Book picks similar to
Free Prices Now! by Hunter Lewis
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The New Capitalist Manifesto: Building a Disruptively Better Business
Umair Haque - 2011
Trillions of dollars of financial assets and shareholder value destroyed; worldwide GDP stalled; new jobs vanishingly scarce. But this isn’t just a severe recession. It’s evidence that our economic institutions are obsolete—a set of ideas inherited from the industrial age that no longer work for business, people, society, or the future.In The New Capitalist Manifesto, economic strategist Umair Haque argues that business as usual has outgrown the old paradigm of short-term growth, competition at all costs, adversarial strategy, and pushing costs onto future generations. These outworn assumptions are good for creating only “thin” value—gains that are largely illusory and produce diminishing returns every year. For “thick” value—enduring, meaningful, sustainable advantage that deeply benefits the larger society—Haque details five new cornerstones of prosperity in the twenty-first century:•Loss advantage: From value chains to value cycles•Responsiveness: From value propositions to value conversations•Resilience: From strategy to philosophy•Creativity: From protecting a marketplace to completing a marketplace•Difference: From goods to bettersThe New Capitalist Manifesto makes a passionate, razor-sharp economic case that these methods will produce a more enduring prosperity for business as well as society.
Free to Choose: A Personal Statement
Milton Friedman - 1980
In this classic discussion, Milton and Rose Friedman explain how our freedom has been eroded and our affluence undermined through the explosion of laws, regulations, agencies, and spending in Washington. This important analysis reveals what has gone wrong in America in the past and what is necessary for our economic health to flourish.
Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel's Economic Miracle
Dan Senor - 2009
Start-Up Nation addresses the trillion dollar question: How is it that Israel -- a country of 7.1 million, only 60 years old, surrounded by enemies, in a constant state of war since its founding, with no natural resources-- produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada and the UK? With the savvy of foreign policy insiders, Senor and Singer examine the lessons of the country's adversity-driven culture, which flattens hierarchy and elevates informality-- all backed up by government policies focused on innovation. In a world where economies as diverse as Ireland, Singapore and Dubai have tried to re-create the "Israel effect", there are entrepreneurial lessons well worth noting. As America reboots its own economy and can-do spirit, there's never been a better time to look at this remarkable and resilient nation for some impressive, surprising clues.
Time on the Cross: The Economics of American Negro Slavery
Robert William Fogel - 1974
In an Afterword added in 1989, the authors assess their findings in the light of recent scholarship and debate.
Sex, Drugs & Economics: An Unconventional Introduction to Economics
Diane Coyle - 2002
It is rare that an economist has the courage and aptitude to take a studied look at real world issues and to lay out the advantages and disadvantages of current policies. Coyle takes these potentially confusing and politically rife issues and makes them straightforward, thereby educating the reader in an entertaining and sophisticated manner. Coyle uses humour and irony to explain the issues. Who else could draw a link between Japanese teenage fashion and the country's long standing liquidity trap; or how sunspots can determine whether we will have a financial crisis on earth; or how pork belly futures depend on the weather and pigs' amorous intentions? Throughout the book, Diane Coyle highlights the fact that above all, economics is a social science, and one that affects us all.
Honest Money: Biblical Principles of Money and Banking
Gary North - 1986
Government debt is skyrocketing. Currencies are collapsing. Banks are going broke. Businesses are folding. Families are struggling. We've been stranded, sitting on top of a mountain of IOU' that will never be paid off. Most professional economists don't know what to do. Neither do most professional theologians. They don't have answers. But the Bible does. In this book, Dr. Gary North outlines specifically what those answers are. He demonstrates beyond any shadow of a doubt that there is hope. If we act quickly, wisely and scripturally, we can save our nation-indeed, Western Civilization-from the most disastrous economic catastrophe in history. The Bible tells us what to do, when, where, how, and why. It offers a "blueprint" for financial victory. Honest Money lays out that "blueprint" simply, practically, and understandably. It shows us how we can "move mountains."
Treasure Islands: Uncovering the Damage of Offshore Banking and Tax Havens
Nicholas Shaxson - 2011
Nicholas Shaxson, a former correspondent for the Financial Times and The Economist, argues that tax havens are a central cause of all these disasters.In this hard hitting investigation he uncovers how offshore tax evasion, which has cost the U.S. 100 billion dollars in lost revenue each year, is just one item on a long rap sheet outlining the damage that offshoring wreaks on our societies. In a riveting journey from Moscow to London to Switzerland to Delaware, Shaxson dives deep into a vast and secret playground where bankers and multinational corporations operate side by side with nefarious tax evaders, organized criminals and the world's wealthiest citizens. Tax havens are where all these players get to maximize their own rewards and leave the middle class to pick up the bill.With eye opening revelations, Treasure Islands exposes the culprits and its victims, and shows how:*Over half of world trade is routed through tax havens*The rampant practices that precipitated the latest financial crisis can be traced back to Wall Street's offshoring practices*For every dollar of aid we send to developing countries, ten dollars leave again by the backdoorThe offshore system sits much closer to home than the pristine tropical islands of the popular imagination. In fact, it all starts on a tiny island called Manhattan. In this fast paced narrative, Treasure Islands at last explains how the system works and how it's contributing to our ever deepening economic divide.
