fff.org — The wonderful Walter Williams, Professor of economics at George Mason Univ. has put together a ten-part series entitled "Economics for the Citizen". Williams uses plain language, common-sense examples and his special brand of humor to make the whole thing easy to understand. It's evident that Williams loves to teach and that he's a master at it.
Oct 29, 2006 View in Crawl 4
icsuOct 30, 2006
@nfultonWrong.Kids are an investment that will pay-off in the future. Old people worked during their lives to earn pensions. And disabled and partially the other two groups make currently economically active population (its part, at least) work more so that they can support them.
mikeunwiredOct 30, 2006
"Buried as inaccurate because the title and description do not disclose that this is a libertarian partisan site and that the "economics lesson" is deeply skewed towards libertarian ideology."The site the digg link takes us to is not the original channel for delivery. And, even if it was, the piece should be judged on its own merits, not on the hosting site. Saying it's not a valid piece is like saying that everything on the Internet must be wrong because Drudge is on the Internet.Specifically, what facts in the piece do you dispute? What facts make it libertarian propaganda rather than instructively useful economic summary?NOTHING and I mean NOTHING should be taken as gospel regardless of how well it's written or how credentialed the author is. Everything we read should be thought about, discussed and taken-in to expand our minds. But, that doesn't make the title inaccurate in the least.
argoffOct 30, 2006
I'll teach economics in one lesson:In a healthy economy there is a near fixed amount of money. That tends to keep prices stable over time and tends to limit excesses of debt, hoarding, and speculative bubbles, while encouraging thrift and savings. In the US economy there is not a fixed amount of money. All money loaned out by the federal reserve bank is printed up out of thin air. That tends to encourage excessive amounts of debt, discourage savings, and create bubbles in housing, stocks, bonds, and lots of other things as well as drive up prices over time. Hey lookie - the US has record high debt rates, record low savings rates, and a housing bubble coming off of a dot.com crash and prices have gone up about 20 times since 1915. Hmmm, the gravy train is running out. People had better buy precious metals.
mouskyOct 30, 2006
That's not economics in one lesson. That's monetary policy in one lesson.
xevecOct 30, 2006
this article is interesting. He at times does make blanket statements like "free-market generates most over-all wealth." I bet he does explain it later(but I'm only on part 3 at the time of the writing) but still, I wish he would make a better explanation of it.A funny statement so far I like was this comment:I’m reminded of charges of exploitation Mrs. Williams used to make early on in our 44-year marriage. She’d charge, “Walter, you’re using me!” I’d respond by saying, “Honey, sure, I’m using you. If I had no use for you, I wouldn’t have married you in the first place.” How many of us would marry a person for whom we had no use? As a matter of fact, the problem of the lonely hearts among us is that they can’t find someone to use them.I remember an article on Mises during valentine's day...discussing private property. The economist said he was confused when his girlfriend said "you treat me like property." He was confused because he didn't understand how that was bad. I mean, he was protecting her, treating her well, as well as being good to her. So how could she hate this? He didn't understand...so she broke up with him.<a class="user" href="http://www.mises.org/story/2058">http://www.mises.org/story/2058</a>Here is the article if anybody wants to read it.
jeffiekOct 30, 2006
He at times does make blanket statements like "free-market generates most over-all wealth."My interpretation:On the first page is this:"Which is the best method to resolve conflict issues surrounding the questions of what’s to be produced, how and when it’s produced, and who’s going to get it? Is it the market mechanism, government fiat, gifts, or violence?"We can eliminate gifts since they don't produce wealth, just change ownership.. Government fiat is simply the threat of violence so it can be treated in the same manner as violence. Both fall under the "broken window fallacy" which shows that violence doesn't produce wealth, it merely redistributes it (and at a loss). Elimination leaves the market mechanism.
