A fairly good, if basic, financial primer, despite some readability issues.
A professional real-estate broker presents his thoughts on how to manage and restore one’s credit.
As Underwood explains in this debut, there’s no “magic bullet” for credit problems. However, it’s possible for even the most debt-ridden person to dig his way out if he’s motivated, determined and has the right system. The core of the author’s credit restoration system is a three-step process: The first step involves writing up basic personal finance documents to assess one’s current financial situation. The second step explains the factors that can affect credit scores, and how one can improve scores as quickly as possible. The third step is to lay the groundwork for a strong financial future by analyzing one’s plans. Underwood briefly summarizes each step, then goes into detail about how to implement each one. He provides basic information on how credit cards work, along with several different payoff methods to clear one’s debt over time; he also explains the importance of establishing an emergency fund. Later, he reviews the four life stages of financial planning, and describes the priorities for each stage. He also discusses the perils of being a distressed homeowner, and offers a few options that homeowners can use to bail themselves out of trouble. Finally, Underwood talks about the importance of having the proper mindset when reworking one’s finances, and provides a list of motivational sayings. The financial advice here is solid and detailed, and may be useful to someone who knows nothing about personal finance. However, anyone with a basic knowledge of the subject likely won’t find anything new here. Also, the book’s excessive use of dashes makes the text difficult to parse in places (“In the current economy—many individuals and companies promote the early payoff of your home mortgage as if there is a magic—or secret formula—that they possess”).
A fairly good, if basic, financial primer, despite some readability issues.Pub Date: Oct. 31, 2012
ISBN: 978-1469991672
Page Count: 214
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: June 5, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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A readable, persuasive argument that our ways of doing business will have to change if we are to prosper—or even survive.
A well-constructed critique of an economic system that, by the author’s account, is a driver of the world’s destruction.
Harvard Business School professor Henderson vigorously questions the bromide that “management’s only duty is to maximize shareholder value,” a notion advanced by Milton Friedman and accepted uncritically in business schools ever since. By that logic, writes the author, there is no reason why corporations should not fish out the oceans, raise drug prices, militate against public education (since it costs tax money), and otherwise behave ruinously and anti-socially. Many do, even though an alternative theory of business organization argues that corporations and society should enjoy a symbiotic relationship of mutual benefit, which includes corporate investment in what economists call public goods. Given that the history of humankind is “the story of our increasing ability to cooperate at larger and larger scales,” one would hope that in the face of environmental degradation and other threats, we might adopt the symbiotic model rather than the winner-take-all one. Problems abound, of course, including that of the “free rider,” the corporation that takes the benefits from collaborative agreements but does none of the work. Henderson examines case studies such as a large food company that emphasized environmentally responsible production and in turn built “purpose-led, sustainable living brands” and otherwise led the way in increasing shareholder value by reducing risk while building demand. The author argues that the “short-termism” that dominates corporate thinking needs to be adjusted to a longer view even though the larger problem might be better characterized as “failure of information.” Henderson closes with a set of prescriptions for bringing a more equitable economics to the personal level, one that, among other things, asks us to step outside routine—eat less meat, drive less—and become active in forcing corporations (and politicians) to be better citizens.
A readable, persuasive argument that our ways of doing business will have to change if we are to prosper—or even survive.Pub Date: May 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5417-3015-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
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