The following references, many of which are classics, are suggested as background reading for graduate study of economic theory. The student is advised to read and possess a working understanding of a portion of this material prior to taking the microeconomics preliminary examinations.

• Alchian, Armen A., and Reuben A. Kessel, "Competition, Monopoly and the Pursuit of Pecuniary Gain," Aspects of Labor Economics (Princeton, N.J., National Bureau of Economic Research, 1962), pp. 156-183.  
• Alchian, Armen A., "Costs and Outputs," The Allocation of Economic Resources, ed. M. Abramovitz (Stanford, 1959). HB601 A 454  
• Alchian, Armen and Allen, William, Exchange and Production  
• Alchian, Armen A., "Private Property and the Relative Cost of Tenure," The Public Stake in Union Power, ed., Philip Bradley (University of Virginia, 1959), pp. 350-371.  
• Alchian, Armen, and Demsetz, Harold, "Production, Information Costs and the Theory of Organization," American Economic Review, Dec. 1972, and "Economic Organization," American Economic Review, Dec. 1972, pp. 777-795.  
• Alchian, Armen, and Demsetz, Harold, "The Property Right Paradigm," Journal of Economic History, Dec., 1972.  
• Alchian, Armen A., and Kessel, Reuben A., "Redistribution of Wealth Through Inflation," Science, Vol. 130, 3375 (September 4, 1959), pp. 535-539.  
• Alchian, Armen A., "Effects of Inflation," JLE, 70 (12, 1962).  
• Alchian, Armen A., "Reliability of Progress Curves in Airframe Production," Econometrica, 31 (1963), pp. 679-693.  
• Allen, Roy G. D., Mathematical Analysis for Economists.  
• Allen, R. G. D., Mathematical Economics.
• Averch, Harvey, and Leland L. Johnson, "Behavior of the Firm Under Regulatory Constraint," American Economic Review, 52 (1962), pp. 1052-1059.  
• Bain, Joe S., "Economies of Scale, Concentration, and the Condition of Entry in Twenty Manufacturing Industries," American Economic Review, 44 (1954), pp. 15-39, reprinted in American Economic Association Readings in Industrial Organization and Public Policy, eds. R. B. Heflebower and G. W. Stocking (Homewood, Ill.: Irwin, 1958), pp. 46-68.  
• Bator, F. M., "The Simple Analytics of Welfare Maximization," American Economic Review, Vol. 47 (March 1957).  
• Baumol, William, Economic Theory and Operations Research, Prentice Hall, 2nd ed., 1965. Understand the principles of linear programming.  
• Becker, Gary S., "Investment in Human Capital," Journal of Political Economy, Supplement, Vol. 70, No. 5, Part 2 (October 1962), pp. 4-49.  
• Becker, Gary S. "A Theory of the Allocation of Time," EJ (Sept. 1969).  
• Bottomley, Anthony, "The Structure of Interest Rates in Underdeveloped Rural Areas," Journal of Farm Economics, 46 (May 1964), pp. 313-322.
  
• Buchanan, James, and Tullock, Gordon, The Calculus of Consent: The Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy. 
• Buchanan, James M., The Demand and Supply of Public Goods.  
• Cassel, Gustav, The Nature and Necessity of Interest, 1903, Kelley and Millman, 1957.  
• Clemens, Eli, "Price Discrimination and the Multiple-Product Firm," Review of Economic Studies, 19 (1950), pp. 1-11. Reprinted in American Economic Association Readings in Industrial Organization and Public Policy, eds. R. B. Heflebower and G. W. Stocking (Homewood, Ill.: Irwin, 1958), pp. 262-277.  
• Coase, Ronald H., "The British Post Office and the Messenger Companies," Journal of Law and Economics, 4 (1961), pp. 12-63.  
• Coase, Ronald H., "The Federal Communications Commission," Journal of Law and Economics, 2 (1959), pp. 1-40.  
• Coase, Ronald H., "The Nature of the Firm," Economics 4 (1937), p. 386, reprinted in Readings in Price Theory, American Economic Association, 1952.  
• Coase, Ronald H., "The Problem of Social Cost," Journal of Law and Economics, III (1960), pp. 1-44.  
