Principles of Economics经典读后感有感

《Principles of Economics》是一本由N. Gregory Mankiw著作，South-Western; 6 edition出版的Hardcover图书，本书定价：USD 329.95，页数：888，特精心收集的读后感，希望对大家能有帮助。

《Principles of Economics》读后感(一)：经济学门外汉

大学以来啃的第三个版本的经济学原理 崇敬曼昆的思考方式和极简要概括的数理图像说明 钟情微观经济多于宏观经济 可能因为古怪的对图表分析的addiction 同时认为微观是宏观的有力支持。 多次和爸爸探讨凯恩斯主义 谈到曼昆理论恰恰为凯恩斯通论在微观方面的基础缺失做了弥补。

《Principles of Economics》读后感(二)：要想去了解经济学方面的知识，这本书很值得去看的

首先，请原谅我在网上花了好长时间下载到了这本书的PDF版，不是我不想去买正版，只是因为到现在为止，国内，都还没有一家网店可以买到这本书，我只有在amazon.cn上找到这本书的第5版，并且还有翻译版的。我真的觉得，有些东西，必须要去看原版，尽管有的时候原版我们看的不是很流畅，可是像国外的电影、外国文学、经济书籍等，都尽量试着去看原版，因为我觉得，虽然有点时候，国内翻译过来的真的质量很好，并且有那么是字幕组一直都在努力奉献，可是还是很多的东西是无法从翻译所能表现的，譬如像某些外国诗歌，你去看那些中文翻译，真的是不知道在说什么。N. Gregory Mankiw的这本书，真的是很经典的，这本书对像我这样不是经济学专业出身的人来说，还是很有帮助的，如果你用心去看的话，因为正如张维迎说的，这本书具有启发性和引导性，所以你能很好的去进入，去思考，而不会觉得没有方向和找不到切入点。我们的每天的生活，都处处与经济有关，你去消费，去娱乐，去购买股票、基金，或者债券等。有的时候，当你去电影院看电影的时候，不知道你会不会有想过，为什么在电影院的Concessions，爆米花会买的如此只好，这就是经济学的问题。所以说，为了很好的生活，有必要多了解一下经济学方面的知识吧

《Principles of Economics》读后感(三)：After Reading <Principles of Economics>

Reason to choose this book

With the rapid development of society, especially since 2010, the increased wealth gap became gradually more apparent. China itself faces the question of economic development and the redistribution of wealth in the political discourse, which forms a famous metaphor named “Cake theory”. If economic development is seen as analogous to baking a cake, one side of the debate suggests that development should focus on 'dividing the cake more fairly, ' while the other says development should be focused on 'baking a bigger cake. '

But for further discussion on similar topics, we need to acquire basic economic knowledge, and this book I am going to talk provides me the necessary skills of thinking economics.

Introduce by N. Gregory Mankiw (ISBN: 9780538453059). The according textbook has been the formal student book for almost economic college students. With its clear and engaging writing style, continues to be one of the most popular books on economics available today.

The Author

N. Gregory Mankiw is Professor of Economics at Harvard University. As a teacher, he has taught macroeconomics, microeconomics, statistics, and principles of economics. Professor Mankiw is also a prolific writer and a regular participant in academic and policy debates. His research includes work on price adjustment, consumer behavior, financial markets, monetary and fiscal policy, and economic growth. In this book, he emphasizes material that you are likely to find interesting about the economy (particularly if you are studying economics for the first time), including real-life scenarios, useful facts, and the many ways economic concepts play a role in the decisions you make every day.

The Onset

Very beginning, if we want to know of “economics”, we know “economy” first. “The word `economy` comes from the Greek word `oikonomos`, which means `one who manages a household`”. We can say like this: “the household must allocate its scarce resources among its various members, taking into account each member’s abilities, effort, and desires.” Reflected to a country, “the management of society’s resources is important because resources are scarce……Economics is the study of how society manages its scarce resources”.

In the following chapters, Pro. Mankiw divides the book into thirteen parts to fulfill the basic economic concept.

PART I, the introduction of the whole book, gives us a rough deｓｃｒｉｐｔion of this book content. First of all, “Ten Principles of Economics”, which is made up of:

1. People face trade-offs

2. The cost of something is what you give up to get it

3. Rational people think at the margin

4. People respond to incentives

5. Trade can make everyone better off

6. Markets are usually a good way to organize economic activity

7. Governments can sometimes improve market outcomes

8. A country's standard of living depends on its ability to produce goods and services

9. Prices rise when the government prints too much money

10. Society faces a short-run tradeoff between inflation and unemployment.

These ten compendious principles I listed above is exactly what this book inclines to enunciate to us. Pro. Mankiw had striven to use elaborate examples to account for each one.

