Microeconomics: Principles and Tools (3rd Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Better textbooks exist...
Review: While experimenting with different textbooks for my Microeconomics classes, I decided to try the O'Sullivan and Sheffrin text. That experiment lasted two semesters.

Portions of the textbook are written at levels which are too low for college/university students, while other portions expect students to go beyond the scope of the material covered in the text. For example, in the chapter on demand and supply, surpluses and shortages are never referred to as such. Instead, they are only referred to as 'excess supply' and 'excess demand'. Too simplistic of a definition is also used for opportunity cost.

At the same time, additional problems inserted near the end of each chapter (not the chapter problems themselves), require students to apply the theory in a way that isn't taught in the textbook. Any student who has been required to complete these questions, on the basis of the textbook alone, may have experienced a lot of frustration from attempting these problems.

In addition, the textbook presents a detailed theory of taxicab licensing, yet doesn't completely explain all of the needed theory (short-run and long-run) for the market structures (pure competition, monopoly, etc.) The explanation of taxicab licensing is poor, for this level of student.

For any professor considering adopting this textbook, the testbank offers some very good questions. However, apparently some of the questions have been changed, perhaps from an earlier edition, but the answers haven't been. Overall, there were more errors in this testbank than in others I've used.

To anyone required to purchase this textbook for a course, I would recommend purchasing or borrowing other textbooks to supplement this text. If someone wants to learn Microeconomic theory on their own, there are better books available.