• Dam, Kenneth W., "Oil and Gas Licensing and the North Sea," Journal of Law and Economics, October 1965, pp. 51-76.  
• Dam, Kenneth W., "Trademarks, Price Discrimination and the Bureau of Customs," Journal of Law and Economics, October 1964, pp. 45-60.  
• Demsetz, Harold, "The Exchange and Enforcement of Property Rights," Journal of Law and Economics, October 1964, pp. 11-26.  
• Director, Aaron, "The Parity of the Economic Market Place," Journal of Law and Economics, October 1964, pp. 1-10.  
• Downs, Anthony, "An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy," Journal of Political Economy, 65 (April 1957), pp. 135-150.  
• Farmer, Richard N., and Harold H. Kassarjian, "The Right to Compete," California Management Review, 6 (1936), pp. 61-68.  
• Fisher, Irving, Purchasing Power of Money.  
• Fisher, Irving, The Theory of Interest.  
• Friedman, Milton, "The Monetary Studies of the National Bureau," Forty-fifth Annual Report of the National Bureau of Economic Research, June 1964, pp. 7-24. This contains a statement of the evidence for the proposition that money supply changes affect employment and output.  
• Friedman, Milton, and Anna J. Schwartz, "Money and Business Cycles," Review of Economics and Statistics, Vol. 45, Supplement (February 1963), pp. 32-64, especially pp. 59-64.  
• Hayek, F., "The Use of Knowledge in Society," American Economic Review, September, 1945. Important.  
• Hazard, Geoffrey C., "Rationing Justice," Journal of Law and Economics, October 1965, pp. 1-10.  
• Henderson, James, and Quandt, Microeconomic Theory, McGraw Hill, 1980.  
• Hicks, John R., The Theory of Wages, 1932, Macmillan, 1957, (except Chs. 7, 8.)  
• Hicks, John R., Value and Capital, Clarendon Press, 1939. 1st half.  
• Hildebrand, George H., "Collective Bargaining and the Antitrust Laws," Public Policy and Collective Bargaining, ed. Aaron, Summers, and Shister (Industrial Relations Research Association, 1961).  
• Hilton, George W., "The British Truck System in the Nineteenth Century," The Journal of Political Economy, 65 (1957), pp. 237-256.  
• Hilton, George, "Tying Sales and Full Line Forcing," Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv, 82 (1958), p. 265.  
• Hirshleifer, Jack, The Theory of Capital and Interest.  
• Homans, G. O., Social Behavior, (Harcourt, 1961). Chs. 1-4.  
• Jung, A., "Price Variations Among Automobile Dealers in Chicago, Illinois," The Journal of Business, October 1959, pp. 315-325.  
• Kessel, Reuben A., and Alchian, Armen A., "Effects of Inflation," Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 70 (December 1962), pp. 521-537.  
• Kessel, Reuben, and Alchian, Armen A., "The Meaning and Validity of the Inflation-Induced Lag of Wages Behind Prices," American Economic Review, Vol. 50 (March 1960), pp. 43-66.  
• Kessel, R. A., "Price Discrimination in Medicine," Journal of Law and Economics, I (1958), pp. 20-53, especially pp. 29-32.  
• Knight, Frank, The Economic Organisation, New York, Kelley, 1951.  
• Knight, Frank H., "Realism and Relevance in the Theory of Demand," Journal of Political Economy, 52 (1944), pp. 289-318.  
• Knight, Frank, Risk Uncertainty and Profit, 1921, Kelley, 1964, Harpers Torchbooks.  
• Lazar, W., F. Bean, and K. Hunter, "Labor Department Examines Consumers' Prices of Steel Products," Iron Age, April 25, 1946.  
• Lee, T. H., Mathematics of Finance, Irwin, 1957.  
• Leijonhufvud, Axel, "Keynes and the Keynesians -- A Suggested Reinterpretation," Proceedings of American Economic Review, May 1967.  
• Lerner, Abba, Economics of Control, Macmillan, 1946. Careful reading.  
• Macaulay, Steward, "Non-Contractual Relations in Business: A Preliminary Study," American Sociological Review, Vol. 28, No. 1 (February 1963), pp. 55-69.  
