Reddit mentions: The best microeconomics books

>We were planning on sending that to selected businesses, along with a personal letter and an iphone stand we designed ourselves. Good / bad? Businesses would be small to medium size for now. Do you have any tips on that, personal anecdotes? Anything would help.

It is good to go after the exact companies you want. Not just to put up a website and take anyone who contacts you.

Small to medium sized businesses is not narrow enough. ===> dentists, accountants, landscapers, whatever, but make it narrower. You can get lists of these people.

Don't ever use the word "we." Ever. Except in your "About us." Everything else should only be "you."

So on your front page, don't say, "We do SEO, design, blah-blah-blah." I see this mistake all. the. time. Instead, "YOU will get more customers", "YOU will get all the hot women into your bed," whatever.

It takes 3 contacts minimum to make an impression, so instead of going to 6000 prospects one time, go to 2000 prospect 3 times.

Trust is the major issue, and trust only builds with repeated contacts. Just like making a friend - you really can't (shouldn't) trust someone after one meeting. It usually takes getting together over beers or sports many times.

Always have new content interesting to give to the target audience each time you contact them. Who would buy a magazine or newspaper if it didn't have new content every single issue? No one. Many businesses do this.

Headlines are the most important. 80% of the attention of the prospect is the headline, therefore you should spend 80% of your time developing the headline. Maybe use a Johnson Box. For a good idea of good headlines, go to the grocery store and look at the magazines and see what their headlines are on the cover. There are multiple ones. Copy them, but just tweak it for your company. Magazines are an impulse buy, they only have a few seconds at the counter to make someone buy. They spend big bucks on the titles.

For example, here is the May 2012 cover of Cosmopolitan Magazine. Cosmo has been around forever, so they have to be doing something right. So let's take some of the headlines: 99 Sex Questions ==> 99 Sexy Website Designs; Feel Great Naked ===> Feel Great Naked (work it into the copy somehow); 8 Ways to Get Over a Bad Day ===> 8 Ways to Make Sure You Don't Have a Bad Website. Then let's hit the arrow and go to the prior month, and here are some headlines: You on Top: The Hardcore New Success Secret ===> You on Top: The Hardcore New Success Secret; 25 Fun, Free Dates ===> 25 Fun, Free Designs; "My Gyno Talked to My Vagina"........hmmm, ok, I got nothin'.

My point is that a headline is crucial, and you can make it easy by looking at what works at the check out magazine covers. I really like "You on Top: The Hardcore New Success Secret" It is awesome. "New" and "Secret" are Proven* to draw attention. Classic.

Each of the 3+ letter should have a different headline.

Text sells. Have lots of text. It's one thing to grab attention, but with a serious and informed buyer, let's say of a car, the buyer will read all kinds of words in magazines to determine which car they will buy. Not pictures.

Have dual reading to help the reader.

You say you have a good graphic design and IT, that is great. But you need a quality copywriter. Everyone thinks they know how to do this.

Store-to-store is so-so. You target, your clients. Much better to target the exact client you want. The letter should still be the same. You must follow up 3 times with them, too. More is better. There are statistics on this that you can google. Maybe you already know.

Target target target. If you don't know, go with who is kicking off the largest profits. They have the money. For example, check this out: most profitable. Accountants have a 16% pre-tax profit. On the other hand, restaurants have a 2-6%. Fuck working for restaurants. Who will it be easiest to collect money from once you've done the work. Someone in a 16% margin industry, or 2-6%. Maybe none of these choices fit you, but I hope you understand the idea of targeting specifically. I mean, fuck it, why not just focus on the top 5?

>leave one of our posters behind

Make sure you leave a letter with all the reasons why they should choose you - what do you do that others don't.

>I absolutely don't have a problem to just walk up to people and talk to them, but maybe it annoys them more than anything? What do you guys think? Any advice on that one?

I have done this a lot. There is no problem. But then again, I'm in the USA, and don't know the culture of Swiss.

>Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

There is only one type of business. Marketing. If you have the skills to do the website, and can execute well, then just forget about it. You can do it. The marketing is the only thing that matters.

Pricing: Crucial. The more you can niche, the less pricing matters. You make it so that the client cannot compare your company with others. Niche = more money. Example: Website for any business = $200; Website for dentist = $1000; Website for dental surgeon = $2500; website for dental surgeon who specializes in diabetics = $5500. Please understand that this is for advertising directed at them, not just getting a call out of the blue. So if you advertise worldwide for doing only websites for dental surgeon who specializes in diabetics

You should have a different website property for each specialty. Webdesignforlawyers.com. Bestwebsite4accountants.com. Because each industry will feel like you're talking to them, specifically, and you can target the message to them.

Oh. When contacting prospects, make sure you have TWO letters. Keep track of which pulls better. One will become the standard, and everything new will test against it. This is critical, because some copy could pull 1%, and other would pull 10%. Huge difference. If you have a successful copy, never change, even if you get bored of it, as long as it works. Many people want change for the sake of change on their copy. Bad idea. This is not to say that one shouldn't test new copy - just make it controlled.

Pricing: Remember, pricing is totally disconnected from the "thing." People are not price conscious, unless they are poor. And you don't want poor businesses.

Read Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It)

It is based off this. Print this out and memorize it.

Google Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman and read everything by them.

Target, target, target. Chose specific industries so you can go to them specific solutions, and charge more.

.

Not sure if this helps.

oh, this is good http://www.amazon.com/Being-Direct-Making-Advertising-Pay/dp/0394540638

also read this http://www.scientificadvertising.com/ScientificAdvertising.pdf and this: http://ebookee.org/Claude-Hopkins-My-Life-In-Advertising_904762.html

I'm not too much of the "put a website up and wait for a call" or "go into random businesses." I'm more of a "target your ideal customer, customize to their specific needs, go after them, and therefore price very high amount" kind of guy.

TLDR: target your ideal customer (ones with money if you don't know), and pricing is disconnected from the buying decision.

Firstly. just to say, take note lurkers and searchers of what is being said here. I work in the sector and it is completely evident that dallyopcs knows exactly what he is talking about. They have made far more sense than anyone else on this subreddit.

We are relatively anonymous here on reddit but I feel like I may know you one way or another IRL.

But in reply:

>Sounds like you did well man, congrats, sacrificing now usually pays off in the future! I was 24 myself when I'd managed to save up a 10% deposit.

There was definitely an element of luck, whilst I was at University I secured a deal with a supermarket for a site that paid me £15,000 finders fee that contributed majorly towards my deposit for a home. Some people say this was luck, but to be honest I worked very hard to get this deal. Combine this with scrimping and saving every penny I earned I was then able to buy my own home very early. I completely forebode any temptation of expenditure for years to finally afford a house deposit (including ignoring the peer pressure and temptation to frivolously on materialistic items like; smartphones, designer clothes or holidays). There are many who complain they cannot afford a home at my age, yet simultaneously tell people like me that I "never lived" by avoiding the latter expenses. I guess it is all down to preference and what is more important.

> Another thing we should take in to account is, why would people actually want to buy a property now? A lot of the market is very over valued, especially down south.

This is definitely a local issue. "DAAARN SAFF" has always seemed expensive and overvalued to me. But people from "DEEEEAAARN SUFF" are not restricted to buy in that area. I am based in Manchester and even though it is a rapidly growing market and in some places properties are very much overvalued; there are still many untouched property "Oasis'" that offer many opportunities.

> We live in a time where property in all the nicest areas are owned by the older generation and that wealth doesn't seem to be moving. Millenials have not had any opportunity to buy anything cheap yet like previous generations had.

I can understand many of my fellow Millennials share this view, thinking "them boomers" are buying up all the best property in the area. Leaving us all in the proverbial. But we shouldn't blame them at all...

1. Buying the cheapest property for investment in an area is only what you would do in the same position.
   
2. Supplement to point 1, buying investment properties is the only thing these "boomer" generation have been taught. They were never taught or given any other methods; i.e. forex, shares, ISA's, etc...
   
3. Many property opportunities were offered, under-handily marketed and eventually sold to the "baby boomers" generation as a good investment opportunity. Only after time did these investments pay off (as does anything in property). If boomers had the resources, knowledge and transparency that we have now the majority would have never have invested.
   
4. Confidence in a market drives growth, point 3 above is an example of what happened in the real world with the "boomers" generation. Moreover, why our "baby boomer" population in the 20th century as the large percentile of our well-educated population (for the time), could be conned into buying property as an investment with nothing more than a light touch of verbal diarrhoea from a white collared, gold tie, braces wearing con man. The reason why many didn't lose money was because enough people fell for the con that property market confidence drove exponential growth.
   
5. Us millennial's could never have this sort of "hivemind" between us that would create a growth in a market through sheer confidence... because:
   
6. Firstly we are peppered with negative media reports regarding any economic market making us all a bunch of miserable, cynical and cautious bores.
   
   
7. In our information age, we have access to information that we had never had before like recent sold prices. This simple information we expect nowadays so we can make a decision. However back in the day it was not so accessible, Estate Agents being the sole traders of this information and the reason they became so influential in the property market. I just remember this era, but for those who don't; I suggest reading the book Freakonomics there is an excellently written piece alongside other enjoyable articles, that compares Estate Agents "value" being in their knowledge and why this is like the Professional Sumo Wrestling League.
   
8. It's easy in hindsight to say that it was actually mega risky for boomers to buy property in this way and really they only succeeded because everyone else did the same... but their ignorance was the reason property prices grew. Us millennial's who have all the necessary info and ability to question someones "bullshit" are arguably suffering from being too informed. I.e. Being more aware of the market conditions warns us off buying, leading to less confidence and slower market growth.
   
   
   
9. Having traditionally secret information like local sold prices made easily accessible to all the public this make the general public more astute and informed as to the true values of properties in the area. This is the reason why I believe it would be unlikely we would ever see a crash in values as we saw in 2007-2010, why? well even in busy markets people are unlikely to offer way over the asking price of a property as they are more aware as to the true value, comparing it to others that have sold.
   
   
   So you see the "Baby Boomer" generations growth in property wealth was a big gamble, the risks of they were probably unaware of. The younger generation actually have the hindrance of knowledge, rather than the bliss of ignorance.
   
   This is why nowadays professional investors like myself tend to ignore whether a location has potential "capital growth"... nobody has a crystal ball... instead we concentrate on the rental values/income/yields/rent ROI all of which are must easier to determine. A good rental income from a secure and minimal hassle tenant is the priority... any capital growth in the property value is a bonus. At the end of the day the end value means little to you as an investor if you are producing a consistent income out of the asset, therefore no intention to sell.
   
   That being said there are still many that look for properties in areas where they expect capital growth. They may decide to buy to refurb and sell on a property. This is usually an option preferred by the boomers over the investment/income method above.
   
   These opportunities can make an investor a quick £10k-15k profit, rarely more nowadays, especially if you are buying a property via Auction/Open Market channels. That being said there are some areas where opportunities like this could profit far more...which leads us on to:
   
   > Millenials have not had any opportunity to buy anything cheap yet like previous generations had.
   
   and
   
   > I think our time will come, but all this quantitive easing central banks are doing is delaying it, because its holding off the natural cycle of recessions.
   
   There is definitely not as many opportunities also the market plus legislation at the time was far more forgiving to any mistakes previous generations made. That being said the opportunities that are out there where you have little competition and potential for big gains so long you can identify the location early enough.
   
   
   This is usually an area that has undergone major regeneration, rejuvenation or just a sudden surge in popularity...
   
   Strangely boomers are the last to find these houses as an area that goes through any of the latter is usually considered by a boomer as a "s##tehole location they would never buy in"... Their inability to shake historic prejudices of an area is their downfall and an opportunity for the next generation to take advantage of (maybe creating another confidence led house price growth).
   
   For example: In my area of Manchester there is a Large Ex-Local Authority Estate called "Langley" (close to Middleton if anyone knows it). Now the estate was notorious during the 90's,00's and early 10's for crime and anti-social behaviour.
   
   Langley was that bad that when I worked in the area (circa 2010-2012) we were not allowed to book appointments after 5pm.
   
   In 2013 though, the council partnered with a developer began to regen the area by CPO'ing ex-council properties and replacing them with brand new homes.
   
   This method worked wonders, slowly displacing problem families and replacing them with young professionals. However people of a certain age still have this stigma associated with Langley, even though the regen scheme has resulted in £50k homes increasing to £125k homes in less than 10 years.

Oh boy, this shall be fun, it's a little disappointing that people are downvoting this, as I think it's a fairly reasonable question given the idea's spat out about economics from politicians and journalists.

Edit (this paragraph is the edit, not the huge wall of text, that was always there): Also I think one of the other problems seen is often it's not actually the economists who even get to make the important decisions in the end, time after time I have seen politicians implement policies that economists will repeatedly facepalm over. My biggest issue with modern day politics is that it is a popularity contest, rather than vote between the most qualified people of who we think could do the right job, we vote mostly on unqualified people who we think would do the least bad job, or for most people, who they think appeals the best to their self interests. I don't have a perfect solution, but fuck, there must be a better way.

(also part of edit) I guess you also have the problem of the agenda of the economist, are they trying to optimise social welfare, their own interests, or the interests of someone providing for them by other means.

I myself am still only an undergraduate, I graduate at the end of this year with majors in analytical economics, computer science and pure mathematics. Next year I am doing an honours year in just mathematics, followed possibly by a 2 year masters in the same three area's my undergrad is in, then I'm not really sure what I will do my PhD in yet, other than the topic will most probably be on game theory. I also work as a research assistant for a somewhat well known macroeconomist at my uni who also has a research position at Cambridge (they're actually over there for a month at the moment).

What I will say I have come to find holds across all fields of science, only in the social sciences there seems to be a greater number of pseudoscientists (my personal branding of them). Basically, any of the topics termed a science, whether they be a natural or social science, are really complex. Most of the mathematics scientists find useful can be used across any of these fields, and one can't necessarily say that a physicist is smarter than say a political scientist, or that the work the physicist is doing is harder than that of the political scientist.

