• Economics
• Areas of study in economics
• Interdisciplinary studies and cross-application
• Economic language and reasoning
• Modern mainstream economics

Economics

In the social sciences, economics is the study of human choice behavior and how it effects the production, distribution, and consumption of scarce resources. Economics studies how individuals and societies seek to satisfy needs and wants through incentives, choices, and allocation of scarce resources. Alfred Marshall in the late 19th century informally described economics as "the study of man in the ordinary business of life".

The word "economics" is from the Greek words ????? [oikos], meaning "family, household, estate," and ????? [nomos], or "custom, law," and hence literally means "household management" or "management of the state." An economist is a person using economic concepts and data in the course of employment, or someone who has earned a university degree in the subject.

The field may be divided in several different ways, most popularly microeconomics (at the level of individual choices) vs macroeconomics (aggregate results), but also descriptive vs. normative, mainstream vs. heterodox, and by subfield. Economics has many direct applications in business, personal finance, and government. Theories developed as a part of economic theory have also been applied to non-monetary choices in fields as diverse as criminal behavior, scientific research, death, politics, health, education, family, dating, etc. This is allowed because economics is fundementaly about human decision making.