Thursday, January 4, 2024

Slouching Towards Utopia by Brad DeLong

This book’s full title is Slouching Towards Utopia: An Economic History of the Twentieth Century. It is an interesting read and I found the book quite fascinating. He has some interesting points of view and the book is well worth reading. I have read a lot, but Karl Polanyi is new person to me. He has interesting views and I believe a very good understanding of humans.

However, I do not understand why it should be thought that just because we have enough resources to satisfy everyone that we did not do that. That is our society should be a utopia. Humans throughout history has always been ruled by elites. When we got lots of resources we were still ruled by elites. We are today, still ruled by elites.

I also do not think that Utopia is good. Utopia will produce bored people. Bored people are dangerous people. They will find lots of stupid things to do. You can produce a satisfactory life or society for most people. I think that is possible.

There is a Lecture by Brad DeLong at Peterson Institute. His lecture starts almost 5 minutes into the video and stops around 26 minutes. This is an interview by Gillian Tett on YouTube by RSA. Bradford DeLong talks about this book at Fordham Gabelli School of Business. Lecture stops around 35 minutes and then he answers questions.

There is a short review at Kirkus. Joel Mokyr on Economic History Association has a great review of this book. Rohit Krishnan from Substack gives a review of this book. . .

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.

Monday, November 27, 2023

Values by Mark Carney

This book’s full title is Value(s): Building a Better World for All. I have always found Mark Carney interesting. He was the Governor of the Bank of Canada and then of the Bank of England. I found the book interesting. After I read a book, I like to look at book reviews and listen to videos with the author as a speaker or to videos with interviews of the author.

I believe in capitalism. I found interesting his views on capitalism in our current societies. He says that the world is moving to two capitalism types of Political, Authoritarian capitalism and Liberal, Meritocratic capitalism.

He defines Political or Authoritarian capitalism system with 3 characteristics of Efficient technocratic or merit-based bureaucracy; absence of the rule of law; and ultimate autonomy of the state. He defines liberal or meritocratic capitalism which means meritocratic in that there are no legal constraints on people earning an income or having a position in society. It is liberal through attempts to correct for initial differences in endowments through widespread education and income cases inheritance taxes. (This is page 132 in my book.)

Will Hutton reviews this book for the Guardian. There is a great review by Philip Cross in the National Review. Philip Cross is quite critical of the book. The review by Max Fawcett at Open Canada is very different. He liked the book.

Mark Carney is interviewed by Amanda Lang at the Rotman School in Toronto. This is a short around 5 minutes interview. Mark Carney is interviewed by Anna Gainey of Canada 2020. Michael Massoud interviews Mark Carney for CPA Canada. CPA Canada is Chartered Professional Accountants of Canada.

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.

Monday, November 6, 2023

The Whisper on the Night Wind by Adam Shoalts

This book’s full title is The Whisper on the Night Wind, The True History of a Wilderness Legend. This book is a wonder adventure story. It is a very easy read. I learnt things about Labrador a place I had never visited and a place I had not read about before.

There is a great review by Kevin Hardcastle on Quill & Quire. There is another review on CBC Books. There is an interesting review by The Geeky Jock on WordPress.

Mike Balsom on YouTube interviews Adam Shoalts about this book. McNally Robinson Online Events on YouTube with Joanne Kelly and Adam Shoalts. Interview stars around 5.23. There is a podcast on Like a Bigfoot Podcase.

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.

Wednesday, September 14, 2022

Land by Simon Winchester

This book’s full title is Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the Modern World. His telling of the first farmers etc. is like a telling a just so story. It is a story that has not been verified. This is my only negative comment. I found the book interesting reading. An example is how much land the cattle and sheep stations cover and how much land Gina Rinehart owns.

Aaron Retica writes an interesting review at the New York Times. Unfortunately, this review is now behind a pay wall. Carmen Margiotta on Earth.org gives us a review of this book. Also, I found a review on Kirkus Reviews. There is also a good review on Coot’s Reviews. I also read a review by Eric Liebetrau at the Boston Globe.

Simon Winchester is interviewed at the Kinokuniya Book Store about this book. The author is interviewed at the Gibson’s Bookstore. On C-Span Simon Winchester starts his talk 2 minutes in. Simon Winchester talks on TED.

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.

