Dr. Eric Chiang is no stranger to being online and in front of a camera. The Economics: Principles for a Changing World 6e author and instructor was a pioneer in online learning, bringing tech to teachers and students - an environment he was very familiar with well before virtual learning took over during the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, his stint on the nationally televised show Holey Moley was when I first met him. Just as I was curious about his time on the show in 2019, I’m curious about what got him to that point. At Macmillan Learning, we recognize that the success of our textbooks and courseware is in large part due to our outstanding authors. With this Author Spotlight series, we offer students and instructors a unique opportunity to better get to know these extraordinary authors, whose remarkable careers and interests often extend far beyond higher education.  There’s so much genuine interest and passion about the world’s economies within Dr. Chiang that helps make Principles for a Changing World the compelling text that it is. Within it, learners can hear his distinct voice speaking to them as they are introduced to economic concepts and the many unique examples from both within the United States and around the world. Economics can be practical Economics doesn’t have to be some pie-in-the-sky, impractical set of concepts. And Dr. Chiang doesn’t teach it that way because he didn’t learn it that way. His journey into economics began when he was just a boy, with everyday lessons from his father, a chemist by trade, who had immigrated from Taiwan in the 1960s. While his father had always been interested in economics, he felt compelled to go with the trend of the time within the Taiwanese culture of coming to the United States and studying either engineering or the sciences. Despite that, his father never lost his interest in economics, and he began to teach Dr. Chiang the principles of it with practical life lessons -- how to be frugal with money, how to save money and how to invest money. “He got me excited because he spoke about it in ways that made sense. Oh, we eat at Wendy's a lot, do you want to own a piece of Wendy's?” Dr. Chiang did want to invest and he saved his birthday money and allowances for some time so that he could invest $100. “He taught me about how companies make profits, how companies work -- and the fact that I owned just a few shares of Wendy's … it felt really exciting.” And it’s that same practical thinking that he uses to teach his students at Florida Atlantic University and the College of Southern Nevada. His interest was further piqued when, in high school, he had the opportunity to take classes at Indiana University South Bend. “Everything I’d learned as a child just sort of formalized into these economic models.” And while he considered pursuing careers in his other interests during his undergraduate years of college, like geography or hotel management, he was always drawn back to economics. “Economics provided a foundation that allowed me to study many other subjects,” he explained with a smile. It was ultimately Game Theory, the study of how and why people make strategic decisions, that took him from the role of student to teacher. As a graduate student at the University of Florida (Go Gators) he was expected to teach an undergraduate class; he saw that Game Theory was an option in the catalog and decided to go for it. It was his first teaching experience, so he over-prepared his lectures, memorizing and scripting them. As it turns out, that wasn’t necessary. “As soon as I stepped into the classroom it became so natural, I absolutely fell in love with it. From that point on, I knew I was going to be a teacher because spending time with my students in the classroom was the highlight of my week.” And while he loved teaching Game Theory, the topic proved to be a specialty and niche subject. So niche that he was having to come up with his own course materials for his students because there wasn’t much out there for him to use. “I wasn't satisfied with the existing textbooks at the time, so I was always using my own content.” And while he went on to customize chapters in other economics textbooks, something was still missing in those textbooks and, well, most others. “One part missing in most books that I wanted was the story behind the concept. For example, most principles textbooks jump right into supply and demand, they jump right into elasticity, and they didn't really start the chapter with ‘Why is this important, and how is this relevant to everyone's life?’, and that was the part that I kept sort of filling in right when I customized the book.” And soon enough, he got the chance to write one on his own terms. At first he began as an accuracy checker and reviewer of an economics textbook written by Jerry Stone, but quickly became more and more involved as a contributor. The two authors had a lot in common, with both Stone and Chiang teaching at public universities catering mostly to non-traditional students, who often took classes at night because they were working during the day or had families. Both believed in teaching practical, usable versions of economics -- Chiang understood just how valuable the students' time was and wanted to help them invest it in their future. To do that, Stone and thereafter Chiang tailored the textbook to the needs of those students with the philosophy of being practical and connecting economics to the real world. “You have to be a little more