Economics in SFF

Somebody with extremely good tastes once said that "the best science fiction is social science fiction". I agree. And as an economist, I am always especially interested in the way in which economics is portrayed in science fiction and fantasy.  This interest usually turns to horror when it emerges that the author has not understood their first lesson in economics about the importance of comparative advantage.  But it does not stop me getting excited about the next attempt.

I feel much the same way about blog posts that aim to identify the "best uses" of economics in SFF. Often (although with a notable exception or two) these blog posts are written by non-economists who really are thinking of business when they talk about economics, or are narrowly focused on macroeconomics, as opposed to discussions of economics per se. I was reminded of this by a recent post in the Barnes and Noble Sci-Fi and Fantasy blog entitled 6 Fantasy Novels that Explore the Economics of Imagined Worlds which focused almost entirely on monetary systems.

There have been a number of relatively recent posts pointing to SFF books that treat economic issues. These include:

1. Science Fiction Novels for Economists by Noah Smith on his blog.
2. More Science Fiction for Economists (Seriously Time-Wasting) by Paul Krugman in The New York Times.
3. Science Fiction and Fantasy To Learn Economics From by Tim Worstall on Forbes.
4. Essential Science Fiction Novels for Understanding the Economy by Charlie Jane Anders on io9.
5. Great Science Fiction Stories That Can Help You Make Sense Of Economics by Diana Biller on io9.
6. Hard Social Science Fiction: Neptune’s Brood by Alex Tabarrok on the Marginal Revolution blog. (This is a review of a single book, and not a list).

Most of the above were inspired by Noah Smith's blog post. In introducing his list, he wrote:

Really, most science fiction is about economics. What makes most future visions interesting is not just the technical particulars of the cool new Stuff, but the social ramifications. Here are some of the sci-fi books that I thought dealt with important economic issues in the most insightful and interesting ways. I also chose only books that I think are well-written, with well-conceived characters, engaging plots, and skillful writing.

I haven't read more than a small subsample of the books on the lists people have come up with, and I will endeavor to read more in my abundant (ha!) free time. For now, I will simply collect here a large subset of the books on these lists, along with some comments of my own about them and a few additional books I have either read or mean to get around to reading. I exclude a few books from the lists, such as Dune and McCaffery's Dragonrider books, because I have read them and do not think the economics stands out as being of interest.

In rough alphabetical order by author's last name:

