The Ordinal Society

The Ordinal Society PDF Author: Marion Fourcade
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674971140
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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Book Description
Organizations now measure and rank nearly every aspect of our lives, using data to make predictions about our purchasing power, tastes, and character. The Ordinal Society shows how these predictions structure life chances, producing a hollow morality that launders familiar forms of social advantage into an illusion of merit.

The Ordinal Society

The Ordinal Society PDF Author: Marion Fourcade
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674971140
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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Book Description
Organizations now measure and rank nearly every aspect of our lives, using data to make predictions about our purchasing power, tastes, and character. The Ordinal Society shows how these predictions structure life chances, producing a hollow morality that launders familiar forms of social advantage into an illusion of merit.

Economists and Societies

Economists and Societies PDF Author: Marion Fourcade
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691117608
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 413

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Book Description
'Economists and Societies' explores the role of economists in the modern world. It looks at the extent of their involvement in social programs, the regulatory environment & commerce, & offers analysis of the development of this ubiquitous profession.

Society and Economy

Society and Economy PDF Author: Mark Granovetter
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674975219
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 254

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Book Description
A work of exceptional ambition by the founder of modern economic sociology, this first full account of Mark Granovetter’s ideas stresses that the economy is not a sphere separate from other human activities but is deeply embedded in social relations and subject to the same emotions, ideas, and constraints as religion, science, politics, or law.

Institutions and Economic Performance

Institutions and Economic Performance PDF Author: Elhanan Helpman
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674038578
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 672

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Book Description
Institutions and Economic Performance explores the question of why income per capita varies so greatly across countries. Even taking into account disparities in resources, including physical and human capital, large economic discrepancies remain across countries. Why are some societies but not others able to encourage investments in places, people, and productivity? The answer, the book argues, lies to a large extent in institutional differences across societies. Such institutions are wide-ranging and include formal constitutional arrangements, the role of economic and political elites, informal institutions that promote investment and knowledge transfer, and others. Two core themes run through the contributors’ essays. First, what constraints do institutions place on the power of the executive to prevent it from extorting the investments and effort of other people and institutions? Second, when are productive institutions self-enforcing? Institutions and Economic Performance is unique in its melding of economics, political science, history, and sociology to address its central question.

Indeterminacy and Society

Indeterminacy and Society PDF Author: Russell Hardin
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691123926
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 182

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Book Description
In simple action theory, when people choose between courses of action, they know what the outcome will be. When an individual is making a choice "against nature," such as switching on a light, that assumption may hold true. But in strategic interaction outcomes, indeterminacy is pervasive and often intractable. Whether one is choosing for oneself or making a choice about a policy matter, it is usually possible only to make a guess about the outcome, one based on anticipating what other actors will do. In this book Russell Hardin asserts, in his characteristically clear and uncompromising prose, "Indeterminacy in contexts of strategic interaction . . . Is an issue that is constantly swept under the rug because it is often disruptive to pristine social theory. But the theory is fake: the indeterminacy is real." In the course of the book, Hardin thus outlines the various ways in which theorists from Hobbes to Rawls have gone wrong in denying or ignoring indeterminacy, and suggests how social theories would be enhanced--and how certain problems could be resolved effectively or successfully--if they assumed from the beginning that indeterminacy was the normal state of affairs, not the exception. Representing a bold challenge to widely held theoretical assumptions and habits of thought, Indeterminacy and Society will be debated across a range of fields including politics, law, philosophy, economics, and business management.

Modern Public Finance

Modern Public Finance PDF Author: John M. Quigley
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674004207
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 376

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Book Description
In Modern Public Finance, senior scholars in the field review and synthesize recent theoretical developments in important areas--optimal taxation, public sector dynamics, distribution theory, and club theory, to name a few--which challenge us to understand and improve public policy. Each chapter highlights original research by a recognized leader in the field, relates this work to cumulative developments, and frames important questions for further study.

Innovation—The Missing Dimension

Innovation—The Missing Dimension PDF Author: Richard K. Lester
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674040104
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
Amid mounting concern over the loss of jobs to low-wage economies, one fact is clear: America's prosperity hinges on the ability of its businesses to continually introduce new products and services. But what makes for a creative economy? How can the remarkable surge of innovation that fueled the boom of the 1990s be sustained? For an answer, Richard K. Lester and Michael J. Piore examine innovation strategies in some of the economy's most dynamic sectors. Through eye-opening case studies of new product development in fields such as cell phones, medical devices, and blue jeans, two fundamental processes emerge. One of these processes, analysis--rational problem solving--dominates management and engineering practice. The other, interpretation, is not widely understood, or even recognized--although, as the authors make clear, it is absolutely crucial to innovation. Unlike problem solving, interpretation embraces and exploits ambiguity, the wellspring of creativity in the economy. By emphasizing interpretation, and showing how these two radically different processes can be combined, Lester and Piore's book gives managers and designers the concepts and tools to keep new products flowing. But the authors also offer an unsettling critique of national policy. By ignoring the role of interpretation, economic policymakers are drawing the wrong lessons from the 1990s boom. The current emphasis on expanding the reach of market competition will help the analytical processes needed to implement innovation. But if unchecked it risks choking off the economy's vital interpretive spaces. Unless a more balanced policy approach is adopted, warn Lester and Piore, America's capacity to innovate--its greatest economic asset--will erode.

The Assumptions Economists Make

The Assumptions Economists Make PDF Author: Jonathan Schlefer
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674068831
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 412

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Book Description
Economists make confident assertions in op-ed columns and on cable news—so why are their explanations often at odds with equally confident assertions from other economists? And why are all economic predictions so rarely borne out? Harnessing his frustration with these contradictions, Jonathan Schlefer set out to investigate how economists arrive at their opinions. “A lucid, plain-spoken account of the major economic models, which [Schlefer] introduces in chronological order, creating a kind of intellectual history of macroeconomics. He explains what the models assume, what they actually demonstrate—and where they fall short.” —Binyamin Applebaum, New York Times blog “Fascinating...[Schlefer’s] book is a tough critique of economics, but a deeply informed and sympathetic one.” —Justin Fox, Harvard Business Review blog “This book is an impressive and informative analysis of the economics literature—and it presents some useful insights about how a more eclectic, catholic approach might allow economics to progress more convincingly into the future.” —Michelle Baddeley, Times Higher Education “The Assumptions Economists make [is] a knowledgeable...broadside against neoclassical economics...Schlefer’s gripes concern model-building run amok...His criticisms of these models are original and sophisticated.” —Christopher Caldwell, Literary Review

Growth and Distribution

Growth and Distribution PDF Author: Duncan K. Foley
Publisher:
ISBN: 0674986423
Category : Economic development
Languages : en
Pages : 417

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Book Description
Authors Foley, Michl, and Tavani offer a major revision of an established textbook on the theory, measurement, and history of economic growth, with new material on climate change, corporate capitalism, and innovation.

Institutional Foundations of Public Finance

Institutional Foundations of Public Finance PDF Author: Alan J. Auerbach
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674030978
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
Auerbach integrates economic and legal perspectives on taxation and fiscal policy, offering a provocative assessment of the most important issues in public finance today.