thorough in your explanations, and you have to provide those additional explanations and examples and connect what we're learning to the real world.” That philosophy may be the reason why the largest population of students using the book are those from community colleges. A global perspective When Chiang began authoring the Principles for a Changing World textbook in 2014, he brought in a wealth of modern examples and global perspectives to create even stronger connections with the students. He also placed a greater emphasis on data literacy, all while still staying true to the original philosophy of being practical and connecting economics with the real world. In writing, he made sure that the text attempted to make connections with every student by offering examples from across various regions of the US and even the world. “Take, for example, sports. We’re not just talking about baseball and football in the examples. We’re also talking about cricket, soccer and field hockey. That makes it more relatable.” Chiang is passionate about international travel and culture, which is evident throughout the textbook. Every chapter of the book has an “around the world” feature, offering a different way to think about economics. “If you look at most other textbooks, if they're talking about something in another country, it is because they're comparing their country with our country. It’s their growth rate vs. ours. For me it's more from an individual perspective -- if you were standing in that country, how would someone in that country solve a problem?” Take, for example, Disneyland in Tokyo. It’s quite different from the Disney World or Disneyland that students in the U.S. are used to. Culturally, in Japan, they are not as interested in thrill rides, like roller coasters, but they love photo taking. “Line management in dealing with scarcity and surplus is different in Japan. The park is so crowded but everyone's having a great time because there's so many characters walking around, and you can always take a picture with them and it's a very fulfilling experience …It's just interesting to see how different countries address different demands, and different cultural differences of what people value and that goes into their decision making. It all goes to show there’s not just one way to solve an economic problem.” Growing up, Chiang never traveled far from his Indiana hometown. So as an adult he makes up for it by trying to visit a new country every year. He wants to bring new examples, ideas and stories to his students, which is how he came up with the idea of his Around the world in 80 hours series which is “a fun way to show the class how economics is all around the world.” I asked him about his favorite spots and he mentioned Japan and Singapore. Although he tends to stay a very short time in each country, his reasoning is that there’s around 200 countries in the world, so he’d like to have a glimpse of as many countries as possible -- his face lights up just thinking about it. His most striking economic lesson was when he traveled to Bhutan, a small agricultural Kingdom in the Himalayas. According to Chiang, while it’s not modern (he did not see a single traffic light in the entire country), it’s one of the safest, healthiest and happiest places in the world. “You know they don't have much, but they live very, very well so to me that's a striking economic example.” “The government doesn't measure their well-being through gross domestic product, which is how every other country measures the size of their country.” Rather, Bhutan has a Gross National Happiness Index comprising of nine domains that include psychological well-being, health, education and good governance, among others. “I think Bhutan offers an example of the opposite of what we think of as societal norms - you don't have to have money or lots of possessions, but you have to have community. And that’s a different way of thinking about the health of a country and its economic well-being.” And that’s what makes Bhutan Bhutan. And what makes each student their own person as well, which is why it’s so important that diversity is not only recognized, but championed. “Everyone faces different circumstances and manages resources differently, and that's what economics is about. How you manage your money and your time is different from how I do it. A lot of it's based on our circumstances and values, and how we grew up, and that's based on cultural diversity,” Chiang said. Students growing up in a small town have vastly different experiences than students growing up in an agricultural community, which differs vastly from those in a large city. And that’s just taking into account population size, let alone ethnicity, background, gender or income, among other factors. And that’s true for the world around us, for our classrooms and also for our textbooks. “In the past century there have been so many prominent economists and Nobel Prize winners that are women and people of color, and we highlight the biographies of many of these important contributors to economics,” Chiang noted. He cited Cecilia Rouse and Phyllis Wallace as examples. He further explained, “People always talk about prominent macroeconomist Milton Friedman, but actually he worked most of his life with Anna Schwartz, who was equally deserving of the Nobel Prize.” Dr. Chiang just finished writing the sixth edition Economics: Principles for a Changing World and notes that it will offer the practical and relevant content that’s been counted on for many years as well as fantastic new features like interactive graphing. But this new edition will offer even more information about diverse economists like Rouse and Wallace and how their contributions have affected our everyday lives -- including the economic decisions we make today. It will also include more stories, just like the Gross National Happiness Index from Bhutan that help students understand different ways of thinking about economics. Until then, you can find Dr. Chiang at FAU, UCS, or somewhere at cruising altitude. ... View more

