A New York Times Bestseller A Wall Street Journal Bestseller A New York Times Notable Book of 2020 A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Shortlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year A New Statesman Book to Read From economist Anne Case and Nobel Prize winner Angus Deaton, a groundbreaking account of how the flaws in capitalism are fatal for America's working class Deaths of despair from suicide, drug overdose, and alcoholism are rising dramatically in the United States, claiming hundreds of thousands of American lives. Anne Case and Angus Deaton explain the overwhelming surge in these deaths and shed light on the social and economic forces that are making life harder for the working class. As the college educated become healthier and wealthier, adults without a degree are literally dying from pain and despair. Case and Deaton tie the crisis to the weakening position of labor, the growing power of corporations, and a rapacious health-care sector that redistributes working-class wages into the pockets of the wealthy. This critically important book paints a troubling portrait of the American dream in decline, and provides solutions that can rein in capitalism's excesses and make it work for everyone.

From the Nobel Prize–winning economist and New York Times bestselling coauthor of Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism, candid reflections on the economist’s craft When economist Angus Deaton immigrated to the United States from Britain in the early 1980s, he was awed by America’s strengths and shocked by the extraordinary gaps he witnessed between people. Economics in America explains in clear terms how the field of economics addresses the most pressing issues of our time—from poverty, retirement, and the minimum wage to the ravages of the nation’s uniquely disastrous health care system—and narrates Deaton’s account of his experiences as a naturalized US citizen and academic economist. Deaton is witty and pulls no punches. In this incisive, candid, and funny book, he describes the everyday lives of working economists, recounting the triumphs as well as the disasters, and tells the inside story of the Nobel Prize in economics and the journey that led him to Stockholm to receive one. He discusses the ongoing tensions between economics and politics—and the extent to which economics has any content beyond the political prejudices of economists—and reflects on whether economists bear at least some responsibility for the growing despair and rising populism in America. Blending rare personal insights with illuminating perspectives on the social challenges that confront us today, Deaton offers a disarmingly frank critique of his own profession while shining a light on his adopted country’s policy accomplishments and failures.

A New York Times Bestseller A Wall Street Journal Bestseller A New York Times Notable Book of 2020 A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Shortlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year A New Statesman Book to Read From economist Anne Case and Nobel Prize winner Angus Deaton, a groundbreaking account of how the flaws in capitalism are fatal for America's working class Life expectancy in the United States has recently fallen for three years in a row-a reversal not seen since 1918 or in any other wealthy nation in modern times. In the past two decades, deaths of despair from suicide, drug overdose, and alcoholism have risen dramatically, and now claim hundreds of thousands of American lives each year-and they're still rising. Anne Case and Angus Deaton, known for first sounding the alarm about deaths of despair, explain the overwhelming surge in these deaths and shed light on the social and economic forces that are making life harder for the working class. They demonstrate why, for those who used to prosper in America, capitalism is no longer delivering. Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism paints a troubling portrait of the American dream in decline. For the white working class, today's America has become a land of broken families and few prospects. As the college educated become healthier and wealthier, adults without a degree are literally dying from pain and despair. In this critically important book, Case and Deaton tie the crisis to the weakening position of labor, the growing power of corporations, and, above all, to a rapacious health-care sector that redistributes working-class wages into the pockets of the wealthy. Capitalism, which over two centuries lifted countless people out of poverty, is now destroying the lives of blue-collar America. This book charts a way forward, providing solutions that can rein in capitalism's excesses and make it work for everyone.

Edited by Angus Deaton, winner of the 2015 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, this volume features early work on the theory and measurement of consumer behaviour. Featuring contributions from leading economists such as Anthony Atkinson, Nicholas Stern, John Muellbauer and Deaton himself, the book offers papers on a wide range of topics. Topics covered range from theory to econometrics, from Engel curves to labour supply and fertility, and from consumer demand in England to consumer behaviour in the USSR. These papers were written and collected for this volume to honour Sir Richard Stone on the occasion of his retirement from his chair at the University of Cambridge.

The world is a better place than it used to be. People are healthier, wealthier, and live longer. Yet the escapes from destitution by so many has left gaping inequalities between people and nations. In The Great Escape, Angus Deaton--one of the foremost experts on economic development and on poverty--tells the remarkable story of how, beginning 250 years ago, some parts of the world experienced sustained progress, opening up gaps and setting the stage for today's disproportionately unequal world. Deaton takes an in-depth look at the historical and ongoing patterns behind the health and wealth of nations, and addresses what needs to be done to help those left behind. Deaton describes vast innovations and wrenching setbacks: the successes of antibiotics, pest control, vaccinations, and clean water on the one hand, and disastrous famines and the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the other. He examines the United States, a nation that has prospered but is today experiencing slower growth and increasing inequality. He also considers how economic growth in India and China has improved the lives of more than a billion people. Deaton argues that international aid has been ineffective and even harmful. He suggests alternative efforts--including reforming incentives to drug companies and lifting trade restrictions--that will allow the developing world to bring about its own Great Escape. Demonstrating how changes in health and living standards have transformed our lives, The Great Escape is a powerful guide to addressing the well-being of all nations.

