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An Introduction to Economic Reasoning

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... but found nobody whom to ask?

This book is definitely the way out. It has everything a beginner's textbook is asking for. Witty writing, step-by-step explanations, practical examples. By the way you understand what is meant with concepts and theories economists use to explain to us why a certain policy should be pursued or abolished, like the labor theory of value, price controls, minimum wages, and different currency systems. And before you know you understand what is behind the arguments of current policy issues, what are the true and the false arguments, misleading paths, right or wrong theories behind them.

The author is not soft on the issues, but uses logical reasoning and explains in every step the possible fallacies. In the end - if one likes it or not - one has to follow his cogent conclusions about the way markets work in a free society and how government intervention affects those outcomes.

AN INTRODUCTION TO ECONOMIC REASONING is probably the first book you want to read if you are planning on studying economics. Although this work is called an introduction to "economic reasoning," it is perhaps more accurately considered an introduction to economics as such.

This book is quite basic, and could be profitably used by high school students or anyone without a knowledge of economics. It hits many of the basic topics in economics, such as marginal utility, supply and demand, and money. It is from the Austrian perspective, so it could save a high schooler from years of unlearning. The only drawback is that although it contains many useful study questions, it doesn't include the answers (nor is there, from what I can tell, a teacher's guide).

Dr. David Gordon is associated with the Ludwig von Mises Institute, the nation's premier free enterprise think tank. The Institute has published another work - ECONOMICS FOR REAL PEOPLE by Gene Callahan - that is more advanced and would make an excellent follow-up work.

This is a very good book for a high school economics 101 course. This book should be read by every high school student. The ideas are put forth in a very straight foward manner that is almost too easy to understand. If you have any knowledge about ecomomics, do not get this. You will be board with the concepts Gordon goes over.

As the author states in the introduction this book is written from the viewpoint of the Austrian School of economics. More precisely it follows the teachings of Ludwig von Mises. Von Mises based his economic theories on a single axiom: "Man acts to achieve an end." From this single axiom he drew all his consequences that led him to the conclusion that free market is not bound to a specific economic system but rooted in the very nature of man.

Von Mises himself might have done better, but David Gordon does not succeed in showing what should prevent men from achieving their ends by non-market means like for example enslaving other people. That is at least what people did for thousands of years. But observations like this would not be taken into consideration by Misesian economists: Von Mises based his economic theories entirely on deductive logic and viewed empirical facts as simply irrelevant. The reader should take into account that this book follows a sectarian approach which is rejected as methodically inadequate by mainstream economics as well as by other members of the Austrian School.

The autor is well versed in logic and writes a witty prose but he employed his abilities to write a right-wing propaganda pamphlet disguised as textbook. David Gordon makes out numerous enemies: Sociology, progressive schools, Hillary Clinton, trade unions, taxes, the New Deal, Minimum Wages, any kind of state intervention. The state is the villain anyway.

In its essence this book presents a cynical viewpoint. We learn for example that "the marginal sellers will exit the market". But what does it mean if a marginal seller of labor exits the market in a society without welfare system? Thomas Robert Malthus was the last economist that dared to be explicit about this point: "Exiting the market" means starving to death in this case.

David Gordon's promise is that in a completely deregulated marked there will be no unemployment. But will the sellers of labor also be able to make a living from their wages? David Gordon does not bother to answer this point but we can call the founder of the Austrian School to the rescue: Carl Menger stated in his Principles of economics (1871): "Experience also informs us that many labor services cannot be exchanged by the laborer even for the most necessary means of subsistence... In Berlin, a seamstress working 15 hours a day cannot earn what she needs for her subsistence. Her income covers food, shelter, and firewood, but even with the most strenuous industry she cannot earn enough for clothing."