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Finance & Economics Books

Written by: Igor Glavanic

Article Overview: Some free finance & economics books available - improve your financial IQ

Finance & Economics Books

Good grasp of finance & basic economics is a very important component of every individual's financial education.
Most business people nowadays have excellent understanding of financial intricacies of how a business is run including cash-flow, budgeting, forecasting, profitability etc. but in the same time a solid foundation on macro-economic principals.
We operate in a globalised environment today & such levels of knowledge are a prerequisite for a well rounded individual given the external economic factors are likely to impact both businesses as well as individual's finance.
Take a relationship between interest rates, un-employment rate & inflation for example.
It's generally understood that higher inflation pushes up the interest rates - why ? Well, the governments typically set target inflation bands. For US, Australia… they are typically between 2% & 3% p/a. In case that inflation figures go above the range, government will pull the levers it has under control to bring in into line - such as increase interest rates. Basically higher interest rates mean that people have less money to spend as their mortgages costs increase so the prices of other goods recede and inflation thus reduces.
Now to complicate things a bit add un-employment rate to this. Again it's well understood that lower un-employment rate is better - more people have work, families have food on the table and people are happy. However on the downside low unemployment creates upward pressure on the items such as wages - there are less people available to work so you have to pay the ones who are working a bit more. This in turn now gives more money to people who then spend it again so the inflation goes up.
Sounds complicated - well it is a bit, as getting the right balance is fairly hard. You could argue that to fix above scenario you could increase interest rates even further but that can create pressure on business profitability and potentially bring forward a recession.
We'll leave that as a topic for another article. For now to get you going in your quest of financial IQ improvement, I'd recommend two classical texts of economy:
- The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations is the magnum opus of the Scottish economist Adam Smith, published on March 9, 1776 during the Scottish Enlightenment. It is a clearly written account of political economy at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and is widely considered to be the first modern work in the field of economics. The work is also the first comprehensive defence of free market policies. It is broken down into five books between two volumes.
- The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money by John Maynard Keynes
The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money is generally considered to be the masterwork of the English economist John Maynard Keynes. To a great extent it created the terminology of modern macro-economics. It was published in February 1936. The book ushered in a revolution, commonly referred to as the "Keynesian Revolution", in the way economists thought, and especially in terms of the feasibility and wisdom of public sector management of the aggregate level of demand in the economy.

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Re: Finance is the primary requirement of business - [quote="rauljoseph":36x8dadn]Finance is very important in a business. It is all about managing the business' money and other assets. Finance includes the study and analysis of processes, financial institutions, markets and instruments that are involved in the transfer of money or anything that has a monetary value among consumers, businesses and government.[/quote:36x8dadn] Good point. I'll just add that if I was going into business for myself and could only have one skill it would be Sales & Marketing. You need to be able to create customers first and foremost. Finance is more of a support function for entrepreneurs.
Finance is the primary requirement of business - Finance is very important in a business. It is all about managing the business' money and other assets. Finance includes the study and analysis of processes, financial institutions, markets and instruments that are involved in the transfer of money or anything that has a monetary value among consumers, businesses and government.
Top 19 Copywriting books - 1. Ogilvy on Advertising. David Ogilvy. Wiley. 2. Positioning: The Battle for your Mind. Al Ries and Jack Trout. Warner. 3. The New Positioning. Jack Trout. McGraw-Hill. 4. Tested Advertising Methods. John Caples. Prentice-Hall. 5. How to Make your Advertising Make Money. John Caples. Prentice-Hall. 6. Guerrilla Advertising. Jay Conrad Levinson. Houghton Mifflin. 7. Direct Mail Copy that Sells. Herschell Gordon Lewis. Prentice-Hall. 8. Sales Letters that Sizzle. Herschell Gordon Lewis. NTC Business Books. 9. Herschell Gordon Lewis on the Art of Writing Copy. Herschell Gordon Lewis. Prentice-Hall. 10. Romancing the Brand. David Martin. American Management Association. 11. The Art of Writing Advertising: Conversations with William Bernbach, Leo Burnett, George Gribbin, David Ogilvy, Rosser Reeves. NTC Business Books. 12. Confessions of an Advertising Man. David Ogilvy. NTC Business Books. 13. My Life in Advertising. Claude Hopkins. NTC Business Books. 14. Scientific Advertising. Claude Hopkins. NTC Business Books. 15. How to Become an Advertising Man. James Webb Young. NTC Business Books. 16. The Lasker Story as He Told It. NTC Business Books. 17. Advertising Concept and Copy. George Felton. Prentice Hall. 18. The Copy WorkShop Workbook. Bruce Bendinger. The Copy Workshop. 19. Hey, Whipple, Squeeze This: A Guide to Creating Great Ads. Luke Sullivan. Wiley. This should keep you busy for at least a year. Enjoy!
My entry - 1. The Best Business Books Ever: The 100 Most Influential Business Books You'll Never Have Time to Read - this is a fascinating book about the history of Business theory, and I'd recommend it to anybody. 2. The Big Book of Small Business: You Don't Have to Run Your Business by the Seat of Your Pants, by Tom Gegax. Ditto. 3. PADI: The Business of Diving Book Okay, so this book won't be of use to anyone who doesn't want to start a scuba store, but I did, and this book was of course invaluable to me in reaching that goal.
New poster! Thought I would start by saying Hi. - Hi, my name is Ringo and I'm new to the forum. A little bit of background. I am from Toronto, Canada. I recently completed a BAH Economics. My professional interests are in marketing, finance and management consulting. I hope to own my own business one day. But before that I would like to learn as much as possible. Either from the community of entrepreneurs around me or from work experience. I hope our conversations will be fruitful and engaging!


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