One can however, obviously, point out that the average (take any measure of that you want) person that studies physics is generally smarter, knows a lot more maths etc. than the average political science or economics student (hell, I even think the average economics student learns a lot more than the average political science student). I think this is sad, I don't necessarily expect quite the same level, but people are given economics degree's these days without even taking a multivariable calc course, that should be illegal! (only half /s).

Okay, now to kind of move onto what you were asking. If you want resources that debunk economic models, then you merely need to find an economic model you have a problem with and search for criticisms of that, I expect it works much the same for any other science.

If you as a mathematician were interested in actually learning a bit about how real economists model different aspects of the economy, here is a bit about some of the main subject areas (there are a lot of sub-areas to these and somewhat large area's that fit into multiple or none of the areas well), any of the texts linked you could acquire off rapidlibrary for a look if you want, or should be in the library of any uni you are at.

One must remember that economics deals with a subject that has a lot of randomness (much like biology, giving a natural science counterpart), so a lot of the models don't give an exact answer, or even model anything that you can assign good specific numbers to, a lot of the time you are just trying to model as many of the effects of different things as you can, then trying to see what happens when you control certain things like interest rates, or how consumers can optimally make decisions etc.

Microeconomics tends to deal with the economic decisions faced by individual entities, whether it be people/consumers or firms/producers etc. This is where game theory is probably used more than any other area of economics, but it certainly isn't the only area.

Consumer theory is basically built up on the idea of utility, which is basically defined as someone's "enjoyment" of consuming something (one can have negative utility for something, sometimes referred to as a bad rather than a good for obvious reasons). Utility is only defined to be ordinal, so one can say someone strictly prefers one good to another for example, but not that they like it twice as much or anything like that.

Utility also has to satisfy a few assumptions (which is where it is mostly criticized) for the theory that gets developed to mostly hold, but on the most part they aren't too bad if the person is actually trying to make an optimal decision, they are things like preferences should be complete, transitive, consistent etc.

One of the simple first models one would be taught in microeconomics is that of a simplified world where there is one consumer trying to pick a consumption bundle out of 2 existing goods that will maximise their level of utility (very straight forward constrained maximisation problem). If you ever hear someone say that microeconomics is just one simple constrained optimisation problem, it's because they are under the impression that "microeconomics == n-good utility maximisation problem", which it is not.

A lot of the main theory for micro now works with general equilibrium models, which has n-consumers and n-producers. The maths for this gets rather messy, and I wont try to explain it here, if you want to learn more about microeconomics with a background in mathematics I would suggest you pick up Microeconomic Theory. This is essentially the text used by most post grad micro courses at the better universities.

Macroeconomics tends to deal with the aggregate effects in economy. What's going on with the interest rate/price level, what is the aggregate level of income inside the economy, what is the average level of welfare for a person. For example a model I did in my third year macro unit was the central banks problem of setting the interest rate to help optimise an objective of the bank. Basically the bank has a target interest rate and target level of output, then it models the effects in the economy (which direction the forces are on inflation and output, given any output gaps and the interest rate) and sets the interest rate to minimise the weighted sum of difference from target inflation and target output. Looking back it was very much an optimal control problem in disguise.

From what I have been able to gather (I have managed a postgrad micro unit during undegrad but not macro) most of modern day macro models are built up using dynamic programming methods (I just took a course on calculus of variations with a large chunk on optimal control theory which was awesome, I love it). If you want to learn more about that go look at Recursive Macroeconomics.

Game Theory (which you might have actually learnt something about) is also vital for modern economic theories, as essentially it is the study of agents optimal decisions when interacting with other self thinking agents. This is where my main interest is along with micro, if you wanted to learn about this I would suggest Myerson's Analysis of Conflict book, or possibly Fudenberg or Tiroles, as it covers more, but I don't think it's as good for an introduction, and trust me, game theory takes a bit of work to learn properly.

There are many different kinds of games, strategic deals with situations where all players make their move (surprise) simultaneously, extensive form will allow turn based games. Then you have a whole array of others, Bayesian games deals with players having multiple possible types, differential games is basically multiplayer optimal control theory (set of state variables and control varaibles, each player tries to find optimal control function given others will be doing the same to maximise their utility of the terminal state), stochastic games is similarly pretty much multiplayer dynamic programming I think.

Like I previously mentioned, game theory is my main love, I am currently working on a fairly large game theory library in c++ which I'm hoping may end up being the standard tool for research in game theory, and economics certainly isn't the only area currently interested in game theory, there are biologists, computer scientists, mathematicians, political scientists etc. that are doing research with it as well. (<3 Von-Neumann!).

So there are two things I would like to bring up, not because I disagree with you wholly, but because I think it's worth shedding light on how this problem persists. (For what it's worth, I'm a lawyer, and while I mostly handle commercial work now, I used to focus on IP).


First, the most recurring and simple issue: Litigation is a very expensive and unpredictable meat grinder.

The longer I practice the more I am convinced that the civil court system in America today is used less as a way to administer justice as it is to threaten/fight wars of attrition. Parties in two-party (as opposed to class action) litigation do not go to court so that a judge can find the answer to their issue and grant some award or order - they do it because they are extremely mad and want to destroy the other party. It may start with a genuine legal claim, but things snowball, parties build grudges, and they become less interested in getting their money than in being proven right by a person in a robe. Or they have secondary goals, such as squashing their competition (which is quite effective if your competition is smaller than you - a $1,000,000 company is a great target because they have a lot to lose but they do not have much to fund their fight with). The vast majority, as in more than 95%, of claims are settled out of court because for the most part the law is clear and parties consult lawyers who listen to the facts and tell them "you almost certainly win/lose" so they choose to avoid the costs of the courts and just deal with it privately. When that does not happen, there are reasons for it. Either the case is very complicated and has interwoven claims such that a win is less predictable, or in other cases they just want to cost the other party a large amount of money and send a message (see SLAPP suits, for example). On top of that, jury verdicts are super unpredictable, and the awards they grant even moreso. In cases where parties might experience real economic harms of $1500 you see awards of $15,000,000 (there are whole schools of thought about how to make this happen but it just turns out that no matter how much you ask a jury for, they tend to just give you a little less than that, and there is no real limit or logic to this (this book has some great material on this subject) and judges rarely overrule an award for being too high).


In trademark cases, you often have multiple claims coming at once. For example, they might claim that you are interfering with their mark, and also their trade dress, and also a design patent, and maybe throw in some trumped up copyright claim for good measure, along with a bunch of state law unfair competition claims. So where you propose that the case should be simple, "the only lawsuit that should come up..." etc., it is rarely the case. The extra claims only need to have a glimmer of promise (be "colorable") and they are added so that the other party has to spend more. Trademark cases also require answering whether there is a "likelihood of confusion," and that is an expensive fact to prove/disprove.


Second (and this is particularly prominent in patent and copyright and not well recognized - I hope to publish something about it some day), there is a huge degree of passive collusion (I'll describe later) in litigation, which shapes the precedent, i.e., the law, such that IP laws end up, through court precedent, way stronger than they were when the legislature wrote them. To your point about claiming that the trademark should not have been granted in the first place, there is far less precedent where parties argue that the mark/copyright/patent is invalid than there should be, and this, I believe, is because parties suing each other usually come from the same industry, and it is not in their broader interest to create precedent invalidating the types of IP that those industry participants rely upon. For example, many IP scholars and public critics of IP laws hold the view that there should not be any software patents (and that is arguably the state of the law currently) but who sues each other in software patent cases? Software companies. Do you think software companies want to put law on the books that says software is not patentable? Of course not. In music copyright cases, parties always have to pretend that the industry is not absolutely rife with borrowing of material, and music industry actors almost never use the fair use defense. It's odd, because it is a pretty robust and flexible doctrine. It probably would have saved Robin Thicke a few million in his Blurred Lines lawsuit, but they did not try. Weird. This is, I believe, because the content industry hates fair use, so they don't want more precedent on the books. As a result they end up tiptoeing around the issue and making weird arguments about very specific legal issues that don't make full use of the law. You only see significant changes in the law, like cases going to the Supreme Court, where the parties are not similarly situated, like a pharma company suing a university, or the MPAA suing Sony for making the Betamax player (Sony did not have its hand in movie production at the time), or the RIAA vs. Napster, Viacom vs. (a young, and not making its own shows) YouTube.


TL;DR - The court system really is that expensive, and the "adversarial" system which generates our law is actually filled with collusion.

There are handful standard theories of labor market value that are relevant to this conversation

1. Negotiating power, outside options, and surplus. The classic example is 100 farms that each need only one worker. If there are 99 workers, the workers have all the power, and can negotiate all the surplus value from the farm so they will be well paid because they can hold the farmers 'hostage' in the negotiations. This is the debate between wage takers vs wage setters.
   
   
2. Marginal revenue product of labor - workers earn in real terms the marginal value of their production. Effectively, the amount of revenue earned from the marginal worker.
   
   
3. Contract theory and incentives - Management is paid to optimize effort and appropriate risk taking. Because of the unique way managers operate, incentives are developed to encourage desired behavior. They still are assumed to not be worth more than the marginal revenue product of their labor, but as that is less clear than for other workers, there are incentive structures to align their pay along with profits, finding generally show management should and is paid in accordance with what is believed to be their marginal contribution to profits.
   
   We add on top of these theories of search, learning, risk and expectations, stickiness, and such but the two above are the key drivers of wage. CEO pay is more complicated because they're generally not seen as interchangeable marginal producers of value like most labor - they are different
   
   As the fortune 500's profits are on average only 7% of sales, I thought I was playing the part safe just keeping the discussion to profits but for what it's worth, CEO salaries are 0.04% of revenue on average in the fortune 500. Surely it's reasonable that CEOs marginal product of labor is at least .04% of total revenue and incentive alignment can expect them to be compensated up to 1% of profits? Do you really disagree with that?
   
   As for other labor, that becomes harder. There really isn't much theory tying their pay in to profit. Is the first, negotiating wage market a reasonable way to look at it? I don't really think so, especially in dynamic economies firms and labor is so constantly adjusting that bargaining power has to be at best temporary. If that was the case, immigration and other increases in the labor supply would probably be met with greater evidence of bringing down wages. We'd also not see as much movement between jobs as we do as it depends on a much more static wage formulation. I think firms learn over time what marginal value workers bring, there is probably bargaining power problems in the lowest wage occupations, but the average worker spends time searching for a good fit - somewhere where their marginal value is best.
   
   ----
   I got most of the numbers from this article and quick googling skills. The economic concepts come from grad school but can be found in detail in this grad school bibl and in this undegrad text.

Yeah, not making an argument here, but there's a lot of things to consider when looking at the monetization schemes of other games. I know the Smite model has been brought up a ton, so I'll give my 2 cents on that.

You have to remember, firstly, that when Smite and HON departed the price-per-hero model, they already had significant amounts of content (way more than Dawngate), and were struggling to monetize it. It was a change borne out of necessity. I think Dawngate could have gone that way, but certainly wasn't ready in beta. Moreover, it's really hard to go from a Smite to a LOL model, so even if you did plan on it, you'd want to launch with a LOL model first, gather some data, and then pull the trigger.

Also, DOTA is always brought up... now let's forget for a moment that Valve doesn't need to show profit. Both DOTA and HON (not as familiar with Smite) are designed such that you need more access to all champs, as there are some hard counters that are disadvantageous to compete without. Limiting champion choice actually helps new players by putting them against less meta variety, and without a robust guides system like HON (or even with), that hurts early experience, esp. in game as different as Dawngate. LOL had a different champion design philosophy that was less champion-specific in meta, and Dawngate was even less so with the brilliant role system.

The pricing is a long ass subject... suffice to say, a lot of it was designed to help us learn what players valued, and that shapes future content. There was also lots of guesswork. And maths. Pricing is a fascinating, endless subject, more psychology than science, if you're interested I recommend this book to start: Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

I absolutely did want some kind of starter pack system, but that never took off... there were just too many other priorities. No matter how I sliced the data, I couldn't prove that player were in fact dying to try every shaper. Again, what people say and what they do doesn't always match.

I had a crazy idea at one point to do an Amazon prime like system of a small flat fee for recurring bonuses, deep shaper discounts, and exclusive special access. Proved the profit potential in my modeling, but alas... priorities yo. Haha!

Yeah, if I had to pick 2 things that would have been game changers for Dawngate, first-time user experience (FTUE) and progression were always by far the most important to me. Teaching people to love your game is the most important step to getting them to spend, period.

I'm not sure what the nature is of your service precisely, but I can throw out a few thoughts.


The pricing you offer could be affecting your customers' decision about signing up for the trial in a couple of ways. Here are two examples that came to mind:

1. Even if there's a free month or so of trial, they might not be able to commit for their company to a certain amount of money, so there's no point in trying out the product.
   
2. If they need to use the company credit card for signing up - even if the first month is free - a significant portion of the purchase churn and effort is essentially happening at this point since this is when they'll to fill in company credit card information and perform whatever bureaucracy they need to do.
   
   
   To pick up some more customers falling into category 2, and depending on the nature of your service, it might be interesting to offer a truly free trial month where all they need to do is sign up with their email instead of already signing up for billing. (It would be important to make sure the prices aren't found anywhere near the "free trial" signup.) This could potentially allow many more customers to understand the benefits of your offer who might be willing to commit to a higher price at the end of it.
   
   
   Something else to think about - people like comparing prices. An additional benefit of offering alternate pricing schemes is that the prices you choose there will make certain offers look more or less attractive depending on your pricing.
   Example: Offer two plans. Plan 2 offers major benefits over Plan 1, but only costs 10% more. Plan 2 looks more attractive, and Plan 2 might have been your initial offer. It's the same idea as McDonald's "super size me" offers.
   
