Aims of This Text

There are a lot of introductory economics texts. Why write another? One reason is as obvious as your computer screen: this will be an experiment in the use of a new technology, the World-Wide Web, to present the basic text materials. There are things we can do with this technology that we cannot do with print. But there is a danger in this. As a teacher of economics, I don't want my students to focus on the technology and miss the economics! And I have sometimes seen that happen. But everything new has risks, and we will just have to be alert for this problem and do what we can to avoid it, you and I.

Another reason is to present the material in a different and, we hope, better way. Economics is a conversation that has been going on for over two hundred years. And the conversation is continuing today. There are issues that are not resolved, but there are also some very important things we have learned. The conversation is not limited to professional economists, of course, but involves responsible citizens in our democratic republics. The main objective of this text is to introduce the student to that conversation, as professional economists have participated in it, and thus enable the student to participate more effectively (as a citizen and manager) in the discussion as it goes on. In some fields, the introductory material is presented as a historical survey -- the basic ideas presented as they came along in the history of the subject, and put in context that way. Philosophy is an example of this. In other fields, the basic texts are written as if the field had no history at all. Mathematics is an example of this. Economics texts are usually somewhere in the middle, but a little closer to the mathematics end of the spectrum. In thirty years of teaching economics, I have come to the conclusion that we need to come a little closer to the philosophy end of the spectrum, and this text will try to put economics in the context of that ongoing conversation.

Another reason to approach economics this way is that economics is a field full of controversy. There is a joke that economists can never agree with one another. That's not quite fair -- there is much that economists do agree on, and much of that is important -- but there are also issues that remain open in economics, issues on which well-informed, intelligent people can disagree. And that should not be a surprise. These issues are even more controversial among the general public. I believe we can understand these issues in a more even-handed way by seeing economics clearly as a conversation -- usually with two or more sides.

Plan of the Chapter