I’m starting to get extremely interested in economics and I’m slightly scared that if I get a hold of a bad book/author in my beginning stages of learning that it will screw me up for good. AR constantly mentions Mises and Austrian Economics. Should I start reading Austrian tilted books or are there better books with which to build my economic foundation on?
Henry Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson is quite good for debunking many economic myths such as Full Employment, Unions, and much more. So far Ludwig von Mises’ Human Action seems to be pretty good (albeit I am still on chapter one.) George Reisman’s Capitalism is supposedly very good, as it synthesizes Austrian Economics with Objectivism.
Keep in mind there is no such thing as official “Objectivist Economics.” For an introduction to the study of economics, I would recommend The Wordly Philosophers by Heilbroner. For an introduction to solid economic principles, I would suggest Hazlitt’s work. For information on business cycles, I sent this list to a poster here in private at one point:
The General Theory of[…] by Keynes
The Theory of Money and Credit by Mises
Austrian Theory of the Trade Cycle by Mises
Prices and Production by Hayek
Time and Money by Garrison
Business Cycles by Schumpeter
Recessions and Depressions: Understanding Business Cycles by Knoop
Many of Milton Friedman’s works are also good. Read everything you can get your hands on and form your own opinions. Keep in mind that a lot of work needs to be done in economic methodology. If you have access to economic journals, you can find some good articles there as well. The “Journal of Economic Perspectives” is one of the least technical and often has quality work.
Henry Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson is quite good for debunking many economic myths such as Full Employment, Unions, and much more. So far Ludwig von Mises’ Human Action seems to be pretty good (albeit I am still on chapter one.) George Reisman’s Capitalism is supposedly very good, as it synthesizes Austrian Economics with Objectivism.
I must agree with you on that. Economics in One Lesson is also recommended by Dr. Peikoff, which is reason enough for me to read it. If you happen to Google it, many pdf or HTML versions of the book come back as a result. I thought it was public domain at first, but upon research I’m almost 100% sure that these are illegal copies. It’s not hard to find this book used online, for cheap.
Also Capitalism: An Unknown Ideal, of course, if you haven’t read it already. If you’re interested in “Objectivist Economics,” this is it. A little difficult to grasp, but it definitely reveals many economic myths in its naked ugliness. Definitely worth a read.
I’ve not read it yet, but I hear Andrew Bernstein’s The Capitalist Manifesto is good.
I’ll add my vote to Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson. It’s an easy read, very accessible, succinct and complete.
http://fee.org/library/books/economics-in-one-lesson/
Apparently, the Foundation for Economic Education has a special edition available in PDF format.
Read this book.
I’m starting to get extremely interested in economics and I’m slightly scared that if I get a hold of a bad book/author in my beginning stages of learning that it will screw me up for good. AR constantly mentions Mises and Austrian Economics. Should I start reading Austrian tilted books or are there better books with which to build my economic foundation on?
There are two approaches to studying economics: reading economic treatises by Hayek, Mises, Menger, etc or getting a broad but shallow overview from many essays. If you are actually willing to read an original treatise, do so by all means, but don’t wear yourself out on a single work and miss the bigger picture.
Here are some books to read:
- Economics in One Lesson
- Economics for Real People
- Economic Calculation In The Socialist Commonwealth
There are some important essays here: http://mises.org/misesuniv.asp
Also, some self-promotion: http://oneminute.rationalmind.net/category/economics/
I’ve not read it yet, but I hear Andrew Bernstein’s The Capitalist Manifesto is good.
It’s not anything like an economics textbook though. It discusses philosophy and gives a lot of history and debunks a lot of asshat socialist myths.
On second thought I shouldn’t have crossed out “asshat.”
It is an excellent book (when Bernstein told me it was 500 pages my jaw dropped–it was such a great read it hadn’t seemed that long!) but probably not what you are looking for at the moment.
“Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy” by Thomas Sowell
I second, George Reisman’s “Capitalism”. It is a tour de force in a class by itself.
I’ve been told that Jean-Baptiste Say’s “A Treatise on Political Economy” is the best work on economics for Objectivists. Is this true, and how does it compare to “Human Action” by Ludwig von Mises?
In case you’d like to check it out, Say’s treatise is online, as is Mises’s “Human Action”.
Of those two, I would suggest the former, particularly if its among the first 10 books one reads on economics. In general, the classical scholars tend to be less abstract that Mises.
I recommend you to read the following books, in the following order:
Economics in one lesson by Henry Hazlitt: https://www.aynrandbookstore2.com/prodinfo.asp?number=DH01B
Economics for real people by Gene Callahan: http://mises.org/resources/2031
Markets don’t fail! by Brian P Simpson: https://www.aynrandbookstore2.com/prodinfo.asp?number=DS81B
Economic Policy by Ludwig von Mises: http://mises.org/etexts/ecopol.pdf
Capitalism: A Treatise on Econmics by George Reisman: http://www.capitalism.net/Capitalism/CAPITALISM_Internet.pdf
Human Action by Ludwig von Mises: http://mises.org/resources/3250
Knast got it. George Reisman’s “Capitalism” is pretty damn good.
Personally, my view is that if one intends to read Mises, they should probably start with Menger. If you hit up the Ludwig Von Mises institute, you can order Carl Menger’s Principles of Economics, which will lay the basic foundation for the rest of the Austrian school. It can be a bit of a troublesome read (the grammar employed is not something I’d personally encountererd elsewhere, possibly because it was originally written in german), but it will prepare you for thinking like an Austrian Economist. From there, Human Action and pretty much anything by Mises or Hayek makes for a good route.
Milton Friedman’s TV series “Free to Choose” is now available free online.
(Friedman presented mostly classical economics ideas – with all its flaws, but still a valuable introduction.)