Field Guide to the U.S. Economy: A Compact and Irreverent Guide to Economic Life in America, Revised and Updated Edition

by Jonathan Teller-Elsberg, Nancy Folbre, James Heintz

Extensively revised and expanded with the most up-to-the-minute data, this new edition of the Field Guide to the U.S. Economy brings key economic issues to life, reflecting the collective wit and wisdom of the many progressive economists affiliated with the Center for Popular Economics. User-friendly and accessible, the book covers a wide range of subjects, including workers, women, people of color, government spending, welfare, education, health, the environment, macroeconomics, and the global economy, as well as brand-new material on the war in Iraq, the Department of Homeland Security, the prison-industrial complex, foreign aid, the environment, and pharmaceutical companies.

Genres: Economics

237 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2006

Reviews

[Kate Pitrone · Rating 1 out of 5]

A book on economics to avoid: Someone recommended this to me for my granddaughter, I presume because it has cartoons in it. It is exactly the kind of book I don't want, being not about economics really, but rather one long whine about fairness with a bizarre conglomeration of topics and statistics with the answer to every problem as more government aid. For example, the sections on the family and poverty purport to show that the solution to every family-related problem is more government programs for families. As if we haven't seen federal poverty programs since before the New Deal. What good are they doing if we are still having the same problems with poverty, and worse, that those government programs were designed to prevent and ameliorate? "Reflecting the common wit and wisdom of more than forty progressive economists...." Narrow-minded, intensely political, didactic without actually being educational; what a useless book.

Whoever suggested this to me ought to go read a few real books about economics. Reading this is like reading a book that purports to be about physics, but instead is a long complaint about how what goes up must come down gets people hurt and really must stop.

[Mckinley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short entrees with cartoons, tables etc.