Macroeconomics is concerned with the economy as a whole. In macroeconomics, we develop an overall view of the economic system and we study total (or aggregate) economic behaviour. The emphasis is on topics such as total production, income and expenditure, economic growth, aggregate unemployment, the general price level, inflation and the balance of payments. Macroeconomics is therefore the world of totals.

This second edition of Understanding macroeconomics is a comprehensive revision and restructuring of the first edition, but still against a contemporary South African background. The major changes include the following: the chapter on money has been expanded and moved forward, and the material on the Keynesian model has been consolidated in two separate chapters, instead of being spread over different chapters . There is also a greater emphasis on the role of monetary and fiscal policy. New topics include the role of the ratings agencies and the notion of "radical economic transformation".

As in the first edition, the easy style and practical examples make the content extremely accessible. A wealth of relevant information about the South African economy is also provided. A companion to this book, Understanding microeconomics, is also available.

This South African edition of Macroeconomics is essential reading for all students taking introductory economics modules on undergraduate courses throughout South Africa. It is also ideal for use with the macroeconomics component of MBA courses.

The text contains updated case studies, set against a South African context to illustrate how the principles of economics relate to your life. The news articles are based on news events in South Africa along with questions to help you apply your knowledge and to build your understanding.

This text is designed to give you the confidence and ability to think like an economist.

How does the South African economy work? Why do macroeconomic variables change? So what if they do? What happens next? How do economic processes and policy institutions really work? Which data must I use? What can policy do? And then the big questions: How can we reduce unemployment and maintain low inflation? What then about poverty, inequality, inclusive growth and development in South Africa?

The answers are found in How to think and reason in Macroeconomics – A South African text, a popular university textbook with very positive feedback from students, lecturers and practitioners. This fifth edition is completely up-to-date and comprehensive. It combines well-informed intuitive understanding with solid economic theory plus a concrete understanding of South African economic issues, processes, institutions and data. In this way it prepares you to analyse macroeconomic events and policies in a globalised and development context – and understand different perspectives in policy and political-economic debates.

Key features:

• Accessible analysis, theory and diagrams, combining intuitive understanding and sophisticated analysis.
• A choice of learning routes with different levels of difficulty and mathematics.
• Real-world economic reasoning skills, not dry theory.
• Online animations that provide unique insights into macroeconomic fluctuations and shocks.
• Explicit continuous focus on South Africa as an open economy in an African and global context shaped by China, Trump’s trade wars and Brexit.
• Theoretical and policy analysis of unemployment, inflation, low growth and inclusive growth, as well as the National Development Plan.
• Analytical case studies of the global financial crisis, quantitative easing, the Euro crisis and the Eskom crisis.
• First-hand, freshly updated insights into how South African policy institutions, processes and instruments work.
• Clear guides to access relevant South African data sources, with useful data tips.
• Thorough integration of the structural social and economic realities (notably inequality and poverty) of South Africa as a middle-income country.
• Incorporation of broader considerations such as human development, inclusive growth and sustainable development.

In terms accessible to non-economists, Marcos Jose Mendes describes the ways democracy and inequality produce low growth in the short and medium terms. In the longer term, he argues that Brazil has two paths in front of it. One is to create the conditions necessary to boost economic performance and drive the country toward a high level of development. The other is to fail in untying the political knot that blocks growth, leaving it a middle-income country. The source of his contrasting futures for Brazil is inequality, which he demonstrates is a relevant variable in any discussion of economic growth. Inequality illuminates causes of seemingly-unconnected problems. This book, which includes freely-accessible documents and datasets, is the first in-depth analysis of an issue that promises to become increasingly prominent.

This book provides researchers, students, and practitioners with a methodology to evaluate the impacts of a wide diversity of development projects and policies on local economies. Projects and policies often create spillovers within project areas. LEWIE uses simulation methods to quantify these spillovers. It has become a complement to randomized control trials (RCTs), as governments and donors become interested in documenting impacts beyond the treated, comparing the likely impacts of alternative interventions, and designing complementary interventions to influence program and policy impacts. It is also a tool for impact evaluation where RCTs are not feasible. Chapters 1-4 motivate and present the basics of impact simulation, including how to design a LEWIE model, how to estimate the model, and how to obtain the necessary data. The remaining chapters provide a diversity of interesting real-world applications and extensions of the basic models. The applications include evaluations of the impacts of cash transfers for the poor, ecotourism, global food-price shocks, irrigation projects, migration, and corruption. Each chapter provide readers with the tools they need to conduct their own local economy-wide impact evaluations. All models and data used in this book are available on-line.