• Manne, Henry, Insider Trading and the Stock Market, Free Press, 1967.  
• Marshal, Alfred, Principles of Economics, 8th ed., (1890-1920), Books III and V. Macmillan.  
• Marx, Karl, Capital, (Modern Library abridgment, 1959), edited by M. Eastman, pp. 15-141.  
• McKean, Roland, Efficiency in Government Through Systems Analysis, Wiley, 1958. 1st half.  
• Nevins, A. T., Rockefeller.  
• Newman, Peter, The Theory of Exchange.  
• Radford, R. A., "The Economic Organization of a Prisoner of War Camp," Economica, 12 (1945), pp. 189-201, reprinted in excerpts in Selected Readings in Economics, 2nd ed., ed. C. Lowell Harriss (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1962), pp. 73-82.  
• Ralph, James and Estelle James, Hoffa and the Teamsters, Van Nostrand, 1965.  
• Ricardo, David, The Principles of Political Economy, 3rd ed. (1821), Chs. 17, 20.  
• Robinson, Joan, Economics of Imperfect Competition, Macmillan, 1934.  
• Rottenberg, Simon, "A Theory of Corruption in Trade Unions," Symposia Studies Series No. 3, Series Studies in Social Economic Sciences (Washington, D.C.: National Institute of Social and Behavioral Sciences, June 1960), pp. 1-7.  
• Samuelson, Paul A., Foundations of Economic Analysis, Harvard, 1945, Chs. 1-3.  
• Samuelson, Paul A., "Intertemporal Price Equilibrium: A Prologue to the Theory of Speculation," Collected Scientific Papers of P. A. Samuelson (M.I.T., 1966).  
• Samuelson, Paul A., "The Pure Theory of Public Expenditures," Review of Economics and Statistics (November 1954).  
• Schultz, Henry, The Theory and Measurement of Demand, Chicago, 1938 Chs. 1-8.  
• Scott, Anthony, "The Fishery: The Objectives of Sole Ownership," Journal of Political Economy, 63 (1955), pp. 110-124.
• Smith, Adam, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, (1776), Available in Modern Library edition, Book I (Chs. I-IX), Books IV, V.  
• Smith, Roy, "The Lemon Prorate in the Long Run," Journal of Political Economy, 59 (1961), pp. 573-586.  
• Solow, Robert, Capital Theory and the Rate of Return, Rand McNally, 1964, Chs. 1 and 2.  
• Stigler, George J., "Administered Prices and Oligopolistic Inflation," Journal of Business, 35 (1962), pp. 1-13.  
• Stigler, George J., "The Economics of Information," Journal of Political Economy, 69 (June 1961), pp. 213-225.  
• Stigler, George J., Theory of Price, 3rd ed., Macmillan, 1966.  
• Stockfish, J. A., "External Economies and Diseconomies," International Encyclopedia of Social Sciences, Vol. 5, pp. 268-74.  
• Taft, Philip, "Judicial Procedure by Labor Unions," Quarterly Journal of Economics, 59 (1945), pp. 370-385.  
• Tesler, Lester, "Why Should Manufacturers Want Fair Trade?" Journal of Law and Economics, 3 (1960), pp. 86-106.  
• Turvey, Ralph, "On Divergences Between Social Cost and Private Cost," Economica, August 1963, pp. 594-613.  
• Turvey, Ralph, "Some Features of the London Cab Trade," Economics Journal 71 (1961), pp. 79-92.  
• Wasson, R. G., The Hall Carbine Affair, (Pandick Press, 1948).
  
• Weston, J. Fred, Managerial Finance, Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1962.  
• Williamson, Oliver E., "Managerial Discretion and Business Behavior," American Economic Review, 53 (1963), pp. 1033-1057.  
• Working, Holbrook, "Futures Markets Under Renewed Attack," Food Research Institute Studies, IV (Stanford University, 1963), excerpted in Barron's, February 4, 1963, pp. 11 ff.  
• Working, Holbrook, "Price Effects of Futures Trading," Food Research Institute Studies, I (Stanford University, February 1960), pp. 3-31.
  
• Yamane, Taro, "The Federal Communications Commission," JLE, 2, (1959).