I’m a political science major and we’re required to take basic economics courses. This particular course is just studying the central concepts of economics with an “extended look into the Keynesian Revolution”
Our textbook is Macroeconomics by Paul Sameulson and William Nordhaus.
I heard the Professor doesn’t really care for the textbook and everything that’s essential to the class is in the notes.
Does anyone know what I should expect? I took AP Economics in 12th grade in high school if that helps.
Just a bit nervous here, outside of AE, I haven’t really done much with mainstream economics. Anything in particular I should be worried about?
If you have a solid foundation in Austrian Economics, you will do just fine in this course. It’s all very basic stuff. I have never read Samuelson’s textbook, but I’d imagine that it pretty much covers what every other textbook covers, at least for a principles of economics class. As far as the “extended look into Keynesian economics”, I’m sure Samuelson will be more partial towards Keynes than the author of my textbook was (even though the author of my textbook was also a Keynesian, Samuelson is a widely known and more scholarly supporter of Keynes and Keynesian theory), but for a principles of economics class it shouldn’t go into more depth than you already know about (it will pretty much cover Keynes’ “refutation” of “Say’s Law”, and then cover recessionary gaps, fiscal expenditure, et cetera).
The Keynesian theory taught in any macroeconomics textbook is very different from that expounded by Keynes in The General Theory. Focusing on Keynes’ book is great from a historical perspective, or if you are interested in the topic, but it is more difficult to apply criticism against John Keynes to modern Keynesian thought. Maybe they have the same foundations, but Neo-Keynesian theory is still substantially different (I don’t even think Neo-Keynesians agree on what defines a liquidity trap).
This is true. But I find that no matter how the theory is spinned, if the premises behind it are challenged, it always comes down to the same old economic fallacies.
Roger Garrison in “Time and Money” provides a critique of what is perhaps more common in textbooks.
I was flipping through the textbook and they pinned recessions on “technological shocks” hah that’s pretty typical of mainstream economics I guess. I guess Schumpeter’s “creative destruction” managed to sneak in here as well.