Title: What Every American Needs To Know About Economics
Author: David F. Rankin
Publisher: XlibrisUS
ISBN: 1984537482
Pages: 118
Genre: Non-Fiction
Review by: Aaron Washington
Pacific Book Review
Economics is one of the distinct fields humans depicted as being crucial in their understanding of society. It is an important and delicate subject that needs full comprehension when being discussed. Being a professor of economics and finance, David F. Rankin evidently understands the subject he wrote about and explicitly expounded on the nitty-gritty of the main subject matter. I want to first mention that the main reason I enjoyed reading this book is that the author made me feel like I was in an
economics class. His way of discussing real-life situations in relation to economic theories and policies is fantastic.
The author first stars by discussing -isms. I like that he described communism as autocratic socialism. As much as it is applied in numerous societies around the world, communism may not exactly be good for a growing economy. The author discussed how communism can be atrocious and unhelpful to individual freedoms. Citizens can lose their rights as the state uses force to ensure that they do not fail to cooperate. When talking about communism, the author on several occasions used examples of old USSR. This helped put into perspective what he was writing about. The author also touched on autocratic socialism and market socialism; saying that the latter is better because unlike the former, market socialism does not use force to seek compliance with its policies.
The discussion around capitalism was another interesting chapter in the book. “Just what is capitalism anyway?” reads the heading of chapter 2. The thing about headlines which are phrased like questions is that they make one more curious about the discussion which follows. I was eager to learn the author’s thoughts about capitalism because of 1) How he framed his heading and 2) Because I so much enjoyed reading the previous chapter. “Private property is the first cornerstone of capitalism. If an individual can own property, then he or she is freer than a person who can’t,” the author wrote. He went on to add that private property is used more efficiently than public property because it is in the citizen’s best interest to see to it. I fully agree with the author’s sentiments here.
To say this book is a gem would be an understatement. Everything the author wrote about was based on pure facts. I also appreciate that he considered the average reader when writing his book by not using heavy jargon or technical terms. He also mentioned economic policies during previous administrations, helping young readers compare how things were back then – as compared to today. The good thing about books in this genre is that one can read the content over and over again picking up more details each time. You can always refer to the texts when discussing or talking about events in real life. Professor David F. Rankin’s book will always be relevant. I wish the author could have made the book a bit longer, with the chapters embellishing on the topics for more details; because I learned so much from his words in What Every American Needs To Know About Economics.
