Microeconomics With Calculus (2nd Edition) [Paperback]

Brian R. Binger (Author), Elizabeth Hoffman (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0321012259 | ISBN-13: 978-0321012258 | Publication Date: October 13, 1997 | Edition: 2

Microeconomics with Calculus integrates the graphical and mathematical development of basic microeconomic theory and stresses the relationships between the two approaches. Numerous numerical, mathematical, and graphical examples relating to real-world economic decisions and policy issues appear throughout, providing a meaningful context for microeconomic students.

Product Details

• Paperback: 633 pages
• Publisher: Addison Wesley; 2 edition (October 13, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0321012259
• ISBN-13: 978-0321012258
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 7.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #757,784 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing out-of-date text, May 15, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Microeconomics With Calculus (2nd Edition) (Paperback)

This textbook is the assigned textbook for an intermediate micro class that I was asked to teach. I have been very dissatisfied with the book. I would strongly encourage professors/lecturers to use an alternative text.

A strength of this book is the large number of examples and worked problems. As a book for people who are applying calculus to economics for the first time this is very helpful. However, some of the problems are messier than they need to be, and, more importantly, there is not much of an attempt to link the mathematics with economic intuition, which should be the main objective of a text at this level.

This book has a number of weaknesses, which I will list below:

1) This is the 2nd edition of a 1988 text. Almost nothing has been changed between the two editions except for swapping the order of two chapters (a beneficial change). The references are all exactly the same. The book recommends texts on game theory from the early 80s which are very dated. As an example of an athlete with market power in the labor market they list Fernando Valenzuela, who has not been a superstar for at least 10 years!

2) The text repeatedly discusses the work of experimental economists. While the authors are candid about their possibly biased views about the importance of this field, there is just no place for experimental economics in an intermediate micro text like this. Their brief discussions about experimental work are not successful in conveying what experiments have contributed to our understanding of microeconomics; these discussions merely distract students from the more important objectives in this book.

3)Several times when the authors write about applications of microeconomics, their discussion is simply incorrect. For example, they introduce the Loeb-Magat mechanism for regulating monopolists and claim that it is impractical because the government would need to observe the monopolist's cost. In fact, the government's information challenge here is to know the demand curve, not the firm's cost.

4)Their chapters on production are very disorganized, especially the section on cost functions. The material is not tied together well. They cover obscure and confusing material like biased technological change, while they do not present the simple revealed profitability proof of upward sloping supply functions and downward sloping factor demand functions. They also do not show the connection between total cost and the area under the market supply curve, which they implicitly use for welfare analysis.

5) While this is only an intermediate level text, some theorems should be stated as such, or at least described more precisely. For example the result that complete, transitive, reflexive and continuous preferences can be represented by a utility function could be stated more formally, as could the welfare theorems.

There is a clear need for a good text at this level. Unfortunately, this book has too many problems to fill this need. It is especially disappointing that the 1998 edition is less useful than the 1988 edition was when it was introduced.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Do they know what it means to proof-read?, December 23, 1999

By 

STEVEN R MILLER - See all my reviews

This review is from: Microeconomics With Calculus (2nd Edition) (Paperback)

The idea of this book is fantastic, but there are so many typographical errors in the answers, examples and references. Completely frustrating. The way the math is presented (when accurate) is extremely eloquent, thought the explanations are not, and the reader must determine when the book is accurate.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Pretty good despite the criticisms, May 14, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Microeconomics With Calculus (2nd Edition) (Paperback)

This book isn't perfect, but it is much better than the other reviewers indicate. The best thing about it is that it is more or less self-contained. All of the necessary math can be found in the first chapters, and there are lots of worked-out examples. It's pretty well written too. Problems include: too many typos and an ugly typeface. The graphs are nicely done, though. Its most obvious competitors are Intermediate Microeconomics by Varian and Microeconomic Theory: Basic Principles and Extensions by Nicholson. Varian hides all the math in brief appendices and a supplementary workbook, and Nicholson's book is good but much too expensive.

Hopefully a third edition will address some of the problems with this book. In the meantime, it is a reasonable choice for a microeconomics text.