“50 Economics Classics” – part II

I’m impressed with this book  - one of a very useful series by Tom Butler-Bowden which actually invite you in and keep you reading. Suffering as we do these days from a surfeit of choice (what the Germans poetically call “Die Qual der Wahl”), some people will be dismissive of such a “Reader’s Digest” approach. But when time is short and we are deluged with books – this is a quite brilliant idea. Of course we can all quibble with his selection (I passed on the books on investing) - but the book covers a 200 year period and includes figures whose work challenges what I detect in the summaries as an overly pro-market enthusiasm – such as Hirschman, Klein, Marx, Ostrom, Schumacher and Veblen.

I’ve made my own comments in the penultimate column. You can find Part I here

Book/author	date	Comment on selection	Argument offered by Butler-Bowdon
“The Rise and Fall of American Growth” Robert Gordon	2016	Bit too American – the idea of limits to growth has been developed by so many people	The greatest gains in living standards have already been made
“The Use of Knowledge” Hayek	1945	A short essay which gives the basic principles of Hayek’s challenge to the notion of planning	Societies prosper when they allow decentralisation of knowledge
“Exit, Voice and Loyalty” AO Hirschman	1970	A highly original thinker – whose work deserves to be rediscovered	Consumers have many options to get what they want
“The Economy of Cities” Jane Jacobs	1968	Challenged the trend toward scale and emphasised citizen choice	Cities have always been the main drivers of wealth
“The General Theory of Employment” JM Keynes	1936	Still a bible for my generation	Governments must actively manage the economy
“The Shock Doctrine” Naomi Klein	2007		Neoliberal doctrines have been a disaster for many developing countries
“Freakonomics” Steven Levitt	2005	An early book to challenge the religion of economics	Economics is not a moral science – more a study of how incentives work
“The Big Short” Michael Lewis	2010		Modern finance was meant to minimise risk – but has actually increased it
“Bourgeois Equality” Deirdre McCloskey	2016		The world became rich thanks to an idea – entrepreneurship
“An Essay on the Principle of Population” Thomas Malthus	1798	His shadow still looms over us	The world’s finite resources can’t cope with an increasing population
“Principles of Economics” Alfred Marshall	1890	One of the last clearly-written economics books	To understand people, watch their earning. Saving and investing
“Capital” Karl Marx	1867	A work which suffers from 150 years of exegesis	The interests of labour and capital always conflict
“Stabilising an Unstable Economy” Hyman Minsky	1986	A prophet honoured largely after his death	Capitalism is inherently unstable
“Human Action” Ludwig von Mises	1949	Surprised to find him included	Economics has laws which no person, society or government can escape
“Dead Aid”	2010	people like Bauer were much greater critics – but the author is a black woman	Countries grow rich be creating industries not by addiction to aid
“Governing the Commons” Elinor Ostrom	1990	Got the author a deserved Nobel prize	To stay healthy, common resources like air, water and forests need to be managed in novel ways
“Capital in the 21st Century” Thomas Pikety	2014	The book everyone has claimed to read – and noone has!	If inequality widens, there will be social upheaval
“The Great Transformation” Karl Polanyi	1944	An unreadable classic	Markets must serve society, not the other way around
“The Competitive Advantage of Nations” Michael Porter	1990	A very bad idea	Industry clusters and competition make nations rich
“Capitalism – the unknown Ideal” Ayn Rand	1966	I preferred “The Fountainhead”	Capitalism is the most moral form of political economy
“Principles of Political Economy and Taxation” David Ricardo	1817		A free-trading world will see each nation fulfil its potential
“The Globalization Paradox” Dani Rodrik	2011	One of the most original economists	Globalisation, national self-determination and democracy – only 2 are possible
“Economics” Paul Samuelson	1948		The best-performing economies combine classical and Keynesian approaches
“Small is Beautiful” EF Schumacher	1973	A brilliant mind ahead of his time	A new economics is needed which takes more account of people than outputs
“Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy” Joseph Schumpeter	1942	A powerful book which justified the notion of democracy consisting of “the circulation of the elite”	The dynamics of capitalism and its “creative destruction” is superior to other systems
“Micromotives and Macrobehaviour” Thomas Schelling	1978	Schelling was part of the war-games military complex	Individual choices produce “tipping points” – with major effects
“Poverty and Famines” Amartya Sen	1981	An important thinker but not a good writer	People starve not because there isn’t enough food but because economic circumstances change (!!)
“The Ultimate Resource” Julian Simon	1996	Economics at its most arrogant	The world will never run out of resources – because ingenuity not labour, capital or materials
“The Wealth of Nations”  Smith	1776	The moral philosopher whose basic message has been twisted out of recognition	“the wealth of a nation is its people – not its government” (!!)
“The Mystery of Capital” Hernando de Soto	2000	A favourite of right-wingers	Property rights are the basis of prosperity
“The Euro” Joseph Stiglitz	2016	Highly readable	The ideological underpinnings of a failed currency
“Misbehaving – the making of behavioural economics” Richard Taler	2015	The more presentable face of economics	How psychology has transformed economics (??)
“The theory of the leisure class” Thorstein Veblen	1899	Odd to find in the selection	The great goal of capitalist life is not to work
“The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism” Max Weber	1890	Very influential book!	Culture and religion are the overlooked ingredients of economic success.