   
   In case you want to do some further reading on pricing:
   
   

• Priceless, by William Poundstone (Amazon link to the book)
  
• Price anchoring (Wikipedia article for "Anchoring", there's much more to read about price anchoring online.)

Well, I just read a bunch of stuff. So regarding the marginal cost supply curve debate going on, I googled decreasing marginal cost and came up with this, where the second answer says:

> Again, there's nothing significant, necessary, or truthful about a U-shaped MC curve. It's just a common element in the exposition at the introductory level. More advanced texts (e.g., Mas-Colell) examine other "shapes".

So this is the textbook in question I'm pretty sure. According to this it's "the textbook almost every first year grad micro class uses, regardless of rank." Which seems to be true looking at syllabi on google. Also something by someone named Kreps maybe.

If you google "mas-colell pdf", you can get a pdf of the book. So I did, because I obviously have nothing better to do. Chapter 5, "Production," is about supply stuff. I didn't look at any other chapters. I can't copy and paste from the pdf, and summarizing it is kind of hard and boring, especially because some of it relies on theorems from previous chapters. But here's a couple of points:

If you're looking for an objection to the shape of the supply curve, free disposal seems more important than increasing marginal cost. On page 138 it lists a set of theorems that follow from free disposal and the existence of a production set. These theorems imply the direct relationship between supply and price, but they don't mention increasing marginal cost. This is on page 138 by the way, and it seems like you need some stuff from chapter 3 to get it all.

Second, further down on page 144-146 it shows a bunch of graphs of marginal cost under various situations. Marginal cost is sometimes horizontal, sometimes upward sloping, sometimes U shaped. There isn't one of it just sloping down, it always slopes back up after, and this is consistent with other graphs I've seen. Which honestly makes sense, why wouldn't a firm keep producing until its marginal costs are increasing? When your marginal costs are falling, then what you receive from each sale needs to be falling even faster to deter you from producing more to sell, right?

So I don't know, but I feel like if you want to say economists are ignoring falling marginal costs, or however you want to put it, you need to grapple with economics on the level of rigor of this textbook. This book is a major step up from something like this.

(I feel like a rationalist principle for these kinds of debates is that the conversation should go something like this: "I think X." "Well I think Y." "Hold on, are you a random guy on the Internet?" "I'm a random zuy, but yes." "Oh, right - sorry. Anyway, I don't know a whole lot about this." "Me neither." "Hey, /r/badeconomics is right over there. Let's pop into their open thread and ask them." "$@#! you, Nazi." "Back at you, cuck." It would save me having to do any work ever.)

A reading group for this economics textbook would be really fun, by the way. It was interesting trying to read it, probably even more so if you start at chapter one. It has a lot of math but nothing nerdy STEM types shouldn't be able to handle. It could be a great way to understand economics on a level higher than blogs and Wikipedia can give you, which is honestly kind of interesting. Think of the "well, actually" opportunities for your next Internet debate! We could do a chapter a week or something and focus on comprehension and interpretation. Anyone want to try it?

I don't understand. This is a well thought of economics professor...

http://www.rdwolff.com/content/capitalism-crisis-democracy-now-urging-end-austerity-new-jobs-program-democratizing-work

http://www.amazon.com/Democracy-at-Work-Cure-Capitalism/dp/1608462471/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1377196079&sr=1-1


He wrote this book about worker-owned coops. I've seen some video of interviews he did at the Mondragon hQ in Spain.

http://www.democracyatwork.info/about/

He's trying to lead a push for more of these style worker owned co-ops. Mondragon isn't the only worker owned co-op. So is Costco and REI.

"How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

"...But not everyone is happy with Costco's business strategy. Some Wall Street analysts assert that Mr. Sinegal is overly generous not only to Costco's customers but to its workers as well.

Costco's average pay, for example, is $17 an hour, 42 percent higher than its fiercest rival, Sam's Club. And Costco's health plan makes those at many other retailers look Scroogish. One analyst, Bill Dreher of Deutsche Bank, complained last year that at Costco "it's better to be an employee or a customer than a shareholder."

Mr. Sinegal begs to differ. He rejects Wall Street's assumption that to succeed in discount retailing, companies must pay poorly and skimp on benefits, or must ratchet up prices to meet Wall Street's profit demands.

Good wages and benefits are why Costco has extremely low rates of turnover and theft by employees, he said. And Costco's customers, who are more affluent than other warehouse store shoppers, stay loyal because they like that low prices do not come at the workers' expense. "This is not altruistic," he said. "This is good business."

He also dismisses calls to increase Costco's product markups. Mr. Sinegal, who has been in the retailing business for more than a half-century, said that heeding Wall Street's advice to raise some prices would bring Costco's downfall....

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/17/business/yourmoney/17costco.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Worker owner co-op are a great idea. The concept is a winner. I don't know what's going on specifically with Orbea in China. Looks like I may have been wrong on some specifics on Orbea bikes. Does not disprove the concept of worker-owned co-ops because Costco has been just as successful with the model.

Thanks so much!

As for what to read, it really depends on what you're interested in but I always recommend the classics when it comes to anything to do with the left first.

However, if you'd like something more modern and lighter here are some of my recent favorites:

• Why Marx Was Right - Terry Eagleton is a fantastic author and this book has sold more than one friend of mine on the concept of Marxism. A great resource to learn more about the socialist left and hear the other side of the story if you've been sold the mainstream narrative on Marx.
  
  
• A Cure for Capitalism - An elegant roadmap for ethically dismantling capitalism by the most prominant Marxist economist alive today, Richard D. Wolff. Very utility-based and pretty ideologically pure to Marx while still taking into account modern economic circumstances.
  
  
• No Such Thing as a Free Gift: The Gates Foundation and the Price of Philanthropy - this one is a great take-down of how modern NGO organizations (especially the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) are the premium outlet for soft imperialism for the US.
  
  
• Until We Reckon: Violence, Mass Incarceration, and a Road to Repair - added this because it was a very impactful, recent read for me. A lot of left-of-republican people support some kind of prison reform but we usually view it through the lens of helping "non-violent offenders". This book digs into that distinction and how we, as a society, can't seriously try to broach meaningful prison reform before we confront the notion of helping those who have done violent things in their past.
  
  
• [Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women] (https://www.amazon.com/Backlash-Undeclared-Against-American-Women/dp/0307345424/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1550926471&sr=1-4&keywords=backlash) - probably my favorite book on modern feminism and why it is, in fact, not obsolete and how saying/believing as much is key to the ideology behind the attacks from the patriarchal ruling class. Can't recommend it enough if you're on the fence about feminism.
  
  
• How to Read Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in the Disney Comic - Written in the 70's by a couple of Marxists during the communist purge in Chile, this book does a fantastic job of unwrapping how ideology baked into pop culture can very effectively influence the masses. Though I can only recommend this one if you're already hard sold on Socialism because you might not even agree with some of the core premises if you're on the fence and will likely get little out of it.
  
  
• Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? - Mark Fisher's seminal work deconstructing how capitalism infects everything in modern life. He killed himself a few years after publishing it. My most recommended book, probably.

Well, you can do lots of things.

The government hires tons of economists, notably the Federal Reserve for macroeconomic research, the FTC/DOJ for antitrust enforcement, and the CBO, which evaluates the economic impact of legislation. I imagine most departments have a few economists economists on staff though.

International organizations like the IMF and the World Bank also hire lots of economists. I have a couple of friends who worked there as research assistants before going to grad school. Big development organizations in general hire lots of economists to do program evaluations, for example.

Then there are the think tanks, which hire economists to design/evaluate policies.

Most big companies hire economists now too, I think mostly for data analysis. Google notably employs a large team to design its ad auctions.

Financial institutions like investment banks are full of economists who do, e.g. asset pricing, for them. Also forecasting, although my impression is that that comes with a whiff of quackery.

I'm sure other people have more insight on what you can do with a PhD - I've always been academic-track, expecting to teach and do research as a professor, and so I've never seriously looked at other things I could do. Economics is one of the few fields left that still has a good academic job market, partly because a lot of talent gets poached by the private sector.

I totally sympathize with you. Economics is a sprawling discipline and nobody seems to have condensed the developments of the last 50 years down to a curriculum for the introductory level. So you're left with guys like Mankiw who corner the market on undergrad textbooks, which are typically full of cutting-edge economics from the 60s or 70s.

If it's any consolation, an undergraduate major in economics is typically not necessary to go to grad school in economics, (as long as you have plenty of math and a plausible claim to be interested in econ) which says something about how divorced the intro textbooks are from "real" economics.

If you're looking for a good textbook about economics, I'd recommend Sam Bowles' Microeconomics.

I read it in upper-level undergrad, so I'm not 100% how useful it would be to a beginner, but I think it does a nice job of presenting microeconomics in a way that's accessible (there's pretty minimal math) but rigorous. Also it's written more like a book to read, not a traditional textbook, which is nice.

It's just one economist's perspective, (and a slightly heterodox one at that) so take it with a grain of salt, but Bowles is a serious economist with a good sense (and enough intellectual honesty to admit) of where the field is and what it does well (and badly). I think the axe he's grinding is more methodological than ideological.

"Masters Level" Economic Textbooks.
---

I've picked these texts as they are ones that I ran across in the year I spent as a masters student, or in advanced economics classes when I was an undergraduate/undergraduate tutor.

Hal Varian, Microeconomic Analysis Relatively outdated graduate level textbook in microeconomic theory. I'd imagine his intermediate book would prepare you well for this text. It requires understanding of partial derivatives and some matrix notation to get through, but compared to today's texts comes off comparably light. I'd imagine it'd old and used enough that there exists comprehensive answer guides online that you can track down.

David Romer, Advanced Macroeconomics Romer's Advanced Macroeconomics is used in some undergraduate programs, and some masters/graduate programs. Again, compared to standard texts, it is wanting, but does a good job of covering many of the introductory models that are used in modern economic analysis. This text requires knowledge of at least single variable integration (might require multiple in the later chapters, but when I was tutoring students with it classes never got that far), and the usual multivariate calculus.

Jeffrey Wooldridge, Introductory Econometrics: A Modern Approach this was the textbook that I first saw econometrics through, and I still think its a fantastic applied text. It has a decent mathematical appendix covering some probability and math topics required for the text. On the flip side, the text gives you some pretty good how-to methods to implement a lot of the common econometric techniques and some intuition behind why they are used.

Simon & Blume, Mathematics for Economists This text is usually used in graduate programs math camps as a book saying "you should feel comfortable using these techniques before entering the program." Covers a wide range of topics from calculus, optimization, and linear algebra, to differential equations and some topics in real analysis. It has a fair amount of exercises to work through, and again, the book has been used enough that answer guides may be available online.

As you've probably heard, graduate school is very mathematical, and very little that I learned in intermediate micro ends up bridging the gap outside of some of the intuition I gathered through it. Most of the books I cited above are a solid jump up in difficulty from most intermediate books I've seen, and still a solid jump away from the common PhD level texts (Mas-Colell, Whinston, and Green "Microeconomic Theory". Sargent and Ljungqvist "Recursive Macroeconomic Theory". Greene "Econometric Analysis", respectively).

As a result, depending on what you plan on doing in the near to short term, its usually better to take more calculus, linear algebra, and other mid level mathematics classes.

Disclaimer: I am referring to US PhD programs. Things are a bit different in Europe/Canada, but not in terms of material, only structure.

So what you learn in an Econ PhD is drastically different from undergrad. Unless you go to a heterodox PhD program, an Econ PhD is a “STEM” PhD whereas the same can’t be said for most undergrad Econ degrees. I wouldn't say it's impossible to learn the material on your own; however, 1) only wannabe researchers will gain from learning the material at the level of rigor of a Ph.D. program (some of the exercises are just intellectual exercises rather than providing you with tools you can use at a "normal job") and 2) the material is rather high level and it can be difficult to grasp if not being explained by someone who really understands it. The first year sequence at almost all schools is Micro 1, Macro 1, and Econometrics 1 in the fall, the the corresponding “course_title 2” course in the spring.

The first year sequence essentially lays the standard models/techniques in each of the overarching fields (micro, macro, Econometrics) along with the assumptions that those models rely on. The goal is for you to not just be able to memorize the assumptions and solve the standard models, but to truly understand why we need each assumption, what we gain by using it, and what limitations it imposes on the model. That way when we’re doing our own research and we have to relax an assumption or derive a completely new model, we understand what we’re doing.

After the first year, you choose a subfield of specialization (micro theory, macro theory, applied micro, Industrial Organization, behavioral economics, Econometrics, etc) and take courses which continue doing what you learned in your first year, but specifically for your subfield. Then after the second year, you write your dissertation.

If you’re curious what you learn in a first year micro class, here’s a link to download Ariel Rubinstein’s book Lecture Notes in Microeconomic Theory: The Economic Agent. It’s free on his website as long as you provide an email address. While Microeconomic Theory by MWG is a more standard book for first year Micro, I think Rubinstein’s book is better written, especially when compared to the consumer/producer theory sections of MWG. Also, it’s free :)

Bugger. You stole my suggestion. OP, read this book. It is great.

On a simliar bent but obviously inferior, I'd recommend The Dictator's Handbook which covers more of a political science approach, and will make you reconsider 'stupid' political actions and Freakonomics which covers economics and unintended consequences.

However, the recommendation I'm going to make, in line with my flair, is The Lion and the Unicorn, a dual biography of the greatest political rivalry in British politics, between William Gladstone (the intellectual champion of classical liberalism) and Benjimin Disraeli (the cynical strategist who created the modern conservative party and massively expanded the franchise.