Fully Grown: Why a Stagnant Economy Is a Sign of Success
Dietrich Vollrath - 2020
Most economists would agree that a thriving economy is synonymous with GDP growth. The more we produce and consume, the higher our living standard and the more resources available to the public. This means that our current era, in which growth has slowed substantially from its postwar highs, has raised alarm bells. But should it? Is growth actually the best way to measure economic success—and does our slowdown indicate economic problems? The counterintuitive answer Dietrich Vollrath offers is: No. Looking at the same facts as other economists, he offers a radically different interpretation. Rather than a sign of economic failure, he argues, our current slowdown is, in fact, a sign of our widespread economic success. Our powerful economy has already supplied so much of the necessary stuff of modern life, brought us so much comfort, security, and luxury, that we have turned to new forms of production and consumption that increase our well-being but do not contribute to growth in GDP. In Fully Grown, Vollrath offers a powerful case to support that argument. He explores a number of important trends in the US economy: including a decrease in the number of workers relative to the population, a shift from a goods-driven economy to a services-driven one, and a decline in geographic mobility. In each case, he shows how their economic effects could be read as a sign of success, even though they each act as a brake of GDP growth. He also reveals what growth measurement can and cannot tell us—which factors are rightly correlated with economic success, which tell us nothing about significant changes in the economy, and which fall into a conspicuously gray area. Sure to be controversial, Fully Grown will reset the terms of economic debate and help us think anew about what a successful economy looks like.
Extreme Economies: Survival, Failure, Future – Lessons from the World’s Limits
Richard Davies - 2019
From war zones, natural disasters and failed states, to aging societies and the challenges of technological advancement, every life in this book has been hit by a seismic shock, violently broken or changed in some way.People living in these odd and marginal places are ignored by number crunching economists and political pollsters alike. Science suggests this is a mistake. This book tells the personal stories of humans living in extreme situations, and of the financial infrastructure they create. Here, economies are not concerned with the familiar stock market crashes, housing crises, or banking scandals of the financial pages.In his quest for a purer view of how economies succeed and fail, Richard Davies takes the reader off the beaten path to places where part of the economy has been repressed, removed, destroyed or turbocharged. By travelling to each of them and discovering what life is really like, Extreme Economies tells small stories that shed light on today’s biggest economic questions, with vital lessons for our future.
An Uncertain Glory: India and Its Contradictions
Jean Drèze - 2013
After India gained independence in the year 1947, she decided to adopt a political system that was democratic in nature and involved the existence of several political parties and many political rights. The end of the colonial era saw the disappearance of the continual famines that were striking India. Instead of stagnation, India began to witness growth in her economy, making her eventually rank at number two in the list of fastest growing economies in the world. Even now, though India's economy has dipped slightly, it still has one of the highest growths in the world. An Uncertain Glory: India and its Contradictions is a book that has the opinions of two of India's leading economists, Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen, who highlight the major problems that the country faces at present. These two experts stress on the need to have sound knowledge concerning the deprivations of humans in India.
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
Naomi Klein - 2006
She called it "disaster capitalism." Covering Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, and New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic "shock treatment" losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers. The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq. At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. By capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, Klein argues that the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years.
