It’s true that economic theory is a subject for adults — you don’t want to assign Human Action to an 11-year old — but kids can be taught plenty too. They don’t need details about epistemology or exchange rates. But by enticing them into the subject matter of money and how it gains and loses value, you plant important seeds for future study.
That is precisely what Maybury’s book does. He has a knack for clean expression and simple word choices. He helps people think through what causes prices to rise, the trials that businesses face, the motive force behind entrepreneurship, where wealth comes from, what prosperity and poverty mean, and what kinds of intervention harm business.
He also covers some of the most exciting if financially devastating periods of economic history from the the German hyperinflation of the 1920s to the Great Depression to the 1970s inflation in the United States.
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Mr. Maybury writes on investments and has written 22 books and monographs, including Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? and his Uncle Eric series of books, which focus on economics, law and history.