Naked Economics in His Book Essay

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It would be easy, given that he dismissed equations and charts, to resort to cheap slogans and unhelpful metaphors, but instead he successfully takes the lessons those charts and equations provide and applies them to the world. This element is missing from many economics texts. Yet, the entire concept of economics is simply a reflection of how the real world functions. Thus, everyday examples of economic principles at work are everywhere. It seems almost strange that these examples are not woven into the traditional economics education when real world usage of economic principles demands that economic principles be applied to everyday situations.

There is an aspect to this book I cannot evaluate, however. It is easy for an economics student to understand the points that Wheelan is making, because those are basic points that relate to economic study. It is less clear whether or not his approach would be successful on an audience without an economic background. That is his intended audience, but not being a part of that audience I sometimes felt looking at this book as though the choir was being preached to. I wondered what the response will be from his target audience.

Some of the analogies he makes may only make sense when you understand the underlying concepts. If one does not understand the underlying concepts, they may not understand, for example, why the International Monetary Fund is likened to a fire department and the World Bank to a welfare agency.

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The use of such examples may backfire when the reader is not overly familiar with the analogy, or if the analogy is less perfect than Wheelan implies. There were a few that made less sense because of an inherent lack of familiarity with the analogy, but this was countered by the extensive use of easily understood analogies.

Overall, however, Naked Economics is a strong book. The approach is likely to be very valuable, yet Wheelan never loses sight of the fact that he is explaining complicated economic principles and applications. The book could easily have devolved into an endless string of silly analogies that fail to illustrate much of anything, but I did not find that the case.

I would not recommend this as one's only reading on economics. Understanding the principles is certainly beneficial, but it is not a substitute for a keen understanding of economics from a conceptual level. Reading this book was taking my conceptual knowledge and applying it to examples; the average reader would need to work in the other direction. They should - they would understand economics better if they could apply the examples of Wheelan's book to the equations and charts that drive traditional economics education......

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