Over the past six months, COVID-19 gave many students the opportunity to make economic decisions, whether they knew it or not. This is true for both big decisions, like whether they should attend college this fall, and the day-to-day ones like whether they should go to visit a friend. This is not a new phenomenon, as many of us have been using basic economic principles to make decisions throughout our lives. Everyday economics has been a passion of instructors and authors Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers for years now. They literally wrote the textbook on it. Principles of Economics  To help foster an even better understanding of the history-making pandemic, Betsey and Justin added new, current examples to help instructors cover the pandemic in their classrooms and to show students ways that they are already using economic principles -- or not -- in their recent decision-making.  Here are seven insights distilled from these lessons:  Students weighed the costs and benefits of leaving their homes. They analyzed the pros and cons to determine what worked best for them. And in many instances this meant staying home. In fact many students began to socially distance well before the government required them to do so. Students did not always ignore sunk costs (though they should have). As the pandemic was just beginning, many students had vacations, parties and other activities that had been planned for and paid. With fear of missing out and since money had been spent, many did not cancel. Florida’s spring break was a prime example of why it’s okay to not continue to invest in sunk costs, as people got sick and some died after attending parties. Students reviewed the opportunity costs. Some students considered changing their college plans by asking themselves “or what.” For example, they asked: Should I go to college or … travel (which is limited) ... get a job (which is harder because unemployment is up). Students' actions caused supply and demand to shift. With social distancing measures in place, they didn’t go out to restaurants nearly as often, and overall demand for in-person dining decreased. Students made decisions that impacted more than just themselves. The marginal external costs associated with risky behavior during a pandemic are larger the more infectious and fatal the disease because it's more likely to make more people sick with serious consequences. On the other hand, the marginal external benefits associated with social distancing and mask-wearing during a pandemic are also larger since averting potential infections could save many lives. Students relied more on Amazon for goods, giving Amazon greater market power. An article in The Economist on April 11, 2020 noted: “As the world gets back on its feet, big firms will have better access to capital markets, giving them an extra edge over smaller competitors.” Students played a coordination game when they bought more toilet paper than we needed to. Purchases in excess were made not because they feared a shortage, but because they were concerned that others feared it. These seven examples of how COVID-19 impacted our choices represent just a fraction of how we're using economic principles to make decisions in our everyday lives.  For more information about Principles of Economics with Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers from Macmillan Learning, and to learn more about why every decision is an economic decision, click here.  Betsey Stevenson advised President Obama on social policy, labor market, and trade issues as a member of the Council of Economic Advisers from 2013 to 2015. She is currently a professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan and she serves on the Executive Committee of the American Economic Association and other boards. She is an expert on the impact of the economy on happiness, on public policies’ impact on the labor market, and the economic forces shaping the modern family, among other topics. Justin Wolfers is a professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan. He is an expert in unemployment and inflation, the power of prediction markets, the economic forces shaping the modern family, discrimination, and happiness. He has been an editor of the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, a board member on the Committee on the Status of Women in Economics, a member of the Panel of Advisors of the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, among many other board and advisory positions. ... View more

