Principles of Microeconomics

This brand-new principles of economics text is the most exciting new entry in years. Written by well-known and well-respected economists, Bob Frank, Ben Bernanke, Lars Osberg (Dalhousie University), Melvin Cross (Dalhousie University) and Brian MacLean (Laurentian University) the text seeks to teach introductory students the core economic concepts--the essence of economics-- without overwhelming them with details. A well-articulated short list of core principles is introduced and reinforced by illustrating and applying each principle in several contexts, and then asking students to work exercises to see what they have learned.

The text seeks to create "Economic Naturalists"; that is, after reading the text, students will ask (and answer) questions about their economic environment. For example, students will see Braille dots on drive-up ATMs and ask why they are there. Peppered with such thought-provoking examples, Frank/Bernanke not only engage students, but teaches them to see each feature of their economic landscape as the reflection of an implicit or explicit cost-benefit calculation.

Robert H. Frank received his M.A. in statistics from the University of California at Berkeley in 1971, and his Ph.D. in economics in 1972, also from U.C. Berkeley. He is the Goldwin Smith Professor of Economics at Cornell University, where he has taught since 1972 and where he currently holds a joint appointment in the department of economics and the Johnson Graduate School of Management. He has published on a variety of subjects, including price and wage discrimination, public utility pricing, the measurement of unemployment spell lengths, and the distributional consequences of direct foreign investment. For the past several years, his research has focused on rivalry and cooperation in economic and social behaviour.

Ben S. Bernanke received his B.A. in economics from Harvard University in 1975 and his Ph.D. in economics from MIT in 1979. He taught at the Stanford Graduate School of Business from 1979 to 1985 and moved to Princeton University in 1985, where he is the Howard Harrison and Gabrielle Snyder Beck Professor of Economics and Public Affairs, and where he is currently Chairman of the Economics Department. He has consulted for the Board of Governors of the European Central Bank and other central banks, and he serves on a U.S. State Department Committee that advises the Israeli government on economic policy. He is a Fellow of the Econometrics Society and a Research Associate for the National Bureau of Economic Research. He has been a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve System in Boston, Philadelphia, and New York, and he is currently an advisor to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Professor Bernanke’s intermediate textbook, with Andrew Abel, Macroeconomics, Third Edition (Addison-Wesley, 1998) is a best seller in its field.

Lars Osberg is currently the McCulloch Professor of Economics at Dalhousie University. He was born and raised in Ottawa, Ontario. As an undergraduate, he attended Queen’s University, Kingston and the London School of Economics and Political Science, graduating from Queen’s in 1968. From 1968 to 1970 he served as a CUSO volunteer, working primarily with the Tanzania Sisal Corporation in Tanga, Tanzania. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from Yale University in 1975. His first book was Economic Inequality in Canada (1981), which has been followed by nine others, most recently The Unemployment Crisis: All for Naught (1996) (with B. MacLean), Hard Money, Hard Times (1998) (with P. Fortin) and The Economic Implications of Social Cohesion (Editor) 2003. He is also the author of numerous refereed articles, book chapters, reviews, reports and miscellaneous publications. His major fields of research interest have been the measurement and determinants of poverty and economic well being, with particular emphasis in recent years on social policy and the implications of changing patterns of working time. Among other professional responsibilities, he was President of the Canadian Economics Association in 1999/2000 and is now Review Editor for the Review of Income and Wealth.

Brian K. MacLean is Professor and Chair of Economics at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario, where he has been Director of the Institute of Northern Ontario Research and Development and the organizer of an annual economic policy conference series. He speaks Japanese as a second language and has been a visiting professor at Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan, and at Saitama University, just outside of Tokyo. He has edited Out of Control? Canada in an Unstable Financial World (Lorimer, 1999), co-edited The Unemployment Crisis: All for Naught? (McGill-Queen's, 1996) and has published in the Cambridge Journal of Economics, Review of Income and Wealth, Canadian Business Economics, and other journals. His keen interest in economic policy issues is reflected in these publications and also in the monthly economics columns he has written for the National Post for two years.

Melvin L. Cross received an Associate of Arts degree from Dawson Community College in 1968, a B.A. from the University of Montana in 1970, an M.A. from Simon Fraser University in 1972, and a Ph.D. in economics from Texas A&M University in 1976. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Economics at Dalhousie University, which he joined in 1975. He also holds an adjunct appointment in the School of Resource and Environmental Studies and was an Associate Fellow in the Foundation Year Program of the University of King’s College from 1991 to 2002. In 1994-95, he was a Visiting Adjunct Associate Professor at Queen’s University and in 2002 he was a Visiting Lecturer at the University of Sydney. His teaching and research interests are in the economics of natural and environmental resources and the history of economic thought. He has taught principles of economics throughout his career. He is an author or co-author of articles in the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Science, Canadian Public Policy, History of Political Economy, Marine Resource Economics, and other journals.