Ask HN: Reliable/Reputable sources on personal financial literacy and economics | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Reliable/Reputable sources on personal financial literacy and economics

I majored in CS and never really explored much outside of it, so I didn't give myself a chance to learn about the reputable names, concepts, or theories in economics. I'm going to start applying to jobs soon and would like to learn about personal financial literacy and historical and present day economics to get a better understanding of the context before I get paid. I'm hoping learning about these things earlier can lead to making smarter moves earlier and more financial stability. If you have any books, videos, articles, podcasts, sites, or news sources or whatever else that you liked, I'd love to take a look!

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Try New Ideas from Dead Economists by Todd Buckholz, a gentle and non-ideological introduction to a wide variety of theoretical concepts in economics.

For personal money management, ignore macroeconomics but develop some capability at micro, which is useful in many everyday contexts, from household budgeting to managing your time. Macro is just micro with more price theory and overconfidence. (Seriously, macro is interesting but the theoretical foundation is wobbly and prone to fads. I like the econophysics approach of treating economic systems as kinetic models myself.)

There are lots of good books but everything you need to know for personal use can be found in an AP study guide. Barrons (the financial daily newspaper) publishes an excellent and affordable series of study guides on this and related topics. It's not hard, a great deal of economics is just measuring the area under a curve, ie basic calculus.

Be ware that political evangelists promote personality authors as being the only ones worth reading, eg Marx on the left, Friedman or Hayek for libertarians, Thomas Sowell for conservatives. These are all meme writers who are more interested in getting you to agree with a particular interpretation of the world than developing independent reasoning skills, so I suggest treating their fans the same as religious solicitors.

Das Kapital is a foundational work that provides an insightful analysis whether or not one agrees with its premises and conclusions.

Banking/finance/crypto developer. Economics major. With a keen lifetime interest in finance. Here are some shiny gems in this space.

Economics Foundation: Basic Economics, Thomas Sowell - https://www.tsowell.com

Personal Finance: The Psychology of Money, Morgan Housel - https://www.amazon.com/Psychology-Money-Timeless-Lessons-Hap...

The Millionaire Next Door, Thomas Stanley - https://www.amazon.com/The-Millionaire-Next-Door-audiobook/d...

Building Wealth: Ten Roads to Riches, Ken Fisher - https://www.amazon.com/Ten-Roads-Riches-Second-Wealthy/dp/B0...

Financial Freedom/Independence: Mr Money Mustache - https://www.mrmoneymustache.com

FIRE - Financial Independence Retire Early - https://www.reddit.com/r/financialindependence/

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