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schroederius 's review for:
Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy
by Thomas Sowell
This book is very interesting, and I do think it's good to read it and understand it. Sowell basically seems to see EVERYTHING through the lens of economics. He seems to grudgingly accept that there are areas that ought to be covered by politics, but he's dismayed that there's no built-in efficiency tools. The same for non-profits. Since I value things that he doesn't seem to value, such as clean water and natural diversity - if they don't have prices in a market, there's no mechanism for them being treated efficiently, so they seem to be inherently objectionable to Sowell - I kept thinking, "But, wait..." while reading. But I do think he's right, we mistakenly embark on things like rent control, or Prop 13 in California, which interfere with market-based decisions in ways that yield undesirable outcomes. If you then read a book by a political scientist, who believes that everything important in the world involves the management of political power, I'm not sure how you will reconcile the 2 perspectives. This book probably would have been better, IMHO, if it had SOME treatment of topics that are important but not in the realm of economics directly. Maybe one of his other books?