Every year a slew of new economics books are published. But which ones are actually worth reading? We've picked out some of the books that have recently hit the shelves or are out in the next few months and explain what we like about them and why they're worth reading. (We've also included economics books that are new in paperback).
Economics in the Age of COVID-19
by Joshua Gans
"We are living in a moment of unprecedented crisis. The international spread of COVID-19 and the measures taken by governments to halt transmission of the virus are happening at a scale unlike anything seen in our lifetimes. As we grapple with the implications of social distancing and the tragic loss of human life, we need resources to help us make sense of this crisis. The MIT Press mission challenges us to meet the need for reliable information at such a time. In this spirit, we offer a new book, Economics in the Age of COVID-19 by Joshua Gans."
Capital and Ideology
by Thomas Piketty
"I find the study of belief systems to be a lot more fun than calculating ratios between deciles of income." —Thomas Piketty.
Following on from his bestselling (and often recommended on Five Books) Capital in the Twenty-First Century, Thomas Piketty turns his attention in his latest book to the grand forces of history and politics and how they underpin the global economy. Piketty argues for a new "participatory" socialism.
We interviewed French economist Thomas Piketty on the books that inspired Capital and Ideology.
Economics in Two Lessons
by John Quiggin
"If you understand opportunity cost—that the price of something really is what you have to give up to get it—you’re further along than the vast majority of economics graduates and quite a few professional economists" —John Quiggin.
In 1946, a book appeared called Economics in One Lesson by American journalist Henry Hazlitt. It's been in print ever since, and sold more than one million copies. Economics in Two Lessons is Australian economist John Quiggin's effort to explain what economics is about from a 21st century perspective. Hazlitt's one lesson, Quiggin argues, did not give the whole picture, "So, we need Economics in Two Lessons."
A highly respected academic economist, John Quiggin recommended the Best Books for Learning Economics for us.
Radical Markets: Uprooting Capitalism and Democracy for a Just Society
by E. Glen Weyl & Eric A. Posner
In the early days of economic science, in the 18th and 19th centuries, a lot of work went in to analysing and attacking vested interests, monopolistic arrangements that enabled the rich to live lives of idleness while enjoying the unearned rents from their estates, mines and factories. This intellectual and political work was known as “radicalism”, as it sought to take an axe to the root of society’s economic and social ills.
In Radical Markets Eric Posner and Glen Wely self-consciously raise again the standard of “radicalism”, both in the sense of going to the root of society’s ills and proposing solutions that are transformative. They argue that the global economic system is, once again, dominated by monopolistic practices and vested economic and political interests. The system is rigged. Inspired by the approach of their 18th and 19th century forebears, they suggest a range of reforms that will de-rigg the system, thereby transforming the global economy, dramatically improving productivity, increasing economic equality globally and making democratic systems more responsive to voters’ preferences.
The book’s five chapters cover: ideas for completely reforming how we think about property, by requiring it to be taxed (and transferred) at a self-assessed value; reforming voting systems by allowing voters to increase their influence on issues they care most about and allowing the expression of negative as well as positive opinions; improving global labour markets by dramatically increasing immigration (and, effectively paying poorer people in developed countries to sponsor immigrants from less developed countries); improving corporate governance through limitations on the cross-ownership of different companies within the same industry by asset management companies; and making the Googles and Facebooks of the world pay their users for data.
Posner and Wely are clear that their book does not constitute an “oven-ready” policy programme, for immediate implementation. They acknowledge that policies they advocate will have to be tested and would require appropriate regulatory and supervisory regimes. Nevertheless, they deliberately follow the logic of their position to its logical conclusions, rather than what might be politically feasible right now. That helps to highlight the “radical” potential of what they are advocating and also throws into sharp relief the shortcomings of current practice. Their arguments about how current arrangements are delivering unnecessary poverty, inequality and waste are persuasive.
In fact, on the whole, the solutions offered do not seem wildly impractical and in some important areas, such as opinion polling they are already getting traction. In others, such as the management of some commercial assets, or elections by political parties of candidates for office, it is easy to imagine how immediate improvements could be made by adopting the methodologies outlined here.
In some areas Posner and Wely are going to be faced with a very hard sell. Currently Facebook auctions advertising space on a continual basis. Posner and Wely want to extend this kind of auction to all property. This would give rise to a situation where everyone’s house is, essentially, permanently on the market. It makes a lot of sense and has many attractive features—“wouldn’t it be better if people invested less of their emotional energy in objects and more in their personal relationships”—but it would require some very deft political messaging (and some brave politicians) to get it off the ground. Similarly, it is hard to see one person one vote ever being abandoned for elections to democratic legislative assemblies, whatever its technical limitations. These may not be ideas whose time has come, but they feel like ideas whose time, in some shape or form, is coming. This is a very thought provoking book. Expect to hear more of common ownership self-assessed taxes (COSTs), quadratic voting, Visas between individuals programmes (VIPs) and data as labour.
Benedict King, Contributing Editor
Open: The Progressive Case for Free Trade, Immigration, and Global Capital
by Kimberly Clausing
Kimberly Clausing makes the progressive case for free trade and globalisation, arguing that free trade is overwhelming beneficial. She advocates particular measures to equip workers and business to meet the challenges of a globalised economy.
“Carl’s work is about what the impact of this new wave of technology and automation is going to be on everybody’s jobs and standards of living. He does that by taking a historical perspective and looking at the Industrial Revolution. The fact is that for quite a long period there wasn’t any increase in average standards of living and indeed, as we know from literature, there was a period of great misery for lots of people as they moved from the countryside to work in the mills and so on. The question he’s asking is, ‘Is it going to be the same this time? Is history going to repeat itself?’ and ‘Are there things we can try and think about in terms of policy that will stop history repeating itself?’” Read more...
