Cities and the Wealth of Nations: Principles of Economic Life

I just love Jane Jacobs' viewpoints. She has so much common sense and she is able to cut through long-held misconceptions concerning the ways cities generate wealth. This otherwise boring topic takes on real life in this book. Although she passed away in 2006, her ideas span time.This book in particular examines the ways nations acquire wealth. According to Jacobs it is generated on a very basic, local level and percolates to the top. The top-down theory doesn't work. It has never worked. This book points out the fallacies of some of the most common ways municipalities attempt to pump life back into an ailing economy. These downfalls are unremitting military production, unremitting subsidies to poor regions, and heavy promotion of trade between advanced and backward economies. These three things have been the undoing of every major empire from the Roman empire onward to today.This book was a real eye-opener for me on many levels. It changed the way I think about the way cultures thrive or fail.

An oldie, but a wonderful, thoughtful, engaging book if you are interested in society... 5-stars. Not right on everything, but deserves to be read and fought over. A must read for anyone who pretends to have a college degree or HS grad who wants to be engaged in social discourse.

Jacobs contends that cities, not nations are the most active and important economic entities. This is the only book I have read that gives a rational explanation to why Mississipi is always poor, whereas the Northeast is consistently prosperous. If you are interested in the economic health of small, local economies, this is an excellent antidote to nation-based macroeconomic theory.

Jane Jacobs is brilliant. This book is a must read, very insightful. Any earnest student of economics and urban development should read this book.

This is an fascinating book on the one fact that most economists overlook: economies are centered around cities and their immediate hinterlands, not around larger territories such as states, provinces, countries, or continents.

Great book.My daughter loved it.Definitely, recommend.

Am important read for economic health within a region

Jane Jacobs is a genius. She is one of the most original and creative minds I have ever encountered. The future is with her thinking, if there is to be one.

Shows such common sense in debunking the myth that economies can be in any sort of equilibrium.Jane Jacobs was probably better placed to answer the Queen's question to the LSE than most 'professional' economists.As the Brexit negotiations start this gives some very helpful hints of what should be happening but sadly is not.The inherent energies (and traps) described in this book coupled with the urban planning views of her Death and Life book make her wisdom worth examining at any time.

Very interesting

Ugh, I miss Jane Jacobs! I do think of this as being the pinnacle of her writing achievement. (I know, I know, Decline & Rise is great, but this has a broader scope.) The central thesis is that the most important activity for regions is import-replacing, which means producing locally what is usually brought in from outside. JJ sees tariffs as being reasonable when they support this kind of development -- temporarily. Long term tariffs will actually cause the industry that is supported to decline.

An excellent read. An interesting presentation on economies how they work and could be potentially improved. Highly recommended.

another unusual take on urban planning, a must-have for people in this field or amateur interested.