Friday, September 2, 2022

The Journey of Humanity by Oded Galor

This book’s full title is The Journey of Humanity; the Origins of Wealth and Inequality. I found this book to be very interesting. I realize that there are criticisms of Oded Galor theories. The criticisms are interesting, but so is the book. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and found it worthwhile to read.

According to Oded Galor, there was a rapid eruption of change in the past 2 centuries. The change did not happen equally across the globe. Some areas saw the change and in other areas, change is just happening recently. We went from stagnation to growth. It was a huge transition.

During the Malthusian epoch, there was technological innovation, but it leads to a bigger population, but the individuals of that population were not better off. Eventually, technological progress reaches a critical threshold. Eventually, human capital formation triggers a reduction in fertility and growth is freed from the counterbalancing effect of population growth. He calls this a phase transition.

Steven Poole on the Guardian reviews this book. His criticism of the book is quite interesting. James Kwak of the Washington Post reviews this book. Simon Kuper at the New Statesman reviews this book.

There is a public online speech at Brown University by Oded Galor. Q & A. starts around 1 hour into the video. Economist Oded Galor joins Penguin Books UK to answer some Big Questions on diversity, equality, and the future of humanity. This video is around 12 minutes in length. Oded Galor is interviewed on Growth Chat. This video is around 40 minutes long.

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.

Wednesday, August 31, 2022

Medieval World by Susan Wise Bauer

This book’s full title is Medieval World: From the Conversion of Constantine to the First Crusade. However, it should be called Medieval World of Eurasia. She includes Europe, Middle East, India, China, Korea, and Japan. South East Asia is missing as its America and Africa. She has her own site here.

However, I did like the book as it covered a lot of history of the medieval world. I liked that it covered India a lot, because a lot of history books tend to just skip over India. The parts of world mostly covered in this book, give a good history of those areas which seem to be her area of expertise.

I certainly appreciated all the maps she included. There was at least one map in each chapter and all the places mentioned were on these maps. Too many history books do not include maps and this is a big mistake as far as I am concerned. Some include maps but do not show on the map all the places that they mention. This is frustrating.

What I did not like is that she says the old canard about Greenland being called Greenland to make it attractive, but it was just sand. However, people who have investigated it looking at soil samples say that where the colony was situated was covered in trees when the Vikings landed. She also gives a very shallow coverage of North America and completely ignores South America.

I must admit there are some very good (and very long) reviews on Good Reads. There is a short, interesting review by Christine at Our Curious Home. This is a link to a PDF of an essay by J. M. Roberts at Open Journals.

Dr. Harry Bleatter, interviews author, historian, and professor Susan Wise Bauer at The King's College in New York City . This is part of The King's College Distinguished Visitor Series and it is just a snippet of the interview and it the whole does not seem available for the public. I cannot find anything on this author and history on video. There is also a short interview with Susan Wise Bauer at the San Diego Comic-Con 2018.

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.

Monday, November 29, 2021

Has the West Lost It? By Kishore Mahbubani

This book’s full title is Has the West Lost It? A Provocation. He thinks that they have not lost it yet, but it still can. Throughout most of history, India, and China each produced about a third of the world’s GDP. However, Europe, then the US (i.e., the West) has dominated the world since 1800. However, this is coming to an end and the US (and the West) will have to deal with the changing world. Kishore Mahbubani has his own web site .

I quite liked this book. Kishore Mahbubani certainly has a different view of the world. But this is what I would expect from him. He is a Singaporean citizen. I felt the book was well written and interesting. I like to read people who have a different world view that what I generally hear. I live in Canada. The world is changing and we need to hear from non-westerners.

There are a surprising number of very negative reviews on Good Reads. Hilton L. Root writes a great review of this book at Independent Institute. Masih Ullah Khan at India Quarterly, Journal of International Affairs writes a balanced view of this book. There is another good review by Sir Richard Jolly at the Institute of Development Studies. Kishore Mahbubani at World Economic Forum on how Asian wisdom can complement western thinking.

Bill Emmott & Kishore Mahbubani talk at Ideas Abu Dhabi about A Clash or Fusion of Civilizations and the state of our world. This is an interesting discussion only about 22 minutes long.

An index of the books I have reviewed are on my website at Books. I have three blogs. The first talks only about specific stocks and is called Investment Talk . The second one contains information on mostly investing and is called Investing Economics Mostly. My last blog is for my book reviews and it is called Non-Fiction Mostly. Follow me on Twitter.