History is more than just a study of past events. It's an interpretation of people, artifacts and events that allows us to find a path forward. With an important milestone that just passed, the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, we discussed women's equality with acclaimed historian, author and instructor Nancy Hewitt. Marisa Bluestone: How do you think that the women’s marches in 2016 will be remembered in our history books 100 years from now? Nancy Hewitt: Among women’s historians, I think the 2016 women’s marches will be highlighted as part of a new wave of activism touched off by Donald Trump’s election as president but rooted in a much longer shift in progressive women’s activism. The repeated attacks on abortion rights since Roe v Wade, the snail-like pace in achieving equal pay, the continued devastation caused by sexual assault and domestic violence, the continued issues of sexual harassment in workplaces of all kinds, and attacks on immigrants and Dreamers fueled the 2016 marches. But so, too, did the expanding power of women in law, academia, medicine, journalism, and many other professions, the increasing power of Black, Hispanic/Latinx, Native American, and Asian American women’s activist organizations, the expansion of LGBTQ rights and organizations, and the growing importance of women elected officials from diverse backgrounds. Among American historians, it’s likely that the women’s marches will be viewed as part of the wave of protests in the 2010s and early 2020s inspired by women and men, young and old, working-class and middle-class, from diverse racial and ethnic communities. These activists have demanded racial, environmental and economic justice; gender equality; indigenous rights, LGBTQ rights, and universal healthcare. This extended period of progressive activism, in which women play central roles, will follow on stories of similar moments in the decades before the Civil War, the Progressive Era, and the Sixties (really the 1950s into the early 1980s). Among both women’s and American historians, this progressive activism will be examined alongside the rise in conservative and alt-right activism among women and men and fueled by many of the same issues. This, too, echoes earlier periods, particularly the Red Scare of the 1910s and 1920s, the McCarthy era and the anti-feminism and New Right of the Sixties. Marisa: What role have students played in women’s equality movements? Nancy:  Students, especially college students, have been critical to women’s equality movements since at least the late nineteenth century. Before that, education at all levels was a key demand of women, including writer Judith Sargent Murray and educators and activists Sarah Mapps Douglass, Mary Ann Shadd, Mary Lyon, Catherine Beecher, Elizabeth Peabody, and Fannie Barrier Williams. It was also one of the key demands of women’s rights advocates from the 1840s-1880s. African American students, such as Rosetta Douglass (Rochester, NY) and Mary Jane Patterson (Oberlin), played key roles in movements for women’s educational equality movements by demanding access to predominantly white schools. The success of these educational campaigns allowed female students at women’s colleges and a growing number of coeducational institutions to become deeply involved in women’s equality movements over the next half-century. Associations of college students joined the suffrage movement, fought for improvements in public health, advocated for temperance and peace, labored in settlement houses; and, as journalists and writers, they investigated conditions in prisons, asylums, workplaces, and impoverished neighborhoods. Photographs of massive suffrage parades in New York City, Washington, D.C. and other cities in the 1910s show young women marching under student and sorority banners. Black sororities were especially important in training young women for careers in civil rights and social justice efforts. In this decade, white and Black college women volunteered for overseas work supporting American troops during WWI or banded together at home to assist the Red Cross and other organizations. It’s also important to think about the children who did not get to continue their education because of the economic needs of their families. Even when public education was widely available, many African American and immigrant children had to leave school early to earn money. Many native-born white children in rural areas had to miss school as well to help plant and harvest crops. Some of these young people, too, participated in social movements, including labor movements in cities and populist movements in rural areas. This part of the story continues today for children of recent immigrants, migrant workers, and impoverished families of all races. In the post-World War II period, as the college population increased significantly, students remained central to movements for peace, women’s rights, civil rights, farm workers rights, and social justice. More high school students joined their ranks. The southern civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s offers one of the most powerful moments of student activism from Black children who integrated white schools amid rising violence to white and Black college students who joined efforts to integrate transportation, stores and lunch counters. They testified about the sexual abuse of Black women and pushed for voting rights across the South. Farmer worker movements across the West politicized Chicana students, many who worked the fields themselves, a necessity that limited their access to education. College students were among the groups that supported the grape and lettuce boycotts launched by Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta through the United Farmer Workers. While Chavez missed school for weeks at a time as he moved with his family picking crops across California, Huerta left her job as a school