On the face of it, a book about 19th century British prime ministers might not be what you immediately thought of, but it has everything. Parties being created, and destroyed. Idealism against strategy, moral outrage against cynicism, Imperialism and foreign interventions against liberal internationalism, where a candidate elected on a ticket of anti-imperialism inadvertantly triggered the largest colonial expansion in world history. It covers how British politics was created, and the strategies and ideologies that were perfect then remain in place to this day, with Neoliberalism, Globalisation and 'One Nation' effectively a bastardisation of Gladstone's economic policies, Free Trade vs Imperial Preference debates, and the original One Nation Conservatism championed by Disraeli allying the industrious elite with the upper working class populace against the liberal elite (remind you of anything...)

The Beauty of Geometry: Twelve Essays, H. S. M. Coxeter
This requires a little background, and may require a few brain cells, but Coxeter is a great expositor. I find myself rereading this every couple of years.

The Pleasures of Counting, TW Korner
This is a tour through applied math. It needs almost no background, but does more than scratch the surface. It is the perfect response to "... bur what is this good for?". I'd also recommend his 'Fourier Analysis', but I'm pretty sure that it does not qualify as light.

Winning Ways, J. H. Conway, et. al.
Light in tone, but heavy in content. I love these books. Other people, including competent mathematicians, have declared them as impossible to learn from.

If you do not mind reading from the screen, try this collection of Martin Gardner's books.

My two favorite books which introduce economic thinking are Armchair Economist and The Undercover Economist. They're quick reads, they're jargon free, and actually teach some of the thinking. Unlike the pop-econ books (Freakonomics and its ilk), which are simply about strange results from research (some of Landsburg's later books suffer from this problem). For an introduction to behavioral economics, you can't do better than Predictably Irrational, which is a bit more like pop-econ books (e.g. Freakonomics) than books that teach some thinking (e.g. Armchair Economist), but it is an easy read.

For substance, textbooks are probably best unless you have a carefully chosen list of academic articles. Wooldridge for Econometrics, Mankiw for introductory macro, and Mankiw's micro book is good too (Nicholson & Krugman's micro books are fine too). Mankiw writes my favorite econ textbooks. For game theory, I used Rasmusen's textbook, and it was very accessible (most of it is online), but I don't know how other game theory books stack up. Get old used versions, or else you'll pay too much, especially with Mankiw's books.

If textbooks are a bit much, but you still want some substance, the first chapter of Thomas Sowell's introduction is good, the rest is repetition. If you want a some discussion of partially-discredited economic theories that are still trotted out regularly (like supply side), Zombie Economics is a really fun read.

R1:

Today I bring you this WaPo Op-Ed on how the Carrier deal will return business norms back to ones that favor labor and community because firms will fear Trump’s wrath. Here the author offers a distorted view of America’s past, a dysfunctional view of how contracts and norms interact, and a wayward portrayal of economists as unable to fathom agents and systems which do not follow strict mathematical functional forms.

>There was a time in America when there was an unwritten pact in the business world — workers were loyal to their companies and successful companies returned that loyalty by sharing some of their profits with their workers in the form of higher wages, job security and support for the local community.

The author wistfully describes a past that did not exist when businesses and workers in long term marriages because it was what was right and good for the community.

At its heart this period existed because unionization (or more accurately worker bargaining power) made it possible. Certainly on the point of loyalty, unionization decline is the largest contributor to declining tenure (see Bidwell. As unionization fell, this loyalty also disappeared.
However, unionization's decline can largely be explained by the rule of law (right-to-work laws, unionization process etc.) though governing and business norms played a role (to be discussed).

With bargaining power largely reduce, workers had additional difficulty (for better or worse) attempting to hold their jobs in the face of international pressures and especially technological change as countless economist (Autor just to name check one) have documented.

>modern day economists tend to ignore such shifts in social norms because they can’t quantify them in the same way they can quantify trade flows or technological innovation or changes in educational attainment. They assume that social norms change in response to economic fundamentals rather than the other way around.

This is the sort of things that can ruin my work day as a nominally institutionalist style economist. To begin, several Nobel prize winning economists have done significant work studying norms formation and effects such as North, Ostrom, Akerlof, Akerlof again!.

Beyond this, others have built off these works (Ostrom was focusing on the importance of norms, but not specifically addressing the problem) to try to model norm development in game theory example.

In fact, in Samuel Bowles’ Microeconomics, discusses in detail the way contracts influence the norms and institutions of exchange (Chapter 8, p. 265). The long and short of Bowles’ discussion is that norms are well understood, evolutionary, and in the absence of complete contracting have significant influence on the results of exchange.

Norms matter greatly to economists in the event that contracting is incomplete. One would hope, it seems in vain, that contracting between the federal government and American firms is more complete than most contractual situations.

>the new norm is not longer acceptable, and [Trump] intends to do whatever he can to shame and punish companies that abandon their workers.
>He may even have to make an example of a runaway company by sending in the tax auditors or the OSHA inspectors or cancelling a big government contract.

Many economists see the potential change of market norms that will result from government contracts suddenly being less than 100% enforceable as a problem. Coming back to Bowles, he notes that said norms “are sustained by the structure of the market and other social interactions in which traders routinely engage.” If having government contracts and enforcement become less predictable is to be the new norm of enforcement, surely the market response will be to ask government from some premia in contracting to account for uncertainty. New firms may avoid starting their business under the supervision of this government altogether.

Tyler Cowen points out that the new norms that would arise likely involve more complex contractual agreements to skirt restrictions, degradation of U.S. tech advancement, a ramping of favoritism to levels not seen since the Harding administration, potential de facto capital controls, or at best a politicization of the economy with no real rule of law effects.

>Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt understood that. So did Ronald Reagan when he fired thousands of striking air traffic controllers and set back the union movement for several decades.

Perhaps most crucially, the author here references a variety of Presidents who enforced their support (or lack therefore) for labor, but did so through the rule of law via various anti-trust acts, the championing and enactment of a large set of labor relations legislation, and the decision to enforce laws enshrined in code 15 years prior that had been previously ignored. As opposed to potentially undermining the rule of law as Trump does by leveraging government contracts and regulation.

A bonus on this point is that—though Reagan’s actions may have signaled willingness from government to support changing business norms by supporting them through rule of law—unionization’s decline had already begun years prior to the changes in business norms Reagan’s ruling supposedly incited.

The study of economics is not one that lacks an understanding of how norms influence market interactions. Though I am not as well versed in studies accounting for changes in norms mathematically, I’d wager someone here could produce good examples of studies that do just this through the use of good instrumental variables.

The Carrier deal will likely change norms in business actions, but those are likely to be related to businesses’ certainty in contracting with government during the Trump presidency. Just as is seen in Trump’s cabinet, the only people left to provide work will be those certain they can take advantage of information asymmetry to get a better deal from U.S. governments. Any mass effort to enforce job retention on a scale much more massive than the Carrier deal will be enacted via law and will be just as harmful to business culture as Cowen and other economist predict, but it will be the changes to contractual enforcement that drive these results and not revolution in norms spurred on by backroom dealing.

Read the book free by Chris Anderson. (It's not free in dead-tree form but you can get it free in other ways.) It covers this sort of social value versus monetary value rather well.

In the specific case of Reddit, I imagine that most people participate because they get value from the interesting links, and the 'payment' of an upvote is given exactly to encourage similar links. The upvoter does get value from it -- it's just a social value rather than a monetary value.

I'm not aware of a whole lot of books specifically about accounting, but here are a few recommendations of books about finance, economics, business or that I just think might appeal to /r/accounting.

Anything by Michael Lewis. Liar's Poker has been mentioned elsewhere, but The Big Short is excellent as well.

Ben Mezrich has written some good books about business, but not really accounting specifically. He's most famous for The Accidental Billionaires which is about Facebook (I believe it, along with The Facebook Effect were the main sources for the movie The Social Network) and Bringing Down the House which was about the MIT card counting team and inspiration for the movie 21. You might be interested in Ugly Americans or Rigged though.

Here's a few more that are a little less fiction-y:

Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin

Traders, Guns and Money by Satyajit Das

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles Mackay

Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It) by William Poundstone

EDIT: Now with links!

>These are not false dichotomies I bring up, but genuine concerns about tradeoffs for implementing democratic processes at so many levels of a society

This is not the false dichotomy I mentioned; the problem was that the two options originally presented were the existing power relationships or a dystopian state controlling everything we do. But once you start to criticize specific details of one possible implementation of socialism, you are merely doing precisely what good socialist thinkers should do. Given some ideal, how should it be implemented? What are the inherent problems? How can we make this work? And you certainly have not given enough credit to socialist intellectuals who do consider these problems when you imply that there is one implementation of socialism and it is necessarily "a fairy tale". That is simply willful ignorance of an entire body of work stretching back centuries to the early days of capitalism.

You want to have a conversation about how socialism should work as a democratic alternative to authoritarian capitalism and find out more about what proposals have been made? Wonderful! My work is done.

>the greater the task or function of some institution, the larger the centralized body must be to orchestrate whatever task it must carry out; the greater the that this democratic, centralized body must be, the more people we need; the more people, the more statistics bear out the chance of differing opinions, differing levels of expertise, and susceptibility to corruption; then we have a slower, more inefficient operation.

You make a whole range of statements that imply things must necessarily be a certain way. Given how rare these truths are when discussing human societies, I would have to ask you to justify these claims with at least some good argument. "The greater the task or function of some institution, the larger the centralized body must be to orchestrate whatever task it must carry out"? What does "greater" even mean to begin with? Why should the importance of a task necessitate more centralized control? If greater tasks require more centralized control, why should these same tasks require more centralization when we switch to socialism? And so on and so on. None of these concerns seem valid to me; they seem to be disguised forms of fear of the unknown.

>These problems will arise; to pretend that this system is immune to problems of corruption and conflict, that it's some rosy paradise of a solution to governing a society is naive.

Nobody ever said socialism would have no problems that we'd need to solve. Again, you're misrepresenting the alternative to the current power structure instead of directly engaging with it. People who believe in revolutionary change to socialism must be "naive" because we're to scared to think about the implications of such fundamental social changes.

>But suppose we go throw with it. How deeply do you embed this democratic structure into company. Large companies admit nested hierarchical command structures. Do we elect someone at every level of management? That only magnifies the problems of democratic processes listed above, likely in some geometric fashion.

Worker cooperatives already exist and have a wealth of answers to these questions. The Mondragon corporation is an often-cited example of a pseudo-democratic institution operating within the prevailing capitalist system. Also, Richard Wolff has written and spoken about these issues extensively; to these concerns I would simply say "go and find out - engage with that conversation!"

>I'm not saying that we should ignore socialism entirely, but to swallow it wholesale is not practical.

Now these are the statements that imply a false dichotomy. What is it to "swallow socialism wholesale"? Socialism is not a single monolithic set of precepts about how society should work. Socialism is simply saying that the biggest problem you currently face is that private control of capital has created and raised a powerful monster that has simply purchased your "democratic" government and will now proceed to solidify its global power until regular people are left with lives that are barely worth living. And all of this was entirely predictable for people who are just willing to question the underlying social hierarchies instead of blindly accepting them! Socialism is a universe of possibilities that begin with one idea - nobody should rule. Surely that one single idea cannot present such an insurmountable difficulty for our digestive tracts.

Well sometimes things actually are free, someone's just hoping you'll buy stuff later. If you have not I recommend you read this book https://www.amazon.com/Free-Smartest-Businesses-Something-Nothing/dp/B0043RT912

It is extremely interesting. It's about the practice of giving away things for free to encourage stronger customer relations and sales in the future. Examples include bands putting their music up online for free, games being "free to play," etc.

A few others have mentioned Mas-Colell, Whinston, and Green's Microeconomic Theory. Personally, I would never recommend that someone read it as a first reference, but it is the most comprehensive book on microeconomics, and can serve as an excellent reference manual that can clarify concepts you come across in your other readings.

There are much better texts (though less comprehensive) than MWG that focus on specific subtopics of microeconomics, for example:

Contract Theory(covers Moral Hazards, Asymmetric Information, optimal wages etc)

General Equilibrium-Overlapping-Generations, optimal growth (covers micro-foundations of macroeconomic theory)

Primer on Game Theory

For macroeconomics, since you are from a Physics background, I would recommend Recursive Methods in Economic Dynamics.

Edit: One "popular" book I read that I found to be fairly decent on economic theory was "The Ascent of Money" by Niall Ferguson

Where are you in economics right now? Undergraduate? Graduate?

Advanced mathematics appears everywhere in economics, though your mileage may vary depending on your definition of "advanced". As a mathematician, I suspect that quantitative finance contains the most advanced mathematics, since in modern mathematics research the majority of interaction with economics is through quantitative finance. But unless you plan on doing the most advanced math, there's more than enough advanced math in non-finance economics to keep you interested.

Generally speaking, professional economists build up some skill in real and functional analysis, as well as a variety of other skills like optimization, stochastics, and PDEs, depending on their specific research interests. These are all graduate-level math topics, so I'd consider them reasonably advanced. Take a look into econ PhD prelim coursework. When I took the sequence, we used the texts Microeconomic Theory by Mas-Colell-Whinston-Green, Recursive Macroeconomic Theory by Ljungqvist and Sargent, and Econometrics by Hayashi. I think they're good springboards for you to evaluate the math in higher economics.

In quantitative finance, I'd maybe start by checking out Portfolio Risk Analysis by Connor, Goldberg, and Korajczyk, then if you're still interested, I'd pick up measure-theoretic probability. I recommend Probability with Martingales by Williams. Once you're comfortable with measure theory, look through Stochastic Calculus and Financial Applications by Steele. You'll very quickly enter the area of research mathematics while studying quantitative finance, e.g. jump-diffusion models and Levy processes appear in the pricing of exotic derivatives, and they're heavily studied by even pure mathematicians.

>I'm interested in expanding my knowledge of modern socioeconomic thought, but for some reason I am certain that what Your Grace has in mind consists of one or several of the following:

I'd start something like this. Hal Varian is good but it can be esoteric at times. Nicholson and Snyder are also good and would probably be a bit easier of a read.

