/lit/ - Literature

>>17440491
Yeah good book

>>17440491
no, economics is not a science. Only atheist hegelian types who jsut push maths as a tool for study manage to delude themselves that what they do is about reality and not making up a huge delusion.

And by the way economics is not verifiable.

>>17440502
Nothing is a science, nigger

>>17440502
...so to pursue and be knowledgeable about economic endeavors and topics (crypto, stocks, investing...) I should read...? What?

>>17440502

It's a solid read. Sowell is great.

>>17440502
>Only atheist hegelian types who jsut push maths as a tool for study
full retard

>>17440529
I posted my personal list in another thread asking for a /biz/ reading list. If I had to recommend only one book from that list in order to become a trader though, it would be "Mind over Markets". However if you want to become an investor then maybe "Personal Finance and Investments: A Behavioural Finance Perspective" would make a good entry point.

>>17440491
The problem with Sowell is that he is from the Chicago School of economics, economics isn't a hard science, it's a social science, closer to philosophy than physics.
If you want to learn economics you should try to approach it from a plurality, where every school of economics hit a certain type of wall.
I recommended everyone to watch this lecture:
https://youtu.be/9aK4OztueuE

>>17440502
>science
the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment.
>Economics
the branch of knowledge concerned with the production, consumption, and transfer of wealth.

Just because you are to much a tard to understand economics doesn't make it less of a science. It is more of a science the philosophy is.

wealth of nations first if you don't know anything. makes sure you know the basics and is a very light read.

>>17440491
henry hazlitt economics in one lesson is better

>>17440491
It's more of a conservative polemic for free trade and such. Thomas Sowell has been a political commentator for 40 years so his income has had more to do with saying the right things than actually having to understand markets.

>>17440529
>crypto, stocks, investing
This has little to do with "economics". You should actually look into people who actually have some track record there... (although obviously something like crypto is much to young to have anything to be taken to seriously).

>>17440583
You can set out your own methodological criterion but that doesn't mean everyone is following it. You'll find lots of people online who believe in a hardcore form of "Austrianism" that claims observation and experiment is counterproductive and all relevant knowledge only exists outside of that.

I have a master's degree in Economics from New York University.
I've learned very little of value. All you basically need to know is this:
- Low international trade barriers good
- Free market is good except for in the case of market failures. With goods prone to market failures, heavy handed government intervention is good. Read up on market failures on wikipedia, as well as "negative and positive externalities", "public goods", "non-rivalrous goods", "monopolies" and "high barriers to entry". These are features that cause market failures, mainly.
- Governments have gotten much better at handling economic crises, mostly through a thing called "quantitative easing". Basically, government pouring billions into private companies in times of economic downturn = Good.
- FED = Good (unironically, don't believe the poltards)

That's the quick rundown. You can now proceed to study a more valuable and meaningful discipline.

>>17440620
Oh and one last thing:
High taxes, generally good. The negative effects of high taxes are overstated.

>>17440620
What can you do with that degree employment wise?
>>17440491
While I enjoyed it immensely, to the point I read it twice, it's not a neutral econ 101 textbook. Sowell is coming at things from his laissez faire Chicago School perspective.

>>17440620
I'm sure the brainwashed faggot thinks the fed is good.

>>17440636
He can work at hedge funds and short dying companies

>>17440620
Watch this lecture >>17440580 and tell me what you think about it.

>>17440620
>Basically, government pouring billions into private companies in times of economic downturn = Good
where have you been the past 12 years?
in order to keep the economy ticking over money needs to be in circulation, all that QE did was funnel money into the portfolios of the super wealthy
the government should intervene but private companies won't send money where it needs to go, into the hands of people who are actually going to spend it
print money, give it to poor people (actually give it to literally everybody because it's gonna be more efficient than means testing), the economy recovers
they won't do it because then all the lies about the defecit and needing to reward 'hard work' are shown to be the deceptions that they are

>>17440620
lol, this is what a non-STEM degree does to your brain.

University is for law, medicine and stem. All else should be learned on your own.

Read mises and fuck off till you have.

>>17440636
I wrote my master's thesis on macroeconomic benefits of standardisation of fodder production for dairy cows.