Burning Entrepreneur: How to Launch, Fund, and Set Your Startup on Fire
Brad Feld - 2012
Renowned tech investor and start-up guru Brad Feld lights YOU on fire with this insider's book that will teach you how to launch, fund and run your own company. If you're already an entrepreneur or have always dreamed of being one, douse yourself in “Feld Thoughts” and catch the spark. You'll be burning, entrepreneur, with this e-book!. Brad's blog is a backstage pass to the 24/7 rock show that is tech startups. It is a master class in startup investing for givers and takers of funds. It is a rolling critique of tech products vast and simple (with enough edge to make the most scathing restaurant critic in Manhattan blush). And it is the journal of a peripatetic marathoner who still believes he will crack the four-hour mark someday. From such Feld Thoughts, we have constructed “The Burning Entrepreneur,” the e-book on startups that you would take to a desert island if it had electricity, a decent Internet connection and angel investors. “The Burning Entrepreneur” illuminates the actions and attitudes required to launch, fund and ignite your startup. Brad Feld is on fire. Find out what happens when you stand too close. TABLE OF CONTENTS - Introduction - Be on Fire - Be In Love With Your Business - Don't Be in the 99% - Ignorance Is Success - Meet the New Boss, NOT the Same as the Old Boss - Hire the Right People - It's the Product, Stupid! - Learning to Program: A Case Study - I Don't Hate Marketing: Neither Should You - OK, It's Really the Money, Stupid - Keeping Your You-Know-What Together - Burning Examples - Conclusion - Recommended Books for Burning Entrepreneurs GREAT EXCERPTS FROM THE BOOK It was during that car ride that my dad hit me with words that would prove to be fundamental for me: “If you aren’t standing on the edge you are taking up too much space.” Thirty years later that line continues to be a defining characteristic for how I live my life. I’m constantly pushing, looking for the edge of whatever I do. (pg 14) Over time, I’ve learned that none of the short-term moves in the stock market matter at all in my life. It’s occasionally entertaining to turn on CNBC and see my friend Paul Kedrosky in the octobox telling all the other people that they don’t actually understand macro-economics, but it’s no different than watching McEnroe when he’s announcing a Nadal–Federer match. It’s just sport. (pg 33) I don’t create products anymore (I invest in companies that create them), but I’m a great alpha tester. I’ve always been good at this for some reason — bugs just find me. While my UX design skills are merely adequate, I’ve got a great feel for how to simplify things and make them cleaner. (pg 58) If you are someone who spends 30 minutes or more a day “organizing yourself,” I encourage you to step back and think about what you could change and how that might shift you from focusing on organizing to working toward outcomes. It’s liberating. (pg 103) ...buy a copy to read more!
The Great Financial Crisis: Causes and Consequences
John Bellamy Foster - 2008
As banks collapsed and the state scrambled to organize one of the largest transfers of wealth in history, many--including economists and financial experts--were shocked by the speed at which events unfolded.In this new book, John Bellamy Foster and Fred Magdoff offer a bold analysis of the financial meltdown, how it developed, and the implications for the future. They examine the specifics of the housing bubble and the credit crunch as well as situate current events within a broader crisis of monopoly-finance capitalism--one that has been gestating for several decades. It is the "real" productive economy's tendency toward stagnation, they argue, that creates a need for capital to find ways to profitably invest its surplus. But rather than invest in socially useful projects that would benefit the vast majority, capital has constructed a financialized "casino" economy that neglects social needs and, as has become increasingly clear, is fatally unstable. Written over a two-year period immediately prior to the onset of the crisis, this timely and illuminating book is necessary reading for all those who wish to understand the current situation, how we got here, and where we are heading.
China's Economy: What Everyone Needs to Know
Arthur R. Kroeber - 2016
In the 1980s China was an impoverished backwater, struggling to escape the political turmoil and economic mismanagement of the Mao era. Today it isthe world's second biggest economy, the largest manufacturing and trading nation, the consumer of half the world's steel and coal, the biggest source of international tourists, and one of the most influential investors in developing countries from southeast Asia to Africa to Latin America.China's growth has lifted 700 million people out of poverty. It has also created a monumental environmental mess, with smog-blanketed cities and carbon emissions that are a leading cause of climate change. Multinational companies make billions of dollars in profits in China each year, but tradersaround the world shudder at every gyration of the country's unruly stock markets. Most surprising of all, its capitalist economy is governed by an authoritarian Communist Party that shows no sign of loosening its grip.How did China grow so fast for so long? Can it keep growing and still solve its problems of environmental damage, fast-rising debt and rampant corruption? How long can its vibrant economy co-exist with the repressive one-party state? What do China's changes mean for the rest of the world? China'sEconomy: What Everyone Needs to Know(R) answers these questions in straightforward language that you don't need to be an economist to understand, but with a wealth of detail drawn from academic research, interviews with dozens of company executives and policy makers, and a quarter-century of personalexperience. Whether you're doing business in China, negotiating with its government officials, or a student trying to navigate the complexities of this fascinating and diverse country, this is the one book that will tell you everything you need to know about how China works, where it came from andwhere it's going.
Four Futures: Life After Capitalism
Peter Frase - 2015
In Four Futures, Frase imagines how this post-capitalist world might look, deploying the tools of both social science and speculative fiction to explore what communism, rentism, socialism and exterminism might actually entail.Could the current rise of real-life robocops usher in a world that resembles Ender’s Game? And sure, communism will bring an end to material scarcities and inequalities of wealth—but there’s no guarantee that social hierarchies, governed by an economy of “likes,” wouldn’t rise to take their place. A whirlwind tour through science fiction, social theory and the new technologies already shaping our lives, Four Futures is a balance sheet of the socialisms we may reach if a resurgent Left is successful, and the barbarisms we may be consigned to if those movements fail.