Prof. Releases New Textbook, Poor Students Cower in Fear
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Harvard professor of economics has just released the fifth edition of Principles of Economics, a bestselling introductory economics textbook, and all across the world trees and and students have been falling in equal measure: the former have been severed by chainsaw-wielding maniacs in stump-filled ravines; the latter have been collapsing in their dormitories for want of sustenance, an entire month’s pittance diverted from the cafeteria to the campus bookstore, to fill the coffers of a grinning, bespectacled Bostonian.
On Greg Mankiw’s blog, of course, there is no mention of the money the professor will reap from the newest iteration of his textbook, which is selling on Amazon for a whopping $178.89. In a post dated to Saturday, October 11, Mankiw writes:
Why a new edition? The fundamentals of economics are much the same: Supply curves still slope up, and demand curves still slope down. But a lot has changed over the past three years, and the new edition covers recent developments in economic research, events, and policy. In particular, it includes over 40 new applications, including Case Studies and In the News boxes, to remind students that economics is about the world in which they live.
Indeed, much has changed in the past three years. (For example, look at how all those economic theories helped the Fed prevent our economy from tanking). But really, Mankiw, the readers of your introductory economics textbook are not the same Ivory Tower academes that receive a dozen canary-colored working papers from NBER each month. They’ll survive without 40 new applications, thank you very much.
When asked by email to detail the changes he made from the fourth edition to the fifth, Mankiw was not extremely helpful. He wrote: “contact brian joyner, who I mentioned on my blog post. he can give you some information.” The fact that Mankiw directed me to someone at the publisher of his textbook leads me to wonder whether he knows what he changed at all.
After the jump: an approximation of Mankiw’s rake on every textbook.
In an article at Economic Principals that was then picked up by a blog on Condé Nast Portfolio, David Warsh writes that Mankiw must be making
Plenty. For it was in December 1992 that Mankiw startled the textbook world by leaving the publisher of his intermediate macroeconomics text to write in introductory text for a rival firm, for a $1.4 million advance, or roughly three times the previous record for a college text… Mankiw, of Harvard University, had written his highly-successful intermediate book, the traditional warm-up to a new introductory text, for Worth Publishing. Scott Stratford, then an editor at McGraw-Hill, offered a princely $1 million to defect. Then, John Greenman, economics editor at HarperCollins, told Nasar, “That little money-grubber started shopping the deal.” Greenman declined to bid.
Four years later, Mankiw delivered the introductory text. It was an immediate success. Heralded by a cover story in The Economist (“writing more in the style of a magazine than a stodgy textbook”), its exposition was indeed graceful and clear, but its real innovations lay elsewhere: as much as a third shorter than most competing texts, it contained hardly any equations. It was adopted for introductory courses around the country, especially in junior colleges.
That adds up to a formidable income stream – with editions in 20 languages, perhaps as much as $6 million per edition of the principles text alone, or more than $2 million a year.
Six million dollars to tweak a textbook every few years? It’s your right – as much as mine – to make money, but isn’t it all a bit obscene, when it’s only a side gig? I’m not saying you have to donate all your proceeds to charity like some of your more altruistic colleagues, but I’m sure you could make our lives a bit easier (read: keep our wallets a bit heavier) if you wouldn’t update as frequently, or if you used your clout to lower the price of your cash cow.
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October 15th, 2008 at 11:42 am
I’m not saying you have to donate all your proceeds to charity like some of your more altruistic colleagues, but I’m sure you could make our lives a bit easier (read: keep our wallets a bit heavier) if you wouldn’t update as frequently, or if you used your clout to lower the price of your cash cow.
This is exactly why Mankiw’s text book is necessary.
You have displayed a mind-numbingly un-economic way of thinking.
October 15th, 2008 at 12:33 pm
Haha, exactly! You can read about scaled price curves and monopolistic supply chains all you want but now you get to experience it, mofos!
October 15th, 2008 at 2:13 pm
I wouldn’t say that professors can be expected to lower the price. Those who donate to charity are very, very considerate wonderful human beings. Those who “never considered” it like the Crimson says of Mankiw, are jagoffs.
Anyway, maybe Mankiw just phones it in, but after having the misfortune of taking a class based on his book (the intermediate one) I see no reason why he makes that much money. A course I took subsequently in economic growth was devoted mostly to plugging the huge gaping chasms in Mankiw’s work. Hearing the professor bashing that wretched bane of my existence was the most wonderful catharsis.
October 15th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
i’m taking a stats class this semester. new version of the textbook costs 140usd. the professor (K.M.), a decent person, included references to the previous edition whenever readings / exercises were assigned. i got that edition for 15usd on ebay. now this professor is who i can call an educator. prof. mankiw, on the other hand… nobody tells him not to publish a new version of his textbook every year (mmm, new color schemes!), but it would be simply decent of him to inform his students that they can use older editions of the book as well and make it clear which pages to refer to. his books would still sell. and he could let some of his struggling students pick classes based on their interests and not their wallets (believe it or not, many of us are on full financial aid).
October 15th, 2008 at 8:32 pm
correction: in my previous comment i was referring to K.S., not k.m. also, a professor of my government class this semester (R.F.) made a book written by him, required for the course, available for free online.
mankiw should realize that his primary job as a professor should be to teach, not to sell.
October 15th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
Clearly, it is within Mankiw’s rights to make the tons of money he does off his book and not give any to charity. It is interesting, though, that on his website he compares how much the Palins and Bidens give to charity every year, and suggests that the Palins are much more charitable people. If he himself does not give any of his proceeds to charity, and doesn’t even consider doing so, one would think that he would consider ANY donations a mark of generosity, regardless of exactly how much was given.
October 17th, 2008 at 12:52 am
I actually think Mankiw’s textbook was pretty good. He’s pretty clear in his explanations, and it isn’t dense reading at all. A lot better than how Professor Nordhaus explains things.