The economics book - big ideas simply explained

The economics book - big ideas simply explained

[...]... why? And when we seem to be at the mercy of risk-taking banks and big corporations, do we know how they came to be so powerful or understand the reasons for their original and continued existence? The discipline of economics is at the heart of questions such as these The study of management Despite the importance and centrality of economics to many issues that affect us all, economics as a discipline is... approaches In the late 20th century new areas of economics incorporated ideas from disciplines such as psychology and sociology into their theories, as well as new advances in mathematics and physics, such as game theory and chaos theory These theorists also warned of weaknesses in the capitalist system The increasingly severe and frequent financial crises that took place at the beginning of the 21st century... So the moral arguments of these philosophers were somewhat academic Rise of the city-states A major change occurred in the 15th century, as city-states developed in Europe and became wealthy through international trade A new, prosperous class of merchants replaced the feudal landowners as the important players in the economy, and they worked hand-in- LET TRADING BEGIN 19 A speculative bubble in the. .. between the bank and its The City of London is home to a dense cluster of banks built over medieval streets Today it is the world’s largest center for foreign-exchange trading and cross-border bank lending customers at a time of social change Because the members of these organizations checked up on each other, and the managers had good local knowledge, they could provide the long-term loans that their... goods The argument over free trade dates back to the mercantilist era, which began in Europe in the 16th century and continued until the late 18th century With the rise of Dutch and English seaborne trade, wealth began to shift from southern Europe toward the north This was also the age when nation-states began to emerge, along with the idea of the wealth of the nation, which was measured by the amount... subjected to rigorous examination By the late 19th century economists educated in science were approaching the subject through the disciplines of mathematics, engineering, and physics These “neoclassical” economists described the economy in graphs and formulas, and proposed laws that governed the workings of the markets and justified their approach By the end of the 19th century economics was beginning to develop... science The huge increase in trading also prompted a renewed interest in the working of the economy and led to the beginnings of the discipline of economics Emerging at the beginning of the 18th century, the so-called Age of Enlightenment, which prized rationality above all, took a scientific approach to “political economy.” Economists attempted to measure economic activity and described the working of the. .. than competitive markets The rest of the world, however, was concerned with asking whether the markets alone could be trusted to provide prosperity While continental Europe and Britain argued about degrees of government intervention, the real battle of ideas was fought in the US during the Great Depression after the Wall Street Crash of 1929 In the second half of the 20th century the center of economic... course, the rulers adulterating the coins The money supply Bodin was not the first to point to the new influence of American treasure and the effect of the abundance or scarcity of money on price levels In 1556, a Spanish theologian named Martín de Azpilcueta (better known as Navarrus) had come to the same conclusion However, Bodin’s essay also discussed the demand for and the supply of money, the operation... in the shorter form of economics. ” A softer science Is economics a science? The 19th-century economists certainly liked to think so, and although Carlyle thought it dismal, even he dignified it with the label of science Much economic theory was modeled on mathematics and even physics (perhaps the “-ics” ending of economics helped to lend it scientific respectability), and it sought to determine the . makers The competitive market 130 Make one person better off without hurting the others Efficiency and fairness 132 The bigger the factory, the lower the cost Economies of scale 133 The cost. for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: 97 8-0 -7 56 6-9 82 7-0 DK books are available at special discounts when purchased in bulk for sales promotions, premiums, fund-raising,. the mercy of risk-taking banks and big corporations, do we know how they came to be so powerful or understand the reasons for their original and continued existence? The discipline of economics