Economy & Finance

Exam Board: AQALevel: AS/A-levelSubject: EconomicsFirst Teaching: September 2015First Exam: June 2016Build knowledge of Economics through active learning with the latest Powell textbook, featuring quantitative skills practice and brand new case studies.This textbook has been fully revised to reflect the 2015 AQA A-level specification, giving you up-to-date material that supports your teaching and will enable your students to:- Develop subject knowledge with topic-by-topic support from Ray Powell and James Powell, who both have extensive experience in teaching and examining- Demonstrate awareness of current issues in Economics through brand new case studies that also help build analytical and evaluative skills- Use the language of economics to explain important concepts and issues effectively, with key terms identified throughout the text and glossaries for both microeconomics and macroeconomics- Build quantitative skills with worked examples- Stretch and challenge their knowledge with extension materials- Prepare for exams with practice questions and activities throughout

A million readers bought The Undercover Economist to get the lowdown on how economics works on a small scale, in our everyday lives. Since then, economics has become big news. Crises, austerity, riots, bonuses - all are in the headlines all the time. But how does this large-scale economic world really work? What would happen if we cancelled everyone's debt? How do you create a job? Will the BRIC countries take over the world? Asking - among many other things -- what the future holds for the Euro, why the banks are still paying record bonuses and where government borrowing will take us, in The Undercover Economist Strikes Back, Tim Harford returns with his trademark clarity and wit to explain what's really going on - and what it means for us all.

Provides advanced students and researchers in experimental economics with the skills they need in order to analyse their data in deeper and more illuminating ways.

Truly eye-opening . . . There is almost no situation that Harford cannot dissect with his sharp economist's tools . . . economics has never been this cool' NEW STATESMANIf humans are so clever, why do we smoke and gamble, or take drugs, or fall in love? Is this really rational behaviour? And how come your idiot boss is so overpaid? In fact, the behaviour of even the unlikeliest of individuals - prostitutes, drug addicts, racists and revolutionaries - complies with economic logic, taking into account future costs and benefits, even if we don't quite realise it. We are rational beings after all.

'Whether a complete novice, or a professional portfolio manager, this book will give you access to the mindset and techniques of the most successful investors of our time and more importantly, it will help you avoid mistakes. The Great Investors will have a permanent place on my desk.'Mark Sheridan, Executive Director, Nomura International PLC Leading investors such as Warren Buffett, Benjamin Graham, Sir John Templeton, George Soros and Anthony Bolton are known throughout the world. How did these people come to be so successful? Which strategies have they used to make their fortunes? And what can you learn from their techniques?In The Great Investors, Glen Arnold succinctly and accurately describes the investment philosophies of the worlds greatest investors. He explains why they are the best, gives details of their tactics for accumulating wealth, captures the key elements that led to their market-beating successes and teaches you key lessons that you can apply to your own investing strategies. From the foreword: There are some very special people who seem to possess an exceptional talent for acquiring wealth. I want to explore not just the past triumphs of these masters, but also the key factors they look for as well as the personality traits that allow them to control emotion and think rationally about where to place funds. How does a master of investment hone skills through bitter experience and triumph to develop their approach to accumulating wealth?Glen Arnold The Great Investors is the story of a number of remarkable men: John Templeton, George Soros, Warren Buffett, Benjamin Graham, Philip Fisher, Peter Lynch, Anthony Bolton and John Neff. Whether youre new to investing, have had success in the markets, or youre a professional investor or fund manger, youll benefit from reading about their proven, and successful, trading philosophies. The Great Investorswill show you how to: Be a business analyst rather than a security analyst Do your homework and develop a broad social, economic and political awareness Control emotion so as not to get swept away by the market Be consistent in your approach, even when you have bad years See the wood for the trees and not over complicate your portfolio Learn from your investing Be self reliant, stand aside from the crowd and follow your own logic Take reasonable risk

