.

Ch 8 which explains Solow and endogenous growth models is by far the most understandible and educational of any text on the market, since Williamson does the models in discrete time rather than continuous time. If you're a professor that wants to teach undergraduates growth theory and/or growth dynamics SO THAT THEY REALLY UNDERSTAND THEM DEEPLY and ENJOY THE LEARNING EXPERIENCE, this is the book to assign. ... Read more

Book Description

Steve Slavin’s lively and comprehensive Microeconomics student-friendly, step-by-step approach, coupled with its low price and built-in Workbook/Study Guide is very attractive to adopters. Instructors and students like the author’s humorous anecdotes, direct language, and easy conversational style. The text encourages active rather than passive reading. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Micro and Macroeconomics made easy
Any student not mathematically inclined will be able to understand economics and obtain a better than passing grade by using this book. Like Denzel Washington's character in the movie "Ricochet" said, "Explain it to me like I'm a three year-old". That is what Slavin's book does. I gave this book to a classmate that was taking the class after me because she could not afford her own. Unfortunately, I could not locate her or the book again. Although I graduated this year, I am going to buy it as a used book to add to my present textbook collection.

Not the best Econ Book
I got this book for my econ class and disliked it from the beginning. The authors attempt at humor and light heartedness just makes the material more confusing. Also the books lack of any color makes it much less attractive and useful than other books that show their graphs and diagrams in color. The color helps distinguish better between lines and other material. I would not recommend this book, and if you have a choice don't get it. ... Read more

Book Description

This text seeks to train students to think analytically in a business context.Specifically, it uses over 250 real-world, managerially-oriented applications to show students how managers apply theories and techniques to solve real-world business problems.This approach motivates student learning and extends student thinking well beyond the final exam.The book includes extensive coverage of the latest analytical tools in managerial economics: game-theoretic tactics, best-practices mechanism design, information economics, and organizational architecture, as well as a thorough integration of international issues. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Unreadable
This book is highly unreadable. Examples are not too bad, but the main text is way over the head of all but the most experienced statisticians or mathematicians.

This is an excellent book for self-conducted study
I used this book for the Managerial Economics course at Universidad Simón Bolívar. This book is an excellent aid for students and is plenty of practical examples. Every theoric explanation is followed by one or two examples. This makes it very easy to understand the concepts and to learn how to use them in practics. The ideas are exposed in a very clear way, what makes this book easy to read even if you don't have previous knoledge of microeconomics.

Counter-intuitive and unnecessarily verbose
The authors do cover most of the material. However, the language used is unnecessarily dense.

A fantastic resource for students of business economics.
This book provides an up to date look at the application of microeconomic concepts to real business problems. It uses an extensive number of interesting examples to illustrate the value of managerial economic principles for practicing managers. Highly recommended.

not that good
this book was used in several universities as a material. however, most professors do not use this book. they just use it as "hand out". i do not recommend this. ... Read more

Book Description

Despite the vast research literature on topics relating to contract theory, only a few of the field's core ideas are covered in microeconomics textbooks. This long-awaited book fills the need for a comprehensive textbook on contract theory suitable for use at the graduate and advanced undergraduate levels. It covers the areas of agency theory, information economics, and organization theory, highlighting common themes and methodologies and presenting the main ideas in an accessible way. It also presents many applications in all areas of economics, especially labor economics, industrial organization, and corporate finance. The book emphasizes applications rather than general theorems while providing self-contained, intuitive treatment of the simple models analyzed. In this way, it can also serve as a reference for researchers interested in building contract-theoretic models in applied contexts.