1. Daniel Abraham
1. The Dagger and the Coin Series. I started the first book in this series and could not finish it.  I also read one of his The Long Price Quartet series and one of his short stories. He has a reputation for using a lot of economics in his stories, but I am not convinced he always gets it right.
2. Isaac Asimov
1. Foundation. Entire Trilogy. I loved these books, and like Krugman, the futuristic vision of mathematical social science probably influenced my love of economics. But I recall nothing special about the economics in the books. I would not go as far as Noah Smith in removing them from the list because of this. And I disagree with a lot of Smith's reasoning: "I love the Foundation series, and it's really fun, but the economics are crappy (agglomeration economies encourage the collapse of empires?). And more importantly, the whole conceit of psychohistory is very dangerous for economists; our models will never forecast that well, the Universe is stochastic rather than deterministic, and we should avoid the temptation for intellectual hubris. Foundation is social science's "physics envy" writ large. We are not, and will never be, Hari Seldon, so Foundation, classic as it is, doesn't go on my list!" I think Smith is wrong. IIRC, Asimov explicitly makes reference to the notion of a universe as stochastic, although with civilization so vast a form of the law of large numbers kicks in so that prediction works well. That is, it works well until a rare draw from a very fat tailed distribution occurs.
3. Margaret Atwood
1. The Year of the Flood. Noah Smith's reasoning here sounds very compelling: "This book is, basically, about a market dystopia. Everything is for sale in this future, and yet negative externalities, asymmetric information, and weak institutions make the world a nightmare."
4. Paolo Bacigalupi
1. The Windup Girl. I loved this book, although I don't recall the economics as being particularly insightful. Noah Smith: "about peak oil, global civilizational decline, and the (temporary) end of positive-sum economies. In a suddenly overpopulated world, humans are forced into a constant Hobbesian zero-sum game, and most moral norms go right out the window. ... it serves as an important reminder of the Malthusian menace that forever lurks just outside the circle of light provided by the flickering candle-flame of modern technology."
5. Kage Baker
1. The Company. Recommended by Anders without comment.
6. Iain Banks.
1. Use of Weapons.
2. Consider Phlebas. Post material scarcity world.  I frankly doubt that such a world will ever exist.
7. Elizabeth Bear
1. Range of Ghosts. About trade routes and financing war.
8. John Brunner.
1. Stand on Zanzibar. Noah Smith: "picks up on a lot of economic trends that were just starting in the 60s (e.g. the pricing of previously plentiful commodities such as water). The economics are all about the effects of overpopulation, which seems less menacing in the 2010s, but is still a major problem in parts of the world."
9. Seth Dickinson
1. The Traitor Baru Cormorant. Not released yet. Supposed to about an accountant who brings down an empire. I am pretty excited about this book although the potential for the economics to go wrong seems very high.
10. Cory Doctorow.
1. Makers. Noah Smith: "The book is all about economics, the death of corporations, the rise of freelance and temp economies, the death of old media and the rise of blogs, and the disruptive impact of technology on people's jobs. It envisions the rise of 3D printing, the startup craze (and the startup glut), and the use of intellectual property as corporations' weapon of choice to fight back against progress."
2. Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom. Noah Smith: "examines what a true post-scarcity society would look like. ... I think that's probably what the future will look like, at least if we're lucky. Anyway, this book is notable for the concept of "whuffie", an online currency based on peer approval, which arguably inspired Facebook's "like" button."
11. George Alec Effinger.
1. When Gravity Fails. Noah Smith: "a novel about underground economies and organized crime."
12. Greg Egan
1. Permutation City. Noah Smith: "about the ultimate nature and purpose of human consciousness and experience, and yet it has implications for technologies that are being developed right now, as we speak."
13. Robert A. Heinlein
1. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Noah Smith: "contains some very interesting thoughts on colonialism and the Resource Curse. Unsurprisingly, terrorism is used as a way to make resource colonialism too expensive for the occupying power. Unfortunately, we don't get to see the political struggles and despotic regimes that probably arose in the aftermath of lunar independence. But Heinlein also does use the book to play with some interesting libertarian ideas, like a privatized court system."
14. Nancy Kress.
1. Beggars in Spain. Not on any of the above lists, but a book I have been meaning to read for a while. It considers a world in which, among other things, genetic modifications have given some people the ability to survive without sleep.  I am a bit afraid that it confuses absolute and comparative advantage.
15. Ursula Le Guin
1. The Dispossessed. Noah Smith: "It's incredibly hard to imagine a world without private property, but LeGuin pulls it off."
16. Ken MacLeod
1. The Restoration Game.
17. L.E. Modesitt, Jr. I am told he writes a lot about economics, but I do not recall much of this in the few books of his I read many years ago.
18. Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
1. Lucifer's Hammer. Noah Smith: "a story about a comet hitting Earth, and the aftermath. It's notable for its quaint Reaganite conservative politics (it came out in 1977), and does make a couple of glaring economic mistakes (for example, a guy trying to build a nuclear power plant is an independent wildcatting entrepreneur instead of a giant government-backed corporation). But it makes up for that with its excellent portrayal of what the economy would be like in the immediate aftermath of an abrupt civilizational collapse. Hint: Farming, containment of contagious diseases, de-specialization of labor, and collective security become very very important."
19. Terry Pratchett
1. Making Money. I haven't read it, sadly. Supposedly about monetary policy, and including a hydraulic model of the macroeconomy reminiscent of The Philips hydraulic model of the macroeconomy known as MONIAC (Monetary National Income Analogue Computer). I have given a talk in the same room as the MONIAC at Cambridge.