You could probably find a bit from Mankiw on utility in his macroeconomic books since it is often briefly touched on.

Utility is found more in microeconomic theory than macroeconomic theory but you will generally find it in the theory books as they tend to be a bit more advanced.

1. Natural Capitalism - Creating the Next Industrial Revolution. Most businesses still operate according to a world view that hasn't changed since the start of the Industrial Revolution. Then, natural resources were abundant and labor was the limiting factor of production. But now, there's a surplus of people, while natural capital natural resources and the ecological systems that provide vital life-support services is scarce and relatively expensive. In this groundbreaking blueprint for a new economy, three leading business visionaries explain how the world is on the verge of a new industrial revolution.
   
   
2. The Information Diet. The modern human animal spends upwards of 11 hours out of every 24 in a state of constant consumption. Not eating, but gorging on information ceaselessly spewed from the screens and speakers we hold dear. We're all battling a storm of distractions, buffeted with notifications and tempted by tasty tidbits of information. And just as too much junk food can lead to obesity, too much junk information can lead to cluelessness.
   
   
3. Republic, Lost. With heartfelt urgency and a keen desire for righting wrongs, Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig takes a clear-eyed look at how fundamentally good people, with good intentions, have allowed our democracy to be co-opted by outside interests, and how this exploitation has become entrenched in the system. Rejecting simple labels and reductive logic - and instead using examples that resonate as powerfully on the Right as on the Left - Lessig seeks out the root causes of our situation. He plumbs the issues of campaign financing and corporate lobbying, revealing the human faces and follies that have allowed corruption to take such a foothold in our system.
   
   
4. Free: How Today's Smartest Businesses Profit by Giving Something for Nothing. A generational and global shift is at play—those below 30 won't pay for information, knowing it will be available somewhere for free, and in China, piracy accounts for about 95% of music consumption. Anderson provides a thorough overview of the history of pricing and commerce, the mental transaction costs that differentiate zero and any other price into two entirely different markets, the psychology of digital piracy and the open-source war between Microsoft and Linux. Although Chris Anderson puts forward an intriguing argument in this cheerful, optimistic book, many critics remained unconvinced.

>All I'm asking is for you to back up your implied claim that creating incentives for business on a national level is an effective strategy for improving job availability and wages.

This is not a controversial claim, however. That cost incentives determine producer choice is the result of a basic economic model of producer choice (a good reference if you are unfamiliar with such models) and this model is supported by evidence from just about every study conducted, and it is simply not realistic to cite thousands and thousands of studies which support the notion that producers optimize and respond to incentives.

[mruniversity.com](http://me university.com) is a great online resource. It features 16 full courses (short videos to explain the concepts + practice questions/examples + exams) including Principles of Microeconomics, Principles of Macroeconomics, Everyday Economics, and other great courses taught by Econ professors from George Mason University.


Fair label: The economists at GMU generally favor Austrian Economics - which heavily focuses on free market solutions.

These courses don't seem biased to me, and the basic microeconomic concepts (the science of economics) are pretty universal. Everything in the world can be seen to have some kind of spin, though, so take everything with a grain of salt.

Edit: This textbook helped me understand a lot but I would definitely at least go through the Principles of Micro course on mruniversity before trying to tackle this book. The book does a great job of connecting the principles to actual real world examples.

Edit 2: Grammar in the first edit

My favorites:

Introduction to Economic Analysis - Free textbook. Taught at a much higher level than your average college textbook, so it provides a better introduction if you think you might go on to study more economics.

Microeconomics: Behavior, Institutions and Evolution - "But of course those ideas are not part of the generally-accepted microfoundations of economics. This is why every graduate student in economics reads (something equivalent to) Varian's Microeconomic Analysis, but not Bowles's Microeconomics: Behavior, Institutions, and Evolution; would that they did. If you read Bowles, you will in fact learn a great deal about the ultimatum game, the rule of law, and so forth; in a standard microeconomics text you will not. I think the Hobbesian vision is wrong, but anyone who thinks that modern economics's micro-foundations aren't thoroughly Hobbesian is engaged in wishful thinking." _ I try an reread this once a year; seriously a fantastic book.

The Company of Strangers - An Economic History of Natural Life - The book that made me decide to be an economist.

Textbooks are your best bet, for pretty much any subject, once you're past the layman's understanding. Just look up what textbooks they are using for Econ 101/102 in a solid University, then find a used copy.

When I was tutoring 101/102, the course used Krugman's Microeconomics and Macroeconomics, which were decent. It was interesting getting the introductory perspective from a prominent, Nobel Prize winning economist.

Macro is a fucking disaster and I have no idea - maybe /u/Integralds does but my impression was there was a huge gulf between intermediate macro books and advanced macro books.

For micro, I think the best bridge textbook is the "easiest" advanced textbook - Jehle & Reny.

It's pretty important if you're trying to get a leg up on grad school stuff that when you go through even Jehle & Reny you make sure you can follow their proofs completely - and if you can't, stop there and go figure out what math you need to figure out to follow them.

[edit] Although you can probably get away with skipping the General Equilibrium sections unless you're actually interested in a dead area of micro.

I highly suggest reading Free: How Today's Smartest Businesses Profit by Giving Something for Nothing (note: audiobook version is, appropriately, free on Audible and there is a free pdf, I believe, on the author's site).

It demonstrates how free and freemium are viable business models for many areas, especially in music.

The text likely refers to the first welfare theorem in general equilibrium theory, which states that a competitive equilibrium is a Pareto efficient allocation. On one hand, this is often considered a formalization of the invisible hand argument. On the other hand, the model in which the theorem holds abstracts away from a lot of real-world issues that may lead to suboptimal market outcomes. The best way to think about it, IMO, is as a theoretical benchmark that allows us to better understand properties of markets, not as an actual policy-relevant result.

A classic reference is Debreu's Theory of Value. More modern treatments can be found in graduale-level microeconomics texts, such as the one by Mas-Collel, Whinston & Green. There are also several lecture notes online, for example these by J. Levin are quite short and accessible.

1. I think the actions of politicians are determined almost entirely by their desire to get re-elected (or else they would be outcompeted by politicians whose behavior was so determined). Thus I expect that having politicians, especially ones who have already been elected, read anything is unlikely to change their behavior.
   
   
2. What is meant by "literature"? Some economics textbooks are classics in their domain (like Exchange and Production, formerly called University Economics, by Armen Alchian). Or, for one more closely related to politics, I might pick Mancur Olson's The Logic of Collective Action. Perhaps by reading it, politicians could become less susceptible to pressure groups. But that would be merely a hope.
   
   
3. If we're going define "literature" more strictly, then I would recommend The Brothers Karamazov, because that's what I would recommend to everyone. Read it slowly, preferably with a friend or two so you can discuss it. Then read it again. Beautiful stuff.

How could you forget the granddaddy of Micro texts: Mas-Colell. This book is the standard in many first year grad courses, and it covers everything pretty well -- the game theory is a little obtuse, though. It won't help much with economic intuition, but for people like the OP who want to learn the mathematical models, it's encyclopedic and definitive.

Otherwise, you have some very good links.

Edit: Apologies, I just noticed that the OP only wanted online links. I'll still recommend Mas-Colell in the case that the OP wants a good Micro text.

As an Economics PhD student, I agree with most of what you've written, but I'm not sure I would characterize the texts you recommend as introductory. Unfortunately, until the graduate level, most economics texts are lacking in formalism, largely because the undergraduates they are aimed at tend to lack background in mathematics. The texts written at the graduate level have the formalism, but presuppose a degree of familiarity with concepts and jargon.

The Mas-Collel is indeed the standard for formal micro, and I would direct the OP to Hirshleifer for a companion that fills in the background and intuitions that might be lacking in that text.

Macro is definitely less accessible, at least to me, but for a recommendation, I think basically everyone uses Romer as the first heavy-duty macro text right now. I can certainly share the sort of Socratic feeling towards macroeconomics, though, the more I learn about it the less I feel confident in saying about the world beyond the models.

Specifically, my focus is in applied econometrics, and I recommend Kennedy to everyone who expresses any interest in the topic. Kennedy employs an approach that I particularly enjoy, where he divides each section into thirds: one for an intuitive explanation, one for an overview of the math, and one for in depth consideration of the method and citations.

EDIT: I was looking over your comments about peppajac217's recommendation, and I scrolled down to examine them. I would second your advice about avoiding those texts, as they are Austrian pop-econ, and involve no formalism at all, making them particularly ill-suited to this request.

do you want stuff to get ahead in university or just fun stuff?

if you just want fun stuff, i highly recommend a book called Winning Ways. it's about 2 player games... hard to explain exactly what it is, but after finishing my B.A. in Mathematics, it is easily the most fun book i've ever read.

EDIT: Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/Winning-Ways-Your-Mathematical-Plays/dp/1568811306

Intermediate econ if you're up for it:

http://www.amazon.com/Macroeconomics-N-Gregory-Mankiw/dp/1464182892

http://www.amazon.com/Macroeconomics-Policy-Practice-Pearson-Economics/dp/0321436334

http://www.amazon.com/Intermediate-Microeconomics-Modern-Approach-Ninth/dp/0393123960

http://www.amazon.com/Money-Banking-Financial-System-2nd/dp/0132994917

EDIT: For intro econ, you can just get started with the books by Krugman and Wells. I'm sure we all love Krugman here yea?

As far as history goes, just FYI, Zinn's People's History has a very poor reputation among (even left leaning) academic historians. You can ask about it at /r/askhistorians if you want to know more. You can also check their excellent book list, organized by region and topic.

EDIT: For an overview of US history, The Oxford History of the US series is an excellent primer.

I know less about sociology, but I think a good intro would be Khan's Privilege in that it touches on a contemporary sociological issue in a lay friendly manner but also goes into some theoretical foundations in the tradition of Bourdieu.

Depending on the flavor of macro, this could be a very non-macro question. If you were comfortable reading Debreu, I would tackle a good graduate micro text, such as Jehle Reny. It is shorter and better explained than Mas-Colell. But if you liked Debreu, then you are probalby ready for Mas-Colell. Reading the footnotes in either is a good indication of newer developments.

> I'm still very doubtful of this claim.

You can look it up in e.g. Varian's undergrad micro book (Salanie has a great exposition for grad students) if you like, but the fact is that more accurate price, quality or preference discrimination will lead a Pareto improvement; maybe the confusing part is that all the welfare gains will go to the party that's able to discriminate better.

>edit: I guess I have misunderstood that espresso is better than coffee. Sorry, I am new to the coffee world, but I still ask why do some people prefer espresso to brewed coffee? And how do they differ chemically?

Why do some people prefer Strawberry ice cream over vanilla?

I find that with some roasts of some beans, I prefer them as espresso. With others, I like them better as filter drip. With still others, French press is just the thing. I don't know enough about the chemistry to answer (I prefer just going with what tastes best to me, and haven't felt too much need to dive into explaining it in terms of chemistry) but if I wanted to know, I'd grab a copy of Dr. Illy's book and start reading. (The second edition was edited by his son and can be found on amazon.)

I think any intermediate or advanced Microeconomics textbook will provide you with the understanding you're looking for. The flaws in the models are self-evident when analyzing the construction from assumption. The best way to go through this is to start with the very basics work through the 5(ish?) assumptions of consumer theory (axioms of choice I think?) and then start thinking of how the model exists when relaxing said assumptions. During this I would maintain the fundamentals of producer theory (profit maximization) to not overly complicate things initially. Then if you really want to you can start moving on from there (market structure, information etc.). This will give you a better understanding of microeconomics than 99% of undergraduate economic students/grads.

If you can do math this book is ideal and comprehensive:
http://www.amazon.ca/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401
PDF:http://graduateeconomist.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/published-1995-microeconomic-theory-by-mas-colell-whinston-green.pdf

If you want to not be bored to death:
Price Theory and Applications - Steven Landsburg
http://www.cengagebrain.com.au/content/landsburg46459_0538746459_01.01_toc.pdf

Sometimes they do, however, there are infinite ways to be irrational, so adding too many variables has the problem of over fitting. If you have X observations and X variables, you can always perfectly explain the data, NO MATTER WHAT the actual causal chain is. (I can help give intuition here if you don't buy this).

Also, economics in its purest form is rather technical. I think macro is rather technical too, I believe solving a DGSE with just a few frictions is very hard by hand. So in some sense, these assumptions help make the model more easily solvable (useful, if you are doing the base case, like perfect competition).

Sometimes relaxing these assumptions is useful. However, I would arguing some of them are obviously wrong and not useful is engaging in hindsight bias.

Yes. Building the "bottom up theory of the economy" is the work of generations of theorists in economics.

You mention you have a math background. If you can do math at the level of a first course undergraduate course in real analysis then you can go directly to Microeconomic Theory by Mas-Collell, Whinston, and Green. This has been the standard grad text in North America for over 10 years and for very good reason. It is a masterpiece. Beyond the content, the references and suggestions for further reading are fantastic. While this book is not the last word on micro theory, it certainly the first.

There are also a number of important lessons for macro theorists in the text. Chapter 4 has important lessons for those who want to do any kind of aggregation, and chapters 15-20 build a general equilibrium model from first principles and point out all the holes that macro theorists paper over.

There are many sources that recommend protecting coffee from light when storing it (as well as from air/oxygen, heat, and moisture). So, although I don't know what the specific light-induced reactions are in coffee, the answer is probably that yes, it is susceptible.

Edit: I was able to find this:
>Light plays a catalytic role in many chemical reactions; in the case of espresso (arabica) blends, particularly rich in unsaturated fatty acids, light catalyses the prime trigger of their auto-oxidation reaction, i.e. the formation of H∙, R∙ (alkyl) and ROO∙ (peroxide) free radicals which then cause the reaction to propagate.

