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Title: The Undercover Economist: Exposing Why the Rich Are Rich, the Poor Are Poor--and Why You Can Never Buy a Decent Used Car!
ISBN: 0345494016
Author:
Tim Harford
Publicate Date: 2007-01-30
Publish: 2007-01-30
List Price: $14.95
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $8.53
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $7.00
Amazon Merchant Price: $10.17
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Just boring
I bought this book following the recommendation of the author of Freakonomics, but I found a book with just one argument, buy cheap and sell high, but overextended through almost 300 pages. In one eloquent sentence he stated about how simply would be life if an alternative to Microsoft appear. Hey Haltford, do you know Google? IBM? NASA? teh CERN? Facebook? Do you really think them uses Microsoft products? That is the problem of the book, relies on misinformation, and that is why the rich will maintain rich, because they have INFORMATION.
The new paradigm is collaboration, not just buy cheap and sell high. I recommend instead Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams or just re-read Freakonomics.
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2: Life is economics
One of my many regrets about my misspent college days is that I never took a course in economics. It was not until I got involved with several documentary projects dealing with economics that I started to learn about it through books. One of the best is Tim Harford's "The Undercover Economist." In this book, he explains why normal people do things that defy common sense: pay a big price for a cup of coffee or build a library in a third world country that can't hold any books because the roof can't keep out the rain.
Long ago, in a book called
Systemantics: How Systems Work and Especially How They Fail, I learned that systems work best that are designed to run downhill. That's one reason it's hard for reformers to get people to do the right thing if it involves more cost or effort than the wrong thing. Harford clearly knows the difference between uphill and down, and in ten delightful chapters, he explains it to his readers.
This is an excellent book with which to start learning about economics. It's easy to read, a lot of fun, and really informative.
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3: not terrible...
decent coverage of scarcity theory, and slight coverage of comparative advantage, but not much ground-braking information here. Its not as good as Freakonomics, which I also disliked. I'm still looking for a book on classical economic theory that I can tolerate... any suggestions are highly welcome!
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4: Enlightening read, entertaining.
This book kind of over billed itself, with the marketers adding "why the rich are rich, the poor are poor and why you can't find a good deal on a used car." This book doesn't read like Freakanomics, Blink or Tipping Point, unfortunately, because the author does have a lot of good things to say and does do a good job of explaining economic terms and theories in laymen's terms.
I'd recommend this book to anyone that is interested in a better understanding of economics and demystifying some of the jargon and terms used on news broadcasts and in newsprint. There are often people of all strips talking about demand, supply, cost, profit and other things that they know little about or sometimes, worse, think they know something but in reality have an understanding that is completely backwards.
Economics theory builds upon a basic foundation and understanding that foundation and the nature of the bricks laid upon it are crucial to having any grasp of what an economist is talking about when he pontificates or simply gives a lesson. Some things are agreed upon by most, but not all things come under a consensus of what is true and what is false and what is unknowable.
If I'm confusing you a bit here, no worries, read this book and my ramblings will sound completely coherent and simple. The knowledge required to totally grasp the theories and the intricacies of markets and why things are priced how they are is such that if you could totally get this book you wouldn't need to read it.
I think most people would benefit from a reading of this, as most people are blind to economic theories and how markets actually work, and therefore are often beguiled by politicians. I give this work a strong recommendation to those interested in econ and those that are students of it as well.
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5: Objective, entertaining, if inot narrow in scope and flawed in areas
Among social science literature I try to detect bias -- this book obviously contains bias, but relative to other books in this category it is refreshingly objective and based on empiricism, fact, logic.
For example, the authors expose environmental abuses, leftist attacks on 3rd world working conditions, while at the same time offer an empirical defense of abortion as a primary causal mechanism for the decades long reduction in crime.
without offering my personal bias and logical objection to many of the assertions made by the authors, as i have done in other reviews, I will simply note that it is rare that an author attacks extremist environmentalism, defends "sweat shops in china" and defends abortion in the same book.
I would recommend this book for any objective, independent thinking, and rational reader.
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