Principles of Economics

In writing this textbook, Mankiw has tried to put himself in the position of someone seeing economics for the first time. The author's conversational writing style is superb for presenting the politics and science of economic theories to tomorrow's decision-makers.
Because Mankiw wrote it for the students, the book stands out among all other principles texts by encouraging students to apply an economic way of thinking in their daily lives. Receiving such a praise as "perhaps the best ever" textbook in economic principles, it's no wonder Mankiw's prize project has quickly become one of the most successful books ever to be published in the college marketplace.

• NEW! Two New Chapters: Mankiw has written two new chapters for this edition. Chapter 22, "Frontiers of Economics," is an enticing introduction to the cutting edge subject areas of asymmetric information, political economy, and behavioral economics. Chapter 26, "Basic Tools of Finance," introduces essential tools - present value, risk management, and asset valuation -- for students to understand the decisions people make as they participate in financial markets.
• Ten Principles: Chapter 1, "Ten Principles of Economics", introduces students to the ten most important principles, which are then thoroughly incorporated in discussions throughout the book.
• Gains From Trade: Chapter 3, "Interdependence and the Gains From Trade", is an early and accessible introductory discussion of one of economics most powerful and universal insights: how people gain from trade. This coverage enables professors to include international applications at the beginning of the course.
• Chapter 6: "Supply, Demand, and Government Policies", the tools of supply and demand are put to work to examine the effects of various government policies.
• Chapters 7, 8, and 9: These chapters discuss why the equilibrium of supply and demand is desirable for society as a whole. The concepts of consumer and producer surplus explain the efficiency of markets, the costs of taxation, and the benefits of international trade.
• Chapters 10 and 11: By introducing Externalities in Chapter 10 and Public Goods and Common Resources in Chapter 11, the author allows discussion of why market outcomes are not always efficient, and how governments can sometimes remedy market failure.
• Chapter 21: An option chapter, Chapter 21 uses indifference curves to examine consumer theory. The box that discusses the equivalence between the utility approach and the indifference curve approach has been expanded: the rule "equalize marginal utility per dollar on all goods" is now described. It also shows why this rule is equivalent to picking the point on the indifference curve that is tangent to the budget constraint. This chapter can easily be introduced earlier.
• Chapters 25, 26, and 28: These chapters describe the forces that determine key real variables (including GDP, saving, investment, real interest rates, and unemployment) in the long run.
• Monetary System: The monetary system is discussed in Chapters 29 and 30. The monetary system is crucial in determining the long-run behavior of the price level, inflation rate, and other nominal variables.
• Chapter 36: This chapter was one of Mankiw's favorite chapters to write. He presents both sides of five major debates over economic policy. This is a great way to end the course. Reviewers say that this chapter is the "perfect ending to a great novel."
• NEW! Chapter 4: The sections on supply and demand in Chapter 4, "The Market Forces of Supply and Demand", have been reorganized and revised extensively to make especially clear the distinction between a change in quantity supplied and quantity demanded and a change in supply.
• NEW! Chapter 10: The first section of Chapter 10, "Externalities", has been rewritten for simplification. Mankiw now refers to the discussion only with the terms positive/negative externalities. The production/consumptions distinction has been rewritten for a more efficient presentation.
• NEW! Chapter 25: Formerly Chapter 24, Chapter 25 offers a significantly revised section on population growth, incorporating an FYI box on Malthus and new material on Kremer's study of population growth and technological progress.
• NEW! Chapter 30: Formerly Chapter 28, Chapter 30 has an improved and more detailed discussion of the Fisher effect which clearly draws the distinction between expected and unanticipated inflation.
• NEW! Revised Content: The term "net foreign investment" has been replaced with "net capital outflow" in chapters 31 and 32 (formerly chapter 29 and 30) to make this concept more intuitive for students.
• NEW! Clear Explanations: In chapter 33 (formerly 31) the organization of the short-run aggregate supply theories has changed. The section now begins with the sticky-wage theory. Reviewers have indicated that this organization makes it much easier to present this material because it puts the simplest theory for students to understand at the beginning.
• NEW! Streamlined Chapters: The author has eliminated the list of "Chapter Objectives" at the beginning of each chapter in order to focus the reader's attention on the author's concise introduction to each chapter. This material can now be found in the Instructor's Manual and Study Guide.
• NEW! Current Information: All tables, charts, graphs, and figures have been updated to reflect the most current information available at the time of publication. Several "In the News" and Case Study boxes have been updated or replaced with more current examples.

Contents

• PART I. Introduction
• PART II. Supply and Demand I: How Markets Work
• PART III. S Supply and Demand II: Markets and Welfare
• PART IV. The Economics of the Public Sector
• PART V. FIrm Behavior and The Organization Of Industry
• PART VI. The Economics of Labor Markets
• PART VII. Topics for Further Study
• PART VIII. The Data of Macroeconomics
• PART IX. The real Economy in the Long Run
• PART X. Money and Prices in the Long Run
• PART XI. The Macroeconomics of Open Economies
• PART XII. Short-run Economic Fluctuations
• PART XIII. Final Thoughts