The quote is online here and here. The source is this book. In the Google Books entry, the first half of the quote appears at the bottom of page 244, while page 245 is not available for preview.

There was an interesting section in Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, that I read recently. It showed that only successful candidates for political positions had massive amounts of financial support, but their success wasn't linked directly to the financial support; it all links back to correlation != causation.

Laffont and Martimort have a book that is probably a good fit. http://press.princeton.edu/titles/7311.html
It is more geared towards walking you through some more common models. I remember the math being relatively light and explained fairly pedantically.

Alternatively, I am working through one by Vohra right now that it quite good but pretty mathematically dense.
http://www.amazon.com/Mechanism-Design-Programming-Econometric-Monographs/dp/0521179467

I also remember the mechanism design chapters in Reny and Jehle's textbook were well presented too.
http://www.amazon.com/Advanced-Microeconomic-Theory-Geoffrey-Jehle/dp/0273731912/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395102676&sr=1-1&keywords=reny+and+jehle

Again, depends on the economist. But here's an example: Richard Wolff, an economist at UMass Amherst if I remember correctly, thinks we should replace capitalist institutions (firms, companies, corporations, etc.) with what he calls "workers' self-directed enterprises." The idea is basically that workers don't need bosses--or if they do need bosses, those bosses should be democratically elected. Here's his book in which he details these proposals.

Robin Hahnel, an economist at Portland State University, argues for what is called "Participatory Economics." Parecon is a quite complicated theory, but it basically boils down to this: everyone can state what products they wish to consume at the beginning of the year, and we can use this information to develop an economic plan which satisfies each participants consumption preferences (most likely with the aid of supercomputers).

So there's two off the top of my head. More certainly exist.

Hi callum_cglp-

Economics, at its heart, is based on calculus. Linear algebra is important mostly for econometrics, although matrix calculus does come up a fair bit. Generally, MA programs are not as rigorous as PhD programs.

I'd suggest having a look at the first 6 chapters of Mas-Colell et al. "Microeconomic Theory" and seeing if you're comfortable with the level of rigor. It's the standard text for microeconomics at almost every PhD program:

http://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401

It's actually not that simple! People seem to prefer prices that end in 9 over prices that end in some of the smaller digits like 2 or 3, even when it results in paying more!

In other words, people will buy something priced at $4.99 at a higher rate than people will buy that same thing priced at $4.93. For an excellent read on this (and related topics), there's a great book called Priceless by William Poundstone.

You're very welcome. Feel free to ask if you have any questions. These would be a good start

Varian on Micro

Dixit on Optimization

Dixit on Game Theory
Romer on Macro e.g. Solow, ISLM, MF, RCK, etc


Schaum's Outline to Math


Mises on Human Action


Alchian on Micro


Hirshleifers on Price Theory

Learner on Macro

1. LOVE this book: Pearls in Graph Theory
   
   Chapters are short and engaging. Great exercises. Very visual and creative which should make mathematical structure more appealing to a lay person.
   
   
2. Winning Ways for your Mathematical Plays by Berlekamp, Conway, and Guy may not satisfy your rigorous criterion but should blow the mind of anyone who thinks of math as primarily computational tools.
   
   
3. Visual Complex Analysis by Needham is an amazing book, but may be too technically difficult (particularly if her calculus is rusty).

I believe OP is roasting coffee to try to improve taste, not to test pressure limits of a jar, and the reason he asked this question :

All roasted bean off-gasses, regardless of quantity. After roasting, coffee continues to undergo both chemical and physical changes that affect quality. "The pressure within the bean pores should be greater than the atmospheric pressure... as the external pressure becomes higher than the partial pressure of volatiles present in the beans, the degassing rate is reduced allowing a larger quantity of volatiles to be dissolved in the lipid fraction or absorbed on the active sites." (Clarke, 1987a, Labuza et al. 2001, reference from page 231, Espresso Coffee, The Science of Quality

If you throw beans into a sealed jar, the off gassing creates atmospheric pressure thats higher than the that within the bean pore. Evident when you open the jar lid and it makes the whooshing sound. It's worth testing yourself, I'm always pleasantly surprised when I can improve flavor in any way.

There is some material in MWG that is considered mechanism design. Chapters 13, 14, 21, 23, maybe some elements in others.

For Contract Theory, this is a great introduction and this is a slightly more advanced followup.

For Matching, this is a good introduction to the basics.

I don't have a good idea for a text for Voting. It's mentioned in MWG to some extent.

If you want seminal papers, these books provide citations of those, as well as many, many others.

Linear programming:

• Vanderbei, Linear Programming: Foundations and Extensions
  
  Combinatorial optimization:
  
  
• Papadimitriou and Steiglitz, Combinatorial Optimization: Algorithms and Complexity
  
• Cook, Cunningham, Pulleyblank, and Schrijver, Combinatorial Optimization
  
  Game theory:
  
  
• Fudenberg and Tirole, Game Theory
  
• Osborne and Rubinstein, A Course in Game Theory
  
  Combinatorial game theory:
  
  
• Berlekamp, Conway, and Guy, Winning Ways for Your Mathematical Plays (volume 1, volume 2, volume 3, volume 4)
  
• Berlekamp, The Dots and Boxes Game: Sophisticated Child's Play
  
• Albert, Nowakowski, and Wolfe, Lessons in Play: An Introduction to Combinatorial Game Theory
  
• Conway, On Numbers and Games

Knizia is a mathematician. For anyone who's ever studied game theory, Knizia's designs are usually pretty obviously derivative of "mathematical games" (this isn't a criticism.) Sometimes I think he just whips out his copy of winning ways and riffs on stuff until he finds a design he likes. Or at least that's how it seems to me.

Like another commenter said, I think Knizia definitely falls into the camp of "experimental genius." I think SUSD put it aptly "Reiner Knizia has designed 1000's of games, literally some of which are good."

Those wouldn't be recommend I'd say Varian would be a gratifying challenge. Completing all the exercises in this book will leave you with a great understanding of microeconomics. Knowing calculus, in particular, knowing how to find minima and maxima of a function, helps a lot.

http://www.amazon.com/Intermediate-Microeconomics-Modern-Approach-Edition/dp/0393934241

Unless you have a particulat desire to learn macro, you'll probably be most satisfied learning micro or game theory. For micro, Bowles' Microeconomics provides a nice balance between mathematical modelling and psychological or institutional details. The standard graduate textbook is Mas-Collel, Whinston, and Green, which is a reasonable place to start with a math degree, although the models are a bit decontextualized.

On the game theory side, Gintis' Game Theory Evolving is structured around problems, with good solutions in the back. Myerson's textbook provides a little more standard approach.

I would argue that market socialism is not outside the spectrum of what you are arguing for. You can have a complete free market where each and every company is a worker cooperative and pay and worker benefits are determined democratically within the workplace, but the consumption of goods and services are still determined in a free market system.

Here's Richard Wolff's book on the idea

Jeffrey if you're reading this thread - PLEASE CONSIDER setting this all up as a Worker's Cooperative or Workers Self Directed Enterprise. Ethereum is the prefect vehicle for experimenting with new biz structures. Please don't be lame and repeat capitalism over & over!

​

Highly recommend this book if the concept is at all new to you-->https://www.amazon.com/Democracy-at-Work-Cure-Capitalism/dp/1608462471

​

&This is how you can prove to everyone you're not in this to get rich!!!!! We need someone like you to turn this idea into reality!

Yes, but 'evidence' is not always what it seems at first sight. That's what differentiates lazy thinking from science.

EDIT:

These are all peer-reviewed articles with rigorous statistical (Cochrane) analyses.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ijc.23033/full

http://bmccancer.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2407-12-385

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc1315315

http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/content/36/5/1048.full
Even seems to go into the effects you run into

http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/content/38/5/1169.full
Context

http://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/tobacco/cessation-fact-sheet
Just a FAQ/fact sheet, but still nice as an overview/bullet pointer. Lists a nice bunch of compounds for which I as a (bio)chemist/toxicologist with a PCC would regard as carcinogenic.

EDIT2:

I'm throwing the same stick back at you. Here is the same website you refer to, but now selecting for deaths due to drowning: http://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/cause-of-death/drownings/by-country/

"WTF? Drowning is more prevalent in [Mozambique/Somalia/(South )Sudan/Zimbabwe/Kenya/Malawi/Central Africa << pick your dry country here]] than in [[Germany/Denmark/Netherlands/United Kingdom/Italy/Iceland/Norway/Belgium/Malta << pick your wet country here]]!"

I live in the Netherlands. If I want to drown in outside fresh water, I'm hardly ever more than 40 meters away from a solid option, whereas in many of the countries with high prevalences it doesn't even rain twice a year.

"How could that be?" Hint: probably swimming lessons as a detracting factor.

Statistics are only more or less transparent to people who have been trained and have extensive experience. We do a lot in epidemiology at my institution, and it's not as easy as you make it seem.

EDIT3: For all interested (I keep adding stuff, sorry, I'll stop after this one, promised), read this book:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Freakonomics-Economist-Explores-Hidden-Everything/dp/0141019018

or one the other books by this duo:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_8?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=superfreakonomics&sprefix=superfre%2Cstripbooks%2C155

Really, it nicely illustrates the pitfalls of intuition and first-glance gut feeling statistics. Several thumbs up!

I don't know, but perhaps they are more in the mold of Steven Levitt (the guy who cowrote Freakanomics as he is probably most popularly known) who just uses the tools taught in economics to understand how to sift through large datasets (something I hope the FDA has a lot of expertise in).

As a secondary question, what is it you think the contractors do? That's one of the side effects of pushing for a "smaller" government when measured in terms of employees. It means the government can't perform its functions itself and has to hire other people to work on its behalf (and no, from many of the contractors I've met [and yes, I often act as one of them] they are not more efficient or encumbered by any less bureaucracy than the government employees).

Good question! I haven't seen much in the way of general literature review books. As I see it, you have a couple options:

• Read/work through a textbook. This will be rather difficult if you don't have a lot of math skill, a ton of intuition, or a great tutor. I suggest Mas-Colell, Whinston, and Green, the standard graduate textbook on microeconomics.
  
  http://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401
  
  

• If you are interested in technical overviews of some subfields, there are certain standout books that can give you a thorough technical overview. E.g. in health economics, read one of Joe Newhouse's books, or in Development, read something by Abhijit Banerjee. In either case, find ones written for other experts, not for the general public. E.g. don't read "Poor Economics" by Banerjee, read "Understanding Poverty".
  
  Really, there is no one "Economics" but a series of overlapping subfields. At the vanguard, research is done within these fields, and so you should focus on the ones that interest you.

Man, you should you get into his stuff, I reckon you'd enjoy it.

https://www.amazon.com/Democracy-at-Work-Cure-Capitalism/dp/1608462471

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynbgMKclWWc

https://economicupdate.podbean.com/

He's one of the most prominent advocates for Democratic Socialism. He's really good.

Winning Ways for Your Mathematical Plays is a fantastic book to work through. Berlekamp also has a great Dots and Boxes book.

Espresso Coffee: The Science Of Quality

> Written by leading coffee technology specialists in consultation with some of the world's biggest coffee manufacturers, the second edition of the successful Espresso Coffee will once again comprehensively cover the current status of the chemistry and technology of espresso coffee. It comprehensively covers topics such as agronomy, green coffee processing, roasting/grinding, packaging, percolating and decaffeination techniques. It provides a comprehensive resource for those interested in the fundamental notions of coffee quality; with a point of reference given in the form of a detailed bibliography to provide direction to the wider literature.

> I'm specifically interested in how the economy is in practice, not theory. I want to know the logistics, current data and statistics (or as current as possible), and economic strategy at a beginner level.

I don't think this is a realistic goal. If you don't know the theory behind why something works, knowing the information of what is occurring will do nothing for you. If you want to know "economic strategy" that is something based in economic theory.

All the current data and statistics, taxes, etc., are available for you to peruse. You can go to Statistics Canada or you can look at the tax code for Canada. But none of that is going to be useful for what you want. I know it's not what you're hoping for, but I really would suggest you pick up an introductory textbook, like this or this and begin learning theory -- if you really want to understand economics.

You could also try Government Policy Towards Business. Maybe this is more what you're looking for? This text is a beginner's guide to business policy and is Canadian specific.

I'd recommend Varian for Micro, https://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Analysis-Third-Hal-Varian/dp/0393957357?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0, and either Wickens, https://www.amazon.com/Macroeconomic-Theory-Dynamic-Equilibrium-Approach/dp/0691152861?ie=UTF8&*Version*=1&*entries*=0, or Romer, https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0073511374/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_dp_ss_1?pf_rd_p=1944687642&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0691152861&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=6BKPTEX4BHMM69GVSK4F, for macro. These texts are typically used in master's degree programs, but it is difficult to find really math intensive intermediate textbooks for undergrad (I once ran into someone that didn't even have to use calculus for his economics degree). Good luck in your studies!

Well, provided you're serious, here's a pretty thorough account. It's not entirely what I advocate, but it's a good summation of the key points in any event.

> But I'm asking you

That's my answer. You expect me to lay out the entire labor arrangement in two sentences?

First, let me say that I appreciate the effort you put into writing the response. I also want to point attention to one crucial thing you may not be be able to discern:

Ownership is your own moral position

Seriously. Whatever your original position do the same analysis of this concept. Read up on how ownership came to be. Read on differences in ownership of animals, things, people, ideas, natural parks, international water and other things. Think why we have ownership rights and what problems do they resolve.

Above all else do realise that in this discussion you are the young bull with radical ideas. Again I was in your shoes when I was 20. Feel free to PM me if you want. Good luck with further life.