teacher to organize farmer workers after seeing the devastation on children’s education caused by the system of migrant farm labor. Huerta was also active in campaigns for voting rights among Mexican American/Chicana/o workers across the Southwest. In the 1970s, college students from diverse backgrounds were central to the rise of women’s liberation, women of color feminism, and lesbian feminism. They remain at the heart of battles for women’s equality today, building on efforts to increase women’s presence in law, medicine, journalism, the arts, and academia. Photographs and videos of women’s rights marches from the 1970s to 2020 document the participation of large numbers of young women, many organized through college and high school networks. The field of women’s history emerged, of course, on college and university campuses. It was launched by women and a few good men trained in other areas of history. Fortunately for me, I entered graduate school at University of Pennsylvania in 1975, when it was possible to claim women’s history as a major field in some graduate departments. When I entered the job market in 1981, 9 history departments were hiring their first women’s historians. I was hired at the University of South Florida, and continued to teach both the American history survey and women’s history at USF, Duke and Rutgers University. Marisa: What woman in US history do you think students should learn more about? Nancy: There are so many that it is hard to choose just a few. Many more women appear in high school textbooks than when I attended high school or college. I remember when Harriet Tubman became a standard figure in high school textbooks. I was teaching the early American history survey at the University of South Florida. I began each semester by asking students to list the names of 10 notable Americans between 1600 and 1865, and then asked them to create a second list of 10 minus political and military leaders. The second lists were often much shorter than the first, and some included authors, explorers and scientists. Frederick Douglass appeared with some regularity, and a few women, most notably Pocahontas and First Ladies. But in the late 1980s, Harriet Tubman started appearing regularly. When I asked my students why, they said she was one of the people featured in boxed biographies in their high school textbooks. Now, high school and college textbooks include a much more diverse cast of characters, and I suspect my opening gambit would be easier for students, at least I hope so. So let me highlight a few women in this early period who are starting to appear in college textbooks and whose stories help us think broadly about women’s roles and women’s equality. Weetamoo, a Wampanoag sachem in 17th century New England, worked to save native lands through deeds and diplomacy. She married into a prominent Wampanoag family, and Metacom (King Philip) was her brother-in-law. Weetamoo was an important diplomat, seeking first to negotiate with English colonists and in the 1670s joining Metacom in King Philip’s War against the colonists. Only recently have historians begun to understand the full significance of her role in native and New England society. Elizabeth Freeman (Mum Bett) was born into slavery in New York and was sold to John Ashley of Sheffield, Massachusetts, as a child. She was allowed to marry and had a daughter before her husband joined the Continental Army. Mum Bett’s owner was an active patriot, who often held meetings in his home. In 1773, the group drafted the Sheffield Resolves, the first manifesto of individual liberties. In 1780, after hearing a reading of the Massachusetts Constitution, she asked one of Ashley’s fellow patriots, Theodore Sedgwick, to help her sue for freedom. He did so; and in winning her suit, she helped ensure the end to slavery in Massachusetts. Jessie Benton Fremont was raised in a prominent political family and spent much of her young life in Washington D.C., where her father Thomas served as Senator from Missouri. She met Lieutenant John C. Fremont, a military officer and explorer. Despite her family’s objection, the two married and Jessie became a critical assistant to her husband as he mapped parts of the western frontier and sought military and political fame in California. She helped him write dramatic accounts of his explorations, putting her husband at the center of the story. When John received the nomination for President from the new Republican Party, Jessie rallied women to his campaign, illuminating the expanding role women played in political campaigns well before they gained the right to vote.  Rose O’Neal was born in rural Maryland in 1813 or 1814 to a poor farm family. After her mother died, she was sent to live with relatives in Washington, D.C. Rose gained the friendship of Dolley Madison, ensuring her entrée to the best social and political circles in the city. There Rose met Dr. Robert Greenhow. After their marriage, she began holding her own “at home” gatherings. By the time Civil War erupted in spring 1861, Rose was widowed and mother to a young daughter. A supporter of the Confederacy, she gathered political and military information from numerous admirers, who had no idea she was passing it to the Confederates. To avoid suspicion, she appealed to the chivalry of men on both sides. She was finally arrested and imprisoned in the Old Capitol Prison with other female enemy agents. She was eventually released and sent to Virginia. Although considered a traitor to the United States, Greenhow used her femininity, intellect and political commitments to claim a significant role in the Confederate cause.  