Alternatives and Supplements: Fun on the Internet

The Logic of Choice Goals and Benefits Economists do not worry about where our wants and desires come from. Some people think advertising is important. Here is a fun review of a fun book about advertising: findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_n12_v12/ai_18134552 This review in The Wall Street Journal also raises questions of where our wants come from: online.wsj.com/article/SB121495573549321235.html?mod=opinion_journal_books Utility Functions Arnold Kling explains the economic concept of utility in his on-line book: arnoldkling.com/econ/markets/consumer.html Constraints and Costs The notion of cost is essential to economics: www.econlib.org/LIBRARY/Enc/OpportunityCost.html The Budget Line This page from MIT lets you play with a budget line: plaza.mit.edu/econ/index.php?id=15 The Best Option The Maximization Principle One of my favorite authors, Steven Rhoads, explains why the marginal way of looking at problems is important: www.econlib.org/LIBRARY/Enc/Marginalism.html The Equimarginal Principle The blurtit.com website seems to allow people to post questions, which others then answer. I have not found anything else that they have on economics, but they did have a short explanation of the equimarginal principle: www.blurtit.com/q870945.html Rational Ignorance Robert Stonebraker explains rational ignorance in this web-based Joys of Economics: Making Sense out of Life: faculty.winthrop.edu/stonebrakerr/book/Rational_Ignorance.htm  John Tierney's article "Appeasing the gods, with insurance" is too good not to include somewhere: www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/07/healthscience/06tier.php These links were checked on July 5, 2008 Copyright Robert Schenk Why is this page here?