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A review by batbones
Economic Facts and Fallacies by Thomas Sowell
5.0
A straightforward and dispassionate look at what numbers can tell us, their potentials and limitations, and how the numbers are often read wrong. For those hesitant to rub shoulders with census takers and statisticians like this reader, Thomas Sowell goes before us. The overall conclusion is that cited data is not straightforward but ultimately knowable with careful sifting.
By turning away from an obsessive focus on contemporary and internal politics, Sowell indirectly shows how myopic this preoccupation can be. (Another way of looking at it: a non-American can appreciate and apply his socioeconomic insights, e.g. claims on the benefits of minimum wage, how 'inequality' is used as the impetus for aggressive revisions of socioeconomic policy.) His examples come from beyond America's borders as he examines the factors of economic growth, social development and personal choice in countries including Japan, Malaysia and South Africa; and, in a short palate-cleansing chapter on the relationship between racism and slavery, across time and space as he traces civilisational conflict within and across continents.
By turning away from an obsessive focus on contemporary and internal politics, Sowell indirectly shows how myopic this preoccupation can be. (Another way of looking at it: a non-American can appreciate and apply his socioeconomic insights, e.g. claims on the benefits of minimum wage, how 'inequality' is used as the impetus for aggressive revisions of socioeconomic policy.) His examples come from beyond America's borders as he examines the factors of economic growth, social development and personal choice in countries including Japan, Malaysia and South Africa; and, in a short palate-cleansing chapter on the relationship between racism and slavery, across time and space as he traces civilisational conflict within and across continents.