The first number of our earlier series, A Programme for Growth, carried a notice of forthcoming papers. Five were announced but eventually only four were published. The fifth, which was intended to deal with consumption functions, never appeared; now it takes its place as number one in the new series. It is not that ten years ago we had nothing to say on the subject of consumers' behaviour. The crude estimation method that I had used in my original (1954) paper on the linear expenditure system gave interesting and in many respects satisfactory results, some of which were published outside our series, for instance in Stone, Brown and ). With this method the parameter estimates changed Rowe ( 1964 very little after the first few iterations. Nevertheless they did change, and with the computing resources then at our disposal we failed to reach convergence. It was mainly for this reason that we decided to wait.

For advanced courses in economic analysis, this book presents the economic theory of consumer behavior, focusing on the applications of the theory to welfare economies and econometric analysis.

The world is a better place than it used to be. People are wealthier and healthier, and live longer lives. Yet the escapes from destitution by so many have left gaping inequalities between people and between nations. In "The Great Escape," Angus Deaton--one of the foremost experts on economic development and on poverty--tells the remarkable story of how, starting 250 years ago, some parts of the world began to experience sustained progress, opening up gaps and setting the stage for today's hugely unequal world. Deaton takes an in-depth look at the historical and ongoing patterns behind the health and wealth of nations, and he addresses what needs to be done to help those left behind.

Deaton describes vast innovations and wrenching setbacks: the successes of antibiotics, pest control, vaccinations, and clean water on the one hand, and disastrous famines and the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the other. He examines the United States, a nation that has prospered but is today experiencing slower growth and increasing inequality. He also considers how economic growth in India and China has improved the lives of more than a billion people. Deaton argues that international aid has been ineffective and even harmful. He suggests alternative efforts--including reforming incentives to drug companies and lifting trade restrictions--that will allow the developing world to bring about its own Great Escape.

Demonstrating how changes in health and living standards have transformed our lives, "The Great Escape" is a powerful guide to addressing the well-being of all nations.

An overview of the most recent research on the saving and consumption patterns of households - a very active area of research in economics in which substanital progress has been made over the last decade.

Two decades after its original publication, The Analysis of Household Surveys is reissued with a new preface by its author, Sir Angus Deaton, recipient of the 2015 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences. This classic work remains relevant to anyone with a serious interest in using household survey data to shed light on policy issues. This book reviews the analysis of household survey data, including the construction of household surveys, the econometric tools useful for such analysis, and a range of problems in development policy for which this survey analysis can be applied. The author's approach remains close to the data, using transparent econometric and graphical techniques to present data in a way that can clearly inform policy and academic debates. Chapter 1 describes the features of survey design that need to be understood in order to undertake appropriate analysis. Chapter 2 discusses the general econometric and statistical issues that arise when using survey data for estimation and inference. Chapter 3 covers the use of survey data to measure welfare, poverty, and distribution. Chapter 4 focuses on the use of household budget data to explore patterns of household demand. Chapter 5 discusses price reform, its effects on equity and efficiency, and how to measure them. Chapter 6 addresses the role of household consumption and saving in economic development. The book includes an appendix providing code and programs using STATA, which can serve as a template for the users' own analysis

Over the past 15 years, the availability of cheap and convenient microcomputers has changed the collection methods and analysis of household survey data in developing countries, making the data available within months, rather than years. Simultaneously, analysts have become more interested in exploring ways in which such data may be used to inform and improve the steps involved in policymaking. This book reviews the analysis of household survey data, including the construction of household surveys, the econometric tools that are the most useful for such analysis, and a range of problems in development policy for which the econometric analysis of household surveys is useful and informative. The author's approach remains close to the data, relying on transparent econometric and graphical techniques to present the data so that policy and academic debates are clearly informed. The author illustrates the analysis through examples of policy issues from several countries, including Cote d'Ivoire, India, Pakistan, Taiwan (China), and Thailand. Two introductory chapters discuss the content and construction of surveys, as well as the econometric methods that can be used with survey data. Survey design and sampling are covered in some detail, as are the effect of survey design on the calculation of statistics and the estimation of parameters. A chapter on econometrics explores issues such as heteroskedasticity, sample selection, and instrumental variables. Four chapters focus on poverty and inequality, demand analysis and intrahousehold allocation, price and tax reform, and savings. Each chapter presents a self-contained development of the topic, introduces the important empirical issues, and provides substantive results. The book also includes the computer code used to calculate the results so that readers can adapt the methods to yield similar results for other data.