Introduction to Quantum Economics
Huilin Zhao
Abstract Since Adam Smith, economics has erected a grand edifice upon the foundations of rational agents, equilibrium analysis, and linear causality; however, the 2008 global financial crisis, the European sovereign debt crisis, and the COVID-19 pandemic have successively revealed its fundamental limitations when confronted with complex economic phenomena: bubbles that ought not to have existed, crises unforeseen by equilibrium models, non-linear ruptures brought about by technological revolutions, and self-fulfilling expectations—all of which call for a richer theoretical language. This book serves as the foundational introduction to the "Quantum Economics Textbook Series," as well as the first gateway into this entire series. It introduces the methodological framework, mathematical apparatus, and philosophical insights of quantum mechanics to economic analysis, grounding its approach in the core proposition of a practical ontology—that human economic practice itself possesses quantum attributes such as superposition, entanglement, constructibility, uncertainty, and emergence—thereby reconstructing the economic world as a quantum process of superposition and evolution. Six core concepts—superposition, entanglement, measurement collapse, the uncertainty principle, quantum transitions, and emergence—run throughout the work. Quantum economics does not represent a simple negation of classical theory; rather, it constitutes a dialectical sublation: under the classical limit—where decoherence is complete, the measurement basis is fixed, and entanglement vanishes—quantum theory precisely reduces to classical theory. This book comprises five parts and thirty chapters: Part I establishes the paradigm shift and theoretical framework, covering critiques of Newton's worldview, the quantum worldview, a foundational conceptual framework, mathematical foundations, and research methodologies; Part II reconstructs quantum microeconomic theory, encompassing consumers, producers, pricing, markets, the wave-particle duality of markets, quantum games, and welfare economics; Part III builds quantum macroeconomic theory, addressing national income accounting, money, inflation, economic cycles, policy, and open economies; Part IV explores quantum finance and market dynamics, including asset pricing, portfolio management, market sentiment, risk management, and trading theory; Part V extends the scope to organizations, innovation, institutions, development, economic ethics, and the digital economy, while offering insights into the future of this discipline. This volume is intended for undergraduate and graduate students, as well as researchers in economics and related fields, and serves as the essential first volume in the quantum economics series.
•Sep 2, 2026•0 citations