Show students how economics is relevant New and Updated - Real-world business chapter-opening cases feature new companies or have been updated with current information for learning, while also sparking students'' interest. They provide a unifying theme for the chapter by showing how the economic concepts presented impact a real business. Examples include: Ford assembling cars in both the United States and Mexico (Chapter 1); PepsiCo''s and Coca-Cola''s premium bottled waters (Chapter 3); Snapchat (Chapter 8); Music streaming by Apple and Spotify (Chapter 14); and the Paytm app in India (Chapter 25). Students can visit MyLab Economics to watch a brief video that summarizes the key points of each chapter opener. New - Critical-Thinking Sections. A new End-of-Chapter exercise set continues the tradition of developing critical-thinking skills in the text. Two to four real-world problems encourage students to do their own research, or to explain key concepts using these new questions. In the MyLab course, these multi-part exercises allow instructors to require short answers to open-ended discussion questions to develop students'' critical-thinking skills.
A Personal Dimension: Economics in Your Life & Career chapter openers ask students to consider questions related to their lives and careers. At the end of the chapters, the authors apply the concepts of the chapter to answer the questions -- highlighting the relevance of economics. Updated - An Inside Look is a 2-page feature that teaches students how to apply economic thinking to current events and policy debates in news articles. There is an excerpt of an article related to the company featured in the chapter-opening case. The authors provide a step-by-step analysis of the article, corresponding graph or table, and Thinking-Critically exercises. This feature appears at the end of Chapters 1 - 4. Additional articles and analysis are also updated weekly in MyLab Economics. New - Taking a principles of economics class requires students to learn different terms, models, and a new way of analyzing real-world events.
It can be challenging for students, especially non-majors, to appreciate how this course can help them in a career in business, government, or a non-profit organization. Chapter 1 includes a new section that describes economics as a career and highlights the key skills students of any major can gain from studying economics. New - 20 Apply the Concepts have been added to reinforce key concepts and help students interpret what they read in the news. There are between 2 and 4 Apply the Concepts in each chapter, and most deal with business and policy topics relevant to today''s students. Examples include: How managers at the nonprofit organization Feeding America use the market mechanism to more efficiently allocate food based on the needs of food programs around the country (Chapter 2); how managers can forecast the demand for premium bottled water (Chapter 3); who gains and who loses from US trade with China (Chapter 9); and an innovative web site that uses the preamble to the US Constitution as a framework for re-organizing macroeconomic data (Chapter 19). Students can visit MyLab Economics to watch a brief video that summarizes the key points of each. New and Updated - Solved Problems give students a model of how to solve an economic problem by breaking it down step by step. There are approximately 2 Solved Problems in each chapter, 17 of which are either new or updated for this edition.
Students can visit MyLab Economics to complete a similar problem and receive tutorial help. Provide a real-world approach to microeconomics Introductory chapters (1 - 4) provide students with a solid foundation in the basics, including marginal analysis and economic efficiency. Early coverage of policy issues (Chapters 1, 4, 5, 6, and 7), including free trade agreements, health care policy; rent control and minimum wage; air pollution, global warming, and public goods; and government policy toward illegal drugs, helps clarify ideas encountered in later chapters. Complete coverage of monopolistic competition is included. A full chapter devoted to monopolistic competition (Chapter 13) is located prior to oligopoly (Chapter 14) and monopoly (Chapter 15) allowing for early discussion of topics such as brand management and sources of competitive success, so that instructors can cover this important topic without loss of continuity. The monopolistic competition model introduces the downward-sloping demand curve material usually introduced in a monopoly chapter, helping students grasp the important point that nearly all firms -- not just monopolies -- face downward-sloping demand curves. These chapters are written to allow professors the option to cover them in the order best suited for their classes. Extensive, realistic game theory coverage in Chapter 14 analyzes competition among oligopolists (including Apple, Amazon, Dell, Spotify, and Walmart), helping students to understand how companies with market power make strategic decisions in many competitive situations.
Unique coverage of pricing strategy in Chapter 16 explores how firms use pricing strategies to increase profits. Students encounter pricing strategies everywhere and this chapter uses relevant, familiar examples -- including Walt Disney, airlines, and movie theaters -- to illustrate how companies use price discrimination, cost-plus pricing, two-part tariffs, and more. Improve comprehension of macroeconomic issues Broad discussion of macro statistics in Chapters 19 and 20 helps clarify some of the policy issues encountered in later chapters, including important differences between the payroll survey and household survey for understanding conditions in the labor market; and the employment-population ratio, which is not covered in some other books but which many economists regard as a key measure of labor market performance. Early coverage of long-run topics in Chapters 21 and 22 helps prepare students to understand business cycles to interpret economic events. Early coverage of long-run growth allows us to pique students'' interest with topics such as ''Why isn''t the whole world rich?'' Coverage of both the demand-side and supply-side effects of fiscal policy is included in Chapter 27. The text distinguishes between automatic stabilizers and discretionary fiscal policy, and also provides significant coverage of the supply-side effects of fiscal policy. A flexible chapter organization satisfies a variety of approaches to teaching the principles of macroeconomics Discussion of long-run economic growth in Chapter 21 makes it possible for instructors to omit the more thorough discussion of these issues in Chapter 22. Discussion of the Keynesian income-expenditure approach (the ''45 degree-line diagram,'' or ''Keynesian cross''), which introduces students to the short-run relationship between spending and production, is confined to Chapter 23 so that instructors who do not use this approach can proceed directly to aggregate demand and aggregate supply analysis in Chapter 24.
A dynamic model of aggregate demand and aggregate supply (AD-AS) , provides students with a more accurate and realistic understanding of the causes and consequences of fluctuations in real GDP and the price level. Coverage of the dynamic AD-AS model is presented in self-contained sections in Chapters 24, 26, and 27, so instructors may safely omit the sections on the Dynamic AD-AS model without any loss in continuity to the discussion of macroeconomic theory and policy. Chapter 24 includes a layered, full-color acetate for the Dynamic AD-AS model, but also basic AD-AS graphs that make it possible to omit the dynamic AD-AS model altogether. International material in Chapters 9, 29, and 30 give students a good understanding of international trading and financial systems -- essential to understanding the macroeconomy and satisfying their curiosity about the economic world around them. Instructors may choose to cover just one, two, or all three of the chapters as needed; a flexibility chart is provided to help select the chapters and order best suited to your classroom''s needs. International examples and comparisons also appear in many chapters, beginning with Chapter 1 with discussions of trade with Mexico and Colombia. Foster thorough understanding via a flexible, student-focused approach An accessible writing style brings concepts to life. Ninety-four percent of 1,500 students from different colleges and universities across the country who reviewed Hubbard/O''Brien rated the writing style an ''A'' or ''B'' compared to their current principles of economics textbook.
Solved Problems provide models of how to solve an economic problem by breaking it down step-by-step. Each solved problem includes a problem statement; delineated steps to solve the problem; a graph or table; and Your Turn, which directs students to related end-of-chapter problems for immediate practice. This feature keeps students focused on the main ideas of each chapter, and prevents them from getting bogged down due to a lack of basic math or word-problem skills. Also available with MyLab Econom.