The book covers all the major topics in contract theory taught in most graduate courses. It begins by discussing such basic ideas in incentive and information theory as screening, signaling, and moral hazard. Subsequent sections treat multilateral contracting with private information or hidden actions, covering auction theory, bilateral trade under private information, and the theory of the internal organization of firms; long-term contracts with private information or hidden actions; and incomplete contracts, the theory of ownership and control, and contracting with externalities. Each chapter ends with a guide to the relevant literature. Exercises appear in a separate chapter at the end of the book. ... Read more

Book Description

"Sometime in the next five years you may kick yourself for not reading and re-reading Kindleberger’s Manias, Panics, and Crashes." –Paul A. Samuelson, Institute Professor Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

"One never picks up a work by Charles Kindleberger without anticipating a feast of entertainment. But underneath the hilarious anecdotes, the elegant epigrams, and the graceful turns of phrase, Kindleberger is deadly serious. The manner in which human beings earn their livings is no laughing matter to him, especially when they attempt to do so at the expense of one another." –from the Foreword by Peter L. Bernstein, author of Against the Gods and The Power of Gold

Praise for Manias, Panics, and Crashes

"Classic. . . . Manias, Panics, and Crashes is a durable guide to meditation: wise, witty, and practical. It is a template against which to measure the latest financial crisis–whatever and whenever that happens to be." –David Warsh, Boston Globe

"Definitive." –Floyd Norris, New York Times

"Menacing..." –The New Yorker

"[Manias, Panics, and Crashes] is a scholarly account of the way that mismanagement of money and credit has led to financial explosions over the centuries."–Richard Lambert, Financial Times

"This book sparkles with the best of Kindleberger’s wit, insight, and passion for financial history. A real delight."–Robert Z. Aliber, Professor of International Economics and Finance, University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business

"What long has been the best history of financial pathologies is now even better. The reader who absorbs Kindleberger’s lessons will be prepared to foresee and navigate the financial crises that surely lie ahead. Like a true classic, Manias, Panics, and Crashes is both timely and timeless." –Richard Sylla, Kaufman Professor of Financial History, Stern School of Business, New York University ... Read more

Reviews (24)

Disappointing and non-useful
The subtitle of this book, "A History of Financial Crises", is misleading since the book is actually a *commentary* on the history of financial crises. As such, it assumes that the reader is already familiar with the history of financial crises from 1600 to the present. The book is organized by the phases of a financial crisis, resulting in a near-complete lack of chronological coherence. The author may typically be talking about the Dutch tulip mania of 1636 in one sentence and the panic of 1907 in the next sentence, a style which quickly becomes exasperating. The overall purpose of the book appears to be the promotion of a thesis favoring the concept of a "lender of last resort" in order to mitigate financial crises. Consequently the book reads like an academic treatise, which is basically what it is. This approach is, in this reviewer's opinion, self-indulgent on the part of the author who appears to be addressing a readership primarily in academia, government and perhaps a limited segment of the banking industry. This book is neither instructive nor useful for the general reader.

Sorry amazon, I read the library's copy...
I'm puzzled by some of the negative comments about this book here, as I'm neither an economist nor a historian and I found the book quite accessible and interesting. The fairly predictable sequence of events leading to crashes, which have been played out many times in the past, is the book's central theme. Some of the story-telling could even be described as fascinating at times, though my knowledge of the subject was pretty much limited to what one learns of the famed `29 crash in high school american history.

Anyway, the critics here are not entirely wrong, though I think they're being a bit nit-picky. I don't think the widely-read and educated lay-person should be scared off. I liked the book, learned something significant from it, was mildly entertained and impressed by the author's plethora of knowledge, and occasionally recommend it to those with an interest in financial markets, especially their so-called irrational side.

extremely valuable and informative, though incomplete
for the economist in me, i resent the fact that the author didn't include the relevant quant / charts of the macroecon factors that precipitated the various extreme situations he describes. having said that, this book does describe the aforementioned factors, as well as detailed accounts of precipitiating factors, outcomes and, sadly, reoccurrences.

if one had read this book prior to 99, one would have profited from the nasdaq meltdown. ---if that's not an endorsement, i don't know what is.

