This book has one overriding message: Economics is a mode of analysis—a way of thinking—that can be applied to a wide variety of topics and can help us understand the world in which we live. The economic principles and concepts that are used most often in evaluating contemporary policy issues are relatively few in number. However, there are many subtle ways in which those few principles and concepts can be used in analysis.
Principles and concepts in any science are important in their own right; however, they take on their full meaning only when they are used within the context of problems that have relevance to you. This book considers some of the most important issues of our time. In addition, it raises one central question: To what extent can or should people’s behavior be controlled?