This innovative new textbook firmly roots management accounting in management, placing the emphasis on the management accountant as a key member of the management team and the strategic business decision making process. Unique case studies and examples of worldwide practices illustrate how concepts and techniques are applied in real-world business situations. It explores how management accounting techniques are adapted and modified to support specific industries from energy to media sectors and covers topical issues such as: Environmental accounting Environmental auditing and ISO14001/EMAS The balanced scorecard Kaizen costing Target costing Social responsibility Features Integrates the most up-to-date and relevant research with a broad approach to management accounting. Presents compelling examples of real organisations, exploring the interactions of management accounting in practice. Extends knowledge of management accounting concepts and techniques to how they can be used for strategic decision making and management control. Uses Excel to develop and apply solutions methods. Examines how management accounting techniques are adapted and modified to support specific industries from energy to media sectors. Covers topical issues such as activity-based budgeting, the balanced scorecard, target costing, capacity planning, quality management, Six Sigma and performance measurement. Fully compliant with developments within the professional bodies such as CIMA and ACCA. Offers end-of chapter exercises to extend your critical thinking and applications of key concepts. Provides short case studies, so you can practise manipulating and analysing data.This is the ideal textbook for students studying management accounting at advanced undergraduate and postgraduate level.

Paul Krugman has made a reputation for himself by telling us the truth about economics however unlikely it may seem and however little we want to believe it. In this collection of sharp, witty essays, Krugman tackles bad economic ideas from across the political spectrum, giving us clear-eyed insights into unemployment, globalization, economic growth and financial speculation. The writing here brilliantly combines the acerbic style and clever analysis that has made Krugman famous.

Our planet's resources are running out. The media bombards us with constant warnings of impending shortages of fossil fuels, minerals, arable land, and water and the political Armageddon that will result as insatiable global demand far outstrips supply. But how true is this picture?In Winner Take All, Dambisa Moyo cuts through the misconceptions and noise surrounding resource scarcity with a penetrating analysis of what really is at stake. Examining the operations of commodity markets and the geopolitical shifts they have triggered, she reveals the hard facts behind the insatiable global demand for economic growth. In this race for global resources, China is way out in front.China, Moyo reveals, has embarked on one of the greatest commodity rushes in history. Tracing its breathtaking quest for resources - from Africa to Latin America, North America to Europe - she examines the impact it is having on us all, and its profound implications for our future. What, Moyo asks, will be the financial and human effects of all this - and is large-scale resource conflict inevitable or avoidable?Instead of another polemic, Winner Take All is a clear-eyed look at the realities we all need to face if we want a just, balanced and peaceful global economy for the 21st century.

Steven Levitt, the original rogue economist, and Stephen Dubner have spent four years uncovering the hidden side of even more controversial subjects, from terrorism to shark attacks, cable TV to hurricanes. The result is Superfreakonomics. It reveals, among other things: - Why you are more likely to be killed walking drunk than driving drunk - How a prostitute is more likely to sleep with a policeman than be arrested by one- Why terrorists might be easier to track down than you would imagine- How a sex change could boost your salaryBecause sometimes the most superfreaky solution is the simplest.

The Financial Times Guide to Banking is a comprehensive introduction to how banks and banking works. Best-selling author Glen Arnold provides you with a foundation for understanding the wide variety of activities undertaken by banks. He shows you why these global institutions are so important to consumers and finance professionals alike and explains how their activities impact on everyday life. The Financial Times Guide to Banking will give you: - A thorough understanding of all types of banking from retail through to asset management and investment banking. - An overview of global banking including the worldwide evolution of the sector, the influence of cross-border money flows and the importance of modern banking to international development - Expert knowledge about instruments and markets including debt markets, futures markets and swaps and options - Insight into the crucial importance of central banking and government regulation - Answers to the big questions about monetary policy and interest rates, payment systems and banking success