An elegant and informed look at markets
Kindelberger's work is a classic study of speculative bubbles and their consequences, and should be read as such. From the first, this is a book that aims to seperate market moves from genuine crises - important in an age were there is a tendancy for the media to seek to dramatise the mundane in order to winn a BAFTA. The definitions provide a framework for examining the development of an irrational interlude in financial markets.

Kindelberger's analysis is not, therefore, a classic "history" primer for the curious - there is no spoonfeeding of facts, for that is not what the book sets out to present. Instead, this is an elegant and informed look at what how financial markets have departed from the course theoretical "rational" behaviour suggests that they should have taken. For all that, it is still an accessible text to those who take a casual interest in financial markets.

A chronicle of financial irrationality
Those who lost money in the 1990's stock market bubble may be tempted to think that they have been cursed with misfortune of unparalleled proportions. Reading "Manias, Panics, and Crashes" will surely change their mind. Bubbles, they will learn, are an enduring feature of financial markets, and generations of investors have fallen in the trap of buying very high to sell even higher, only to find that the frenzy cannot last for ever.

The mania part of the story is familiar: a new invention will revolutionize the economic landscape and bring forth unimaginable profits. The abundance of credit, coupled with leverage (buying with borrowed money), accelerates this process and buying leads to more buying. Then comes the panic: some event shakes confidence and wakes up investors to the mania that has clouded their judgment. This panic leads to a crash: borrowed money needs to be repaid and investors will sell anything at any price to meet the bankers' needs.

Charles Kindleberger has chronicled dozens of financial bubbles spanning more than four centuries. His historiography is impressive and the reader can often wonder how Kindleberger amassed such large amounts of data: his sources are primary and secondary, and they come from economics, history, politics, and even literature. The text is well written and the reader hardly notices that the ride covers centuries' worth of financial troubles.

What, in the end, is Kindleberger's moral? Most cures for dealing with financial troubles, he writes, are no cures at all. Raising interest rates has not proven particularly useful and neither has continued warning from authorities that the investing public is inflating a bubble. The solution, he believes, lies in having a lender of last resort. The trick, of course, is to avoid moral hazard and prevent the public from gambling due to the reassurance of a lender of last resort. The answer is ambiguity: the lender can come in and save the day but investors should never be certain that help is forthcoming.

In the end, "Manias, Panics, and Crashes" is a classic account of financial bubbles and its immense history and shrewd analysis will appeal to both the layman and the expert. And the book's message, that financial bubbles have to be met with an artful lender, should be taken at heart by those interested in the past and future of financial crises. ... Read more

Book Description

In writing this textbook, Mankiw has tried to put himself in the position of someone seeing economics for the first time. The authorÆs conversational writing style is superb for presenting the politics and science of economic theories to tomorrowÆs decision-makers. Because Mankiw wrote it for the students, the book stands out among all other principle texts by intriguing students to apply an economic way of thinking in their daily lives. Receiving such praise as "perhaps the best ever" textbook in economic principles, itÆs no wonder MankiwÆs prize project has quickly become one of the most successful books ever to be published in the college marketplace. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Gets the job done, but nothing fancy here.
This book was the textbook used in a class I was enrolled in on microeconomics. Since it was only an introductory course, this book did a good job of covering a lot of the basic fundamentals that one needed to know before proceeding onto more advanced material. If all you are looking for is a rough guide to the subject without anything terribly in-depth, then this text work well for you. The sections that are touched on are covered extremely well and everything is explained with a lot of clarity. On the other hand, it is a rather frustrating read at times, as it breezes over some of the more interesting aspects of economics. It would have been helpful if the author had gone into more detail during certain sections, or at least had directed the reader to other publications where one could learn more.

Note to the buyer: Beware that the first six chapters in this book are identical to the first six chapters in PRINCIPLES OF MACROECONOMICS (note the "A") written by the same author. And I am not exaggerating when I say they are identical -- even the practice problems are the same. If you are looking for some variety in introducing yourself to economics, you may want to use a different set of books. To have this much repetition in books... may not be something you are interested in, so be careful before buying the second if you already own the first.

