[books] <i>The Economic Naturalist</i> by Robert H. Frank [Rowan Tree and Red Thread]

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First book finished in 2009. Another collection of economics 'just-so' stories, with interesting basic points on 'no cash on the table' and the cost of faking signals in the social arena. I found it worth reading but still not convincing on the Adam Smith style individual as rational maximiser idea. Not as fun to read as The Undercover Economist by Tim Harford, which I read last year and covers many of the same points.

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There are 7 comments on this entry. (Reply.)

First out of the gate!

Yes, I agree 50 books is more reasonable, and I see you're including nonfiction too :)

Onward!

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Damn right I'm including non-fiction. I'll be including graphic novels and the backs of cereal packets to make quota I bet.

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Seems a sensible accounting practice to me. I'm already one novellette down on the one anthology I managed to "finish" this year -- and what's worse, I had started it *last* year. (Had to go back to a local library before I left, y'see.) But hey, I cry "Ellison!", and move along! (Geddit, geddit?) I think I'll have my eyeballs meter my reading by the word, add them all up at the end of the year, and divide through by the number I first thought of. Think post-Gutenberg, man!

I'm probably missing a *lot* of context for the "rational maximiser" bit, but isn't it fairly well-established in economics circles that such individuals *aren't*? Reference for this assertion would be something like [Nash (between bouts of going nutso)].

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Post-Gutenberg is all very well, but I still have a (probably irrational) attachment to physical books. That and most of my words off screens reading is even more ephemeral and bitty than my book-reading.

Whatever about the growth of behavioural economics and the overlap of psychology and economics, most of the theories I'm aware of, including those underpinning, to pick an example not entirely at random, massive deregulation in the banking sector, presuppose rational actors intent on maximising their own gains. I think that the irrationality and errors of individuals are supposed to even out over many actors in a market, but that doesn't always work out, as recent developments and bubbles indicate.

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No, I do too. I'm just half-rationalising, half-spoofing. There was an essay in the Nebula Showcase 2007 (that I may already have mentioned in passing) where some Industry Geezer was touting the alleged health of the publishing business with reference to the growth of e-books and audiobooks, and suggesting that the economics of the paperback might lead to it following the hardback into the near-extinction of a "prestige" product. (I'm paraphrasing fairly heavily here, I suspect.) Rather depressing, but it would certainly help account for the wince I have whenever I go into Waterstones.

So, you mean whether "rational actors" even _exist_, as against whether a population (entirely) of such gives a globally optimal outcome? I think that's respectively "no" and "no". But to placate Kate (plac8 K8?), I'm not claiming there (currently) exists much in the way of a plausible alternative, beyond what's essentially tinkering at the edges of much the same sort of system. (Now with new added "to keep an eye on the other two intellectuals" features!) Bring forth better wetware, sez I.

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Nice icon, btw. Hokusai rules the waves!

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Why thank you. Always liked The Great Wave, and its current appearance on Biffy's bassist's arm, and my officemate's desk, on a dustjacket, possibly prompted it as a means of fixing the great userpic void, suggestible fewl that I am.

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Rowan Tree and Red Thread

[books] The Economic Naturalist by Robert H. Frank

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January