John Quiggin, Economics in Two Lessons: Why Markets Work So Well and Why They Can Fail So Badly

Abstract

The old adage that one cannot judge a book by its cover is almost always true. But only almost. John Quiggin’s Economics in Two Lessons is an exception that proves the rule. Everything that one needs to know about what to expect in its three-hundred-and-ninety odd pages is right there on the cover. Its “two lessons” are emblazoned upon a panel across the dustjacket. They are: (1) that markets normally “work so well”, but (2) that sometimes there may be a spanner in the works that causes them ...