Very comprehensive and well written!
I use this book in my economics class and all I can say is that is excellent. The author describes the basic concepts without being too complicated and messy. He keeps the things simple and incorporates some real-life economic problems and discussions into each chapter. The book overall provides a clear insight into microeconomics and shows what it is all about. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Rampant speculation. Record trading volumes. Assets bought not because of their value but because the buyer believes he can sell them for more in a day or two, or an hour or two. Welcome to the late 1920s. There are obvious and absolute parallels to the great bull market of the late 1990s, writes Galbraith in a new introduction dated 1997. Of course, Galbraith notes, every financial bubble since 1929 has been compared to the Great Crash, which is why this book has never been out of print since it became a bestseller in 1955.

Galbraith writes with great wit and erudition about the perilous actions of investors, and the curious inaction of the government. He notes that the problem wasn't a scarcity of securities to buy and sell; "the ingenuity and zeal with which companies were devised in which securities might be sold was as remarkable as anything." Those words become strikingly relevant in light of revenue-negative start-up companies coming into the market each week in the 1990s, along with fragmented pieces of established companies, like real estate and bottling plants. Of course, the 1920s were different from the 1990s. There was no safety net below citizens, no unemployment insurance or Social Security. And today we don't have the creepy investment trusts--in which shares of companies that held some stocks and bonds were sold for several times the assets' market value. But, boy, are the similarities spooky, particularly the prevailing trend at the time toward corporate mergers and industry consolidations--not to mention all the partially informed people who imagined themselves to be financial geniuses because the shares of stock they bought kept going up. --Lou Schuler ... Read more

Reviews (27)

Very relevant today
Recall the talk before the bust of the "New Economy," in which distended P/E ratios and lack of profits were to be irrelevant. Recall Enron's public proclamations of its stability and projected earnings increases. Keep these in mind as you read The Great Crash, and you will never again listen to an analyst, much less an executive.

Galbraith's theme is that market stability and corporate interests are fundamentally at odds. CEOs will never speak evil about their own companies or the condition of the market, so their speech is about as useful to an investor as a pre-game pep talk is to a bettor. Analysts, as well as executives, are salesmen of their own stock, and their primary objective is to get you to buy high.

So why did the 1929 -- or the 2000 -- crash occur? Buying high is great as long as someone is always buying higher; however, such an aggrandized pyramid scheme is doomed to failure. It's as simple as that. So why, then, read Galbraith's book? He is a talented storyteller, and he highlights themes that are likely to accompany future bubbles so that the reader knows what to be skeptical about. This is a very entertaining read, and if you actively compare what Galbraith tells you of the 20's to what you know about the 90's, you'll likely not be swept away by future investing mania.

Timeless Classic -- Style A Bit Insouciant
Somebody on comp.software.year-2000 urged me to read this Galbraith volume because, he noted, "the parallels with current economic conditions -- with an out-of-control, logic-defying stock market, and happy-face government posturing in face of obvious disaster -- make it a must read." Fine. I bought this book 2 weeks ago on amazon (I'm a regular) and just finished.

True, the parallels are there. And I highly recommend the work if nothing more than to highlight in the reader's mind the elements of human nature that insure that we will always have depressions -- every 70 years or so ... secula seculorum... but in a small way, I expected more.

I find Galbraith (author of some 20 works on economics) to lack an emotional, visceral style that should have enunciated a polished telling of this critical set of events - (I say "set" because although October 24, 1929, or "Black Thursday" may have set events in motion... the bottom did not come until July, 1932). To borrow from Trekkies, if I may, I felt like I was following a history lesson from a Vulcan history professor. The chronology was well placed and organized, but there was nothing to help me "feel" the event.

Nonetheless, I appreciated the referral and the read. And I think that this work will have even more renewed interest when the world investment community eventually comes to grips with the lack of rationale in supporting stock values whose P/E ratios stretch well into infinity.

