Principles of Economics by Mankiw. You can get old, <strong>used</strong> editions for cheap.
It’s not sexy; it’s a textbook. However, it’s by far the best way for you to get a feel for basic theory and to understand the discipline.
Let me give it a shot, but definitely question me if something doesn't make a lot of sense:
Competency-based education (CBE) attempts to create a situation where someone is assessed based on competency (whether or not someone can do something) rather than seat time (how many semesters they've listened to lectures). It isn't an accelerated program, because there is nothing to accelerate. Students can either demonstrate that competency, or they can't.
That sounds like just one big test that people can or can not pass, and that is true. You can see similar types of tests associated with college credit like CLEP, or language exams, etc. But CBE has programs that are much more structured, and the assessments look a lot like standardized testing, large projects, or nursing/teaching practicum.
They also have courses attached to them, which are for the most part self-study and very well designed. An economics course would contain smaller milestone projects, assessments, and a Mankiw textbook to read. This is all to prepare them for the assessment. People who are experts in economics have probably already read Mankiw, and could likely pass the assessment. People who are not experts probably have to go through Mankiw before they can demonstrate enough competency in economics to pass the course.
So, if you read an entire textbook to prepare for a test, and you past the test, then you probably learned quite a bit. If you already knew the information and passed the test, then you probably didn't need to learn from the course.
And yeah, they use Mankiw in pretty much every entry level economics course I've ever seen, CBE or not.
Hope that helps explain some of it.
Being able to pay taxes directly with a currency, as opposed to converting it to fiat beforehand, lends it legitimacy. The fact that the best you can offer is a singular canton in Switzerland and a failed program in Ohio shows that many aren't considering it and that it might not be adopted.
As for what you should read everyone should read this or some equivalent book at least:
https://www.amazon.com/Principles-Economics-Mankiws/dp/0538453052
Greg Mankiw wrong probably the best introductory textbook to economics there is, Principles of Economics, which is pretty standard for many if not most entry-level college courses globally. It's an academic textbook, and the pricetag reflects that.
Most youtube channels claiming to introduce people to economics are heterodox at best and charlatans at worst. However there are a few channels which are more respectable:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtGO-l5UPnrsLXOGG9nMF5w
> What about Proof of Stake currencies that have a nominal value (again I take issue with value, we likely have differing meanings) while also being an investment that generates additional cash?
They are still negative-sum games. Any additional cash it generates is intrinsically inflationary.
> The way you describe a system, the fiat has to be invested in some third party, like real estate or stocks. It would be the market indexing that drives your potential profits.
Exactly. The stock market generates profits because it is a positive-sum game: Additional money flows into the stock market / RE because of services that generate profits (expenditure/revenue), which is a separate mechanism from investment. With cryptos, money flows out (energy bills, hardware) but the only money that flows in is through (bad) "investment".
Again, the currency of my country is a currency and not an investment. I don't expect revenue from my currency, and I would be very concerned if it did (deflation is very bad for the economy).
> It would be the market indexing that drives your potential profits.
No, it is not the "indexing", it is the actual investment that gives returns.
> Take eth2 or Ada, for instance. They have rolled in the indexing into the capital-generation portion of the coin.
No. You cannot generate profits in a negative-sum system. See above.
> Eventually, you can still take either of these assets - with all of their benefits and shortcomings - and invest it in a commodity.
So what? This doesn't make any sense. If your money is in General Motors it isn't in USD or ETH or BTC or EUR. Of course it doesn't matter what you used to buy General Motors stock with. (Leaving aside the fact that you can't use ETH and BTC to buy stock.)
> I am truly having a hard time understanding this preferential treatment given to entirely arbitrary fiat tokens.
I can see that, and I do strongly recommend picking up a proper economics textbook to understand how investment and money actually work instead of relying on whatever sources you have been using so far, because you clearly have some deep fundamental misunderstandings of it all, probably driven by some pseudo-Austrian-school bullshit that circulates in cryptobro circles.
