This brief emphasizes the ways in which introductory economics textbooks incorrectly rely on
assumptions about the free market the rational agent model market fundamentalism and
standard long-standing assumptions in economics and in doing so disregard the effects of
incomplete and asymmetric information on choice and on allocation and maintain a general but
flawed belief that competitive markets can always provide efficient solutions automatically. In
other words the standard economics principles textbook is anachronistic they assume that
tastes are exogenous they overlook interdependencies and externalities not only in production
but in consumption of goods and they overlook the fact that path-dependence is a major
hindrance to optimization. Mainstream principles of economics textbooks distort our worldview
with immense political and cultural consequences. Students of these principles deserve a more
complete perspective and this brief critiques that conventional worldview and provides an
alternative perspective with an emphasis on free-market economics wherein the human element
should be paramount and moral judgments should override market outcomes. In other words what
is important is not GNP as much as the quality of life not institutions but how people live
and fare in them. This brief argues that economics cannot be a science it has too
manyideological aspects and in many ways conventional textbooks are not providinga
true-to-life depiction of the economy. This Brief will be a reference orsupplemental text for
college and university students enrolled in such appliedundergraduate and graduate courses and
seminars in economics and economictheory.