This book collects results from ad hoc surveys on firms pricing behavior conducted in 2003 and 2004 by nine National central banks of the Euro area in the context of a joint research project (Eurosystem Inflation Persistence Network). These surveys have proved to be an efficient way to test theories on the pricing strategies of economic agents, documenting, in qualitative terms, the underlying rationale of the observed pricing patterns. The book provides an unprecedented amount of information from more than 11,000 euro area firms, addressing issues such as the relevance of nominal and real rigidities, the information set used by firms in the price setting process, the strategy followed to review prices, the frequency of both price reviews and price changes, the reasons underlying price stickiness, and asymmetries in price adjustment. It also compares results for the euro area to those obtained for other countries by similar studies. Finally, it draws the main implications for theoretical modeling and for monetary policy.

Consumption decisions are crucial determinants of business cycles and growth. Knowledge of how consumers respond to the economic environment and how they react to the risks that they encounter during the life-cycle is therefore important for evaluating stabilization policies and the effectiveness of fiscal packages implemented in response to economic downturns or financial crises. In The Economics of Consumption, Tullio Jappelli and Luigi Pistaferri provide a comprehensive examination of the most important developments in the field of consumption decisions and evaluate economic models against empirical evidence. The first part of the book provides the basic ingredients of economic models of consumption decisions. The central part reviews the empirical literature on the effect of income and wealth changes on consumption and on the relevance of precautionary saving and credit market imperfections. The last chapters extend the basic framework to such important areas as bequests, leisure, lifetime uncertainty, and financial sophistication. Jappelli and Pistaferri shed light on important issues, including how consumption responds to changes in economic resources, how economic circumstances and consumers' characteristics influence behavior, and whether consumption inequality depends on income shocks and their persistence.

Olivier Blanchard, former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), is author of one of the most important standard macroeconomics textbooks, which is used throughout the world. Endorsed by Blanchard himself, Anti-Blanchard Macroeconomics critically analyzes prevailing economic theory and policy in comparison with alternative approaches. This thoroughly revised edition represents a field of research that has developed through intense theoretical debates, continual empirical testing and the resultant disputes about economic policy. Emiliano Brancaccio and Andrea Califano succinctly explore the relationship between theoretical models and economic policies, providing readers with examples and empirical exercises, and showing how the conclusions of different theories can be empirically tested. This updated second edition examines the links between the issues at the core of macroeconomic debate, including economic growth, economic crises, labour market reforms, government debt sustainability, the behaviour of central banks and the stock market, among many others. Key features: Contains an analysis of the economic policies, consequences and theories surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic Examines the connection between contemporary issues in world politics, economic theory and policymaking It overcomes the typical contradiction between the opportunity to offer students a preliminary mainstream education and the need to nurture rather than crush their critical spirit It helps students to understand that economics is not a discipline that changes in a smooth, linear manner but, on the contrary, represents a dynamic field of research that develops through intense theoretical debate and continual empirical testing, and is shaped by the resultant disputes concerning economic policy Includes the typescript of a lively and informative debate between Emiliano Brancaccio and Olivier Blanchard, together with comparative economic policy examples.

Since the rational expectations revolution in macroeconomics, the subject has evolved in a major way, adopting the principles behind the revolution and building on them in spectacular fashion. In this thoroughly revised and updated second edition, the authors provide a complete and up-to-date textbook designed to guide students through the mathematical and conceptual maze of modern macroeconomics. The updated second edition includes: Explanation of the historical development of the subject Introduction to traditional macro-classical/adaptive expectations Demonstration of how rational expectations are handled in macro models and in finance An explanation of the importance of structural, micro-founded models Key examples of structural models examined in detail, and with extension to the open economy Discussion of policy implications throughout Methodology for testing models against macro data behaviour, complete with the latest evidence on these models' success Coverage of key topics, including the supply-side, unemployment, growth and the open economy. By explaining the basics of each topic, and providing the solid grounding for students to tackle more complex and detailed material, this textbook will be an invaluable resource for both postgraduate and upper level undergraduate students of macroeconomics alike.