I now work for a major agronomical company developing hardware and software solutions that help dairy farmers optimize their dairy production while cutting climate gas emissions.

Is this the best book about Basic economics? Looking to at least have some knowledge on the subject.

>>17440680
Pair it with a typical economics textbook if you're looking to get a well-rounded perspective in the field.
>>17440676
>developing hardware and software solutions
Do you have some skill in programming or engineering as well, or do you just macro design those?

>>17440491
https://www.mcafee.cc/Papers/Introecon/
read this instead.

>>17440726
I have a decent grasp on programming as I've done a lot of modelling and forecasting, but not really on the engineering side. We have engineers and code monkeys on board that take care of that.
I also have some earlier experience with product design and UX, mostly through school projects.
I report directly to the head of the "digital farming" department, in a sort of pseudo trainee-fashion. My job consist of doing a lot of modelling to estimate what parts of the production processes are the most stratified (i.e. where the efficiency varies the most from farm to farm) and then report that to the engineering team. Engineering team comes up with neat prototypes, and I travel to various partner farms with a few of the guys from engineering and do user testing and prototyping, as well as data gathering. I then type up reports and make powerpoints that rely on the gathered insights and data and present to management. It's pretty neat.
If you're interested in doing an economics degree, I'd suggest leaning heavily into the modelling part. Most companies don't care for macroeconomic analyses, for obvious reasons.

>>17440620
>- Low international trade barriers good
For what? Obviously cheaper consumer goods follow but the Clintonian/Blairite thinking was that freer trade would result in low skilled manufacturing employees in developed countries just getting shifted into higher skilled jobs created by the private sector which didn't follow. When a country like China starts using neo-mercantilist policies it makes everyone else potentially richer but the free market can't keep up private investment so government welfare has to fill in to keep up demand and living standards or else everyone would just be poorer.
>- Free market is good except for in the case of market failures.
There's no "market failures", just successful businesses who can shift their costs onto others. A "market failure" is just an embarrassment for people who think profit shouldn't hurt others.
>- Governments have gotten much better at handling economic crises, mostly through a thing called "quantitative easing".
QE seems to be much more of a demonstration of the weakness of monetary policy. All it can do is create secular stagnation.

>>17440626
What do you want high taxes on? Europe has a highly regressive taxation regime and has hardcore stagnation. That's what happens when you go after corporations or consumers.

>>17440672
>all that QE did was funnel money into the portfolios of the super wealthy
That's not "all it did". The wealthy own real businesses people work at.
>print money, give it to poor people (actually give it to literally everybody because it's gonna be more efficient than means testing), the economy recovers
You're kinda seeing a big experiment in that on a limited scale right now. Turns out most people want to save money and gamble more than spend it, if you give money to people there's noting stopping them from buying bitcoin and increasing their net worth as the economy continues to stagnate.

>>17440680
Read mommy: http://digamo.free.fr/ecophilo.pdf

>>17440802
>What do you want high taxes on? Europe has a highly regressive taxation regime and has hardcore stagnation. That's what happens when you go after corporations or consumers.

Goods with negative externalities mainly. Earmark income to goods with positive externalities.

Market failures not existing is a very spicy point of view

>>17440821
Nice in theory but black markets will become a problem in a lot of cases and if you're just hoping infrastructure that doesn't exist will just magically pop up because of higher prices you might be disappointed. And you don't need to tax cigarettes to subsidize people to eat vegetables, there's non-monetary ways of manipulating people if that's really desirable.

>>17440802
How do i acquire as much knowledge as you to talk about this subject?

>>17440491
Good book. It explains the basic understanding of Economics, while at the same time gives you a mindset of how economics works and how it should be understand. Some said that this book represent capitalism in a nutshell since there's a lots of examples of socialism/communist refuted, explaining why such wouldn't work, but I digress. This is one of the book that explains economics thoroughly

If you dislike the idea of understanding one point of view (making it somewhat biased), try reading the equivalent economics book for socialism/communist. I forgot the name of the book, but its written by an asian. Alternatively, consult to Marx.

