The discoveries made, however, are so far-reaching that a large portion of economics literature will have to be modified to accommodate another half to the macro economic spectrum of possibilities that conventional theorists have overlooked. In particular, Japan's Great Recession showed that when faced with a massive fall in asset prices, companies typically jettison the conventional goal of profit maximization and move to minimize debt in order to restore their credit ratings. This shift in corporate priority, however, has huge theoretical as well as practical implications and opens up a whole new field of study. For example, the new insight can explain fully the precise mechanism of prolonged depression and liquidity trap which conventional economics - based on corporate profit maximization - has so far failed to offer as a convincing explanation. The author developed the idea of yin and yang business cycles where the conventional world of profit maximization is the yang and the world of balance sheet recession, where companies are minimizing debt, is the yin. Once so divided, many varied theories developed in macro economics since the 1930s can be nicely categorized into a single comprehensive theory, i.e., the Holy Grail of macro economics The policy implication of this new discovery is immense in that the conventional aversion to fiscal policy in favor of monetary policy will have to be completely reversed when the economy is in the yin phase. The theoretical implications are also immense in the sense that the economics profession will no longer have to rely so much on various rigidities to explain recessions that have become the standard practice within the so-called New Keynesian economics of the last twenty years.

    In fact, there are thousands of ways to solve not only our recurring fiscal crises but our ongoing social and ecological debacles as well. Solutions are already in place where terrible problems once existed. The changes came about not through increased conventional taxation, enlightened self-interest, or government programs but by people simply rethinking the concept of money. With this restructuring, everything changes.In this visionary book, Bernard Lietaer and Jacqui Dunne explore the origins of our current monetary system—built on bank debt and scarcity—revealing the surprising and sometimes shocking ways its unconscious limitations give rise to so many serious problems. But there is hope. The authors present stories of ordinary people and their communities using new money, working in cooperation with national currencies, to strengthen local economies, create work, beautify cities, and provide education—and so much more is possible. These real-world examples are just the tip of the iceberg—over 4,000 cooperative currencies are already in existence.The book provides remedies for challenges faced by governments, businesses, nonprofits, local communities, and even banks. It demystifies a complex and critically important topic and will strike a deep chord with readers eager to find innovative, meaningful solutions that will do far more than restore prosperity—it will provide the framework for an era of sustainable abundance.

    Venture capital firms, Goldman Sachs, the New York Stock Exchange, and billionaires such as Richard Branson and Peter Thiel have invested more than $1 billion in companies built on this groundbreaking technology. Bill Gates has even declared it ‘better than currency’. The pioneers of Bitcoin were twenty-first-century outlaws – cryptographers, hackers, Free Staters, ex-cons and drug dealers, teenage futurists and self-taught entrepreneurs – armed with a renegade ideology and a grudge against big government and big banks. Now those same institutions are threatening to co-opt or curtail the impact of digital currency. But the pioneers, some of whom have become millionaires themselves, aren’t going down without a fight. Sweeping and provocative, How Money Got Free reveals how this disruptive technology is shaping the debate around competing ideas of money and liberty, and what that means for our future.

    It gives special emphasis to the 1980s and 1990s when Japan's economy experienced vast swings in activity. According to the author, the most recent upheaval in the Japanese economy is the result of the policies of a central bank less concerned with stimulating the economy that with its own turf battles and its ideological agenda to change Japan's economic structure. The book combines new historical research with an in-depth behind-the-scenes account of the bureaucratic competition between Japan's most important institutions: the Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Japan. Drawing on new economic data and first-hand eyewitness accounts, it reveals little known monetary policy tools at the core of Japan's business cycle, identifies the key figures behind Japan's economy, and discusses their agenda. The book also highlights the implications for the rest of the world, and raises important questions about the concentration of power within central banks.