How did we get to where we are? John Cassidy shows that the roots of our most recent financial failure lie not with individuals, but with an idea - the idea that markets are inherently rational. He gives us the big picture behind the financial headlines, tracing the rise and fall of free market ideology from Adam Smith to Milton Friedman and Alan Greenspan. Full of wit, sense and, above all, a deeper understanding, How Markets Fail argues for the end of 'utopian' economics, and the beginning of a pragmatic, reality-based way of thinking.A very good history of economic thought EconomistHow Markets Fail offers a brilliant intellectual framework . . . fine work New York TimesAn essential, grittily intellectual, yet compelling guide to the financial debacle of 2009 Geordie Greig, Evening StandardA powerful argument . . . Cassidy makes a compelling case that a return to hands-off economics would be a disaster BusinessWeekThis book is a well constructed, thoughtful and cogent account of how capitalism evolved to its current form Telegraph Books of the Year recommendationJohn Cassidy ... describe[s] that mix of insight and madness that brought the world's system to its knees FT, Book of the Year recommendationAnyone who enjoys a good read can safely embark on this tour with Cassidy as their guide . . . Like his colleague Malcolm Gladwell [at the New Yorker], Cassidy is able to lead us with beguiling lucidity through unfamiliar territory New StatesmanJohn Cassidy has covered economics and finance at The New Yorker magazine since 1995, writing on topics ranging from Alan Greenspan to the Iraqi oil industry and English journalism. He is also now a Contributing Editor at Portfolio where he writes the monthly Economics column. Two of his articles have been nominated for National Magazine Awards: an essay on Karl Marx, which appeared in October, 1997, and an account of the death of the British weapons scientist David Kelly, which was published in December, 2003. He has previously written for Sunday Times in as well as the New York Post, where he edited the Business section and then served as the deputy editor. In 2002, Cassidy published his first book, Dot.Con. He lives in New York.

A book that revolutionised our understanding of English social history. E. P. Thompson shows how the English working class emerged through the degradations of the industrial revolution to create a culture and political consciousness of enormous vitality.

'Endlessly witty, but the wit is underpinned by a tremendous, unembarrassed anger and moral lucidity. A superb guide which will turn any reader into an expert within the space of 200 pages' Jonathan Coe There's probably a word in German for that feeling you get when you can understand something while it's being explained to you, but lose hold of the explanation as soon as it stops. A lot of writing about the credit crunch has that effect: you can grasp it while it's going on, and then as soon as it's over, you can no longer remember the difference between a CDO, a CDS, an MBS, and a toasted cheese sandwich. Whoops! makes it possible for all of us to grasp how we found ourselves in this predicament.What went wrong? In 2000, the total GDP of Earth was $36 trillion. At the start of 2007 it was $70 trillion. Today that growth has gone suddenly and sharply into decline, with an effect roughly resembling that of putting a car into reverse while doing seventy down a motorway. John Lanchester is a journalist, novelist and winner of the Whitbread First Novel Award. He is a regular contributor to the London Review of Books and the New Yorker, with a monthly column in Esquire. John's piece on our love affair with the City, 'Cityphilia', generated much response on its publication in January 2008 and indeed predicted a worldwide crash based on the misuse of financial derivatives. In October 2008 he charted the crisis as it had developed over the year in 'Cityphobia', which also attracted much attention as a piece that explained not only what had happened, but how we felt about it. John was raised in South-East Asia and now lives in London John Lanchester travels with a cast of characters - including reckless banksters, snoozing regulators, complacent politicians, predatory lenders, credit-drunk spendthrifts, and innocent bystanders to understand deeply and genuinely what is happening and why we feel the way we do.

Forget the 1% - it's time to get to grips with the 0.1% ...There has always been some gap between rich and poor, but it has never been wider - and now the rich are getting wealthier at such breakneck speed that the middle classes are being squeezed out. While the wealthiest 10% of Americans, for example, receive half the nation's income, the real money flows even higher up, in the top 0.1%. As a transglobal class of highly successful professionals, these self-made oligarchs often have more in common with one another than with their own countrymen. But how is this happening, and who are the people making it happen? Chrystia Freeland, acclaimed business journalist and Global Editor-at-Large of Reuters, has unprecedented access to the richest and most successful people on the planet, from Davos to Dubai, and dissects their lives with intelligence, empathy and objectivity. Pacily written and powerfully researched, Plutocrats could not provide a more timely insight into the current state of Capitalism and its most wealthy players.'A superb piece of reportage ... a tremendous illumination' (New Statesman on Freeland's previous title, Sale of the Century)

In The Conscience of a Liberal Paul Krugman, one of the US s most respected economists and outspoken commentators, lays out his vision of a New Deal for a fairer society. After the Second World War it seemed that, in the West, society was gradually becoming more equal. Welfare States had been established in many countries, there was a general reduction in income inequality and in America Franklin D. Roosevelt s New Deal seemed to ensure strong democratic values and broadly shared prosperity. So what went wrong? Why, in the past thirty years, has the gap between the poor and the super-rich become such a gulf? Why are we so disillusioned with the political system? And what can be done about this huge economic inequality and bitter polarization? Krugman argues that the time is ripe for another era of great reform. Here he outlines a programme for change, explaining what can be done to narrow the wealth gap. And he shows how a new political coalition can both support and be supported by reform, making our society not just more equal but more democratic. The Conscience of a Liberal promises to reshape public debate and become a touchstone work.