Greg Caton Lumen Foods (soybean.com) caton@soybean.com March 14, 1999

Exploring the 1929 crash in elegant prose
Economics, like physics, has a fundamental canon: you cannot make money out of nothing. To narrate the history of financial bubbles is to chronicle those times when people overlooked that fact. In those instances, asset prices soar merely to be resold for profit, with little regard as to their actual value; when something shakes confidence and buyers are in short supply, a crash follows as prices were sustainable only insofar as they could be resold higher.

According to John Galbraith, the stock-market crash that took place in the fall of 1929 was typical of this prototype. Mr. Galbraith, a Harvard economist, traced the optimism to the Florida real-estate bubble of 1925 which made people forget the elementary rules of money making. What follows is an elegant narrative that interweaves economics with history to produce one of the most telling and lucid accounts of the developments, economic and otherwise, that lead up to the October 1929 crash.

The crash, according to Mr. Galbraith, was caused by an admixture of bad income distribution (economy too dependent on luxury spending and investment), bad corporate structure, bad banking structure, foreign imbalances, and bad economic intelligence. In seeking compelling explanations, the "Great Crash" often resists conventional wisdom: for example, to those who blame the abundance of credit, Mr. Galbraith answers: "on numerous occasions before and since credit has been easy, and there has been no speculation whatever." Mr. Galbraith looks beyond central banking and interest rates to compile a rich and diverse history of the 1929 crash.

So what about preventing future crises? Here, Mr. Galbraith is ambivalent. Regulation has and can play a substantial role in preventing future troubles. But the problem lies elsewhere: people continue to believe that they have been blessed, and that they can make money with little or no effort. When wise men see such folly and decide to partake in it rather than spoil it, a bubble that later crashes is inevitable. For all those who seek an economic solution to this economic problem, Mr. Galbraith surely disappoints. The surest protection against over-speculation, he writes, is to remind people that you can never get something from nothing. Those in love with central banking might find the idea simplistic, yet its beauty lies with its simplicity.

Fascinating. Effective. Inventive.
Galbraith's inventive work on the fascinating events leading up and preceding the 1929 stock market crash is must-read for anyone interested in the national economy, how it functions, how it fails, and what role the federal government plays in perpetuating or stifling the situation.

He very convincingly establishes a good groundwork for the reader, explaining why the stock market was in such a large expansion and how federal regulation (or lack therof) enabled the financial firms to operate in very risky and perhaps unethical ways.

Obviously, the book chronicles the disastrous declines in 1929 and further discusses the federal government's attempts to revive the American economy, those for the most part failed.

The most important lesson this book can allay to the reader is that economies are not self-sustaining structures that are only subject to supply and demand shifts. In instances like the 1929 crash, the prognosis for dynamic economies can often lie in the actions of a handful of actors/people. A good lesson to remember.

Indeed there are many lessons to be learned from this book, many that are relevant to today's economy (2003). Read this book with care and with a comparative mindset!

A must read for economists and public policy makers!

Informing, but slow
The book The Great Crash 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith was very informative, full of facts and other things which made me understand what the great crash was all about. Although, the book went slow, and I often lost interest in it seeing as how it blasted me with information. I would recommend this book to anybody who really wants to learn about the great depresion, and about how unpredictable the stock market can really be. ... Read more

Book Description

Roughly once a year, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, the U.S. treasury secretary and in some cases the finance ministers of other G-7 countries will get a call from the finance minister of a large emerging market economy. The emerging market finance minister will indicate that the country is rapidly running out of foreign reserves, that it has lost access to international capital markets and, perhaps, that is has lost the confidence of its own citizens. Without a rescue loan, it will be forced to devalue its currency and default either on its government debt or on loans to the country's banks that the government has guaranteed. This book looks at these situations and the options available to alleviate the problem. It argues for a policy that recognizes that every crisis is different and that different cases need to be handled within a framework that provides consistency and predictability to borrowing countries as well as those who invest in their debt. ... Read more

