Showing results for "Stories" in Theory

In The Price of Time, Edward Chancellor traces the history of interest from its origins in ancient Mesopotamia, through debates about usury in Restoration Britain and John Law's ill-fated Mississippi scheme, to the global credit booms of the twenty-first century. We generally assume that high interest rates are harmful, but Chancellor argues that, whenever money is too easy, financial markets become unstable. He takes the story to the present day, when interest rates have sunk lower than at any time in the five millennia since they were first recorded.

Economics and comic books seem to be a world apart. But in the hands of economics professor and comic hero aficionado J. Brian O'Roark, the two form a powerful alliance. With brilliant deadpan enthusiasm, he shows how the travails of superheroes can explain the building blocks of economics and how the laws of economics explain the mysteries of superhero behavior. Why Superman Doesn't Take Over the World: What Superheroes Can Tell Us About Economics probes the motivations of our favorite heroes and considers what it would look like if their stories played out in reality.