Economics argued through a novel; markets and their moral defence
Roberts wrote a novel to make an argument. Sam Gordon teaches economics at a private high school and holds a strongly market-liberal position; Laura Silver teaches English and holds the opposing view; they argue and fall in love while a subplot involving a corporate executive, a workplace safety scandal and a government investigation tests the positions.
The economic content is delivered through the arguments. Roberts covers why prices convey information, why firms have incentives to provide safety even without regulation because of wage premiums and reputation, why sweatshop employment can improve on the alternatives available to the workers who take it, why corporate philanthropy is a poor use of shareholder capital, why price gouging after disasters allocates scarce goods, and why unintended consequences frequently reverse the effect of well-intended policy. Laura's objections are given real weight in places and are conceded in others.
The form is the book's problem and its point. As a novel it is thin, the characters exist to hold positions, and the plot resolves in favour of Sam's framework. As economics it is a well-constructed statement of the Chicago and public choice position, accessible to readers who would not read the argument in expository form. Roberts is explicit that it is advocacy. Readers should take it as one side stated attractively, and should note that several of the empirical claims, particularly on workplace safety and on the effects of regulation, are contested in the labour economics literature rather than settled.
Readers who want the market-liberal position on regulation, wages and prices argued in accessible narrative form, understood as advocacy.
Chosen by shared topics, the entries that hold them, and the people who recommended both.