Book Description

Robert Frank’s Microeconomics and Behavior covers the essential topics of microeconomics while exploring the relationship between economics analysis and human behavior. Human behavior in this context is of significant interest to today’s academic community. The book’s clear narrative appeals to students, and its numerous examples help students develop economic intuition.This book introduces modern topics not often found in intermediate textbooks. It encourages the reader to begin to learn to “think like an economist." ... Read more

Reviews (7)

Judgment, Choice and Rationality
As of late, microeconomic and macroeconomic theory has been incorporating social, psychological and social-psychological theory and concepts into the fold. This makes sense, for the quantification sans-psychology (social psychology) of analysis has been poor.

This author is well-versed in this area and articulates well the concepts which are important. However, as my colleagues have stated, the book does leave much to be desired in the mathematical-sense.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in Judgment, Choice and Rationality (defined).

This book should be included in undergraduate curriculum.

Five stars because it accomplishes what it was designed for (non-mathematical approach to microeconomics).

Regards,
Tyler Markowsky

Fascinating
A must for who is genuinely interested in UNDERSTANDING and ENJOY the basis of neo-classical theory. Better than any other other book!

Mathematical--no. Fascinating--yes!
It's rare to find a text as enjoyable to read as Frank's in any subject, let alone microeconomics. The reader looking for the standard calculus-based, mathematical approach to micro should look elsewhere (Jehle and Reny is a great place to start). That's simply not the point of this text--the point is to provide the insight behind the models, as well as to promote critical thinking about the shortcomings of the traditional assumptions economists make. This text, combined with Jehle and Reny if one desires rigor as well, provides FAR more than any other single or multiple text combination available.

where's the math?
I'm studying out of this book for my intermediate micro course. Simply put, the text is good (but unremarkable) for what it is: a no-nonsense bridge between the usual undergraduate principles course and graduate course in microeconomic theory. However, I can't help but feel that Frank skims off too much math in the name of accessibility. This won't help the reader looking to go further in the subject, i.e., grad or b-school. This would be okay if the appendices packed the math, but this isn't the case: the appendices are on-line at the publisher's web site, which pretty much means if you want to follow the math, you need to be near a computer. A somewhat "mathier" text, that I highly recommend, is the latest edition of Varian's Intermediate Microeconomics.

Better than average
In response to the previous reviews: It is true that this text does fit neatly between the "mathematical" (read: hard) and the "wordy" (read: easy) alternatives texts available on the market today. It is also true that it is disappointing (and annoying) to see the mathematical appendices shipped off to a website (which readers then have to print out for themselves!).

However, a virtually unique virtue of this text that has not been mentioned so far is the supplementary chapters, "The Economics of Information and Choice Under Uncertainty", "Explaining Tastes: The Importance of Altruism and Other Nonegoistic Bheavior", "Cognitive Limitations and Consumer Behavior" (very good), and "Government". These chapters really distinguish the book. They are intellectually (and I mean that it the broad sense) stimulating and challenging. Thus, for the student who is genuinely interested in UNDERSTANDING (as opposed to memorising) the basis of neo-classical theory, it a must.

In my opinion there are a few annoying omissions (e.g., Pigovian taxes/subsidies with respect to externalities, and bilateral monopolies in labour markets), but then again, others would no doubt object to the inclusion of these topics.

Overall, the text is very well written, user-friendly and, more importantly, intellectually stimulating thanks largely to the supplementary chapters. I just hope they're not shipped off to some website too. ... Read more

Book Description

"History shows that people who save and invest grow and prosper, and the others deteriorate and collapse.
"As Financial Reckoning Day demonstrates, artificially low interest rates and rapid credit creation policies set by Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve caused the bubble in U.S. stocks of the late ’90s. . . . Now, policies being pursued at the Fed are making the bubble worse. They are changing it from a stock market bubble to a consumption and housing bubble.
"And when those bubbles burst, it’s going to be worse than the stock market bubble . . .
"No one, of course, wants to hear it. They want the quick fix. They want to buy the stock and watch it go up twenty-five percent because that’s what happened last year, and that’s what they say on TV."
–Jim Rogers
author of the bestseller Adventure Capitalist
from the Foreword to Financial Reckoning Day

