60 Seconds Adventures in Economics - The Invisible Hand

If you thought the Open University's 60 Second Adventures in Thought were over, think again! Yes, they may be done with paradoxes and strange thought puzzles (for now), but there's plenty of other fascinating things to explore, and they have decided to devote some attention to the field of economics.

Of course, no introduction to economics would be complete without Adam Smith's concept of the "invisible hand," that self-directed mechanism through which markets regulate themselves for the collective benefit of both consumers and producers.

Oddly enough, at least here in America, many of those people who deny the self-directed and amoral process of evolution through natural selection are perfectly comfortable with the equally blind and amoral self-directed market, and some, such as objectivists, actually argue that a completely free, unregulated market is the ultimate expression of a moral society.  Oh yeah, we've got it all...

And if you need a refresher on modern economics, you might want to check out the Hayek vs. Keynes rap.