Questions About Arguing with Zombies: Economics, Politics, and the Fight for a Better Future

by Paul Krugman (Goodreads Author)

Reader Q&A

To ask other readers questions about Arguing with Zombies, please sign up.

Answered Questions (2)

Daniel The book is mostly "about" the USA, but the question of what the work applies to is subtly different. To the degree that social and economic problems …moreThe book is mostly "about" the USA, but the question of what the work applies to is subtly different. To the degree that social and economic problems are similar in other countries, the book should generalize to them. But if you need a book specifically tailored to a different country, keep looking. For what it's worth, books written by American economists are read all over the world, sometime for the better and sometimes for the worse.

The same thing should hold true with time. The USA in fifty years won't be today's USA. Will the book's lessons still apply? Sadly the insurance company life expectancy tables suggest I won't be around to find out. The "laws" of economics might change with time, unlike the laws of physics (gravity, electromagnetism, relativity, etc.). That's because humans are intelligent actors who can adapt to policies based on earlier "laws" of economics, perhaps changing what is economically "true." (less)

flag

Why would I want this if I read his columns?

Daniel So you can get credit for reading them, toward your Goodreads Reading Challenge! And also so you can take notes - you do take notes on all the books y…moreSo you can get credit for reading them, toward your Goodreads Reading Challenge! And also so you can take notes - you do take notes on all the books you read, right? An anthology, being a book, is a nicely self-contained chunk of information, perhaps with thematic order, compared to the same content scattered among many smaller articles. A book is handier to cite, for example in those all-consuming Internet debates. You'll notice most of the wingnuts on the Web don't cite books of substance - instead they post dodgy memes or links to non-fact-checked Web pages or they make no attempt at a source at all (since they traffic in folklore rather than scholarship). Books remain vital tools for scholarly thinking and discourse.

Also you can read books without necessarily purchasing them, as there are free options such as libraries (along with Libby/Overdrive for checking out ebooks). (less)

flag

Unanswered Questions

About Goodreads Q&A

Ask and answer questions about books!

You can pose questions to the Goodreads community with Reader Q&A, or ask your favorite author a question with Ask the Author.

See Featured Authors Answering Questions

Learn more