    And it’s getting worse. Since the turn of the twenty-first century, we’ve seen two massive value-destroying market meltdowns and a string of ethics breaches, including accounting scandals, options-backdating schemes, and the subprime mortgage debacle.Just what is going on here? Is it the inevitable decline of the American economy? Is it the new normal in a technology-enabled global marketplace? Or is it possible that the very theories we’ve embraced to underpin our capital markets are actually producing these crises?In Fixing the Game, Roger Martin reveals the culprit behind the sorry state of American capitalism: our deep and abiding commitment to the idea that the purpose of the firm is to maximize shareholder value. This theory has led to a massive growth in stock-based compensation for executives and, through this, to a naive and wrongheaded linking of the real market—the business of designing, making, and selling products and services—with the expectations market—the business of trading stocks, options, and complex derivatives. Martin shows how this tight coupling has been engineered and lays out its results: a single-minded focus on the expectations market that will continue driving us from crisis to crisis—unless we act now.Using the National Football League as his primary example, Martin illustrates that it is possible to take a much more thoughtful and effective approach than we now do to the intersection of the real and the expectations markets and to governance in general in the capital markets. Martin shows how we can act to end the destructive cycle, including:• Restructuring executive compensation to focus entirely on the real market, not the expectations market• Rethinking the meaning of board governance and role of board members• Reining in the power of hedge funds and monopoly pension fundsConcise, hard-hitting, and entertaining, Fixing the Game advocates seizing American capitalism from the jaws of the expectations market and planting it firmly in the real market—and it presents the steps we must take now to do so.

    From this perspective the crisis was an interruption, caused by bad policy or bad people, and full recovery is to be expected if the cause is corrected.The End of Normal challenges this view. Placing the crisis in perspective, Galbraith argues that the 1970s already ended the age of easy growth. The 1980s and 1990s saw only uneven growth, with rising inequality within and between countries. And the 2000s saw the end even of that—despite frantic efforts to keep growth going with tax cuts, war spending, and financial deregulation. When the crisis finally came, stimulus and automatic stabilization were able to place a floor under economic collapse. But they are not able to bring about a return to high growth and full employment.Today, four factors impede a return to normal. They are the rising costs of real resources, the now-evident futility of military power, the labor-saving consequences of the digital revolution, and the breakdown of law and ethics in the financial sector. The Great Crisis should be seen as a turning point, a barometer of the rise of unstable economic conditions, which should be regarded as the new normal. Policies and institutions going forward should be designed, above all, modestly, to cope with this fact, maintaining conditions for a good life in difficult times.

    Only billionaire J.P. Morgan was able to save the stock market.Black Tuesday (1929): As the newly created Federal Reserve System repeatedly adjusted interest rates in all the wrong ways, investment trusts, the darlings of that decade, became the catalyst that caused the bubble to burst, and the Dow fell dramatically, leading swiftly to the Great Depression.Black Monday (1987): When "portfolio insurance," a new tool meant to protect investments, instead led to increased losses, and corporate raiders drove stock prices above their real values, the Dow dropped an astonishing 22.6 percent in one day.The Great Recession (2008): As homeowners began defaulting on mortgages, investment portfolios that contained them collapsed, bringing the nation's largest banks, much of the economy, and the stock market down with them.The Flash Crash (2010): When one investment manager, using a runaway computer algorithm that was dangerously unstable and poorly understood, reacted to the economic turmoil in Greece, the stock market took an unprecedentedly sudden plunge, with the Dow shedding 998.5 points (roughly a trillion dollars in valuation) in just minutes.The stories behind the great crashes are filled with drama, human foibles, and heroic rescues. Taken together they tell the larger story of a nation reaching enormous heights of financial power while experiencing precipitous dips that alter and reset a market where millions of Americans invest their savings, and on which they depend for their futures. Scott Nations vividly shows how each of these major crashes played a role in America's political and cultural fabric, each providing painful lessons that have strengthened us and helped us to build the nation we know today.A History of the United States in Five Crashes clearly and compellingly illustrates the connections between these major financial collapses and examines the solid, clear-cut lessons they offer for preventing the next one.

    Written by Barry Ritholtz, one of today's most popular economic bloggers and a well-established industry pundit, this book skillfully explores how the United States evolved from a rugged independent nation to a soft Bailout Nation-where financial firms are allowed to self-regulate in good times, but are bailed out by taxpayers in bad times.Entertaining and informative, this book clearly shows you how years of trying to control the economy with easy money has finally caught up with the federal government and how its practice of repeatedly rescuing Wall Street has come back to bite them.The definitive book on the financial crisis of 2008 Names the culprits responsible for this tragedy-from financial regulators to politicians Shows how each bailout throughout modern history has impacted what happened in the future Examines why the consumer/taxpayer is left suffering in an economy of bubbles, bailouts, and possible inflation Ritholtz operates a hugely popular blog, www.ritholtz.com/blog Scathing, but fair, Bailout Nation is a voice of reason in these uncertain economic times.

