Podcast: Econtalk. it is excellent and has been around since 2007. The topics you can find on there are endless.
Some topics: If someone wants to truly think like an economist they have to possess a strong grasp on counterfactuals, marginal value/marginal cost (or marginal thinking), opportunity costs, and causality. I am sure I am missing some, but I use these everyday in my life and career.
I think it would be valuable to read some perspectives of economic history.
Incentives are important to think about.
bonus topic: google Game theory for applied economists. If you want to buy it and try to go through it, that would be a good challenge. Otherwise, just look up the games covered in the contents (e.g., cheap talk games, two stage games of of perfect but incomplete information) and try to find explanations of them. I find thinking like a game theorist is the next level that "amateur" economists don't often get to. I only say amateur to distinguish from those who studied it formally or it is their career. There are a lot of excellent amateur economists so it is not meant to be a negative.
Authors: John Taylor, Milton Friedman, Thomas Sowell all have very good books.
I second economics in one lesson. As a comparison to chess, I feel like that book will take you from moving aimlessly around the board to having some tactics and you will start winning a lot more games.
Personally, I would not spend my time reading human action, but it really depends on your goals.
Thank you so much for the outline of concepts I should hone in on during this journey.
I would love to be able to think like an economist, much like I would like to think like an engineer and poet-warrior.
The first goal is enrichment, to be able to see the world around me more vividly and to understand it. The second goal is decision-making. Backed with a strong framework about using resources when they are scare, I hope to get better at making smart decisions for my family.
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