Do you sometimes wonder why a sure sale falls through the cracks? Don't you feel powerless every time that happens? You know that your product or service is really good for your customer. You've done everything to get the customer interested. They obviously like what you're selling, but they shift, they fidget and then inexplicably walk away to the competition. Being pushy is unnecessary... That's because pushiness creates an unnatural situation. The Brain Audit doesn't teach you how to use mind tricks. It's not a system of coercion. It doesn't psyche the customer into buying against his or her will. Instead it shows you how to attract the attention of a customer. It shows you how to keep that attention. It shows you where the attention wavers. And it takes you through a series of steps that we all take on a day-to-day basis when buying products or services. And not only does it show you a step-by-step method, but it gives you a checklist that takes the 'iffiness' factor out of your own marketing and communication. So what's the 'iffiness' factor?On any given day, if you were to ask someone to critique your website, your presentation or your business cards, they'll simply give you an opinion. And the opinion will vary from person to person. This variation leaves you confused. You're not really sure if your marketing message is working at 20%, 55% or not working at all. And you suspect that you could vastly improve your results, if you had a clear set of guidelines and benchmarks. With The Brain Audit, you're going to have consistent results The reason why you'll get consistent results is because of three simple reasons:Reason 1: The Brain Audit is built on a system. It's not random. Reason 2: It isn't some magic trick. It follows the decision-making pattern that we use everyday. Reason 3: You can spot the mistakes and fix them thereby improving attraction and conversion. So what's in The Brain Audit? And how can it help you?Here is just a tiny preview of what's in The Brain AuditHow the Brain Goes Through Decision-Making: Do you often wonder what your customer is thinking? Don't leave the thought process to chance and let that customer walk away. Your customers don't want to walk away. They want to buy from you. So how does the brain make decisions? And what causes it to get confused?Is the Brain a Conveyor Belt?: Does the brain actually process thoughts in a step-by-step manner? Would you believe it's not random at all? The Brain Audit is a tool that allows you to understand the predictability of a buying sequence. The moment you understand how the 'conveyor belt' concept works, you'll see that your brain follows this sequence no matter what product or service you're buying. The Hidden Trigger: This one factor will turn everything you've learned on its head. Readers have changed their business cards, their websites and their whole way of thinking once they learned the extreme power of this simple trigger. When you use this trigger, you activate the curiosity of the brain and get customers engaged. Customers start asking questions, and instead of shooing you away, invite you to tell them more. The Futility of Solutions: Most of us believe that we should talk about benefits and solutions. And benefits and solutions work, but they fail miserably if they're placed out of the sequence. So where do you place your benefits? And why?Getting the Customer's Attention: The core of getting attention is to flag a customer down. But how are you going to do that if you don't even know what gets their attention in the first place? The Brain Audit not only shows you how to get their attention, but actually get a response. This response helps you go ahead with the sale.

This book picks up where Karl Polanyi's study of economic and political change left off. Building upon Polanyi's conception of the double movement, Blyth analyzes the two periods of deep seated institutional change that characterized the twentieth century: the 1930s and the 1970s. Blyth views both sets of changes as part of the same dynamic. In the 1930s labor reacted against the exigencies of the market and demanded state action to mitigate the market's effects by 'embedding liberalism.' In the 1970s, those who benefited least from such 'embedding' institutions, namely business, reacted against these constraints and sought to overturn that institutional order. Blyth demonstrates the critical role economic ideas played in making institutional change possible. Great Transformations rethinks the relationship between uncertainty, ideas, and interests, achieving profound new insights on how, and under what conditions, institutional change takes place.