    A hidden circulatory system flows beneath the surface of global finance, carrying trillions of dollars from drug trafficking, tax evasion, bribery, and other illegal enterprises. This network masks the identities of the individuals who benefit from these activities, aided by bankers, lawyers, and auditors who get paid to look the other way.In Secrecy World, the Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter Jake Bernstein explores this shadow economy and how it evolved, drawing on millions of leaked documents from the files of the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca--a trove now known as the Panama Papers--as well as other journalistic and government investigations. Bernstein shows how shell companies operate, how they allow the superwealthy and celebrities to escape taxes, and how they provide cover for illicit activities on a massive scale by crime bosses and corrupt politicians across the globe.Bernstein traveled to the Caribbean, Latin America, Europe, and within the United States to uncover how these strands fit together--who is involved, how they operate, and the real-world impact. He recounts how Mossack Fonseca was exposed and what lies ahead for the corporations, banks, law firms, individuals, and governments that are implicated.Secrecy World offers a disturbing and sobering view of how the world really works and raises critical questions about financial and legal institutions we may once have trusted.

    The Dow Jones nearly doubled between 1962 and 1966, the recurring recessions of the Eisenhower years ended, and America saw a run of economic growth that ranks among the biggest in its history. Today, the Left would have voters believe that the 1960s boom happened despite, or even because of, high taxes. In fact, America enjoyed this era of prosperity because John F. Kennedy, the great hero of liberals today, embraced the very conservative ideas of supply-side economics. To the horror of fellow liberals, he initiated tax cuts that launched America's economy into years of growth--and that later inspired Ronald Reagan to imitate them. In a blow-by-blow narrative of the tax battles within the Kennedy administration, the authors reveal how JFK assembled Keynesian advisors, only to reject their plans for loose money and big spending. Instead, Kennedy embraced ideas advanced by the non-Keynesians on his team of rivals and drew upon his own deep reading of history to opt for tax cuts and a recommitment to the gold standard. Here we meet a fascinating cast of Kennedy Administration characters, especially Treasure Secretary Douglas Dillon, the token Republican in JFK's cabinet. Dillon's opponents, such as liberal economists Paul Samuelson, Robert Solow, and James Tobin, strove to stifle the push to bring down the high tax rates--including an astonishing 91% top rate on the wealthiest earners-- that were damaging the economy. Once JFK became convinced of the power of tax cuts, he held his ground against the Keynesians. And as Kennedy made his case for the tax cut, the economy took off. After the assassination, Lyndon Johnson finally signed the tax-cut law in February 1964. The subsequent economic boom delivered the greatest prosperity the nation had ever seen. This is an eye-opening look at one of the most important yet least understood episodes in American economic history. It shatters the argument that the Republicans who believe that cutting tax rates can result in more growth and more tax revenue have moved to the extreme right. Instead, it is the Democrats who have moved so far left as to have to disown John F. Kennedy's most successful policies.

    Forget the 1%; it's the wealthiest .01% who are fast outpacing the rest of us. Today's colossal fortunes are amassed by the diligent toiling of smart, perceptive businessmen who see themselves as deserving victors in a cutthroat international competition.  Cracking open this tight-knit world is Chrystia Freeland, an acclaimed business journalist. At ease in Davos or Dubai, Freeland has reported on the lives and minds of these new super-elites for nearly a decade. Grounding her interviews in the economics and history of modern capitalism, she provides examples of the new wealth and its consequences. She showcases the $3 million birthday party of a New York financier months before the financial meltdown; details the closed-door 2005 SEC meeting where the US government allowed investment banks to write their own regulatory laws; and tells how the Bank of Canada's Mark Carney became a key figure in the central battle between the plutocracy and the rest of us.  Brightly written and powerfully researched, Freeland's Plutocrats will be a lightning rod event in the midst of the US election season.