>>17440882
Start with the Cambridge Capital Controversies to understand no one knows what the fuck they're actually even talking about

>>17440620

sounds like the entire study is basically a propaganda proxy for lolberterian economies

try having fun and seeing where it goes at the point overproduction crashes the economy

>>17440626

Nah, high taxes cause the rich to run away and take away their infrastructure which causes a chain effect of states lowering taxes and regulation on their local capitalist class causing the gradual withering away of the state as a neutral apparatus for societal protection. Nationalization of the big industry is better if you actually want to improve people's lives.

You should be starting with Adam Smith and Keynes. Sowell is okay, but he's far from an unbiased source.
Adam Smith -> Keynes -> to Marx (if you're interested in a thorough critique of capitalism. Sowell should be read after you get a good grasp on economics. Don't let somebody else make up your mind on this subject. Sowell is aiming to do precisely that. That being said, it's worth reading him, just don't go into it a total blank slate.

>>17440802

Europe is better than america, lolberterian

>>17441930
Physical infrastructure isn't actually that mobile obviously, rich people can run but they can only easily move claims on wealth not real wealth. And no people won't care if goods come from public industry or Chinese firm #3123 as long as the price and quality is good.

>>17441945
I never said it was or it wasn't just that Europe taxes people heavier and has a bigger issue with secular stagnation than America, that has to do with Europe having a much bigger institutionalized fiscally conservative bias than America who aren't afraid of collectively running multitrillion dollar deficits together... you would never see Germans accepting that.

>>17440502
>economics is not a science
sowell added no charts or figures. his book is not empiricist, but rather rationalist. similar to pic related

>>17441930

In theory perhaps but in practice it's obvious if you look at any country with high taxes it is doing them more good than harm

>>17442683
>but in practice

https://www.sovereignman.com/tax/the-state-of-new-jersey-just-signed-its-own-death-warrant-23939/

>new jersey raises taxes
>richest man, David Tepper, moves to Florida
>NJ loses hundreds of millions in revenue
>2 million residents also move, earning a combined $18 billion NJ could have taxed

>>17440502
Bait

read Mankiw principles instead

>>17442633
Sowell is completely operating in the Friedman tradition and he staked everything on historical quantitative data to support his claims (which is easy to nit pick and shit on). Hazlitt is an out and and out Austrotard

>>17442683
That's completely wrong. Where people are taxed hardest is in technocratic settings where they have little input and you're going to be getting your consumption taxed not establishment wealth.

>>17442820
They're talking nationally not lower levels... but than again if you want to claim wealthy residents are always a public good I can call up Bill Gates and George Soros to move next door to you and they'll get working on philanthropy to solve local issues.

>>17442890
If you want to be a more respected retard that's a good idea

>>17440802
>Turns out most people want to save money and gamble more than spend it
what the fuck are you talking about? if you think this robinhood gme stuff is 'most people' your head don't work

>>17442989
It's fairly anecdotal but what you see going on with stuff like GME is more of a general trend. Has the price of crypto been driven purely by institutions? A lot of people who traditionally wouldn't get involved in risky activity have. The government handed out money and the first thing people did was use it to pay down debt and not consume more. All this for proponents of helicopter money should be intriguing since it's showing some weakness of monetary policy alone... it could radically disrupt a lot of aspects of the economy in unintuitive ways.

>>17442933
>nationally not lower levels
NJ is as populated as Switzerland. You can call it anything you want, the principle still applies.

>Bill Gates
I didn't know I was talking to a schizo. Take your meds

>>17440491
If you're a pseud yes, if not pick up mankiw's textbooks on undergraduate econ.

>>17443277
Moving wealth around inside a federation based on internal free trade like the USA is a lot easier than between nation states.

>>17440777
Can I do modeling if I am STEM retarded?

>>17440491
Read that one and another book by Sowell called black rednecks and white liberals

>>17440882
I did formal education up to postgrad, so I suppose you could do that but then you would realise even >>17440802 has only the most basic understanding and that there's no point in any of it other than fooling people into thinking you're smart

>>17440491
no its a meme

>>17443130
>All this for proponents of helicopter money should be intriguing since it's showing some weakness of monetary policy alone... it could radically disrupt a lot of aspects of the economy in unintuitive ways.
this is literally how people satirize a dumbfuck trying to sound smart
>HMM YES QUITE INTRIGUING IF I DO SAY SO MYSELF. PROPONENTS OF SOME SUCH THING IS VERY CONCERNING. I AM VERY SMORT.
hahahahaha kys

>>17440580
Varoufakis is an idiot.

