On the cover of Jim Stanford’s book Economics For Everyone there is a blurb by Naomi Klein that reads, “Stanford is that rare breed: the teacher who changed your life. He has written a book — both pragmatic and idealistic — with the power to change the world.” Anyone who scoffs at Klein’s description is not familiar with the work of Jim Stanford. For Stanford is anything but a dismal scientist: in his economic writing he makes clear complex concepts and processes, cuts through the ideology of the ruling class and their servants in the economics profession, and empowers the everyday people upon whose labour our economy rests. And he does this mercurially through a variety of mediums, whether in his column for The Globe and Mail, appearing on CBC television and radio, or in his work for the Canadian Auto Workers union. He’s Canada’s answer to American public intellectuals such as Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz — only more radical — and indeed our most formidable political economist since John Kenneth Galbraith migrated south so many years ago.

It’s only fitting then that Stanford would undertake the sorely needed task of writing a popular introduction to modern capitalism. Such books face a dilemma: do they provide a thorough but lengthy guide to the subject or risk dumbing down the material in the cause of accessibility? To his credit, Stanford has written an accessible but methodical introduction to the economics of capitalism which explicates the subject from the ground up, beginning with a discussion of the basics (work, tools, and profit) to the complexity of globalization, financial markets, and the causes behind the peaks and troughs of our volatile economic system. The book’s conclusion, A Dozen Big Things To Remember About Economics, is an excellent capstone which lays bare the absurdity of neoclassical economics. The witty illustrations of Tony Biddle that accompany Stanford’s text make the most serious and demanding subject matter a little more bearable.

Socialists might be somewhat disappointed with the space that Stanford devotes to a discussion of alternatives, but the absence of a blueprint for a democratically controlled socialist economy is less a comment on the author than it is on the current impasse of socialist politics and thought. With the current economic crisis, the book may be in need of a second edition. While the imbalance between the real productive economy and the speculative paper economy that has been a theme of Stanford’s work for years gets decent treatment, Economics For Everyone was published just prior to the global meltdown of the capitalist economy. However, a great addition to the book is the accompanying website (www.economicsforeveryone.ca) which contains lesson plans for educators, including a sample course outline, lecture slides, and a comprehensive glossary of terms. While the lesson plan section of the site is not complete, it is due to be finished in the near future.

All in all, Economics For Everyone is an invaluable book and a necessary addition to the library of popular educators, trade unionists, activists, or any person trying to make sense of the conundrum that is modern capitalism. And as Stanford makes clear, the first step to transforming the system is knowing how it works and for whom. To this end, Economics For Everyone has made a vital contribution.

—Simon Black, Canadian Dimension

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 Only a few short pages into Economics for Everyone, Jim Stanford warns his reader to “never trust an economist with your job”. This bold statement makes Stanford, an economist for the Canadian Auto Workers Union, a true iconoclast in a field which has increasingly become dominated by supply-sided neoliberal practitioners. These are the experts” who can be seen on television and in print treating economic questions as apolitical abstractions, reinforcing the hegemonic logic of unregulated free-market capitalism, even in a time of economic crisis.

In this book Stanford breaks with convention to present a populist, worker-centered perspective on economics that challenges the prevailing apolitical models of capitalist economic orthodoxy. Stanford accomplishes this task by structuring the book into short, readable chapters, free from excessive economic jargon or mathematics. The use of cartoons and easy-to-read flow charts throughout helps the reader connect their actual lived economic circumstances in the workplace, at home, and in their communities to the bigger economic picture and the capitalist system as a whole. Stanford has also included a blog, a Web-based glossary, and ready-made lecture slides to accompany the book, thus giving activists the tools necessary to teach a popular economics course, based on the content of the book.

The book is organized into five parts, each containing a number of small chapters. Part I introduces the reader to basic economic and political concepts. The next section reviews the concept of work (both paid and unpaid), focusing on the relationship between bosses, workers, companies, and profit. Part III considers capitalism as an economic system and introduces the reader to the concepts of competition, investment, employment relations, and the distribution of wealth. This is followed by an examination of the monetary and financial systems that sustain capitalist economics both nationally and internationally. The final section evaluates the capitalist system with a report card, highlighting its strengths and weaknesses, before imagining alternative economic systems.

Three chapters stand out. Chapter 8 effectively explains, in plain language, the adversarial nature of the employment relationship under capitalism. Chapter 15 focuses on reproduction and documents the important role that domestic labor plays in the capitalist system. An in an analysis of capitalism and the environment, chapter 15 explores issues of sustainability and growth, casting doubt on market-based mechanisms, such as carbon taxes and cap and trade, as effective means to address the important issue of global warming.

Although Stanford does a good job explaining the relationship between capitalism and the class power structure throughout the book a sustained discussion or even a stand-alone chapter on the relationship between capitalism and the racial power structure would have helped to make the book even more relevant the a wider audience.

Finally, while Stanford does hold out hope for an alternative to capitalism, he provides no real road map for activists interested in building a transformative political project. For segments of the activist Left who are forever asking< “What is to be done?” Stanford’s discussion of alternatives to capitalism will likely disappoint. That said, understanding the system one seeks to replace is a good starting point for any activist with aspirations of changing the world. To that end, Stanford’s Economics for Everyone is an exceptionally valuable contribution to the field of union education and could easily be adopted as a course text in introductory labor studies courses at the post secondary level.

- Larry Savage, Brock University for Labor Studies Journal, 2009 (posted with permission from Sage Publications US).

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