Teaching Students about Money and the Economy

Last week at the Las Vegas MoneyShow, a recent subscriber dropped by our booth to say hello, but it turned into much more than a simple greeting.

Our visitor was Edwardo Torres, a professor of economics at San Joaquin Delta College in California. After the MoneyShow, he wrote us the following letter:

“I thoroughly enjoyed hearing the wisdom of my three favorite speakers — Mark Skousen, Steve Forbes and Steven Moore. It is my intention to go to the San Francisco MoneyShow event later this year and to attend the FreedomFest event during July 2017.”

“I first met Mark Skousen in person at the Las Vegas Investment Club meeting on February 25th, 2017. His speeches on dividend investing were excellent. I also lecture on this very topic when I teach my college-level macroeconomics, microeconomics, and managerial economics classes. He graciously signed a copy of his book, “The Maxims of Wall Street.” A few weeks later he also sent me a complimentary copy of his other book entitled, “EconoPower.” I also recently purchased his other book entitled,” Economic Logic” to review it for use in my college classes. I was very impressed by those books and by his newsletter Forecasts & Strategies.”

Opposition on College Campuses

He then recounted the struggles he faces on college campuses:

“It is a real struggle on college campuses today to teach economics and say nice things about free markets and capitalism. For over 20 years I was a Private Banker/Economist for many major financial institutions, then in my late 50’s I decided to become a Professor of Economics. But the level of hostility and ridicule that I constantly get from the sociology, women’s studies, history, and other social science professors is irritating. I object to the fact that these professors lecture about economic issues in their classes that are often based upon emotions and erroneous facts. Many of them never even took a basic economics class in their lives. I am outnumbered 20 to 1 and there are very few professors who appreciate the role of liberty and free market capitalism. I wage a daily battle and I know that Mark and I share this in common as college professors.”

It is my mission to teach the sound principles of money and economics to students through books and lectures. I’m optimistic we can make a difference. Most of the top textbooks in economics are market-friendly. Sean Flynn, for example, is the primary writer of the popular McConnell textbook. For years the McConnell textbook was a Samuelson-clone with a Keynesian mindset. But under Professor Flynn’s influence, it is now much more free market.

Endorsement of My Newsletter

Professor Torres then wrote the following endorsement of my newsletter, Forecasts & Strategies.

“I am currently a Professor of Economics and was a former Private Banker/Economist for major financial institutions for over twenty years. Since the 1980’s I was aware of Mark Skousen and I even received some of his mailers asking me to become a subscriber but I never did. Only recently did I become a subscriber to his Forecasts & Strategies newsletter and then I started to read some of his books. I now admit I made a major mistake by not becoming a subscriber earlier and by not reading his books. Mark, please forgive me.”

Edwardo, you are forgiven! See you in Vegas!

Watch What I Said about Economic Growth on CNBC

I appeared on CNBC Tuesday morning, May 30, with Rick Santelli. Watch the interview by clicking here. Rick asked me about the outlook for the economy and the markets, given that first-quarter gross domestic product (GDP) growth data is weak — only around 1%. I told him that gross output (GO) data was much stronger, more than double real GDP, because the supply chain and business-to-business (B2B) spending were much more robust than final output (GDP), indicating optimism by the business community about President Trump’s agenda. Corporate profits rose 13% in the first quarter to achieve the best result in six years.