EDIT: I hate to do this as I hate links to literature of the other side. But if you really want to "see the other side" then read this on economics and this on history. I have no other advert than being in your shoes when young. Take it or leave it. At worst is two random books you may download by torrents that may be informative. At worst you ignore it and go on preaching your faith to weak minded. On the other hand If you have a good counterargument or literature then I am more than willing to engage in the discussion.

There's multiple ways that already exist in other countries to show how to transition/start a coop. Richard Wolff explains this in his book . Basically workers can buy it from an employer who is sympathetic or retiring and wants to sell. Or as Wolff likes to bring up, it can model Italy's Marcora Law which allows for unemployed workers to get in groups of 10 people to start a coop. If they do, the government will pay each worker their 2 years worth of unemployment in one lump sum to help with investment capital in their self directed business. This law has existed since the 80s. Also there are banks that currently will loan to coops although not as reliably as normally structured businesses.

This video pretty much says everything in Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism by Richard Wolff. It's a really good book.

http://www.amazon.com/Espresso-Coffee-Second-Edition-Science/dp/0123703719/ref=dp_ob_title_bk

i have this one and it is amazing i recommend reading it

The Soviet Union and China were/are state capitalist countries. Capitalism is defined as an economic system where the capitalists (read non-producing workers) own all the value created by the laborers (read people who produce the physical product). In socialism and communism the labor force is more democratic in that the laborers directly own and distribute their profits.

Source:
Richard Wolff - Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism https://www.amazon.com/dp/1608462471/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_HBHRBbGEVP6FD

Richard Wolff - Google Talk https://youtu.be/ynbgMKclWWc

Wikipedia - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_capitalism?wprov=sfla1

> Didn't listen to the whole thing

\
>I also thought his proposed solution was interesting;
>
it was…
>
It was…
>
Oh, he didn't have one.


Wolff has written multiple books about a solution, and his lectures all delve into a bit of the ideas of democratic workplaces etc

I really like Introduction to Modern Economic Growth by Acemoglu, which was the first year Macro textbook at my alma mater and where I currently teach. He does all his own proofs and includes more on institutions and directed technical change.
For Micro theory, I'd suggest Nicholson and Snyder's Microeconomic Theory: Basic Principles and Extensions, although the standard first year text for graduate school is probably Mas-Collel.
If you want a more heterodox book, check out [Microeconomics: Behavior, Instituions, and Evolution by Sam Bowles] (https://www.amazon.com/Microeconomics-Institutions-Evolution-Roundtable-Behavioral/dp/0691126380/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1510358192&sr=1-1-fkmr0&keywords=behavior+institutions+and+evolu)

Check out Dr. Richard Wolff and Democracy at work

Mondragon Corporation

Pretty good book, too.

Michael Lewis has some great titles, with Liar's Poker being my favourite finance-related book of all time. Malcolm Gladwell is another good author, but that's more behavioural economics then high finance. Some stand alone titles:

- Intelligent Investor, Ben Graham

- Free, Chris Anderson

- Persuasion, Arlene Dickinson (Dragon's Den)

- Decisions, Jim Treliving (Dragon's Den)

It depends on what you expect to get out of it. Just because he advocated the labor theory doesn't mean that he was stupid. After all, Aristotle was a geocentrist and Galileo believed that the moon did not cause tides. Mill is an early pioneer of economics and utilitarianism, which on one hand means that he greatly influenced those schools of thought, and on the other hand means that other thinkers have refined and surpassed his ideas. If you want to know more about economic utilitarianism, check out some graduate economics textbooks like this one.

Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It)
William Poundstone
http://www.amazon.com/Priceless-Myth-Fair-Value-Advantage/dp/0809078813

>Please demonstrate that competition can be universally assumed to always reduce prices and improve customer service.

Here, this should be helpful for you.

there's so much out there if you like this stuff.

gar alperovitz writes and lectures about democratic economics in the form of coops and democratic communities in what he calls democratization of wealth. his most recent book is called america beyond capitalism (pdf).

richard wolff also talks a lot about workplace democracy in what he calls democracy at work in the form of "worker self-directed enterprises" (WSDEs). his recent book on the matter is called democracy at work: a cure for capitalism.

both of these guys have regular podcasts, public lectures, countless videos and they write prolifically. gar alperovitz actually gave a speech at the green party convention.

I think that with the integration of increasing perceived value techniques, Jeff Walker style Launch marketing, some persuasion supplementation, using stories in marketing, Neuromarketing, Web Copy techniques, and many others, all put together in combination - anything's possible. How possible something is I think depends on your perception, and how and if you are familiar with persuasion and how businesses persuade and make something sound 'fair'.

Second, I don't actually mind getting pirated. If those people want it and can't afford it, they should have it. I don't want to stop them. I don't view it as a loss.

I'd rather not go the route of donations... it's honestly too much work.

This is pretty critical. There was a book written about this called Free: The future of a radical price.

https://www.amazon.com/Free-Future-Radical-Chris-Anderson/dp/1401322905

The whole book could probably fit in a single chapter but it's an interesting read.

People stop thinking when you say Free. There's no cognitive cost to making the choice to act if it's "free."

The classic grad micro text is this one. Chiang and Carter both have written good mathematical economics book which are someplace around upper undergrad lower grad. Mostly I think just drilling as many problems as you can find is the best strategy. Look at math calc books to find Lagrange multiplier stuff. Also don't forget that the math is only a part of it. Understanding the economics the models are trying to convey is the most important part.

It doesn't look great. A classic book that's used by Phd programs for the micro sequence is [MWG] (https://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401) (pdf copies exist online). If you can follow it then you have a chance at graduating from a phd program.

I'd recommend taking more upper level and graduate level math classes and getting A's. In addition if you can RA for a professor try to get a co-authorship on some publications. After that, you may have a shot at UCSC, UC Riverside, anywhere 70+ in ranking. Getting into an Econ phd program means that you beat out a handful of candidates, you really have to sell yourself that your better than that handful.

I'd go look for Bowles' Microeconomics: Behavior, Institutions, and Evolution on this. It gives you a good theoretical basis on stuff like overusing of resources.

I'd argue something like this would be a better solution.

Having had experience working with a Co-Op I can't understand why more people don't organize themselves in this way. Groceries and other regular consumables, petrol stations, and housing all seem ripe for this type of organization.

Check out the book "Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value" for a slew of good ideas and insights.

The standard graduate micro book is Mas-Colell, Whinston, & Green, https://amzn.com/0195073401 – If you have a solid matrix algebra and vector calculus background it’ll be fine for you.

Personally, I feel like the very complicated technical/mathematical arguments used in economics are often an obscurantist / diversionary tool, not as well justified by concrete evidence as their proponents pretend. It’s important to think carefully and critically about the limits of economic models’ applicability, and about whether their assumptions match reality in any particular case.

It’s not particularly math-heavy, but I recommend Bowles’s micro book as a complement/alternative to standard introductory textbooks at an undergraduate level, https://amzn.com/0691126380

Fiction:

The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin is a great start (good critique of anarchist philosophy).

The Red Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson actually cites Mondragon and discusses cooperative economics in detail.

After The Deluge (of Critical Mass fame) by Chris Carlsson is a novel about a post-capitalist San Francisco.

Non-fiction:

After Capitalism by Seymor Melman.

America Beyond Capitalism by Gar Alperovitz.

Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism by Richard Wolff.

Capitalism's Crisis Deepens: Essays on the Global Economic Meltdown by Richard Wolff.

After Capitalism by David Schweickart.

Against Capitalism by David Schweickart.

Capitalism or Worker Control by David Schweickart

Putting Democracy to Work by Frank T Adams.

Collective Courage: A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice by Jessica Gordon Nembhard.

Humanizing the Economy: Co-operatives in the Age of Capital by John Restakis.

Owning Our Future: The Emerging Ownership Revolution by Marjorie Kelly.

For All the People: Uncovering the Hidden History of Cooperation, Cooperative Movements, and Communalism in America by John Curl.

Looks like someone read Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value.

This is where all of this post's ideas come from. If you want a more in-depth look, read the book.

Indeed :) I used to own my own coffee roasting business and developed espresso blends. If you want to geek out about coffee, I recommend this book, which is about as scientific as they come (most other coffee books are based on anecdotal evidence at best):

http://www.amazon.com/Espresso-Coffee-Second-Edition-Science/dp/0123703719

it doesn't necessarily fit the "cheap" criterion, but I was quite satisfied with Intermediate Microeconomics: A Modern Approach, Seventh Edition by Hal R. Varian

Stealing a quote from here

>To understand why people have this psychological bearing on the '9's and why it matters, you should turn to a book called Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It) by Poundstone.

>It might be interesting to note that despite being cognizant of this psychological effect, we're still subconsciously driven towards a $99 product when there are two more similar products with price tags of $94 and $100.

tl;dr: Psychological effect.

This is culture dependent and is based on an inculcated (taught) sense of fairness. It can be probed with a specific instrument -- the Ultimatum Game, which yields population dependent results that vary widely between different cultures.

If this kind of thing is intriguing to you, you should read William Poundstone's "Priceless", which is fabulous. Note that it is available as a Kindle e-book for less than the paper book price.

If you're the book reading type, try reading Free: The Future of a Radical Price

My copy of Winning Ways For Your Mathematical Plays signed for me personally by Berlekamp, Conway and Guy is pretty high on my list.

Intermediate Microeconomics by Hal Varian was quite useful for a course I took.

Hey! Would you be willing to review Richard Wolff's Democracy at Work - A Cure for Capitalism?

Any particular books on co-ops you are willing to recommend?

I assume you went through this?

In that case, you could just jump to the next Varian book which, if I remember correctly, is more advanced.

I reckon it beats going full MWG. Though, if you want to do that, be my guest.

As others have already said, you'll get even more of this than you want in any graduate micro textbook. I recommend either of the ones from David Kreps from where you are because I think his writing is relatively accessible and chatty. MWG is generally thought of as the definitive one, though

>but is mathematically as sophisticated as it needs to be

You can find micro textbooks at basically every level of mathematical complexity. MWG is a comprehensive overview of microeconomic theory. I don't think you need any particularly arcane math to get through it, but i wouldn't call it a page-turner either.

The pure mechanics component consists of multivariable differential calculus, a little bit of multivariable integral calculus, and a bit of linear algebra; plus substantial comfort what might be called "systems of equations differential calculus." The fastest way to cover this material is to work through the first five or so chapters of Kaplan's advanced calculus book or something similar. Do the exercises. Your basic Stewart Calculus doesn't adequately cover the systems-of-equations part and Kreyszig's Advanced Engineering Mathematics book is at the right technical level but has all the wrong emphasis and coverage for economists. Kaplan's book isn't ideal, but it's about as close as you're going to get. (This is a hole in the textbook market...)

The theoretical portion mainly consists of basic point-set topology and elementary real analysis. The fastest way to cover this material is to chop through the first eight chapters of Rudin's undergraduate book.

Yale has a lovely set of Math Camp notes that you should also work through side-by-side with Kaplan and Rudin.

To see economic applications, read those two books side-by-side with Simon and Blume's book.

The first chapter of Debreu's Theory of Value covers all the math you need to know and is super slick, but is also far too terse and technical to realistically serve as your only resource. Similarly you should peek at the mathematical appendices in MWG but they will likely not be sufficient on their own.

and Reny, yes

I found the book I was using and they make a similar comment. I appreciate the author's candor in the link you provided.

SG is the start of it. Berkelkam et al. created the necessary rules to extend this for partial, misere and other forms. Winning Ways for Mathematical Plays series does this well. You have to expand Nim to a multistacked version with some extra rules, but it is essentially the same thing.

If you find this interesting, check out Winning Ways for Your Mathematical Plays, it covers this in more depth, as well as a host of other combinatorial games. This game is in v1.

Read chapter 6 in the original Freakonomics

Please go check out Winning Ways for Your Mathematical Plays.

I haven't read SuperFreakonomics yet, I'm sure it's more of the same. The only other one I'm familiar with is Free, by Chris Anderson. I'm particularly into it because I do some stuff on filesharing. It's got a couple of different perspectives on up-and-coming issues.

You'll probably get bored if you just try to 'learn' a textbook. If I were you I'd subscribe to the economist. If you read 3 or 4 issues comprehensively you should begin to understand how things work. Then you can decide if you're still interested enough to learn the theory.

p.s This assumes you're interested in macro, if it's micro then there's no substitute for a textbook. If you're maths is up to it and you don't get bored easily then http://www.amazon.com/Intermediate-Microeconomics-Modern-Approach-Eighth/dp/0393934241/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1302690035&sr=1-1

These charts are from the book "Espresso Coffee: The Chemistry of Quality" by Andrea Illy. The book is pretty dense, expensive, and a little dated, but it's one of the few coffee books that backs up it's claims with chemistry.

http://www.amazon.com/Espresso-Coffee-Second-Edition-Science/dp/0123703719/ref=dp_ob_title_bk

(I found a copy at my local library, so I can rent it whenever I want)

Λοιπόν ανάμεσα σε διοίκηση και οικονομικά πρώτο πτυχίο κατά τη γνώμη μου, ασυζητητί οικονομικά.

Το να μάθεις σωστά και αυστηρά, πως και γιατί πηγάζουν σαν μαθηματική αναγκαιότητα όλα αυτά που μετά βρίσκουν πρακτική έκφραση μέσα από fields όπως η διοίκηση, τα χρημαστηριακά, τα logistics, το shipping, οι επιτροπές ανταγωνισμού και οι ρυθμιστικές αρχές, το marketing, το data mining και data processing and on and on,

το να μάθεις λοιπόν σωστά και αυστηρά, επανέρχομαι, γιατί λειτουργούν όπως λειτουργούν όλα τα παραπάνω, θα είναι τεράστιο συγκριτικό πλεονέκτημα για εσένα στο μέλλον έναντι των αποφοίτων αυτών των σχολών.