Advanced praise from bestselling authors

"An investment book that will not only enlarge your investment horizon, but also make you laugh and thoroughly entertain you for a few hours."
–Dr. Marc Faber, author of the bestseller Tomorrow’s Gold

"Financial Reckoning Day is . . . in the category of scintillating sex or good vision, something to be savored and enjoyed–before it is too late."
–James Dale Davidson
author of the bestseller The Great Reckoning and The Sovereign Individual

"A powerful and insightful vision . . . each paragraph stimulates a new rush of thoughts that fills in gaping holes in the investor’s understanding of what has happened to their dreams . . . while prepping them to confront any new confusion that may arrive."
–Martin D. Weiss, author of the bestseller Crash Profits ... Read more

Reviews (43)

Shrewd Common Sense!
Reading this book is to turn on the spigot, the information and common sense flows freely. The first chapter describes the technology bubble of the 90's and the many hustlers associated with it. Chapter two reviews many of the blunders people have made over the years, Bonner and Wiggin along the way state that mistakes are inevitable and are often repeated. People are sometimes prone to self destruction, and he gives many examples. The third chapter covers John Law and the origins of paper money, the beginning of fiat currency and rampant speculation. The fourth chapter focuses on Japan and the financial bubble that took place there, and it's consequences. The fifth chapter covers the legacy of Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan (not a rosy picture) and the lack of a gold standard in today's international trade balances, which is discussed throughout the book. The sixth chapter illustrates how mob behavior influences individual thinking, and how it is not always rational, and how democracy fits into all of this, how we are not as free as we think we are, this part is a 'must' read. Chapter seven introduces the 'hard' reality of demographics and why aging populations many times spell doom for economies. Chapter eight deals with the economic mess the United States is currently in, one of our own making. Chapter nine, the last chapter, reviews and condenses the major points of the book. Along the way Bonner and Wiggin laments the current phase of 'empire building' the United States is currently in, saying empires eventually end badly, a point that should be taken by our leaders in Washington, D.C.. Also, the authors state many times that when things get out of hand and financial bubbles form, people nearly always get what they deserve. The internet bubble popped in the United States already, the current consumer credit and real estate bubbles are still going strong, when and if they will pop the authors only say they "ought" to.

This is an excellent book for investors of all kinds to read, even for people just interested in our economy. To those people who believe that the 'buy and hold' stategy for stock ownership is the best way to make money in the stock market, and they anticipate making back the loses that they may have incurred over that last three years, they may be very mistaken.

Excellent Explanation of Economic History, But...
This book provides great insight into investment bubbles and the madness of crowds. My only complaint is that the subtitle, "Surviving the Soft Depression of the 21st Century," is somewhat misleading. There isn't much investment advice to be found here, other than "Sell the DOW and buy GOLD." This is excellent advice as far as it goes, but in this book it doesn't go much farther. Having said this, I think the author does a great job of drawing parallels between the Japanese economy of 1989 and the U.S. economy of 1999. There are compelling arguments to be made that our economy is destined to decline in much the same way that Japan's did ten years earlier, but in greater magnitudes. I also enjoyed the political discussions about democracy and freedom, and how the first doesn't necessarily guarantee the second. The fact that the author is also a copywriter, makes the book a pretty easy read.

There are no shortcuts to prosperity
One more book that warns us about the weakness of the US economy and the possible collapse of the dollar in the short term. What sets this book apart is the approach to the topic through the route of financial history, sociology and of course a good grasp of macro-economics. History, the authors argue, has taught us many lessons, only to be quickly forgotten. Two important lessons from the past are that paper money cannot make paupers rich and empire building through military might has ultimately brought misery to mankind. However, nations have consistently repeated these mistakes and lamented when it was too late. No prizes for guessing who the latest adventurer is.