>>17440502
Economics can be extremely mathematical though :3

Just look at Werner Hildenbrand or Debreu or something.

That and his book on Marx are worth reading.

>>17440491
Before you start with ANY economics book read black swan
Here are some books that I read on my macro course that I feel could be of use if you don't know the very basics:
Good economics for hard times
Deficit Myth, but only the first two chapters
Narrative Economics
Never read Basic Economics, but it can't be worse than starting off with Adam Smith

>>17445291
You’ve just outted yourself as the idiot

>>17440529
unironically read ZeroHedge website if you want to know how modern markets work

>>17440502
Based low iq poster
Economics is for the soulless.

>>17440675
GO BACK

>>17440502
God imagine being this much of a cocksucker

>>17441914
Libertarians don't believe in FED, quantitative easing and market failures.

>>17443130
you need to log off my man, 95% of the population don't even know what robinhood or crypto or any of this shit is
the trump stimulus cheque went out in december, 8 months after the spike in savings you're pic shows
the reason savings went up is because of lockdown and the shit people would usually spend on going to retaurants, on holdiays etc etc couldn't be spent

Seek the LORD

>>17440491
Any basis on creating an alternative Economic Method? I know the Zapatistas have one.

Just from reading this thread; Economics seems like a huge waste of brain power

economics is trash and everybody would be unimaginably better off without economists. rise up and shoot economists in the head five times.

>>17440502
I'll have two number nines,
a number nine large,
a number six with extra dip,
two number fourtyfive's, one with cheese
and a large soda.

>>17440491
I'll have two number nines,
a number nine large,
a number six with extra dip,
two number fourtyfive's, one with cheese
and a large soda.

>>17448049
Modern Economics is trash. Old Economics is great.

>>17444205
Probably not. It's quite heavy. There's a reason very few economists do any modelling.

>>17440491
Yeah, its worth it and you should read it.

>>17448062
>>17448064
holy based

>>17440608
second this, and more concise too

>>17440491
No read Rothbard. Sowell is Chicago School.

>>17440502
BASED.

>>17440620
This is decent bait since it'll piss off both commies and libertarians

>>17441914
>lolbertarian economics
Bro no. They hate all the shit he named. They believe in no government intervention and hate central banking.

>>17440675
Based.

>>17440680
Read Rothbard & Hazlitt

>>17448049
Only the economists who treat it like a hard science and not a social science.

It is a good introduction book. Read it and you wont regret it

>>17449584
You still wont know anything about actual economics after reading it. But you will be introduced to some of the key ideas

>I don't know squat about economics.
Neither does the Austrian School of Economics. They don’t just assume that people are rational economical agents, they unironically believe they should be rational economical agents.

It would be like being an astronomer, holding on to geocentrism, and then trying to move the earth of the center of the solar system

>>17449615
>They assume that people are rational economical agents
No they don't you fucking retard

>>17449615
I agree, Austrian economics is stupid. But I dont know if you are implying that Sowell is Austrian? He isn't. He is more Chicago school in the tradition of Friedman

>>17449633
You are a moron. Rational individuals maximising utility is one of the key principles of neoclassical/austrian economics.

>>17449677
You don't understand Austrian economics. It never says individuals are wholly rational but does say that they'll act in self interest.

>>17449721
>but does say that they'll act in self interest.
That is what rationality means in economics retard. You are economically illiterate if you dont know that, and should immediately leave this thread

>>17449734
You're a retard. They mean different things.

>>17449748
No, you are retarded. Leave this thread immediately since you obviously know nothing about even the most basic elements of economics

>>17449755
Yes, irrational self interest. Again they mean different things.

>>17440491
it's great if you want reaganite apologetics

>>17449868
It's not a political book, just a clearly written and intuitive introduction to neoclassical economic theory