Preface  (Page 2/4)

Curation

To broaden access and encourage community curation, Principles of Economics is “open source” licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license. The economics community is invited to submit examples, emerging research, and other feedback to enhance and strengthen the material and keep it current and relevant for today’s students. You can submit your suggestions to info@openstaxcollege.org.

Cost

Our textbooks are available for free online, and in low-cost print and e-book editions.

About Principles of Economics

Principles of Economics is designed for a two-semester principles of economics sequence. The text has been developed to meet the scope and sequence of most introductory courses. At the same time, the book includes a number of innovative features designed to enhance student learning. Instructors can also customize the book, adapting it to the approach that works best in their classroom.

Coverage and scope

To develop Principles of Economics , we acquired the rights to Timothy Taylor’s second edition of Principles of Economics and solicited ideas from economics instructors at all levels of higher education, from community colleges to Ph.D.-granting universities. They told us about their courses, students, challenges, resources, and how a textbook can best meet the needs of both instructors and students.

The result is a book that covers the breadth of economics topics and also provides the necessary depth to ensure the course is manageable for instructors and students alike. And to make it more applied, we have incorporated many current topics. We hope students will be interested to know just how far-reaching the recent recession was (and still is), for example, and why there is so much controversy even among economists over the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). The Keystone Pipeline, Occupy Wall Street, minimum wage debates, and the appointment of the United States’ first female Federal Reserve chair, Janet Yellen, are just a few of the other important topics covered.

The pedagogical choices, chapter arrangements, and learning objective fulfillment were developed and vetted with feedback from educators dedicated to the project. They thoroughly read the material and offered critical and detailed commentary. The outcome is a balanced approach to micro and macro economics, to both Keynesian and classical views, and to the theory and application of economics concepts. New 2015 data are incorporated for topics that range from average U.S. household consumption in Chapter 2 to the total value of all home equity in Chapter 17. Current events are treated in a politically-balanced way as well.

The book is organized into eight main parts:

• What is Economics? The first two chapters introduce students to the study of economics with a focus on making choices in a world of scarce resources.
• Supply and Demand , Chapters 3 and 4, introduces and explains the first analytical model in economics: supply, demand, and equilibrium, before showing applications in the markets for labor and finance.
• The Fundamentals of Microeconomic Theory , Chapters 5 through 10, begins the microeconomics portion of the text, presenting the theories of consumer behavior, production and costs, and the different models of market structure, including some simple game theory.
• Microeconomic Policy Issues , Chapters 11 through 18, cover the range of topics in applied micro, framed around the concepts of public goods and positive and negative externalities. Students explore competition and antitrust policies, environmental problems, poverty, income inequality, and other labor market issues. The text also covers information, risk and financial markets, as well as public economy.
• The Macroeconomic Perspective and Goals , Chapters 19 through 23, introduces a number of key concepts in macro: economic growth, unemployment and inflation, and international trade and capital flows.
• A Framework for Macroeconomic Analysis , Chapters 24 through 26, introduces the principal analytic model in macro, namely the Aggregate Demand/Aggregate Supply Model. The model is then applied to the Keynesian and Neoclassical perspectives. The Expenditure-Output model is fully explained in a stand-alone appendix.
• Monetary and Fiscal Policy , Chapters 27 through 31, explains the role of money and the banking system, as well as monetary policy and financial regulation. Then the discussion switches to government deficits and fiscal policy.
• International Economics , Chapters 32 through 34, the final part of the text, introduces the international dimensions of economics, including international trade and protectionism.