False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World (Hardcover)
by Alan Beattie
Product Description
An important book for turbulent times-an accessible and engaging economic history of the world, by a leading economic writer.
Alan Beattie has long been intrigued by the fates of different countries, economies, and societies-why some fail and some succeed. Here, he weaves together elements of economics, history, politics, and human stories, revealing that societies, economies, and countries usually make concrete choices that determine their destinies. He opens up larger questions about these choices, and why countries make them or are driven to make them, and what those decisions can mean for the future of our global economy.
Economic history involves forcing together disciplines that fall naturally in different directions. But Beattie has written a lively and lucid book that successfully marries the two subjects and illustrates their interdependence. In doing so, he addresses such illuminating queries as: Why are oil and diamonds more trouble than they are worth? Why did Argentina fail and the United States succeed? Why doesn't Africa grow cocaine?
False Economy explains how human beings have shaped their own fates, however unknowingly, and the conditions of the countries they call home. And though it is history, it does not end with the present day. Beattie shows how decisions that are being made now-which have either absorbed or failed to absorb the lessons from economic history-will determine what happens in the future. What does economic history teach us about the present economic unrest? Who will succeed and why? And who will fail? These are questions that we cannot afford to leave unasked . . . or unanswered.
About the Author
Alan Beattie graduated from Balliol College, Oxford, with a degree in history. After taking a master's degree in economics at Cambridge, he worked as an economist at the Bank of England and then joined the in 1998. Currently the FT's world trade editor, he writes about economics, globalization and development.
- posted on 04/08/2009
Dumb Money: How Our Greatest Financial Minds Bankrupted the Nation (Paperback)
by Daniel Gross (Author)
Editorial Reviews
Product Description
The financial crisis that has gripped this country since last September has had so many twists and turns, it would make for a great drama -- if it all were not so real and damaging. Companies are shutting down and laying off workers, 401ks are melting away, and the government is spending $700 billion dollars to bail out banks and financial institutions -- and that's only the beginning. The financial services industry, and the many industries that depend on it -- from housing to cars -- is in intensive care.
So what happened? How did we get to this point of financial disaster? Is the economy just a huge, Madoff-esque Ponzi scheme? It is a complicated and confusing story -- but Daniel Gross of Newsweek has a special gift for making complicated matters easy to understand and even entertaining. In Dumb Money, he offers a guide to the debacle and to what the future may hold. This is not so much a book about who did what, though that's part of the story. Rather, it pieces together the building blocks of the debt-fueled economy, and distills the theory and personalities behind our late, lamented easy money culture. Dumb Money is a book that finally lays it all out in an engaging way, and might just help people invest their money smartly until the gloom passes.
About the Author
Daniel Gross is a journalist, author, and editor who specializes in business history, political economy, and the money culture. He writes the ?Moneybox? column for Slate.com and contributes to the ?Economic View? column of the New York Times. He has worked as a reporter at The New Republic and has contributed to more than 60 publications. Since 1999, he has edited STERNbusiness, the semi-annual management journal published by New York University's Stern School of Business. Gross has appeared on CNBC, CNN, Fox News Channel, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, C-SPAN, and on more than 35 radio programs, including NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross (no relation). In 2001, he was a fellow at the New America Foundation.
- posted on 04/08/2009
Inside the Fed: Monetary Policy and Its Management, Martin through Greenspan to Bernanke (Hardcover)
by Stephen H. Axilrod (Author)
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Axilrod, a longtime Federal Reserve System veteran, provides an insider's perspective on how the Fed has evolved over the past 50 years. Revealing the impact of personalities and their responses to political, social and bureaucratic situations, he explores such key topics such as money supply vs. interest rates, monetary base and reserve aggregates vs. money-market conditions, and increased emphasis on real-world variables rather than on monetary variables as indicators and guides for policy. The book is based mostly on anecdotal recollections of personal interactions with central bank leaders and others as they managed policy discussions and implementation. Despite the involvement of other influential parties, Axilrod's view is that chairmen took the lead in policy formation but had limited influence on the day-to-day operating targets. He also offers his thoughts on the future of the organization, noting that leaders will need to take a more direct account of international markets in making judgments about policy and its management. Informative and insightful, this view of the inner workings of the Fed will appeal to anyone with an interest in economics or curious about the organization's recent progression. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
"An intimate account of the Fed's depressing decline in the seventies and dramatic comeback in the Volcker years when the central bank triumphed over the biggest threat to the U.S. economy since the Great Depression. Now that the old enemy, stagflation, is stirring once more, the lessons Stephen Axilrod draws from past battles couldn't be timelier."
—Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind
"Informative and insightful, this view of the inner workings of the Fed will appeal to anyone with an interest in economics of curious about the organization's recent progression."
— Publishers Weekly
"Stephen Axilrod's aptly titled book is, indeed, the ultimate Federal Reserve insider's account. Leaving aside only the chairmen under whom he served, no one played a greater role in shaping U.S. monetary policy during these turbulent years or had a closer view of how the policy was made. And, true to the author, Axilrod's book is full of plain common sense about central banking, economic policy, and much beyond. No one seriously interested in American monetary policy in the post-World War II era can ignore what Axilrod recounts here."
—Benjamin M. Friedman, William Joseph Maier Professor of Political Economy, Harvard University
- Re: Amazon.com: New Releases in Economics Booksposted on 04/08/2009
Consumption and Prices (消费和价格)
Production and Capital Structure (生产和资本结构 - 地租、劳力工资、资本家
利息、资本家盈利或亏损、企业家等)
Money, Banking and Credit (货币、银行和信贷)
弄明白那里面的道理比读1000本越读越糊涂的书更有用,读明白了再读经济历史,才
不容易迷失在丛林里。读明白了就知道了奥主席确实是一个伟大的(或翻译成“了不
起的”)影帝。当然若不想让影帝身上的光晕破灭,就最好不要读、更不要明白那里
面的道理。 - posted on 04/08/2009
没有任何一个人不是消费者。整个经济是由消费者的主观价值喜好决定的:购买或不
购买一个具体的消费品、积蓄-投资 对 消费 的比例。基于那些消费者个体们的主
观喜好的综合,积蓄-投资 对 消费 的比例决定了 生产资本结构 的宽度和长度,
也就决定了同时作为广义的工人的消费者用单位时间的工作能换来的消费品的数量
和质量来度量的购买力。那里面没有人为无中生有地造出的银行信贷的任何位置。
是每个消费者的积蓄-投资在维持扩充着整个生产资本结构。只要投资的就是资本家。
银行的作用(除了提供金钱仓储和支票便利服务之类)主要是把积蓄-投资者的钱导向
生产者,不是无中生有地造人为信贷。
那整个是一个浑然一体的理论整体。那就是纯粹的理论的一部分。那就是用来看穿
奥主席那样的了不起的影帝的工具之一。
现实和那纯粹的理论不完全一样,是因为现实并不完全是正确的。不正确的主要原
因是政府里的一些政客们和与他们合作的获得政府特权的一些人们(主要是银行家们
)在用种种手段在骗人们,另一个主要原因是多数人们的无知 - 对上述权钱勾结的
无知和对纯粹的经济学理论的无知。 - Re: Amazon.com: New Releases in Economics Booksposted on 04/08/2009
懂了那些纯粹的理论后,就知道现在政府政客们针对经济做的全是错的,没有一样是
对的。知道了那之后,就不用费神看有关经济的电视新闻了。若想看奥主席的影帝
表演,还是要看的。;-) - Re: Amazon.com: New Releases in Economics Booksposted on 04/08/2009
多数“社会”不幸(如自1949年的中共肆虐、美国周期发生的经济危机等)都最终来源
于当地(国)多数人们的无知。减少那样的“社会”不幸,有效的路只有一条:通过
自愿的学习来减少那样的无知。 - Re: Amazon.com: New Releases in Economics Booksposted on 04/08/2009
在前面说的生产资本结构和消费者消费中,也没有中央银行(联储)的任何位置,是完
全不需要中央银行(联储)的。
为何还有中央银行(联储)呢?中央银行(联储)就是政客们的权(和钱) 与 银行家们
从政府获得的特权(以及由那带来的钱) 之间的纽带。 两者已经难解难分了, 就是
一团mess, ugly mess.
而那些瞎子们却还在红润潮湿着眼圈为那些难解难分的政客们和银行家们呐喊帮忙。
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