Marisa: Many (like Macmillan Learning author Betsey Stevenson) believe that COVID-19 may set back women’s workplace gains. What does history tell us about how the pandemic may impact women in the workplace? Nancy: This is a hard question to answer given the dramatically different economic situations of American women. Many frontline workers—from hospital cleaners and laundry workers to nurses and doctors—might improve their position in the workforce because of the critical character of their work during the pandemic. But they are also more at risk of infection. At the same time, many service workers—such as cashiers and secretaries—are likely to lose their jobs with the collapse of brick and mortar stores and small businesses. Those jobs may never recover given that shopping malls and traditional consumer shopping were already in economic trouble with the rise of online shopping.  While women have made huge strides in recent years in terms of access to the professions, entrepreneurship and other fields, they remain a small percentage of workers in high tech companies, which are likely to expand as a result of the pandemic. Moreover, the pandemic is likely to increase disparities between college-educated and non-college educated workers and between women of different racial and ethnic backgrounds whose access to education and job training differ as much as among men. Thus, women of color are likely to be especially hard hit by the economic effects of the pandemic as they are by its medical effects. Thus generalizations are hard to make. Finally, the smaller percentage of wealth held by women (versus men) and of Black, Native and Chicana/Latina women versus white women means that racial inequities will continue to effect women not only in the workplace but on the home front. This is especially true since homeownership is much higher for native-born white women than for other racial groups, providing them with a foundation (literally and figuratively) that allows them to survive economic downturns more easily than those who rent. Marisa: Is there anything else we should be asking you about women’s equality but haven’t? Nancy: I think it’s important to remember that in almost any time period, in the United States and elsewhere, advances for one group of women have not automatically meant advancement for all groups of women. This year with the centenary of the 19th Amendment, the differential effect of that amendment has been the focus of a number of talks, articles and books. Most white women who hadn’t already been enfranchised by their state governments did gain the right to vote in 1920. But Native American and Chinese American women did not gain citizenship rights until 1924 and 1943, respectively, thus making them ineligible to vote. Korean American and Japanese American women were not granted citizenship until even later. And Black women in the South were largely disfranchised alongside Black men until the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Other groups—including Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans—also had to fight for the vote for more than a decade after 1920. And many Spanish-speaking women did not gain full voting rights until the extension of the Voting Rights Act in 1970, when bilingual ballots and voting information was available. Of course these limits were generally shared by women and men, but they make clear that the 19th Amendment did not enfranchise all women, which has been the popular understanding for far too long. As the students we teach in colleges and universities become more diverse, it is important that we incorporate the many stories that contribute to American/US history into our textbooks. It has been incredibly enlightening for me to see how focusing on different groups can shift an entire story. That has been clear since becoming a women’s historian, but I have tried this year to be even more attentive to how women from different backgrounds develop their own histories and relate to other groups of women in forming American histories. The same is true for men, of course. How do their stories differ across race, ethnicity, place and time; and how do those stories relate to each other and to the histories of women. This summer, as I worked on the 4th edition of Exploring American Histories, the addition of Weetamoo and Elizabeth Freeman, giving equal attention to Powhatan as to John Smith, and adding more stories of Mexicans and Tejanos to the period from the 1830s through Reconstruction alongside those of blacks and whites helped me see new aspects of the American past. I hope these stories will also encourage students from diverse communities to understand their part in the historical development of the United States and in struggles for the equal rights promised in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Nancy Hewitt is the co-author of Exploring American Histories franchise, published by Macmillan Learning. She is Professor Emerita of History and of Women’s and Gender Studies at Rutgers University. Her publications include Southern Discomfort: Women’s Activism in Tampa, Florida, 1880s-1920s; Women’s Activism and Social Change: Rochester, New York, 1822-1872; and the edited volume No Permanent Waves: Recasting Histories of U.S. Feminism. Her latest book is Radical Friend: Amy Kirby Post and Her Activist Worlds. ... View more