This timely book sets out a shrewd and comprehensive policy programme, for both 'microeconomic' supply-side settings of tax and regulatory systems, and 'macroeconomic' policies for fiscal and monetary policies to regulate demand and support the supply-side growth agenda. Explaining the numerous benefits of free trade after Britain's exit from the EU, and challenging the anti-Brexit argument, Patrick Minford builds on his extensive research into economic modelling to quantify the effects of Brexit and propose policies for the aftermath. Laying out an agenda for replacing social interventionist EU regulation with a robust free market framework, Minford proposes a radical tax reform programme to broaden the tax base and flatten marginal rates. This incisive book looks to the future of the UK beyond Brexit, addressing the effects of coronavirus and proposing an avenue of policies for recovery. Featuring key empirical analysis and insightful arguments, this book will be crucial reading for economists and policymakers investigating and overseeing the future of UK economic policy. It will also benefit scholars of economics and political economy, particularly those interested in tax reform programmes.

Piero Ferri expertly broadens the analysis of the canonical growth cycle approach by presenting a Minsky-Harrod model, examining how the relationship between income distribution, growth and unemployment becomes increasingly complex. Exploring this new technique to generate a process of growth, based not only on history but disequilibrium, he investigates the current income distribution debate further and the challenges it faces. Written in a succinct yet comprehensive style, Piero Ferri begins by addressing the basic principles, followed by an in-depth look at growth cycle models and how the Minsky-Harrod integrated model would help to unravel the current complexities. The empirical analysis reaches insightful conclusions by justifying the existence of a variety of results and by studying the distributive loop in a dynamic context which is prone to instability. Teachers of macroeconomics and scholars will find this an invaluable read and will benefit from the practical study and results. Researchers interested in labour economics and political economy will also find this a thought-provoking book.

More than a decade after the publication of the critically acclaimed A Modern Guide to Macroeconomics, Brian Snowdon and Howard Vane have produced a worthy successor in the form of Modern Macroeconomics. Thoroughly extended, revised and updated, it will become the indispensable text for students and teachers of macroeconomics in the new millennium. The authors skilfully trace the origins, development and current state of modern macroeconomics from an historical perspective. They do so by thoroughly appraising the central tenets underlying the main competing schools of macroeconomic thought as well as their diverse policy implications. To reflect the important developments which have occurred in macroeconomics over the final decades of the twentieth century, they also survey the burgeoning literature on the 'new political macroeconomics' and 'economic growth'. The book includes insightful chapters on the Post Keynesian and Austrian schools by Paul Davidson and Roger Garrison, and is enlivened by interviews with leading economists such as Robert Skidelsky, James Tobin, Milton Friedman, Robert Lucas Jr, Edward Prescott, Gregory Mankiw, Alberto Alesina, Robert Solow and Paul Romer. The volume also contains an extensive bibliography of over 1,300 publications which highlights the key titles recommended for further student reading. Erudite, accessible and lucidly written, this book is both a stimulating introduction and excellent guide to the controversies and diversity of modern macroeconomic debates. It will prove invaluable for students on undergraduate and postgraduate courses who want to understand as well as simply learn about macroeconomics. It is also a book that many teachers and lecturers will want on their shelves.

Synthesising Marx's, Keynes's and Schumpeter's theories on wage-price dynamics, effective demand, real innovations and financial markets into a coherent whole, this book goes significantly beyond a consideration of their work in isolation. It focuses on exploring and analysing Goodwin's integrated Marx-Keynes-Schumpeter system (MKS), approaching this from a historical perspective. Chapters start from Harrod's and Kaldor's work, reconsidering prominent demand- and supply-side approaches to Keynesian macro-dynamics, supplemented by Goodwin's distributive cycle. The book presents a baseline MKS-type model, considering the rigorous treatment of uncertainty, opinion dynamics, the movement from flexicurity to social capitalism and democracy, and a high-order MKS macro-model. The exploration of the MKS model from a historical basis will make this a useful book for macroeconomics and history of economics scholars and students. It will also be helpful for those looking at macrodynamics in more depth.

A brilliantly reported true-life thriller that goes behind the scenes of the financial crisis on Wall Street and in Washington.
In one of the most gripping financial narratives in decades, Andrew Ross Sorkin-a "New York Times" columnist and one of the country's most respected financial reporters-delivers the first definitive blow- by-blow account of the epochal economic crisis that brought the world to the brink. Through unprecedented access to the players involved, he re-creates all the drama and turmoil of these turbulent days, revealing never-before-disclosed details and recounting how, motivated as often by ego and greed as by fear and self-preservation, the most powerful men and women in finance and politics decided the fate of the world's economy.