    Strangelove’s Game will do for economics what Sophie’s World did for philosophy and E=mc2 for physics.With the infectious enthusiasm of a great teacher and a novelist’s eye for a colourful parade of often bizarre and idiosyncratic figures, Paul Strathern gives us a vivid account of the world of economics through the lives and minds of those who contributed to the growth of economic thought from the Middle Ages to the present.The familiar and iconic names – Adam Smith, Karl Marx and John Maynard Keynes – turn out to be fascinating characters, as do a host of lesser-known figures – from Luca Pacioli, a medieval monk who used a ball game to stimulate thought about probability theory (and gambling) to John von Neumann, the manic genius who invented game theory, worked on the atomic bomb, and was probably the model for Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove. There are pessimistic priests, visionary socialists, crackpot academics, and an alleged murderer who controlled France’s finances.Paul Strathern sets their lives and thoughts against the dramatic backdrop of great events – the South Sea Bubble, the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution and the Great Crash. His lightly worn erudition makes Dr. Strangelove’s Game amazingly accessible, leaving readers enriched and enlightened.From the Hardcover edition.

    Many of us know that our government failed to fix the banking system after the subprime mortgage crisis. But what few of us realize is how the misguided financial practices and philosophies that nearly toppled the global financial system have come to infiltrate ALL American businesses,  putting us on a collision course for another cataclysmic meltdown. Drawing on in-depth reporting and exclusive interviews at the highest rungs of Wall Street and Washington, Time assistant managing editor and economic columnist Rana Foroohar shows how the “financialization of America” - the trend by which finance and its way of thinking have come to reign supreme - is perpetuating Wall Street's reign over Main Street, widening the gap between rich and poor, and threatening the future of the American Dream. Policy makers get caught up in the details of regulating “Too Big To Fail” banks, but the problems in our market system go much broader and deeper than that. Consider that: · Thanks to 40 years of policy changes and bad decisions, only about 15 % of all the money in our market system actually ends up in the real economy – the rest stays within the closed loop of finance itself. · The financial sector takes a quarter of all corporate profits in this country while creating only 4 % of American jobs. · The tax code continues to favor debt over equity, making it easier for companies to hoard cash overseas rather than reinvest it on our shores. · Our biggest and most profitable corporations are investing more money in stock buybacks than in research and innovation. · And, still, the majority of the financial regulations promised after the 2008 meltdown have yet come to pass, thanks to cozy relationship between our lawmakers and the country’s wealthiest financiers.       Exploring these forces, which have have led American businesses to favor balancing-sheet engineering over the actual kind and the pursuit of short-term corporate profits over job creation, Foroohar shows how financialization has so gravely harmed our society, and why reversing this trend is of grave importance to us all. Through colorful stories of both "Takers” and "Makers,” she’ll reveal how we change the system for a better and more sustainable shared economic future.

    VALUE(S) is a meditation on his experiences that examines the short-comings and challenges of the market in the past decade which he argues has led to rampant, public distrust and the need for radical change.Focusing on four major crises-the Global Financial Crisis, the Global Health Crisis, Climate Change and the 4th Industrial Revolution-- Carney proposes responses to each. His solutions are tangible action plans for leaders, companies and countries to transform the value of the market back into the value of humanity.

    Persuasively written by author, investment strategist, and geopolitical analyst Marko Papic, the book applies a novel framework for making sense of the cacophony of geopolitical risks with the eye towards generating investment-relevant insights.Geopolitical Alpha posits that investors should ignore the media-hyped narratives, insights from smoke-filled rooms, and most of their political consultants and, instead, focus exclusively on the measurable, material constraints facing policymakers. In the tug-of-war between policymaker preferences and their constraints, the latter always win out in the end. Papic uses a wealth of examples from the past decade to illustrate how one can use his constraint-framework to generate Geopolitical Alpha. In the process, the book discusses:What paradigm shifts will drive investment returns over the next decade Why investment and corporate professionals can no longer treat geopolitics as an exogenous risk How to ignore the media and focus on what drives market narratives that generate returns Perfect for investors, C-suite executives, and investment professionals, Geopolitical Alpha belongs on the shelf of anyone interested in the intersection of geopolitics, economics, and finance.