A welcome antidote to apocalyptic thinking.
Global threats—including climate change, nuclear proliferation, and pandemics—have people worried about the future of humanity. Siegel instead argues that there is good reason to be optimistic.
At the core of the author’s thesis is the idea that the population explosion is “just about over” and that this is welcome news. “It will almost certainly end in this century,” he writes. As countries experience increased affluence and lower death rates, couples tend to have fewer children. Aided by new technologies, which enhance productivity and reduce the need to own so many things, “we are on the verge of the greatest democratization of wealth and well-being that the world has ever known,” and we will be richer “not just in money and goods, but in food, health, longevity, education, culture, safety, and just about everything else that people need and crave.” Moreover, writes Siegel, this democratized economic wealth will lead to a greener planet through protective policies and eco-technologies. The author backs up his sanguine outlook by citing dozens of economists and researchers, both historical and modern. This glut of data, often presented visually in charts and graphs, is both enlightening and cumbersome. The narrative is a remarkable resource but not a casual read. Still, Siegel does a good job of moving through dense analysis using prose that anyone can understand. He also recognizes that reaching global affluence, peace, and health has significant challenges, though his certainty that they can be overcome might seem overly optimistic in light of many grim current events. Democratizing education and technology and solving the problem of resource allocation for a population living longer are crucial. Siegel’s most salient argument is perhaps our most important goal, and it’s not simple: Everyone, in particular younger generations, must believe it can be done and that they possess the tools and minds to make a difference.
A welcome antidote to apocalyptic thinking. (b/w photos, illustrations, charts, graphs)Pub Date: Dec. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-119-52689-6
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Wiley
Review Posted Online: March 18, 2020
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
Smart, engaging sportswriting—good reading for organization builders as well as Pats fans.
Prolific writer Benedict has long blended two interests—sports and business—and the Patriots are emblematic of both. Founded in 1959 as the Boston Patriots, the team built a strategic home field between that city and Providence. When original owner Billy Sullivan sold the flailing team in 1988, it was $126 million in the hole, a condition so dire that “Sullivan had to beg the NFL to release emergency funds so he could pay his players.” Victor Kiam, the razor magnate, bought the long since renamed New England Patriots, but rival Robert Kraft bought first the parking lots and then the stadium—and “it rankled Kiam that he bore all the risk as the owner of the team but virtually all of the revenue that the team generated went to Kraft.” Check and mate. Kraft finally took over the team in 1994. Kraft inherited coach Bill Parcells, who in turn brought in star quarterback Drew Bledsoe, “the Patriots’ most prized player.” However, as the book’s nimbly constructed opening recounts, in 2001, Bledsoe got smeared in a hit “so violent that players along the Patriots sideline compared the sound of the collision to a car crash.” After that, it was backup Tom Brady’s team. Gridiron nerds will debate whether Brady is the greatest QB and Bill Belichick the greatest coach the game has ever known, but certainly they’ve had their share of controversy. The infamous “Deflategate” incident of 2015 takes up plenty of space in the late pages of the narrative, and depending on how you read between the lines, Brady was either an accomplice or an unwitting beneficiary. Still, as the author writes, by that point Brady “had started in 223 straight regular-season games,” an enviable record on a team that itself has racked up impressive stats.
Smart, engaging sportswriting—good reading for organization builders as well as Pats fans.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-982134-10-5
Page Count: 592
Publisher: Avid Reader Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
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