This timely book explores the measurement and consequences of financialisation, as well as its driving forces, to take a fresh look at reconciling the twin concepts of financialisation and financial development. Imad Moosa provides a critical review of these two separate strands – the individual measures of economic development and financialisation – on the grounds that they are inadequate to represent a multi-dimensional process. Introducing a new composite measure encompassing the means of payment and asset ownership as well as conventional indicators, Moosa expertly investigates the economic, political and social consequences of financialisation. Identifying the driving forces of financialisation, he concludes that there is a requirement to reverse the current trend using more than just legislation and regulation to secure a sound and stable economy. This innovative book will be a fascinating and informative read for academics and research students of financial economics, regulation and economic sociology. Policy makers and politicians engaged in financial regulation will find the suggested insights into achieving future financial stability thought-provoking.

This insightful book offers a comprehensive analysis of how macroeconomics can steer development and reduce poverty. It untangles how developing countries can apply effective economic policies in spite of the challenges they face. With an aim to design a macroeconomic strategy which would provide a stable and long-term growth plan, Basil Oberholzer explores the multiple constraints which prevent developing countries from reducing poverty. The author reveals how countries' scope of action is strongly limited by international economic dynamics, including current account imbalances, capital flight, foreign debt accumulation, and exchange rate fluctuations. His detailed examination of how international payments take place within the current monetary structure also illuminates fundamental flaws that are harmful for developing countries. Applying a newly developed monetary macroeconomic model, Oberholzer suggests a reform of countries' international payments as a solution to these key problems. This book will prove to be a valuable resource for students and scholars of development economics and macroeconomics. Its analysis of how appropriate macroeconomic strategies can be established, pragmatic policy recommendations, and explanation of critical macroeconomic constraints will also be beneficial for policy-makers in progressive governments.

The Pulitzer Prize-wimming author of The Prize joins a leading expert on the global economy to present an incisive narrative of the risks and opportunities that are emerging as the balance of power shifts around the world between governments and markets -- and the battle over globalization comes front and center. The Commanding Heights is essential for understanding the struggle over the "new rules of the game" for the twenty-first century.

Presenting an in-depth overview of the foundations and developments of post-Keynesian macroeconomics since Kalecki and Keynes, this timely book develops a comprehensive post-Keynesian macroeconomic model with the respective macroeconomic policy mix for achieving non-inflationary full employment. The different versions of the model for closed and open economies are concerned with the key areas of macroeconomics, such as full employment, constant inflation and external balance. Eckhard Hein expertly illustrates how to embed these post-Keynesian macroeconomics and macroeconomic policies into the post-Keynesian research programme more generally, whilst also providing a review of its methods and historical roots. Furthermore, the book links post-Keynesian short-run macroeconomics to long-run distribution and growth theories. Finally, it applies these theoretical approaches to the current research on macroeconomic regimes and regime changes within finance-dominated capitalism and on the macroeconomic challenges of the ecological crisis and of the required socio-ecological transformation. This book will be a crucial read for academics and graduate students interested in post-Keynesian macroeconomics. Providing a thought-provoking alternative to orthodox economic policies, this will also be of interest to policy advisers and politicians.

This Handbook collects a set of academic and accessible chapters to address three questions: What should real estate economists know about macroeconomics? What should macroeconomists know about real estate? What should readers know about the interaction between real estate and macroeconomics? Content is focused on four widely discussed themes: real estate-related wealth and macroeconomics, housing price dynamics and affordability, financial crises and structural change, and non-residential real estate. The chapter authors, active researchers from around the world, present evidence from various countries and datasets that are of interest to audiences across the globe, summarize insights from previous research and shed light on current issues. The Handbook of Real Estate and Macroeconomics assists researchers on the big picture as well as a hot spots in frontier research, and facilitates worldwide policy discussions and analysis for practitioners in financial markets, corporate economists, and policy analysts in governments and NGOs.

