Reasonably Simple Economics

Table of Contents Preface. Chapter 1 - Introduction 1.1 The foundation of modern economics -- the idea of scarcity. 1.2 Rules and freedom. 1.3 Rules amid the chaos. Chapter 2 -- Supply and Demand, Considered Separately 2.1 Opportunity Cost. 2.2 Sunk vs. Marginal Costs. 2.3 Costs and supply. 2.4 Demand. 2.5 Elasticity of demand. Chapter 3 -- Supply and Demand Considered Together 3.1 Equilibrium. 3.2 Changes in Supply and Demand. 3.3 Price Controls. Chapter 4 -- The Economics of Information or Knowledge 4.1 Decentralized Knowledge and the Spontaneous Order. 4.2 The Importance of Being Wrong. 4.3 Competition. 4.4 Profit as Markup. 4.5 The Market as What We Know Together. 4.6 Monopoly and Its Meaning, or Lack Thereof. 4.6.1 The Indifference Principle. 4.6.2. When the Indifference Principle Does Not Hold. 4.7 Speculation. Chapter 5 -- Public and Private Decision-Making 5.1 Who Is the Government, and What Does It Want? 5.2 Problem 1 -- Government as Subject to Regulatory Capture and as a Manufacturer of Entry Barriers 5.3 Problem 2 -- The Incentive to Accumulate Knowledge in the Private Sector and in the Government 5.4 Problem 3 -- The Democracy Problem. 5.5 Problem 4 --The Abuse-of-Power Problem. Chapter 6 -- Who Makes How Much, and Why 6.1 The Market for Compensation. 6.2 Power in the Employer-Employee Relationship. 6.3 The Distribution of Income. 6.3 The Economics of Taste-Based Discrimination. 6.4 Statistical Discrimination. 6.5 Who Makes What, By Ethnicity and Sex. Chapter 7 -- The Middleman and the Entrepreneur 7.1 The Middleman. 7.2 Financial Middlemen. 7.3 The Middleman in Society. 7.4 The Entrepreneur More Generally. 7.5 The Entrepreneur as Residual Claimant. 7.6 The Entrepreneur as Social Reorganizer. Chapter 8 -- Time and Risk 8.1 Investment 8.2 Interest Rates 8.3 Risk anbd Risk Trading Chapter 9 -- The Entrepreneur and Some Economics of the Future 9.1 Pessimism Amidst Miracles. 9.2 The Way Things Used to Be. 9.3 How Intellectuals and Politicians See the Future --A Brief History. 9.3.1 Malthusianism. 9.3.2 Luddism. 9.3.3 Marxism. 9.3.4 Permanent Economic Stagnation. 9.3.5 Overpopulation/Sustainability. 9.4 Why We Think Things Keep Getting Worse. 9.5 How Things Got Better. Chapter 10 -- The Things Only Government Can Do (The Economics of "Market Failure") 10.1 Setting the Table for the Entrepreneur and the Market. 10.2 When Prices Are Wrong. 10.3 Positive Externalities. 10.4 The "Market Failure" of Nonexcludability and Nonrivalry. 10.4.1 I'll eat, you pay - Nonexcludability. 10.4.2 Nonrivalrous Consumption -- Of Public Goods. 10.5 Excludability Is the Key Issue. 10.6 The Creation of Scientific Knowledge. 10.7 Crowding. 10.8 The Taxonomy of "Market Failure" 10.9 Conclusion. Chapter 11 -- Macroeconomics (GDP and Inflation) 11.1 The Concept of Gross Domestic Product. 11.2 The Broader Significance of GDP. 11.3 Money. 11.4 Inflation. Chapter 12 -- Macroeconomics: Stabilizing the Economy,or Not 12.1 The Goals of Economic Policy. 12.2 The "Business Cycle." 12.3 Monetary Policy. 12.4 Economic Stabilization: Fiscal Policy. 12.5 Lost in Translation -- How the Economics of Keynes Became Keynesian Economics. 12.5.1 Problem 1 -- Crowding out. 12.5.2 Problem 2 -- Fiscal-policy mechanics. 12.5.3 Problem 3 -- Rational expectations. Chapter 13 -- Macroeconomics: The Short and the Long Runs 13.1 What Are We Aggregating? 13.2 In the Long Run the Short-Run Bill Comes Due. 13.3 Is Stabilization in the End the Primary Economic Objective? 13.4 Economic Policy for the Long Term. 13.5 On Government Budget Deficits and Your Children.