What determines the price of a pop concert or an opera? Why does Hollywood dominate the film industry? Does illegal downloading damage the record industry? Does free entry to museums bring in more visitors? In A Textbook of Cultural Economics, one of the world's leading cultural economists shows how we can use the theories and methods of economics to answer these and a host of other questions concerning the arts (performing arts, visual arts and literature), heritage (museums and built heritage) and creative industries (the music, publishing and film industries, broadcasting). Using international examples and covering the most up-to-date research, the book does not assume a prior knowledge of economics. It is ideally suited for students taking a course on the economics of the arts as part of an arts administration, business, management, or economics degree.

Whether you are saving for a particular goal, planning towards retirement or simply maximising your capital, financial guru Alvin Hall helps you to:Make more informed choices about your investments.Learn basic analysis techniques to minimize risk and maximize reward.Understand your own risk tolerance and find an investment style that suits your personality and circumstances.Investing in the stock market can be a complex business, but with practical examples and clear definitions, Alvin makes it a highly accessible one, regardless of your investment experience. Fully revised and updated with the latest financial information, The Stock Market Explained provides easy comparisons of the features, benefits, rewards and risks among the different asset classes. This is the ultimate guide to feeling more comfortable (and smarter) about your investment decisions.

This book is about the institutions, incentives and constraints that guide the behaviour of people and organizations involved in the implementation of foreign aid programmes. While traditional performance studies tend to focus almost exclusively on the policies and institutions in recipient countries, this book looks at incentives in the entire chain of organizations involved in the delivery of foreign aid, from donor governments and agencies to consultants, experts and other intermediaries. Four aspects of foreign aid delivery are examined in detail: incentives inside donor agencies, the interaction of subcontractors with recipient organizations, incentives inside recipient country institutions, and biases in aid performance monitoring systems.

The definitive textbook on public finance-now back in print for the first time in years This classic introduction to public finance remains the best advanced-level textbook on the subject ever written. First published in 1980, Lectures on Public Economics still tops reading lists at many leading universities despite the fact that the book has been out of print for years. This new edition makes it readily available again to a new generation of students and practitioners in public economics.The lectures presented here examine the behavioral responses of households and firms to tax changes. Topics include the effects of taxation on labor supply, savings, risk-taking, the firm, debt, and economic growth. The book then delves into normative questions such as the design of tax systems, optimal taxation, public sector pricing, and public goods, including local public goods.Written by two of the world's preeminent economists, this edition of Lectures on Public Economics features a new introduction by Anthony Atkinson and Joseph Stiglitz that discusses the latest developments in the field and areas for future research.The definitive advanced-level textbook on public economicsExamines the effects of taxation on households and firmsCovers tax system design, optimal taxation, public sector pricing, and moreIncludes suggestions for further readingAdditional resources available online

"e;[A] magnificent history of money and finance."e;--New York Times Book ReviewConvincingly makes the case that finance is a change-maker of change-makers.--Financial TimesIn the aftermath of recent financial crises, it's easy to see finance as a wrecking ball: something that destroys fortunes and jobs, and undermines governments and banks. In Money Changes Everything, leading financial historian William Goetzmann argues the exact oppositethat the development of finance has made the growth of civilizations possible. Goetzmann explains that finance is a time machine, a technology that allows us to move value forward and backward through time; and that this innovation has changed the very way we think about and plan for the future. He shows how finance was present at key moments in history: driving the invention of writing in ancient Mesopotamia, spurring the classical civilizations of Greece and Rome to become great empires, determining the rise and fall of dynasties in imperial China, and underwriting the trade expeditions that led Europeans to the New World. He also demonstrates how the apparatus we associate with a modern economystock markets, lines of credit, complex financial products, and international tradewere repeatedly developed, forgotten, and reinvented over the course of human history.Exploring the critical role of finance over the millennia, and around the world, Goetzmann details how wondrous financial technologies and institutionsmoney, bonds, banks, corporations, and morehave helped urban centers to expand and cultures to flourish. And it's not done reshaping our lives, as Goetzmann considers the challenges we face in the future, such as how to use the power of finance to care for an aging and expanding population. Money Changes Everything presents a fascinating look into the way that finance has steered the course of history.