Presenting a wide range of topics and written 150 years since Carl Menger’s Principles of Economics was published, this timely book reviews Menger’s life and theories and explains how his insights on the creation of money are still inspiring and relevant today.   Highlighting state-of-the-art results on Menger’s methodology and economic theory, the book expertly analyses key topics such as the debt theory of money, capital wealth and the gender wage gap. Chapters also cover up-to-date topics such as Bitcoin and technological progress reinvigorating the study of Menger’s philosophies and their application for future work in economics and the history of economic thought.   Comprehensive in its approach, this book will provide an excellent addition to the mainstream literature for scholars and students of economics, Austrian economics and the philosophy of economics. Researchers interested in economic development and other areas such as Bitcoin will find this an excellent resource for their research.

This title should be seen as the first building block of any Economics course. The content is organised in such a manner as to proceed logically towards an understanding of macroeconomics. Having studied the title, the student will know what the repo rate, the CPIX, and core inflation are. The student will understand how government debt originates, how it is financed, what its impact on financial markets is, and much more. This title serves as a reference on which students can fall back in years to come and it will stimulate an interest in economics.

Offering a new and comprehensive overview of important topics and orientations in the anthropological study of economic life, this invigorating third edition of A Handbook of Economic Anthropology addresses key changes in the decade since the previous edition in people's economic lives and environments, as well as in intellectual interest among scholars. The Handbook contains diverse reflections on the economic turmoil of 2008 and the austerity that followed. Containing 35 newly commissioned chapters from important scholars in the field, it covers the nature of work and the changing ways people think about it, as stable jobs give way to short term work and the platform economy, as well as the expansion of the financial sector and efforts to control it. Chapters further explore social reproduction, the maintenance and regeneration of households and social relations over time, as well as the increasing concern with value, morality and ethics, both as things that motivate people and as policy orientations. This will be a critical read for academic anthropologists looking for a state-of-the-art and thorough reference work for this key area of the discipline. Economic sociologists and geographers, as well as heterodox economists will also benefit from the broad range of empirical work and theoretical standpoints explored.

A Modern Guide to State Intervention investigates the impact of the changing role of the state, offering an alternative political economy for the third decade of the twenty-first century. Building on important factors including history, the role of institutions, society and economic structures, this Modern Guide considers economic and administrative interventions towards changing the destabilised status quo of modern societies. Exploring a variety of theoretical approaches, chapters offer sustainable growth-inducing policies and proposals to address important challenges in this era of neoliberal globalization and financialization. With key contributions by distinguished academics in the field, the book evaluates past efforts and policies and critiques failed perspectives. A critical read for political economics scholars wishing to look beyond orthodox perspectives, this book highlights key areas of contention in modern economic policies. This will also be a vital book for policy-makers and economists looking ahead to a more sustainable economic atmosphere.

This timely book sets out a shrewd and comprehensive policy programme, for both 'microeconomic' supply-side settings of tax and regulatory systems, and 'macroeconomic' policies for fiscal and monetary policies to regulate demand and support the supply-side growth agenda. Explaining the numerous benefits of free trade after Britain's exit from the EU, and challenging the anti-Brexit argument, Patrick Minford builds on his extensive research into economic modelling to quantify the effects of Brexit and propose policies for the aftermath. Laying out an agenda for replacing social interventionist EU regulation with a robust free market framework, Minford proposes a radical tax reform programme to broaden the tax base and flatten marginal rates. This incisive book looks to the future of the UK beyond Brexit, addressing the effects of coronavirus and proposing an avenue of policies for recovery. Featuring key empirical analysis and insightful arguments, this book will be crucial reading for economists and policymakers investigating and overseeing the future of UK economic policy. It will also benefit scholars of economics and political economy, particularly those interested in tax reform programmes.

Foreign Exchange Constraint and Developing Economies addresses the complex nature of foreign exchange constraint for macroeconomic and social development. The book collects expertise and perspectives from a diverse set of contributions. Using a combination of innovative theoretical and empirical approaches, the book suggests several analytical frameworks to help advance academic research and policy work on foreign exchange and sustainable development. Chapters explore how trends in exchange rates, currency dynamics and international capital markets impact development models of primarily small open economies. The problems of global capital flows affected by the COVID-19 pandemic are also reviewed. The book presents analyses of both country-level and regional patterns and discusses broader implications for emerging markets. Exploring urgent questions for academic and policy agendas, this will be an important read for economists and researchers working on the topics of economic development, international economics, open economy, exchange rate management, sovereign debt, central banking, and monetary policy. Applied economists and policymakers will also find this a meaningful resource.