The Economy of Cities

Jane Jacobs was the legendary author of The Death and Life of Great American Cities, a work that has never gone out of print and that has transformed the disciplines of urban planning and city architecture. Her other major works include The Economy of Cities, Systems of Survival, The Nature of Economies and Dark Age Ahead. She died in 2006.

"The Economy of Cities is an astonishing book. It blows cobwebs from the mind, and challenges assumptions one hadn't even realized one had made. It should prove of major importance."

-- Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, The New York Times

"This book is radiant with ideas about what makes cities rich or poor, how cities grow, and how city growth affects national economies."

-- The New Yorker

"What Mrs. Jacobs has done ... is to begin to formulate a badly needed urban myth for our now almost urbanized society...."

-- Herbert J. Gans, New Republic

"The book is... timely, and if it will irritate some of the experts it will also help bring some neglected issues and theories into public focus. This ... has always been Mrs. Jacobs' most notable taient and her most constructive contribution."

-- Charles Abrams, The New York Times Book Review