The Best Economics Books of 2019
Diane Coyle, Economist
“there’s a whole clutch of AI books…People want to understand what’s going on. Human Compatible is a really clearly written one. It explains enough about how AI works, but also what some of the challenges are.” Read more...
The Best Economics Books of 2019
Diane Coyle, Economist
“This book is about the philosophical origins of neoliberalism in 1930s Vienna and logical positivism and how it spread globally, particularly into Anglo-Saxon and American universities, and also about the way it underpinned the philosophy of globalization that we have seen take over the world since the 1980s. It’s really interesting to understand that the ideas that we think of as ‘natural’ actually have very specific historic and cultural origins. They spread through actual social networks and institutions. The book therefore also offers insight into how you can change that public philosophy.” Read more...
The Best Economics Books of 2019
Diane Coyle, Economist
“This book is a series of rip-roaring tales about what you might classify as ‘informal’ economies in different contexts and the way that some of them work really well and some of them work really badly. The compare and contrast gives you real insights into what perhaps makes a formal, official economy work very well or very badly.” Read more...
The Best Economics Books of 2019
Diane Coyle, Economist
“This is about what social scientists call ‘social capital’, so the social assets or strengths that any community has to draw on in delivering economic improvements or quality of life etc. It’s about libraries in particular, but also other social infrastructure that enables people to meet and understand each other and have safe and inviting ways to help each other. He talks about how these are being eroded through things like library closures or parks not being maintained, or just the design of public spaces in modern cities.” Read more...
The Best Economics Books of 2019
Diane Coyle, Economist
Euro Tragedy: A Drama in Nine Acts
by Ashoka Mody
Professor Ashoka Mody, a former deputy director of the IMF's Europe department, charts the history of the EU's single currency from the birth of an idea in the 1960s, to its creation at the end of the century and the 2008-13 financial crisis, which brutally exposed the currency's weaknesses.
The Triumph of Injustice: How the Rich Dodge Taxes and How to Make Them Pay
by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman
Saez and Zucman lay bare the tax avoidance of the rich and suggest ways to tackle the problem in the context of a globalised economy.
The Code of Capital: How the Law Creates Wealth and Inequality
by Katharina Pistor
Katharina Pistor looks at how the law shapes the creation of capital and how this affects the distribution of wealth.
The Great Reversal: How America Gave up on Free Markets
by Thomas Philippon
Thomas Philippon argues that the central problems of the US economy are the consequences, not of globalisation, but of the increasing concentration of corporate power across the economy.
Capitalism, Alone: The Future of the System That Rules the World
by Branko Milanovic
Branko Milanovic charts the global rise of capitalism and assesses the relative merits of liberal capitalism, as it exists in the "West" and political capitalism, as exemplified by China.
Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World
by Anand Giridharadas
Does the philanthropy of the top 1% benefit society as a whole? No, by and large, it benefits the 1%, argues Anand Giridharadas.
Unbound: How Inequality Constricts Our Economy and What We Can Do about It
by Heather Boushey
Heather Boushey argues that inequality is bad for the economy, restricting the supply of talent and ideas, leaving it dominated by monopolistic corporations and prey to financial instability.
The AI Economy: Work, Wealth and Welfare in the Robot Age
by Roger Bootle
Roger Bootle argues that our AI-dominated future is bright. We will be better off and, although a lot of jobs will disappear, plenty more will be created.
99%: Mass Impoverishment And How We Can End It
by Mark E Thomas
Mark Thomas investigates why, for an awful lot of people, the economic outlook is increasingly bleak, even though the economy is growing. He suggests ways to remedy the situation.
Schism: China, America and the Fracturing of the Global Trading System
by Paul Blustein
Paul Blustein looks at the consequences of China's accession to the WTO in 2001. He explores the impact on the global economy and the dynamics of global trade.
The Narrow Corridor: States, Societies, and the Fate of Liberty
by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson
Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson, authors of Why Nations Fail, explore the conditions under which liberty thrives and why some countries fail to establish a stable free society.
Markets, State, and People: Economics for Public Policy
by Diane Coyle
"It’s billed as a textbook and it’s built on a course that I developed myself and have been teaching for some years. But it’s not technical and I hope is well enough written that anybody could enjoy reading it...What I try to do is demonstrate that there are some problems and some circumstances in which there isn’t a single right answer about how you do things, and there are choices and trade-offs to be made."
Narrative Economics: How Stories Go Viral & Drive Major Economic Events
by Robert J Shiller
In this book Nobel-prize winning economist Robert J Shiller looks at the influence of popular story-telling (narratives) on economic activity and explores how research in this area could improve our understanding of financial crashes and other major economic events.
Jump-Starting America: How Breakthrough Science Can Revive Economic Growth and the American Dream
by Jonathan Gruber & Simon Johnson
Jump-Starting America is the ambitious new book written by two distinguished MIT economists, Jonathan Gruber and Simon Johnson. They examine why the US economy has stagnated over the past two decades, including in the innovation sector, because of the collapse in Cold War defense spending. They propose their nationwide plan to “jump-start” it again, creating more jobs and reducing inequality in the process.
As the full title — Jump-Starting America: How Breakthrough Science can Revive Economic Growth and the American Dream — indicates, this book is a call to action for strategic investing in science and technology. This would amount to reversing the federal cuts undertaken in the 1980s, and if orchestrated in the right way, returning (or even exceeding) postwar levels of economic prosperity.
Jonathan Gruber spoke to Five Books about the best books on public policy.
Simon Johnson spoke to Five Books about the best books on why economic history matters.
Straight Talk on Trade: Ideas for a Sane World Economy
by Dani Rodrik
Harvard Economist Dani Rodrik looks at how globalisation is not working in the way it should and suggests ways to overcome our current social, political and economic problems.
