The economic realities underneath every ordinary decision

It’s National Financial Literacy Month, but on the latest episode of the ABA Banking Journal Podcast — sponsored by IntraFi Network — Matthew Hennessey digs into the literacy that undergirds financial literacy: the basics of economic decision-making, from prices and markets to preferences and specialization. “The main lesson at the heart of economics is that life is about tradeoffs and that economics is about choice,” Hennessey says. “When we make a choice, it almost always means we’re giving something up that we value.” In the newly released book Visible Hand, Hennessey — deputy op-ed editor at the Wall Street Journal — illuminates these concepts in a self-described “avuncular” style designed to help average Americans understand how they make economic decisions every day and to appreciate the free enterprise system that lays atop those decisions. This episode is sponsored by IntraFi Network.