This book is a brilliant expose of the "new economy", the irrational behavior of crowds and its malaise of overvalued stock and asset prices that cannot be sustained. Even the Nobel prize winning theory of efficient markets fails to describe the phenomenon in US markets during the last decade of the twentieth century. Irrational exuberance cannot be explained by rational theories. The book opens with an analysis of the new economy driven by Information technology, and blasts the myth of the new found prosperity. The new economy was supposed to signal the end of history by shortsighted economists during the days of irrational exuberance. The internet in fact amplified the behavior of crowds across continents and created bubbles that were larger than ever. Companies without any revenue, leave alone profits, were busy making money through IPOs and engaged in the most innovative forms of financial engineering to drive their stock prices north. Who cares as long as it makes us rich. But then, history has taught us that reality will catch up and so it did.

There was a time in the seventeenth century when the infamous John Law ( he was mostly on the opposite side of his second name) created the concept of paper money and central banking that ultimately brought his country on its knees. Using this example, the book attacks monetarists for the unbridled expansion of liquidity in a system that temporarily believes that paper money is real. Modern day economists tend to treat the economy as a machine that can be manipulated by driving some screws and made to run a little faster. The problem , the authors feel, is that soon they will be left with no screws and also run the risk of tampering with the wrong ones. Printing more money at regular intervals, is considered a panacea for all economic ills by these pundits of prosperity.

Economic lessons from Japan are described in a separate chapter and quoted in most other chapters of the book. The chapter devoted to "The Hard Math of Demography" is excellent and the topic of an aging America and its economic implications is discussed with accurate statistics and analysis to back the conclusions.

Finally one gets the big picture of the big bubble. Americans are spending and the Fed is encouraging them to spend borrowed money. To make things easier, the interest raters are lowered and more money is printed. Savings rates in the US have reached an all time low close to zero while private sector debt is three times the GDP. US is now the biggest borrower and foreigners till now have believed that the paper money printed by Fed is a safe currency. This illusion may not continue. The party will soon be over, and a massive hangover is imminent. Currency that is not backed by gold or equivalent assets is nothing but what it is made of - paper. History tells us that forbearance and thrift and not profligacy lead to prosperity.

Text books on history a few decades from now will probably carry a chapter on what went wrong with the worlds' once most powerful nation.

Nothing New...
As an avid fan of The Daily Reckoning web site, I was disappointed to find that there were no new or big secrets to be found tucked inside it's covers.

Most of the writing in the book, seems to have been taken from their web site. So if you've read most of their newsletters from the past few years, you will have already read and gotten their most important information. If you are new to the Daily Reckoning team, then the book may be a good way for you to 'catch up' & get current with their viewpoint.

Also, If you are an avid history buff, then their lessons will undoubtedly delight you. But think twice before buying this book, if you find long-winded accounts of history boring.
(If you're not sure, then I'd sdvise you to check out their web site before making your decision.)

Excellent analysis of our current economy & what's to come
The first few chapters were rather boring and too a long time to get to the point, but the information and predictions are based on well-developed history and documented evidience. A must-read for a long-term investor. ... Read more

Book Description

This text exhibits four unique features: 1) it uses the theory of the firm as the unifying theme to examine the managerial decision process; 2) it fully introduces a global view into managerial economics to reflect the internationalization of tastes, production, and distribution in todays globalizing world; 3) it introduces many exciting new topics and managerial tools into the study of managerial economics that are not discussed at all or discussed only very superficially in other texts, such as firm architecture, strategic behavior, business ethics, electronic commerce, risk management, international economies of scale, the virtual corporation, reengineering, benchmarking, the learning organization, and the digital factory; and 4) it shows how managerial decisions are actually made today with more relevant and interesting real-world case applications and integrative case studies than any other text on the market. ... Read more