How knowing the extreme risks of climate change can help us prepare for an uncertain futureIf you had a 10 percent chance of having a fatal car accident, you'd take necessary precautions. If your finances had a 10 percent chance of suffering a severe loss, you'd reevaluate your assets. So if we know the world is warming and there's a 10 percent chance this might eventually lead to a catastrophe beyond anything we could imagine, why aren't we doing more about climate change right now? We insure our lives against an uncertain future-why not our planet?In Climate Shock, Gernot Wagner and Martin Weitzman explore in lively, clear terms the likely repercussions of a hotter planet, drawing on and expanding from work previously unavailable to general audiences. They show that the longer we wait to act, the more likely an extreme event will happen. A city might go underwater. A rogue nation might shoot particles into the Earth's atmosphere, geoengineering cooler temperatures. Zeroing in on the unknown extreme risks that may yet dwarf all else, the authors look at how economic forces that make sensible climate policies difficult to enact, make radical would-be fixes like geoengineering all the more probable. What we know about climate change is alarming enough. What we don't know about the extreme risks could be far more dangerous. Wagner and Weitzman help readers understand that we need to think about climate change in the same way that we think about insurance-as a risk management problem, only here on a global scale.With a new preface addressing recent developments Wagner and Weitzman demonstrate that climate change can and should be dealt with-and what could happen if we don't do so-tackling the defining environmental and public policy issue of our time.

In economics, the emergence of New Growth Theory in recent decades has directed attention to an old and important problem: what are the forces of economic growth and how can public policy enhance them? This book examines major forces of growth--including spillover effects and externalities, education and formation of human capital, knowledge creation through deliberate research efforts, and public infrastructure investment. Unique in emphasizing the importance of different forces for particular stages of development, it offers wide-ranging policy implications in the process. The authors critically examine recently developed endogenous growth models, study the dynamic implications of modified models, and test the models empirically with modern time series methods that avoid the perils of heterogeneity in cross-country studies. Their empirical analyses, undertaken with newly constructed time series data for the United States and some core countries of the Euro zone, show that models containing scale effects, such as the R&D model and the human capital model, are compatible with time series evidence only after considerable modifications and nonlinearities are introduced. They also explore the relationship between growth and inequality, with particular focus on technological change and income disparity. The Forces of Economic Growth represents a comprehensive and up-to-date empirical time series perspective on the New Growth Theory.

International Finance presents the corporate uses of international financial markets to upper undergraduate and graduate students of business finance and financial economics. Combining practical knowledge, up-to-date theories, and real-world applications, this textbook explores issues of valuation, funding, and risk management. International Finance shows how theoretical applications can be brought into managerial practice. The text includes an extensive introduction followed by three main sections: currency markets; exchange risk, exposure, and risk management; and long-term international funding and direct investment. Each section begins with a short case study, and each of the sections' chapters concludes with a CFO summary, examining how a hypothetical chief financial officer might apply topics to a managerial setting. The book also contains end-of-chapter questions to help students grasp the material presented. Focusing on international markets and multinational corporate finance, International Finance is the go-to resource for students seeking a complete understanding of the field. Rigorous focus on international financial markets and corporate finance concepts An up-to-date and practice-oriented approach Strong real-world examples and applications Comprehensive look at valuation, funding, and risk management Introductory case studies and "e;CFO summaries,"e; and end-of-chapter quiz questions Solutions to the quiz questions are available online

Writing in the June 1965 issue of theEconomic Journal, Harry G. Johnson begins with a sentence seemingly calibrated to the scale of the book he set himself to review: "e;The long-awaited monetary history of the United States by Friedman and Schwartz is in every sense of the term a monumental scholarly achievement--monumental in its sheer bulk, monumental in the definitiveness of its treatment of innumerable issues, large and small . . . monumental, above all, in the theoretical and statistical effort and ingenuity that have been brought to bear on the solution of complex and subtle economic issues."e; Friedman and Schwartz marshaled massive historical data and sharp analytics to support the claim that monetary policy--steady control of the money supply--matters profoundly in the management of the nation's economy, especially in navigating serious economic fluctuations. In their influential chapter 7, The Great Contraction--which Princeton published in 1965 as a separate paperback--they address the central economic event of the century, the Depression. According to Hugh Rockoff, writing in January 1965: "e;If Great Depressions could be prevented through timely actions by the monetary authority (or by a monetary rule), as Friedman and Schwartz had contended, then the case for market economies was measurably stronger."e; Milton Friedman won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1976 for work related to A Monetary History as well as to his other Princeton University Press book, A Theory of the Consumption Function (1957).