Among those principles, indeed, I found some topics, take “Rational People (3rd principle)” the most frequent term in debating as example, troubling me, as a debater, for a long time and I longed for a system learning. By the way, rational people are who systematically and purposefully do the best they can to achieve their objects, given the available opportunities. So it is no doubt that on Googreads, a reading community, a comment writes “This is one of few textbooks that didn’t make me fall asleep while reading for hours.” As the same to me.

One classic tradeoff between “guns and butters” is another metaphor we hear often but never think in system, the more a society spends on national defense (guns) to protect it, the less spend on consumer goods (butter), reversely the same. Also important as the writer pointed out, in modern society is the tradeoff between a clean environment and a high level of income.

Besides these, Pro. Mankiw also raise a suggestion for us readers as the second subsection of PART I, which refers to “Thinking Like an Economist”. What’s more, “Interdependence and the Gains from Trade” as the third subsection, functions like a transition part from simple talk to more advanced concept.

Main Themes

The left parts, they can be allotted into two main themes.

1st Theme, from PART II to PART VII, focuses on the “Market”, which we often hear, but seldom know.

Simply we can define two sorts of market, “In the market for goods and services, households are buyers, and firms are sellers……in the market for the factors of production, households are sellers, and firms are buyers.” Pro. Mankiw talked how markets work and related issues like welfare, labor and so on. According to common recognition, we can also call this part as “microeconomics”.

Since it has talked about the source scarce, partly due to which we now have economics, microeconomics also covers this idea, or in other words, microeconomics deploys “how to allocate the scarce source” at the very onset of this part. “There ain’t such thing as a free lunch”. Grammar aside, it is a simple sentence but explains much more things than it could be. Somehow, it can also explain why “the free is the most expensive”.

Another center in this part I think is about marginal topics. Marginal change is a rather simple example. Pro. Mankiw raised a question which can be resumed like: why water is so cheap while diamonds are unbelievably expensive. Meanwhile, we need the previous to survive but the latter one is just a kind of decoration. Pro. Mankiw gave us the economic answer to this, incoherent and scientific.

2nd Theme, from PART VIII to PART XIII, accordingly puts more writing on “macroeconomics” part.

Microeconomics is the study of how households and firms make decisions and how they interact the markets, then macroeconomics is also the study of economy wide phenomena, including inflation, unemployment, and economic growth. From a long run in the real economy to the short run tradeoff between inflation and unemployment, it outlines a comparatively comprehensive “national market” concept. In this part, it, we can see from its each title, brings us a view to observe a national market, so that we are able to think the “invisible hand” measures and the “visible hand” function.

Especially, when we go on to the inflation and unemployment, we will think of the higher unemployment rate in America. Pro. Mankiw introduced the high-reputation Phillips curve, describing a historical inverse relationship between rates of unemployment and corresponding rates of inflation that result within an economy, to seek a hint of making it understandable. Following inflation and unemployment, definitely it went on to Fiser Effect, and then started another term explain, and so on indefinitely.

Step by step, this book makes us absorb more and more, from shadow to deep, from normal to especial, and the back to the normal.

The Writing

One thing is so impressive that I must mention. I scanned almost views on several influential reading communities, the idea is accepted by all that Pro. Mankiw is a great writer. The text and presentation is very clear, engaging and satisfying without going too deep or floating above the surface, peppered with anecdotes and articles from the like of the Economist, the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal that emphasize or clarify the topics discussed in the chapters.

With just the right mix of equations, explanations, and real-life examples, the book is a great overview of Economics.

My Thoughts

The introduction part “descends” itself on me---before I decided to pick up this book, my innocence drove away from it, which I think most people feel similarly, but after reading it, I can apparently feel the inspiration surging in my mind, and the spontaneous explaining, the book gave me, on things once afflicted me on economics.

Quoted from another reader, “A great book that opened my eyes to the world of economics. The rest of my life will never be the same.” Can’t agree more. Absolutely, I am not an economics student indeed, but this book interest me on continuing this topic and gave me a hint to explore it by myself. It is common sense that we call this sort of book masterpiece, and Pro. Makiw deserves “a venerable economist and writer” title.

More important, this book, more like a guideline, leading me into a totally different point to see our world, has changed my way of thinking. Or precisely, it provides a utterly new way for me of viewing this world. From the shoes of an economist, like Pro. Mankiw said “thinking like an economist”, vegetable market, my mom goes there every day, henceforth is no more just a place of simple buying and selling, but a complex tradeoff which connects with the whole country’s destiny tightly.