I’m taking a economics course. It’s basically a 300 level intro to finance, macro and micro economics class. We are covering the micro economics section right now. It’s very confusing though I do understand some of it (some of the bigger concepts sort of). We are covering Opportunity Cost, Supply and Demand, and Elasticity. Personally, I think this problem is partly the textbook writer’s fault, the wording is atrocious. I keep finding myself consulting wikipedia. Does anyone know any layman’s resources to this basic stuff?
Hal Varian “Intermediate Microeconomics” and Greg Mankiw “Principles of Economics” are standard textbooks for introductory level economics and for good reason.
i really like strange loop’s link. i also agree with economistintraining that those are excellent books.
i would also add david friedman’s “price theory” textbook, which is free:
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Price_Theory/PThy_ToC.html
also, if you have any specific questions, i’m sure you can post it here and someone will help you. 
By the way, I’d also recommend picking up something like Freakonomics to help with the intuition.
I mean I sort of understand it, but random things go over my head. It’s ridiculous cause my professor does not have an email address, how archaic can you be?
Graphs for the most part throw me off, outside of basic math (which I’m great with, basic mental math), the rest of mathematics throws me off. I have to take more time then other people to understand it.
Anyway, so in equilibrium, both parties are satisfied with how much they want to buy and sell? I don’t understand ceteris paribus. I understand supply and demand.
So elasticity is whether or not a certain product’s demand would change or not with a change in price, correct? So socks would be elastic, because if I change the price from $2 a pair to $100, people would buy much less, if not any at all. But if I’m selling medicine for cancer, and I add another $100 bucks per pill, the demand would be the same, therefore inelastic. Unitary elasticity, there might be change, but not so extreme. I don’t understand Total Expenditure Rule, what it means to be perfectly elastic, exclusivity and rivalry (when it comes to public, private excludable and congestible goods).
Like I said before, it’s the wording this textbook uses which throws me off. It reminds me of reading the law sections of my real estate textbook. I had to keep rereading it.
So is this all neoclassical or neokeynesian economics? I’m assuming the first.
I am trying to think which book I read where I grasped most of these basic economic concepts (no maths/graphs required). I went back to the few books I thought I got it from, but couldn’t find it exactly. I will continue to keep an eye out though.
Edit: Now that I think about it, I probably grasped the concept by listening to the few introduction speeches to every Mises University (here is the one for the MU this year):
Yes, and at that point both parties value that unit of the good at the same price. Also means there will be no shortage/surplus of the good. If you tried to charge higher than equilibrium, you would have extra surplus, and if you charged lower than equilibrium there would be shortages.
Just means that you are holding all other things constant, besides the one thing you are changing. For example, keeping the person’s income constant while you are looking at the next unit of a good. The information would make no sense if you said:
Person A values the 3rd apple for $.50, (person gets a new job and doubles their income), they value the 4th apple for $1.
You would want to keep the person’s income the same over all information.
Yes, that is a typical example for an inelastic good, but just keep in mind that there is NO SUCH THING as a perfectly inelastic good (the straight up and down Demand Curve on the graph). The quantitiy demanded drops, but very very slowly with a change in price (just imagine if you started charging a person’s entire income for a pill, the quantity demanded would be 0).
I am trying to think of a good way to explain this without maths. Easiest thing I can think of right now is to just get a graph/chart of a Demand Curve and just plug in some numbers and see for yourself.
Again, there is no such thing as a PERFECTLY elastic good, although they always seem to give the example of corn. That you can just produce as much as you want and sell it at the same price, because the market for it is HUGE, and all the producers are producing the “same good.”
Sometimes it is good to look on wikipedia for a little bit better wording or explanation of a concept:
Sorry for the double post, but here is also a great way to learn microeconomics, straight from Rothbard himself:
I finally began reading this and it’s very good.