World Famous Comics: The Choice: A Fable of Free Trade and Protection (3rd Edition)
The Choice: A Fable of Free Trade and Protection (3rd Edition)
By: Russell Roberts Publisher: Prentice Hall Average Rating: Binding: Paperback Label: Prentice Hall Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 144 Publication Date: October 08, 2006
Written as a novel, the book makes the complex concepts, issues and terminology of international trade understandable for students. Professors complain that their students cannot grasp the nature of how some economic tools are used or how they work in life. This novel bridges the gap of concepts with applications by use of a fictional story.
David Ricardo comes to life to discuss international trade theory and policy with Ed Johnson, a fictional American television manufacturer seeking trade protection from television manufacturers. Their dialogue is a sophisticated, rigorous discussion of virtually every major issue in trade theory and policy. To illustrate the positive and normative effects of international trade and trade policy, Ricardo takes the reader and Ed Johnson into the future to see an America of free trade and an America of complete self-sufficiency. The fictional element brings these topics to life so that students gain the intuition and understanding of how trade changes the lives of people and the industries they work in. The fundamental intuition of how international markets function including general equilibrium effects and policy analysis is provided.
A biased fable of free trade Distraction 2/5,education 2/5,inspiration 2/5: The story of small town America,with and without free trade is moderately compelling. It is 120 pages long and gives less perspective than the Wikipedia entry on free trade. There is minimal discussion of the newer ideas of energy flow in economics. There is no concern for resource depletion and no mention of population problems. Lower environmental standards are alright for overseas infant industries(It's alright for a two year old to jab a sharp stick in my eye until she becomes more mature). It is good to specialize,good to consider opportunity costs,good to consider time as a resource. Was it good to export our oil at extremely low costs? Is it good to export our topsoil and the Ogallala aquifer in the form of grain? Wikipedia gives a briefer more balanced answer.
The Choice: A Fine Choice Russell Roberts has taken the concept of free trade and made it understandable. I originally purchased this book for my college International Economics class, but it would work for high school economics classes as well. It is easy to read and has well rounded characters. As a future educator I would certainly recommend this book.
Wish "It's a Wonderful Life" were more like this I don't really consider this a work of fiction, and neither does the author. It is in a fiction format, but its primary purpose is to make the case against protectionism, and for free markets. Roberts does this beautifully, raising and dismissing almost every argument for protectionism, and doing this with charm, wit, and almost a complete lack of venom.
The story follows the time-traveling journey and conversation of Ed Johnson (a businessman looking for protection form Japanese competition) and his guardian angle David Ricardo (modeled after the little-known economist.) Together they travel to the future, back to the past, and through alternate timelines to demonstrate Robert's point.
Through this journey, Ricardo corrects some critical mistakes in economic theory; such as the `zero-sum theory', misconceptions on the nature of supply and demand, the role and meaning of wages and `real' wages, the mythical "dangers" of a trade deficit, what imports and exports really are, and most of all, dismisses the myth that trade with other countries hurts the American worker overall (which he admits, in a smaller sense, it sometimes does.)
The book takes some leaps of logic, which the author fully admits in the back of the book; such as the town of Star (Ed's hometown) being unchanged in the `protectionist' universe. These little plot devices are not meant to represent reality, but demonstrate more abstract points, in that sense, it is more like a metaphor.
Overall, the book makes one of the strongest cases ageists the practicality of protectionism that I have ever heard. He also fits some talk as to the moral case against it, that it is really an issue of freedom, and no one person has the right to force another in to a certain kind of behavior (A.K.A., buying American products) and that "America" is all about dreams and growth, something not very possible in the protectionist world
My only complaint would be that I wanted more elaboration on some sections of the `conversation'; such as the `dumping' segment. Robert's makes a good case that dumping is not really practical for anybody, that the `dumper' would have to make up for lost profits from lowering their prices. What I don't understand is....what if a company could cover their lost profits in profits from another product, or section of their company (Such as a department store lowering prices on televisions and allowing the produce-department to cover the loss.) I wish Robert's would have gone in to slightly more detail.
There are several section of the book like this; but I want to make clear is that Robert's never claims that this is the ultimate source for `anti-protectionist' arguments, he even suggests further reading in the back of the book, something all reasonable people should do if they are truly interested in understanding the complexities of economics.
I love Robert's style of writing, his books are not just informative, but entertaining, something very hard to achieve for this subject matter. The book was good enough that I ordered His other book, The Invisible Heart, form Amazon. After seeing what he did to It's a Wonderful life, I can't wait to see what he does for a romance novel.
How free trade benefits us all This is the third edition of Roberts' novel about the benefits of free trade, using "It's a Wonderful Life" as his template. David Ricardo "touches down" from heaven to earth (like Clarence), to help convince Ed (George Bailey) that he should not support protectionism. The previous versions focused more on threats that were perceived from Japan and Nafta. Here, Roberts uses India and China as his examples.
To me, one of the most appealing things about Roberts' work is his honesty. He doesn't pretend that economic change doesn't hurt, but he also focuses on the benefits in the longer term. He writes in such a pleasant style that economics becomes accessible to people who are "math phobic."
His other book, The Invisible Heart, is at least as good as this one.
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