Economics: The Essentials. 2nd ed.

David Robinson is an associate professor of economics and dean of the
Faculty of Social Sciences at Laurentian University.

Economists suffer from an oversupply of very good introductory
textbooks. Why even consider Bill Scarth’s book? Start with economics.
For about $30 students get a book that is 95 percent as good as the
standard thousand-page hardcover costing $100. It is a pretty poor
economist that would ask students to pay $70 for five percent of a text
that is not likely to be used anyway.

The second answer is that this is a good book. Originally written to
accompany the TVO series on economics, it is clear, concise, and
systematic. This second edition leaves intact almost all the successful
first edition, and adds three new chapters: one on the global economy,
one on raising living standards, and one that attempts to cover
“oligopoly, game theory, asymmetric information, moral hazard, adverse
selection, second best issues and government failure.” (The discussion
is excellent for instructors who want one good example on each topic.)

This is not the textbook of the future. It is a solid representative of
the “conventional” approach to economics filled with excellent
exposition at a level of rigor students need to experience.
Methodologically it is sharper than most of the large texts.
Ideologically it is a bit further to the right. (I personally don’t
like the use of aggregate supply and demand with its built-in natural
rate of unemployment. It may have been an appropriate simplification for
the post–1970s inflationary period in the United States, but is a poor
choice for Canada in 2001.) Chapters 6, 7, and 8 offer a long list of
market failures that follow an explanation of the beauties of the
market. The treatment of government is basically atheoretical. Bragging
about a few paragraphs on game theory just shows how traditional the
book is. But these are faults that almost all introductory texts share.
If you want the standard approach to economics, Economics: The
Essentials offers high quality at a low price.