Help me understand the economy/economics

Nightslyr

Simply put, I know just about nothing of economics outside of my own, limited, personal finances. I have a credit card, checking account, and had some student loans in the past, but beyond that, I'm ignorant. No bonds, stocks, 401k, or anything like that. Given both the shitty economic state of the world, and the US in particular with the Presidential election later this year, I figure I can't remain an economic idiot.

I can't afford books on the subject at the moment, so I'm looking for solid links I can read. Any help/leads would be greatly appreciated.

davidsdurions

I like http://www.khanacademy.org/finance-economics/core-finance

edit: That's just the core finance stuff, the drop down at the top that says "Watch" is where more and more and more things are.

Six

Beaten. Khan will get you there - or at least get you started.

Neaden

Krugman's blog is great for more general macroeconomic stuff: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/ he has a series of links on the righthand side that are an overview of what is going on right now.

MrTLicious

I know it's hard to know exactly what you're looking for without knowing the subject matter, but is there any way you could clarify what kind of information you're looking for? It might be easier to think of ways you might want to use this information or why you are interested in knowing more.

Do you want to try to analyze political positions?
Do you want to be knowledgeable at parties if someone brings up current economic events?
Do you want to be able to manage your investment portfolio?

lessthanpi

A) No one understands Macroeconomics.

Landsburg is a good start for Microeconomics

mrt144

lessthanpi wrote: »

A) No one understands Macroeconomics.

Landsburg is a good start for Microeconomics

Thank you!

Solvent

I consider finance to be a subset, a quite specialised kind of economics. This view is not shared by everyone. Anyway, I bring this up because to me, it sounds like you want to know about finance more than you want to know about economics. Bonds, stocks etc.

My suggestion in that case is search for learning material on finance rather than economics. A grounding in economics is great (well, I would say that, being an economist), but it won't necessarily take you where you want to go if you want to know about portfolio theory and the stock market. If you ask people about economics, they may start talking about monetary policy, monopoly regulation, principal/agent problems in insurance, tariff barriers in trade, or whatever else.

I hope this helps you direct your queries. I'm afraid I'm not a good source for introductory finance material on the 'net though.