Micromotives and Macrobehavior
In Books
by Thomas Schelling
This book is now old enough (first published in 1978), and popular enough to be considered a classic introduction to economics and systems analysis. Schelling uses examples throughout the book that you might have thought of before, and then applies analytical techniques for understanding their behavior.
One of Schelling's main points is that the behavior of groups is caused by the choices of a large number of individuals, each of whom is responding to the choices of the others. In one example, a rush-hour driver decides which route based on what he thinks other drivers will do. Using this and many other examples Schelling shows how individual decisions can aggregate to a collective outcome that is no one prefers.
The book is a good introduction to both the value and dangers of using simulations and models of human behavior.
Posted by Michael Bean
