The Instant Economist: Everything You Need to Know About How the Economy Works

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This review is being written from the perspective of someone who has studied economics for a lifetime and taught it to college students. I have come to realize that when an introduction to economics is presented as if it were designed to be the first course among many for economics majors, it is invariably deemed by most people to be quite boring. However, when economics is presented and explained as the study of how people make decisions in life, all of a sudden it becomes much more interesting. This book takes the second approach, and the author does a good job summarizing a variety of key concepts in short chapters of about eight pages each. You can read the chapters in any order (or even skip some) and still gain a lot of useful information.Importantly, this book is not written using either an academic or overly simplistic approach. With a minimum of work, the average person can understand the material and not feel insulted. Almost equally importantly, the book is written in a blessedly non-partisan style.Before I opened the book, I very quickly sketched out the most important topics I thought it should address: scarcity, opportunity costs, the role of prices, "marginal" analysis, monetary and fiscal policies, specialization and trade, and externalities. Upon reading the book, I found all of these topics addressed and many more: the interplay of supply and demand in market equilibrium, elasticity, the Federal Reserve, international exchange rates, personal finance, etc.Would I give this book to someone with an interest in economics if they had precious little background in the subject? Absolutely yes. And I'd bet they would enjoy it.

I'm sure i'm not alone when I say that economics is boring but nevertheless important. I decided to read this book because I wanted to learn more about economics. In the beginning the author made evident that he set out to objectively cover economics so the reader can have greater understanding when it comes to economic talk, from pundits on tv or a debate with friends. He achieves this for the most part. The book is not long and every discussed topic does not drag on. It transitions fairly well and there is a congenial authenticity when it comes to the author's tone (he knows the subject enough to simply explain things). I've seen many of these topics before but I wouldn't claim to know much if anything about economics. Because it is so mundane and hard to focus on, I still don't feel at ease with the subject but I certainly feel better for the book and recommend it for anyone who is just trying broad and preliminary understanding of economics.Note that this book is divided into two sections: the first half is dedicated to Micro-Economics and the latter half is designated for Macro. Micro was more interesting to me.4.3/5

Hopefully governments can start seeing the economic conditions laid out nicely in this book. I highly recommend reading it for all levels.

Most books on basic economic for beginners are politically biased, unrepresentative of what economic theory really says, and often present theories that are bizarre and quite unfounded. The great strength of this book is that it just presents the theory as it is taught in most economics departments around the world. This is very, very rare indeed.The author is a well-know economist who has run the most widely read journal among economists, the Journal of Economic Perspectives. What he says is what in fact economic theory says.I think the author should write a longer book in which he explores some key issues missing from this book. One is to give solid advice on personal investment, and a second is to apply the theory to evaluating important social policy questions. He doesn't have to come down on one or the other side of a debate, but rather to state clearly what economic theory has to add to the evaluation of issues.

Fantastic book. As a professional athlete, I have never spend much time in school since 9th grade. I am 20 something today. It is scary to know so little at this age, and I found this book while searching for terms I did not understand about economics. Reading this book was the best reading/self-studying decision I have made in 2015.Before the book, I'll come across some economic terms in articles or news, and I will Google to try to understand what it meant. It was fragmented, and I hardly got the "big picture", or understood anything to help me level up to more advanced understanding.This book helped me to kinda "hang all the grapes in the vine", and gave me a much better understanding of the topic rather systematically.This book got me so interested in economics, that now I am following up the reading with The Great Courses where the author teaches.Thank you Timothy Taylor! I hope to come across more authors like you in various other topics that I would like to learn more on.

This is the Reader's Digest version of Prof. Taylor's Teaching Company course on Economics. Prof. Taylor is a FUN guy, believe it or not, with a decent sense of humor. The book (especially the course) is NOT DRY. But it certainly IS informative. It's a must read for anyone who wants to understand basic Economics that can be applied to everyday life. Even better, it will allow you to see right through the lies our politicians tell you, who, in most cases, never took an economics class in their lives. This book is IDEAL as a primer to Economics and should be read by anyone who is unclear on, but highly opinionated when it comes to capitalism and what makes the world go round.

This should be required reading for everybody who wants to offer an opinion on the economy and what politicains are doing right or wrong.It gives you the minimum required, coherent explantions in easy-to-read sections with good easy-to-understand examples and where policy decisions are divergent, explains both sides of the argument so you know where politicians are coming from. It is organised logically and accessibly.It also helps you to look incredibly knowledgeable at dinner parties. You end up stopping conversations and you realise just how tribal so much of economic politics is and just how little loud-mouthed people really know. Most politicians know less than what is contained in this little book.

Easy to read and the author explains things with such ease and clarity. The author is remarkably concise too, with an elegance to way he constructs each chapter.

A few years ago, I followed Prof. Tim Taylor's course in Economics. It was one of the best courses I had ever taken on the subject, with prof. Taylor being one of the best teachers of the subject in my experience over the past 50 years. Taylor has a gift for simplifying concepts which are often over-complicated by 'wannabees' who have have not the love, the grasp, nor the respect for the "study of the allocation of scarce resources having alternative uses" ( Tomas Sowell, Basic Economics).This book 'upgrades' that course and begins with the questions:"what should be produced by a Society; How should it be produced, and who gets to consume what gets produced?" the reader sees immediately, the answering these 3 simple questions can lead the reader to run the gamut of sociopolitical, economic constitutions from Libertarian, Republican Democracies to Totalitarian fear societies. The answers, like the questions, are economic, and although the concepts a often simple; they cover a lot of ground.To tackle the answers to these questions, you must try to 'Think like and Economist'. Buy this book, and love it!

A very good foundational book on economic principles. Pretty much has everything an average person needs to know about how the economy works. It'll get you informed enough to understand financial jargon and I don't think you'd ever feel lost again, in a conversation about the "economy".

great primer for all beginners. basic concepts of economics explained in a gist.