This guide provides teachers, authors, and editors with a fuller knowledge of economics textbook alternatives. The guide consists of four parts which provide information on 41 college economic texts published 1970-72. Part 1 is a guide to text identification through such objective factors as approach, length, price, rigor, publisher, title, textbook organization, economic problems, chapter assignments, teaching aids, index items, supplements, and author's background. Part 2 categorizes the texts by the author's opinion of their worth in terms of clarity, accuracy, point-of-view, innovation, teaching strategies, selectivity, and author credentials. Part 3 provides a one page summary profile of important objective characteristics of each of the 41 texts. Also included in this section is a list of 16 supplementary materials for economics courses. The fourth section asks what kind of text a teacher may want and then provides suggested possibilities depending on the previous objective criteria. (Author/DE)