Concepts that are almost invariably misunderstood by crypto bros, and that may be contributing to your confusion, include:
Mankiw is very much the standard introductory textbook to economics.
You'd understand if you knew anything about econ. You can start here https://www.amazon.com/Principles-Economics-Mankiws/dp/0538453052
where should I ship this?
https://www.amazon.com/Principles-Economics-Mankiws/dp/0538453052
> In this particular case, somebody who
literally wrote the book. Which, by the way, includes the survey in question and has the sources you're after.
>when you base a currency on something with limited availability, you can't proceed to print silly amounts of that currency to fund wars (iraq) and companies like halliburton, goldman, rothschilds, etc..
I don't think a gold standard exactly prevents legislatures from financing wars with debt. As this chart shows, the US incurred substantial public debt to finance many wars, both before and after Bretton Woods.
>it's not like inflation or fiat currency actually helps anyone working a real job in the non-financial private sector...quite the opposite
This is a contested point among economists. The gist of debate (as I understand it) is that there are costs to inflation (shoeleather costs, menu costs, increased variability of relative pricing, etc). However, many economists argue that the costs of reducing inflation can be quite large (on the order of 5% of GDP to reduce inflation by 1 point). In addition, this cost is not spread equitably over the population; the fall in aggregate income is on the backs of workers who lose their jobs. One of the great empirical insights of modern economics is the short-term tradeoff between inflation and unemployment (the Phillips curve).
Look, you seem like an inquisitive person. But most of the arguments you're presenting are extremely one-sided, and were debunked long ago by mainstream economics. I have held strong opinions on economic/political topics for years, but my opinions took a big overhaul a few years ago when I bit the bullet and read an economics textbook from cover to cover. Previously, I pretty much only read popular books on specific topics, most of them advocating for a particular, conservative point of view. (Secrets of the Temple, books by Thomas Sowell, etc). Many of my viewpoints were changed completely, and not necessarily in a more conservative or liberal direction.
Sorry if this comes across as condescending, but I honestly recommend that you invest some time and read a textbook in micro/macro. Mankiw is a popular choice. He devotes entire chapters to the US monetary system, inflation, and central banking. And the last chapter presents a series of debates over current macroeconomic policy, describing both sides. One of them about is whether central banks should aim for zero inflation.
You want me to find experts who don't believe we are heading towards massive deflation, followed by hyperinflation, all in the next year? How do I not find things? Find me an economist that believes that.
Here is Noah Smith, a trained economist addressing debt concerns. Here is the guy that Greg Mankiw thinks does a good job of explaining the debt. Mankiw wrote a textbook that is widely used to teach intro. He's also a libertarian.
Now some economists, like Tyler Cowen, believe it is getting to be a problem and have concerns, but he doesn't make it sound like the sky is falling this year.
Left out this:
Economics is an influential introductory textbook by American economists Paul Samuelson and William Nordhaus. It was first published in 1948, and has appeared in nineteen different editions, the most recent in 2010.[1] It was the best selling economics textbook for many decades and still remains popular, selling over 300,000 copies of each edition from 1961 through 1976.[2] The book has been translated into forty-one languages and in total has sold over four million copies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_%28textbook%29
And this
http://www.amazon.com/Principles-Economics-N-Gregory-Mankiw/dp/0538453052
And this.... http://papers.nber.org/books/frie57-1
But other than that they managed to list 97 out of the top 100 :)
It's not about higher inflation increasing demand. You have the causality backwards: higher demand leads to increases in both inflation and real output.
Draw an AD curve. Draw an upward-sloping SRAS schedule.
Central bank policy involves pushing around AD. Stimulatory monetary policy leads to an increase in nominal income. Increases in nominal income are split along inflation and real growth based on the slope of the SRAS.
If you say the central bank is stuck, then it can't affect either inflation or output.
If you say the central bank can affect inflation but not output, then you think that the SRAS is vertical, but that contradicts all empirical evidence.
See, inter alia, here and here and here and also perhaps here.