Economics has much to do with incentives--not least, incentives to work hard, to produce quality products, to study, to invest, and to save. Although Adam Smith amply confirmed this more than two hundred years ago in his analysis of sharecropping contracts, only in recent decades has a theory begun to emerge to place the topic at the heart of economic thinking. In this book, Jean-Jacques Laffont and David Martimort present the most thorough yet accessible introduction to incentives theory to date. Central to this theory is a simple question as pivotal to modern-day management as it is to economics research: What makes people act in a particular way in an economic or business situation? In seeking an answer, the authors provide the methodological tools to design institutions that can ensure good incentives for economic agents. This book focuses on the principal-agent model, the "e;simple"e; situation where a principal, or company, delegates a task to a single agent through a contract--the essence of management and contract theory. How does the owner or manager of a firm align the objectives of its various members to maximize profits? Following a brief historical overview showing how the problem of incentives has come to the fore in the past two centuries, the authors devote the bulk of their work to exploring principal-agent models and various extensions thereof in light of three types of information problems: adverse selection, moral hazard, and non-verifiability. Offering an unprecedented look at a subject vital to industrial organization, labor economics, and behavioral economics, this book is set to become the definitive resource for students, researchers, and others who might find themselves pondering what contracts, and the incentives they embody, are really all about.

The scientific study of complex systems has transformed a wide range of disciplines in recent years, enabling researchers in both the natural and social sciences to model and predict phenomena as diverse as earthquakes, global warming, demographic patterns, financial crises, and the failure of materials. In this book, Didier Sornette boldly applies his varied experience in these areas to propose a simple, powerful, and general theory of how, why, and when stock markets crash. Most attempts to explain market failures seek to pinpoint triggering mechanisms that occur hours, days, or weeks before the collapse. Sornette proposes a radically different view: the underlying cause can be sought months and even years before the abrupt, catastrophic event in the build-up of cooperative speculation, which often translates into an accelerating rise of the market price, otherwise known as a "e;bubble."e; Anchoring his sophisticated, step-by-step analysis in leading-edge physical and statistical modeling techniques, he unearths remarkable insights and some predictions--among them, that the "e;end of the growth era"e; will occur around 2050. Sornette probes major historical precedents, from the decades-long "e;tulip mania"e; in the Netherlands that wilted suddenly in 1637 to the South Sea Bubble that ended with the first huge market crash in England in 1720, to the Great Crash of October 1929 and Black Monday in 1987, to cite just a few. He concludes that most explanations other than cooperative self-organization fail to account for the subtle bubbles by which the markets lay the groundwork for catastrophe. Any investor or investment professional who seeks a genuine understanding of looming financial disasters should read this book. Physicists, geologists, biologists, economists, and others will welcome Why Stock Markets Crash as a highly original "e;scientific tale,"e; as Sornette aptly puts it, of the exciting and sometimes fearsome--but no longer quite so unfathomable--world of stock markets.

The promise and perils of the digital economy - and how we can use it to create prosperity for allThe digital economy was supposed to create a new age of prosperity for everyone. But as Facebook resells our data for billions and self-driving cars threaten to put drivers out of work, it has so far only exacerbated the gap between winners and losers. Yet the possibility of an economic Renaissance still lingers - if we seize the opportunity now. In The Growth Trap, Douglas Rushkoff identifies this crucial economic turning point and calls on everyone to remake the economic operating system from the inside out - to redistribute wealth and prosper along the way. With practical steps matched by incisive analysis, The Growth Trap offers a pragmatic, optimistic, and human-centered model for economic progress in the digital age.

Jeffrey Sachs draws on his remarkable 25 years' experience to offer a thrilling and inspiring vision of the keys to economic success in the world today. Marrying vivid storytelling with acute analysis, he sets the stage by drawing a conceptual map of the world economy and explains why, over the past 200 years, wealth and poverty have diverged and evolved across the planet, and why the poorest nations have been so markedly unable to escape the trap of poverty. Sachs tells the remarkable stories of his own work in Bolivia, Poland, Russia, India, China and Africa to bring readers with him to an understanding of the different problems countries face. In the end, readers will be left not with an understanding of how daunting the world's problems are, but how solvable they are - and why making the effort is both our moral duty and in our own interests.