What You Need To Know About Economics

What You Need To Know About Economics

Released April 2011
Publisher(s): Capstone
ISBN: 9780857081148

Read it now on the O’Reilly learning platform with a 10-day free trial.

O’Reilly members get unlimited access to books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.

Start your free trial

Book description

George Buckley & Sumeet Desai: What You Need To Know About Economics

Economics Matters. But with confusing things like GDP and interest rates, it's often hard to get you head around.

So What do you really need to know about economics? Find out:

  • What economic growth is and why it matters

  • How inflation happens

  • How jobs are created and lost

  • How the property market works

  • What central banks do and how it affects the rest of us

  • The impact of government spending on the economy

What You Need to Know About Economics cuts through the theory to help you to do your job and understand the world around you better.

Read More in the What You Need to Know Series and Ger Up to Speed on The Essentials... Fast.

Table of contents

  1. Cover Page
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. CONTENTS
  5. INTRODUCTION
  6. Chapter 1: GROWTH
    1. WHAT IS ECONOMIC GROWTH?
    2. Three Measures of Activity
    3. HOW IT ALL FITS TOGETHER
    4. Focus on Household Spending and Investment by Firms
    5. VOLUMES, VALUES AND THE SEASONS
    6. Business Cycles and Trend Growth
    7. Multipliers
    8. SPARE CAPACITY AND THE ‘OUTPUT GAP’
    9. Recessions and Depressions
    10. Comparing Economies Across the World
    11. What to Watch
  7. Chapter 2: INFLATION
    1. What Is Inflation?
    2. How Prices Are Determined
    3. Causes of Inflation: Demand-Pull Versus Cost-Push
    4. The Importance of Inflation
    5. Expectations
    6. A History of Inflation
  8. Chapter 3: EMPLOYMENT
    1. Introduction
    2. Measuring Jobs and Joblessness
    3. The Jobs Market and Wages
    4. Types of Unemployment
    5. Okun's Law
    6. Time Lags
    7. Productivity
    8. The Phillips Curve and the ‘Natural Rate’ of Unemployment
    9. Why the Phillips Curve Stopped Working
    10. Changes in the Workforce
  9. Chapter 4: TRADE
    1. WHAT IS INTERNATIONAL TRADE?
    2. Comparative Advantage
    3. THE BALANCE OF PAYMENTS
    4. Currencies and Trade
    5. Going Back to Balance
    6. PURCHASING POWER PARITY
    7. The Asian Crisis
    8. Protectionism
    9. GLOBAL TRADE DEALS
  10. Chapter 5: MONEY
    1. WHY DOES MONEY EXIST?
    2. What Is Money Today?
    3. MONEY DEMAND – THE MOTIVES FOR HOLDING MONEY
    4. MONEY SUPPLY AND CREDIT CREATION
    5. How Interest Rates Are Determined
    6. The Quantity Theory of Money
    7. The Importance of Money In Practice
    8. The Borrowers and Savers of Money
    9. Household Borrowing and Debt
    10. Borrowing By Firms
    11. The Effect of Borrowing on the Economy
    12. The 2007 Credit Crisis – In a Nutshell
  11. Chapter 6: CENTRAL BANKING
    1. What Do Central Banks Do?
    2. How Central Banking Started
    3. Interest Rates
    4. The Transmission Mechanism
    5. Forecasting
    6. Inflation Targeting
    7. Monetary Policy Rules
    8. Quantitative Easing
    9. Financial Stability
  12. Chapter 7: THE PUBLIC FINANCES
    1. WHAT ARE THE PUBLIC FINANCES?
    2. BALANCING THE BUDGET
    3. The Role of Government
    4. The Keynesian Approach
    5. Taxes
    6. DEBT AND BOND MARKETS
    7. Sovereign Defaults
  13. Chapter 8: HOUSING
    1. THE MARKET FOR HOUSING
    2. How We Measure House Prices
    3. WHAT DRIVES THE PRICE OF HOUSES?
    4. AFFORDABILITY
    5. Housing as an Investment
    6. The Importance of Housing to the Wider Economy
    7. Bubble Trouble and the Sub-Prime Crisis
  14. CONCLUSION
  15. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  16. SOURCES
  17. INDEX

Product information

  • Title: What You Need To Know About Economics
  • Author(s):
  • Release date: April 2011
  • Publisher(s): Capstone
  • ISBN: 9780857081148