Το MBA είναι καλό όταν νιώθεις από data processing και κάνεις σωστό business modeling και όχι όταν είναι από το ALBA με αποφοίτους απο το BCA που η μόνη παλινδρόμηση που έχουν δει είναι η ενδοπαλάμια πεοπαλινδρόμηση ( no offence ) που έλεγε και ο Μουζουράκης.. Διαφορετικά, δια στόματος Russell Ackoff, "Τους μαθαίνουμε τρία πράγματα: πρώτον, πώς να μιλούν με αυτοπεποίθηση για πράγματα που δεν καταλαβαίνουν. Δεύτερον, τους προσφέρουμε «αρχές» οι οποίες τους βοηθούν να μην κάμπτονται όταν η πραγματικότητα συγκρούεται με τις απόψεις τους. Τρίτον, τους δίνουμε ένα πτυχίο το οποίο τους ανοίγει την πόρτα σε μια εταιρεία στην οποία μπορεί να μάθουν κάτι περί μάνατζμεντ"

Στη συγκεκριμένη φάση και για το μεσοπρόθεσμο μέλλον, κατά τη γνώμη μου δώσε πόνο αυστηρά σε Οικονομική Επιστήμη αντί για μανατζέριαλ προπτυχιακό, μετά ενίσχυσε με ένα μαστερ είτε σε οικονομική θεωρία ( pure econ ) είτε σε applied econ και δευτερευόντως ακόμα κάτι σε data mining/processing.

Όλα μαζί είναι κάτι τύπου 6 χρόνια αν δεν μαλακίζεσαι ή δεν δουλεύεις, θα μάθεις όπως πρέπει να γνωρίζεις οικονομική θεωρία, θα μάθεις κάποιες βασικές εφαρμογές με το πρώτο μαστερ και με το δεύτερο θα μάθεις πως να κάνεις research essentially σαν μέρος της δουλειάς σου ή θα πάρεις ότι χρειάζεσαι για ακαδημαϊκή πορεία.


Από τα πανεπιστήμια δεν έχω άποψη πλην ΟΠΑ οπότε δεν μπορώ να βοηθήσω

important edit: Και για όσους φοβούνται τα μαθηματικά... καμία σχέση με το approach που έχεις δει μέχρι τώρα στα μαθητικά σου χρόνια, ειδικά αν την ψάξεις την φάση και σε επίπεδο ανάλυσης αντί μόνο σε επίπεδο calculus. Πάρε όσα πιο πολλά math courses σου δίνεται η ευκαιρία να πάρεις, θα αποδειχθούν τεράστιας σημασίας στις μετέπειτα σπουδές σου, όποιες και αν είναι αυτές και όσο εφαρμοσμένες να είναι. Άσε που έχει και μια άλλη ομορφιά όταν αρχίσεις να μιλάς για το πως δομείς τα αξιώματα των preferences, πως φτιάχνεις την utility function, πως μελετάς existence. Δεν μπορώ καν να σου εξηγήσω πόσο καλύτερα μαθαίνεις μίκρο από εδώ παρά από εδώ, και όλα pretty much είναι μίκρο <3

MWG is the bible of microeconomics, but it's almost entirely unreadable. If you want a step up from Mankiw I'd start with Blanchard's Macroeconomics and Varian's Intermediate Microeconomics. These are the books I use when I teach intermediate macro/micro. The math is straight-forward (nothing beyond calculus), but you're going to be swimming in MWG or Stockey and Lucas unless you have the fundamentals down first.

The most relevant and prescient for you would be Bowles' “Microeconomics: Behavior, Institutions, and Evolution”. It’s a Ph.D. level text, but I throw some of the stuff at my undergrads because it is so well written.

http://www.amazon.com/Microeconomics-Institutions-Evolution-Roundtable-Behavioral/dp/0691091633

Lots of microeconomics. See Mas-Colell, Whinston, and Green.

It's called price anchoring, and it's the same idea that retail stores use to drive sales. I first read about it in this book, but Mint's blog has a good write-up.

For graduate (at quals-level) courses my undergrad institution used Mas-Colell, Whinston, and Green's Microeconomic Theory and Ljungqvist and Sargent's Recursive Macroeconomic Theory.

Pricey

https://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401

Coffee literature seems to be stuck in the stone age. If I were going to look for a reference, I would start here but since this book is out of print, I don't have it. If I'm spending that kind of money, it's on gear... I've come this far on my own anyhow.

This is a little bit clearer now. Your original question was:

> Does this path dependency violate any assumptions in the model?

which is still completely opaque to me. This entire notion you've come up with of some dynamic game in which you can take some paths but not others, and after you've taken some paths you can't go back and take other paths, while possibly interesting, is entirely unrelated to the environment in which the term Pareto efficiency is defined, and so cannot violate any assumptions.

Look, I don't know if you're an alternate account for /u/teryret or not.

If not, I apologize for being so snippity. Another commenter was making up a bunch of crap and it irritated me. You've got some sort of idea in your head about path dependence and what a computer scientist might call a greedy heuristic for traveling along paths. And that's fine, but it's unrelated to Pareto efficiency.

If you are an alternate account for /u/teryret, then read a textbook. You have a number of foundational misunderstandings on this topic and you're misleading a lot of people. The classic reference is Mas-Collel, Winston, Green.

read Priceless" if you are really really serious about it. Don't listen to anyone here.

All of these, even the heavy reading one, are appropriate for a beginner. Pick how big your first bite will be!

Casual:

• ABCs of Socialism by Jacobin - Overview of central elements of socialist ideologies
  
• Occupy the Economy or Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism by Richard Wolff - Criticisms of typical capitalist organization of production
  
• Principles of Communism by Engels - An overview of socialism from a marxist perspective.
  
  Moderate difficulty:
  
• The Conquest Of Bread by Kropotkin - Overview of (anarcho) communism
  
• Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels - Overview of criticisms of capitalism & early Marxism
  
• Marx's Capital Illustrated by David Smith - Deeper analysis & critique of capitalism
  
  Heavy reading:
  
• Das Capital vol 1 by Marx - Extremely deep analysis & critique of capitalism, as well as some hints to late Marxism

https://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401

Only if you're no pussy

That's rough. None of the graduate classes I took had textbooks, so I won't be able to tell you if it bores you with math or not. But there's mascollel winston greene (http://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Theory-Andreu-Mas-Colell/dp/0195073401) which is the classic one all the schools use and graduate varian (http://www.amazon.com/Microeconomic-Analysis-Third-Edition-Varian/dp/0393957357/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_4)

Intermediate Microeconomics, 8e by Varian

I dug up the schedule from the syllabus. The content shouldn't change much from professor to professor.

To me, the most important was chapter 4. Everything before it built up to it, almost everything after it was a spin-off of the material.

Tests were 50% MC, 50% free response. The questions were 90% concept-based math and equations, 10% definition-based questions. I found this in my Econ 10A folder; unfortunately I didn't save any other practice sets. Your experience may vary.

I'll have to agree with /u/MistaPickle that quite a few econ majors struggle with the math concepts. I am a stats major, math minor and I found the calculus in this class pretty chill but the econ graduate TAs struggled with it, and even the professor toned down the math explanations. I found that this hurt the learning experience. If you have trouble with it, I'd suggest going to CLAS sessions with Ed.

Personally, I'm still mostly a market anarchist because I think to have a working system, we need to assume that people will act selfishly, and take any unselfish acts as a bonus. As such, people need incentives to work on unpleasant tasks. I don't see a way to do it without property rights, but I'm open to suggestions. (Also, I think Samuel Bowle's Microeconomics has a chapter on how property rights naturally arise, without requiring any sort of imposition from the top down...that book's on my todo list.)

On the other hand, I part with some ancaps on their insistence on absolute property rights over all things. I was leaning that way due to Lessig's works, then the book The Gridlock Economy killed it off for me, in pointing out the "tragedy of the anti-commons." We need a commons, and I think there are several viable ways to provide for them (eg., assurance contracts).

At the same time, I'm not quite convinced that we've completely figured out how to solve externalities problems in an anarchist way, while also being dissilusioned about the potential for political action to make any difference, so I guess I'm sort of a minarchist aspiring to agorism.

And I suspect that when we do finally figure this stuff out, it will easily outcompete the social structures we have now. Given the work that game theorists are doing with mechanism design, I'm kinda optimistic.

Since the inception of the internet, the old media business model was doomed to fail. News, music, movies, games, etc.

Yet, as time marches on they have 3 options:

• Die out (see newspapers)
  
• Evolve (see gaming industry, DRM, digital distribution, micro-transactions)
  
• Suck the teet dry, which is what this legislation is attempting to do. certain corporations have been unable, or refused to modify their existing and failing business model, and thus, must lobby to find news ways to force consumers into less choice, less user-generated content, less freedom.
  
  Paraphrasing Chris Anderson's Free: The Future of a Radical Price, once something becomes digital and available on the internet, its price drives towards zero.

> I don't know any respected economist

Yes, even a completely destroyed position like this cannot be eliminated by your methods. You have eliminated it by other methods that you do not acknowledge -- that you fail to acknowledge so completely that you think your 'repeated demonstrations' have any bearing on the elimination of this position.

> How is that a straw man?

It isn't. It's a description of the process you immediately re-describe. Let's re-read what I said:

> by presenting carefully falsifiable straw men instead of your real position for attack, an empirical 'economist' can persevere in nonsense beliefs like "a higher minimum wage would benefit workers" - and just always be working on his next straw man

and restate it for you:

1. an 'economist' says, hm, I think a higher minimum wage would benefit workers - why, because they'll get more money! Makes sense.
   
   
2. But I can't propose this by itself - that would be 'unscientific' - so I will instead propose a carefully falsifiable assertion, test it, and then --
   
   
3. hum, it failed. Well, maybe, uh, maybe I need to control for, uh --
   
   The original position is a real economic proposition -- just a very wrong one, assailable on its own terms. The unending stream of psuedoeconomic model-assertions and predictions, what this 'economist' regards as the exercise of his science, are the straw men I refer to. They are not the real position; to propose them or to attack them is not to rebut it.
   
   > That's the very essence of scientific inquiry.
   
   By which you mean: this is what you think physicists do. Misplaced envy doesn't make a science.
   
   > And who has said "we need a new economics"
   
   Everybody says this all the time. Austrians never say this. To say that we need a 'whole new economics' flows naturally from a view of economics as a process of discovering new things to control for, to make your pet idea work: why shouldn't you also 'control for' the political party in power, or the presence or absense of dense information networks, or computers, or mass democracy? We have 'network effects' all of the sudden, so naive marginal analysis no longer suffices! Maybe socialism will work after everything is free?
   
   > "there would have been no great depression without the Fed" are unfalsifiable
   
   This is an obviously problematic counterfactual, but it has this obvious premise: the Austrian threory of the business cycle. So attack that.
   
   > "banks create money out of nothing" is unfalsifiable
   
   This is, depending on the context, an empirical statement about extant banks or an economic proposition about some kind of bank. But, here: start a fractional-reserve bank, accept some deposits, lend out more money than you have (at a 'fraction' of your 'reserve', say?), and then direct your brain at what you've just done. Does BoA also do this?
   
   > "well [Alcoa] was not a REAL monopoly."
   
   Here's me doing you, talking with and then about J. Random Economist:
   
   ME: Milk is so expensive! Why can't they just be forced to sell it at $0.20?
   
   JRE: But then you'd have a shortage.
   
   ME (to a bystander): *guffaw*, can you believe this guy? "Then you'd have a shortage"! Unbelievable! There's already not enough milk! What an ass!

> Come da titolo, se siete esperti di economia ditemi un po' dove posso trovare una trattazione divulgativa della materia o un qualche corso online.

Dunque: IEA e' abbastanza tecnico e te lo sconsiglio, ma Undercover Economist e' divertente, e puo' valer la pena di leggerlo anche solo per intrattenimento; sulla stessa riga c'e' anche Freakonomics che pero' a me e' piaciuto molto meno.

Se poi ti viene la voglia, io inizierei con un po' di microeconomia, ci sono ottimi testi universitari che pero' costano un botto; pero' in genere si trovano usati a poco. Quello di Krugmann e' molto 'easy/pop' e con poca matematica (l'ho solo sbirciato, pero'); io ne avevo uno di Perloff e non mi sembrava male (ma parlo di un bel po' di anni fa; probabilmente c'e' qualcosa di piu' aggiornato).


Per i corsi online: una mia conoscenza ha seguito un corso su Coursera di un tipo indiano (non mi ricordo), ma era orripilante: un mio amico lo seguiva, mi ha chiesto di dargli una mano, ho provato a guardare uno dei video e non ho mai visto spiegazioni cosi' vaghe e confuse. Evitalo come la peste..

Credo che qualcosa di migliore sia su Khan Academy; vale la pena di guardare. (EDIT: ho guardato ed e' un po' stringato, ti servira' un supplemento. Krugmann, Perloff o qualunque altra cosa sia disponibile usata a prezzo ragionevole; evita le traduzioni italiane, pero').

Dopo aver guardato un po' di microeconomia, potrai decidere su cosa buttarti.


Se ti interessa la finanza e ti piacciono i romanzi, leggi Liar's poker, che mi e' sembrato spettacolare. E se a questo punto ti prende l'idea di capire cosa sono mai questi misteriosi bond e derivati, c'e' un ottimo e chiarissimo (ma un po' pesante) libro di finanza di Ivo Welch disponibile online; richiede un po' di matematica ma e' chiarissimo.

Ah, visto che ora va di moda la 'behavioral economy', puoi anche leggere qualunque cosa di Dan Ariely (tipo Predictably Irrational), ed e' sempre divertentissimo (e ha fatto pure lui un corso su Coursera con cui mi sono diverito un sacco). Ma se ti interessano poi gli aspetti seri, leggi lo spettacolare Thinking fast and slow di Kahneman (premio nobel, a ragione).