Recently Mentioned Books

7. John Stuart Mill: Autobiography (yes, for economics) and his Some Essays on Unsettled Questions in Political Economy (Kindle edition is free).  Mill has underrated depth as an economic thinker and he encompassed virtually all of the interesting trends of his time.  That was both his greatest strength and his biggest weakness.

4. The early marginalists: I'll recommend Samuel Bailey on value and Mountifort Longfield on price theory .  Yet still it was a (temporary) dead end and you should read them with that puzzle in mind.  At what level of technical sophistication do the contributions of marginalism suddenly seem impressive?

4. The early marginalists: I'll recommend Samuel Bailey on value and Mountifort Longfield on price theory .  Yet still it was a (temporary) dead end and you should read them with that puzzle in mind.  At what level of technical sophistication do the contributions of marginalism suddenly seem impressive?

3. David Ricardo, Principles of Political Economy , the first six chapters.  Rigor arrives, though at the expense of truth.  Still there is something to it.  Supplement with Mark Blaug on Ricardo , if you want the model spelt out mathematically.

The author is Steven Bryan, a historian, and the subtitle is Rising Powers, Global Money, and the Age of Empire .  This book offers a great deal of previous unpresented information on the operation of the gold standard in Japan, Russia, Turkey, and Argentina, based on original rather than secondary sources.  Here is a summary paragraph at the end of the book:

I spent about ninety minutes browsing this new book , but found it only moderately interesting, with more emphasis on the "moderately" than the "interesting."  If you're obsessed with Twain, you'll find it worth the $20, but the above paragraphs sum up the main problem with the text.

It is a very powerful book and I can recommend this review and this review .  Along somewhat related lines, some of you may wish to read Paul R. Gregory's Politics, Murder, and Love in Stalin's Kremlin: The Story of Nikolai Bukharin and Anna Larina .  Bukharin, of course, was also an economist.  Here is Gregory on the book .  Here is Gregory on Germany's currently low unemployment rate .

The author is Timothy Snyder and the subtitle is Europe Between Hitler and Stalin .  I learned that this period was even bloodier and more brutal than I had thought:

Mortensen has a whole book on wage dispersion , reviewed here .  The key question is why workers with similar characteristics often are paid differently and the answers lie in job search frictions.

Diamond has written a great deal on social security, often at the applied level.  Here is his paper criticizing social security privatization in Chile for its high costs.  Here is his survey on social security reform proposals .  Here is his paper on macro and social security reform .  Here is a very good European talk he gave on pension issues.  Diamond wrote a book with Peter Orszag on social security and he has been a major influence on Democratic Party thinking on this issue; the book looks ...

I do the same, I should add.  That passage is from Stanley Cavell, one of America's leading philosophers.  If you're looking for a book which steps outside the usual mode of strict narrative, I recommend this highly, but it will leave many people frustrated.  You can buy it here .

That is all from the new Bill Bryson book , subtitled A Short History of Private Life , which is both entertaining and informative.

That's for literature , sadly he never had the chance to win a prize for economics, as his political career as a Peruvian classical liberal was cut short by electoral defeat.  He has many fine books but I have two particular favorites: The War of the End of the World (serious and epic, concerning a millenarian revolt in Brazil) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (a fun story and spoof of telenovela culture). Conversation in the Cathedral is sometimes considered a classic but I find it unreadabl...

That's for literature , sadly he never had the chance to win a prize for economics, as his political career as a Peruvian classical liberal was cut short by electoral defeat.  He has many fine books but I have two particular favorites: The War of the End of the World (serious and epic, concerning a millenarian revolt in Brazil) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (a fun story and spoof of telenovela culture). Conversation in the Cathedral is sometimes considered a classic but I find it unreadabl...

That's for literature , sadly he never had the chance to win a prize for economics, as his political career as a Peruvian classical liberal was cut short by electoral defeat.  He has many fine books but I have two particular favorites: The War of the End of the World (serious and epic, concerning a millenarian revolt in Brazil) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (a fun story and spoof of telenovela culture). Conversation in the Cathedral is sometimes considered a classic but I find it unreadabl...

That's for literature , sadly he never had the chance to win a prize for economics, as his political career as a Peruvian classical liberal was cut short by electoral defeat.  He has many fine books but I have two particular favorites: The War of the End of the World (serious and epic, concerning a millenarian revolt in Brazil) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (a fun story and spoof of telenovela culture). Conversation in the Cathedral is sometimes considered a classic but I find it unreadabl...

That's for literature , sadly he never had the chance to win a prize for economics, as his political career as a Peruvian classical liberal was cut short by electoral defeat.  He has many fine books but I have two particular favorites: The War of the End of the World (serious and epic, concerning a millenarian revolt in Brazil) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (a fun story and spoof of telenovela culture). Conversation in the Cathedral is sometimes considered a classic but I find it unreadabl...

That's for literature , sadly he never had the chance to win a prize for economics, as his political career as a Peruvian classical liberal was cut short by electoral defeat.  He has many fine books but I have two particular favorites: The War of the End of the World (serious and epic, concerning a millenarian revolt in Brazil) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (a fun story and spoof of telenovela culture). Conversation in the Cathedral is sometimes considered a classic but I find it unreadabl...

5. State of Play , good British TV show on journalism and politics, recommended.

6. John Quiggin, Zombie Economics: How Dead Ideas Still Walk Among Us , reviewed by Arnold Kling .

5. Steve Hely, How I Became a Famous Novelist .

4. Steven Rattner, Overhaul: An Insider's Account of the Obama Administration's Emergency Rescue of the Auto Industry .  An entertaining account of economic policy making inside the Obama administration.

3. Barry Eichengreen, Exorbitant Privilege: The Decline of the Dollar and the Future of the International Monetary System .

2. Robert L. Tignore, Egypt: A Short History .  A good introduction and overview.

1. J.G. Ballard, Miracles of Life: Shanghai to Shepperton An Autobiography , self-recommending.