Customer Reviews

Microeconomics With Calculus (2nd Edition)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

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.

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.

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.

I am a first semester non-Economics PhD student.

Text is pretty clear and concise. Prior knowledge of microeconomics is helpful and expected for the book.

Unfortunately this edition (the 2nd) seems to suffer from some errors in the answers to problems in the back of the book which makes use of it frustrating. Problems are good tests of skills for each chapter.

The book is appropriate for teaching the material it covers at the level it is geared for.

Microeconomics with Calculus is a great textbook. this is the ideal book for all those economics students who grow weary of wordy explanations of economic models when a touch of calculus say so much more. a great book for people unassociated with economics, but who have backgrounds in any math-related disciplines.

This book teaches you all you have to know about microeconomics from a technical view. The theories are set out in examples that, if you understand calculus, are a fascinating approach to learning about economics. In addition, Professor Hoffman is excellent in presenting this information in an understandable form. I ought to know, she was my micro professor fourteen years ago, an I got an "A" in her class, while I was only a "B" calculus student.

This book is a very nice book to be used in undergraduation level. For those who got a good basis in calculus, this book fits perfectly. After understanding all this book , the stundent will be ready for an advanced text. .

This book is outstanding at taking a difficult subject and making it even more inaccessible. Textbooks like this are why kids don't want to study Econ today. Dry writing, poor examples, and errors make this book a chore to learn from. If it were possible to give it zero stars, I would.

A better resource for your rusty Calc will be Haeussler, Paul, and Wood's Introductory Mathematical Analysis - which includes a section on the Lagrangian method. This is a really great (and fun, yes, fun) calc book.

A better microeconomic theory book is the Wetzstein Microeconomic Theory text.

Finally, for lighter introduction check out any of the recent econ books such as "The Undercover Economist", "Undressing the naked science", etc.

There are much better ways to make micro interesting to learn than from this book...

This is simply the worst economics book I have ever read. There are typos everywhere, the author does a horrible job of tying the economic theory to the math, and the presentation of economic material gives very few applied examples. This book makes a good sleeping aid.