2. The Truth. I haven't read it, sadly. About newspapers?
20. Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter
1. The Long Earth. Economics in a world where land is no longer scarce.
21. Kim Stanley Robinson
1. 2312.
2. Pacific Edge.
3. Mars Trilogy.
22. Karina Sumner Smith
1. The Towers Trilogy. The description makes me concerned that this book also confuses absolute and comparative advantage.
23. Sherwood Smith
1. King's Shield. Apparently considers public finance.
24. Neal Stephenson
1. The Diamond Age. Corporate competition and intellectual property.
2. Anathem.
3. Reamde. Noah Smith: "The hero is an aging tech entrepreneur who owns a game that's a combination of World of Warcraft and Bitcoin (yes, this book predicts Bitcoin). It also deals with the economic incentives of the Russian mob, the challenges facing smart young tech workers in China and Hungary, and lots of other cool features of today's global economy."
25. Bruce Sterling
1. Schismatrix. Noah Smith must have been smoking crack if he recommended it based on this observation: "None of the economics here makes any sense - or, more accurately, it all takes place in such a funky, crazy future world that it's impossible to know if it makes any sense."
26. Charles Stross (Recommended to me for his economics, I have only just begun to read Stross and started with Saturn's Children.)
1. Neptune's Brood. Opening with a quote from David Graeber's Debts is not an auspicious beginning.
2. Accelerando. Noah Smith: "mainly plays with the idea of the Singularity, but he also plays with a bunch of far-out funky future economics. In one part, the main character, impresario and wandering entrepreneur Manfred Macx, uses advanced computer algorithms to successfully implement an optimal centrally planned economy, by predicting what humans will want before they even know they want it. Macx's various disruptive innovations inevitably draw the ire of the law, and he creates a protective cloud of AI lawyers to wage constant "lawfare" against governments and corporations alike. In another part of the book, the entire solar system is taken over by sentient High-Frequency Trading algorithms."
3. Merchant Princes series. Krugman describes them as "arguably parallel-universe fantasies that are also essays in development economics."
27. Vernor Vinge
1. The Peace War. Noah Smith: "[along with] its sequel short story "The Ungoverned", ... like a Real Business Cycle model come to life, with lone-wolf genius engineers teaming up with private police forces to bring down a fascist technocratic government made up of...university administrators."
2. A Fire Upon the Deep. Noah Smith: "private security forces failing miserably when faced with a powerful external threat (in fact, that book made me think of the "Tamerlane Principle"). Security, Vinge realizes, is a public good."
3. Rainbows End. I loved this book. Noah Smith: "a sad, thoughtful novel about old age and obsolescence (notice that there is no apostrophe in the title). But it's also one of the most visionary novels about future labor markets. In an interconnected world in which skills never stay fresh for long and most value is created through entertainment, old engineers have to go back to high school, and new corporations are started by teenagers collaborating online with strangers halfway around the world. Rainbows End is also famous for envisioning the technology of Augmented Reality; this novel probably inspired Google Glass."
4. A Deepness in the Sky. Noah Smith: "In addition to being quite possibly the best science fiction novel I've ever read, Deepness is also a great meditation on public economics. ... In Deepness, Vinge adds another public good: Research. The narrative of Deepness is split between a race of spider-people with roughly 20th-century technology, and a spacefaring guild of human merchants called the Qeng Ho. On the spider world, the protagonist is a brilliant scientist named Sherkaner Underhill, who is basically a Von Neumann or Feynman type. Sherkaner is the ultimate lone genius, but he ends up needing the government to fund his research. In space, meanwhile, the heroic merchant entrepreneur Pham Nuwen (who is a recurring protagonist in Vinge novels) struggles to decide whether he should turn his merchant fleet into an interstellar government. Governments, he finds, are good at producing really new scientific breakthroughs, but eventually they become unwieldy and stifle the economy and society, then collapse under their own institutional weight. The very very end of the book is - or at least, seemed to me to be - a metaphor for the Great Stagnation and the death (and future rebirth) of Big Science."

The Biller article also includes a long quote from an interview with Kim Stanley Robinson:

I am coming to understand that economics is many things, sometimes a social science, but often mostly a name for explication and analysis of a legal system, often pseudo-mathematical or quantitative, which never challenges our current system’s basic rules and assumptions. So “economics” is by definition an explication of capitalism, and as such it can be clarifying or obfuscatory, but it is never speculative or projective, in that it does not often propose really new systems. There are almost no worked-out alternative economic systems, although I’ve seen some good preliminary work in Albert and Hahn and elsewhere; but still, the best current critiques of economics are coming out of sociology or anthropology or political science or law, not out of the field of economics itself. So I am looking around in all these fields and finding lots of interesting things, and I hope it will turn into something I can use. Seems to me science fiction ought to have a substantial dose of post-capitalist futures included in it, just to keep sf’s edge, and keep people thinking in new ways about the future. Capitalism as currently practiced will wreck the Earth; people don’t want to wreck the Earth; therefore a better economic system is called for. So, this is the kind of call that science fiction is supposed to answer.

I could not disagree more with this assessment of economics, but it will take a full blog post to offer a satisfying rebuttal. But, I do *not* disagree with the idea that SFF should explore post-capitalistic futures. I just doubt that they will ever materialize.