jerbakerNov 5, 2006
I'm sorry. Here is this pesky well-known liberal bias of reality working against the nuts. I hate the liberal bias in reality. Someone should launch an investigation.Anyway, you have the phrase, "free to accept or reject". Do you know there's another word that we have in English for "accepting or rejecting"? It's called "choice". "Free to accept or reject" is synonymous with "free choice." If you don't have free choice, you are NOT free to accept or reject. If you don't understand that you are an idiot.Let's work on your limited grasp of the word "exploitation." Exploitation only means "utilization." I know you have all kinds of emotional meaning attached to it, so even if we assume it means the more emotionally charged "selfish utilization," it's still not an inaccurate statement. That's what capitalism is all about. It's people acting in their own self-interest without regard for the interest of others'. If that makes you angry your beef is with capitalism and not with me.No wonder our kids are getting dumber every year is this is what passes as education.
jerbakerNov 5, 2006
Nice comment system.I'm sorry. Here is this pesky well-known liberal bias of reality working against the nuts. I hate the liberal bias in reality. Someone should launch an investigation.Anyway, you have the phrase, "free to accept or reject." You do know that if you do not have "free choice" then you are NOT free to accept or reject anything. That's what we call an underlying principal. If you can't understand that you probably can't even comprehend the article anyway. And it is still dishonest to suggest, imply, or claim that the choice between the two alternatives is a free choice. It is a choice to be sure, but one that has been artificially forced by other acting contrary to the interests of our "choser."Now, on to your issues understanding the term "exploitation." Exploitation only means "to utilize." However, seeing as how you seem to assign some other sinister meaning to it, we can work with the common definition "selfish utilization." That's what capitalism is all about buddy. Milton Freedman (one of your heroes I'm sure) said it best when he wrote, "there is one and only one social responsibility of business–to use it resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits." He even calls the idea of social responsibility "fundamentally subversive" in his book, "Capitalism and Freedom." If the idea that capitalism is about people acting in their own selfish interests without regard to the effects of their actions makes you angry, your beef is with capitalism not me.
miseseanNov 7, 2006
"If the idea that capitalism is about people acting in their own selfish interests without regard to the effects of their actions makes you angry, your beef is with capitalism not me."Renn Zaphiropoulos understood: "the only way to succeed in business is to satisfy a need for a profit. If you satisfy a need at no profit, that's philanthropy. If you satisfy no need at a profit, then you're a crook."
jerbakerNov 16, 2006
Opportunity costs have nothing to do with money. They have to do with what you give up. If I want to work 16 hours a day to earn more money, I give up some or all of my social life, free time, etc. That's an opportunity cost.You are also looking at the concept of "wanting" differently than is suggested by economic theory. Sure, everyone can dream about having unlimited things but that's not what we're talking about. Unlimited wants in the sense of economics means that no matter how much of something a person has, they will still want more of that same thing. That is so totally obviously false that it doesn't need further explanation.
jerbakerNov 16, 2006
"Where in the article does it say the offer was artificially forced?"Come on, you're not that stupid. You MUST be pulling this to bolster your failing argument. My whole beef with that part of the article is that it DOESN'T say the choice is artificial when it really is. It's an artificial choice because the employer in this case has artificially limited the scope of options available to the employee."Now as for honesty, I note that you conveniently skipped my charge of fraud over your implication that "starving to death" is in the article."Nowhere did I suggest "starving to death" is in the article. What I did say was that it's not a free choice to forced to pick between starving to death and getting paid $2 an hour. Your dishonesty is irritating. I will grant you that much."I don't have a beef with capitalism."If you have a problem with the fact that the underpinning of the entire capitalist system is the threat of starvation and death in order to get people to auction off a large portion of their life to the highest bidder, then yes you do have a problem with capitalism. If you don't have a problem with that, then you don't have a problem with capitalism. It's not something I made up, you either believe in it or you don't. You can't just say you like capitalism while at the same time claiming not to like the very foundations of it.You're right. I don't like capitalism at all. I don't think I ever suggested otherwise.
mydaveJul 24, 2008
If you know math, then economics will be easy to understand. <a class="user" href="http://www.shpe-sac.org">http://www.shpe-sac.org</a><a class="user" href="http://www.ocflex.com/">http://www.ocflex.com/</a> <a class="user" href="http://www.trgovinca.org">http://www.trgovinca.org</a><a class="user" href="http://www.chasr.org/">http://www.chasr.org/</a>
refrozenFeb 26, 2009
or just start reading economic news... <a class="user" href="http://www.politonomist.com/">http://www.politonomist.com/</a> is a pretty good source of indepth economic analysis