An authoritative examination of the secret machinery of capitalism and how, for better or worse, it affects us all.
A wide-ranging global history of finance focused on interest.
“By the early twenty-first century,” writes financial journalist Chancellor, “interest had been charged on loans for around five thousand years, possibly longer. Interest had survived biblical injunctions, Aristotelian outrage, and the onslaught of medieval canonists and modern socialists.” As the author shows, interest is the oil in the wheels of capitalism, but it can just as easily became the wrench in the works. Many leftist commentators see it as the means by which the rich get richer, extracting wealth from others while doing nothing. Chancellor points out that lenders are taking on risk and sacrificing the option of spending the money directly, so they should get something for it. Borrowers, for their part, hope to use the funds to improve their own position, even after paying the interest. The rise of banks and professional lenders revolutionized societies, accelerating wealth creation and moving power away from landed aristocrats. It was chaotic, and governments tried to bring order with central banks, which set official rates. The assumption was that rates could be raised to dampen an overheated, inflationary economy and lowered when stimulus was needed. The nadir of this strategy was rates of zero or near zero after the Great Recession, from 2007 to 2009. Of course, for every winner, there is a loser, and Chancellor presents data showing that ultra-low rates often do little to lift a sagging economy. In fact, low interest rates often lead to property speculation, poor corporate governance, and frightening levels of risk-taking. In explaining all this, the author looks at some of the great financial debacles, a host of theories about interest, and rate policy in China. In the end, he does not present answers for finding a “natural” rate—because there aren’t any. Nevertheless, the book is a comprehensive, entertaining read on an ever relevant topic.
An authoritative examination of the secret machinery of capitalism and how, for better or worse, it affects us all.Pub Date: Aug. 16, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-8021-6006-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Atlantic Monthly
Review Posted Online: June 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
IN THE NEWS
IN THE NEWS
Cogent, well-timed ideas for meeting today’s biggest challenges.
Helping liberals get out of their own way.
Klein, a New York Times columnist, and Thompson, an Atlantic staffer, lean to the left, but they aren’t interrogating the usual suspects. Aware that many conservatives have no interest in their opinions, the authors target their own side’s “pathologies.” Why do red states greenlight the kind of renewable energy projects that often languish in blue states? Why does liberal California have the nation’s most severe homelessness and housing affordability crises? One big reason: Liberal leadership has ensnared itself in a web of well-intentioned yet often onerous “goals, standards, and rules.” This “procedural kludge,” partially shaped by lawyers who pioneered a “democracy by lawsuit” strategy in the 1960s, threatens to stymie key breakthroughs. Consider the anti-pollution laws passed after World War II. In the decades since, homeowners’ groups in liberal locales have cited such statutes in lawsuits meant to stop new affordable housing. Today, these laws “block the clean energy projects” required to tackle climate change. Nuclear energy is “inarguably safer” than the fossil fuel variety, but because Washington doesn’t always “properly weigh risk,” it almost never builds new reactors. Meanwhile, technologies that may cure disease or slash the carbon footprint of cement production benefit from government support, but too often the grant process “rewards caution and punishes outsider thinking.” The authors call this style of governing “everything-bagel liberalism,” so named because of its many government mandates. Instead, they envision “a politics of abundance” that would remake travel, work, and health. This won’t happen without “changing the processes that make building and inventing so hard.” It’s time, then, to scrutinize everything from municipal zoning regulations to the paperwork requirements for scientists getting federal funding. The authors’ debut as a duo is very smart and eminently useful.
Cogent, well-timed ideas for meeting today’s biggest challenges.Pub Date: March 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781668023488
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Avid Reader Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
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