Download or read book American Business Since 1920 written by Thomas K. McCraw and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2018-02-13 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tells the story of how America’s biggest companies began, operated, and prospered post-World War I This book takes the vantage point of people working within companies as they responded to constant change created by consumers and technology. It focuses on the entrepreneur, the firm, and the industry, by showing—from the inside—how businesses operated after 1920, while offering a good deal of Modern American social and cultural history. The case studies and contextual chapters provide an in-depth understanding of the evolution of American management over nearly 100 years. American Business Since 1920: How It Worked presents historical struggles with decision making and the trend towards relative decentralization through stories of extraordinarily capable entrepreneurs and the organizations they led. It covers: Henry Ford and his competitor Alfred Sloan at General Motors during the 1920s; Neil McElroy at Procter & Gamble in the 1930s; Ferdinand Eberstadt at the government’s Controlled Materials Plan during World War II; David Sarnoff at RCA in the 1950s and 1960s; and Ray Kroc and his McDonald’s franchises in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first; and more. It also delves into such modern success stories as Amazon.com, eBay, and Google. Provides deep analysis of some of the most successful companies of the 20th century Contains topical chapters covering titans of the 2000s Part of Wiley-Blackwell’s highly praised American History Series American Business Since 1920: How It Worked is designed for use in both basic and advanced courses in American history, at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
Download or read book American Enterprise written by Andy Serwer and published by Smithsonian Institution. This book was released on 2015-05-26 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What does it mean to be an American? What are American ideas and values? American Enterprise, the companion book to a major exhibition at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, aims to answer these questions about the American experience through an exploration of its economic and commercial history. It argues that by looking at the intersection of capitalism and democracy, we can see where we as a nation have come from and where we might be going in the future. Richly illustrated with images of objects from the museum’s collections, American Enterprise includes a 1794 dollar coin, Alexander Graham Bell’s 1876 telephone, a brass cash register from Marshall Fields, Sam Walton’s cap, and many other goods and services that have shaped American culture. Historical and contemporary advertisements are also featured, emphasizing the evolution of the relationship between producers and consumers over time. Interspersed in the historical narrative are essays from today’s industry leaders—including Sheila Bair, Adam Davidson, Bill Ford, Sally Greenberg, Fisk Johnson, Hank Paulson, Richard Trumka, and Pat Woertz—that pose provocative questions about the state of contemporary American business and society. American Enterprise is a multi-faceted survey of the nation’s business heritage and corresponding social effects that is fundamental to an understanding of the lives of the American people, the history of the United States, and the nation’s role in global affairs.
Download or read book American Business and Political Power written by Mark A. Smith and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-01-26 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most people believe that large corporations wield enormous political power when they lobby for policies as a cohesive bloc. With this controversial book, Mark A. Smith sets conventional wisdom on its head. In a systematic analysis of postwar lawmaking, Smith reveals that business loses in legislative battles unless it has public backing. This surprising conclusion holds because the types of issues that lead businesses to band together—such as tax rates, air pollution, and product liability—also receive the most media attention. The ensuing debates give citizens the information they need to hold their representatives accountable and make elections a choice between contrasting policy programs. Rather than succumbing to corporate America, Smith argues, representatives paradoxically become more responsive to their constituents when facing a united corporate front. Corporations gain the most influence over legislation when they work with organizations such as think tanks to shape Americans' beliefs about what government should and should not do.
Download or read book American Business History written by Walter A. Friedman and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This introduction looks at the rise of the American economy from its colonial and frontier beginnings. What made the United States an attractive testing ground for entrepreneurs? How did the United States come to have the largest business enterprises in the world by the early twentieth century? Why did business organizations gain a central place in American society?
Download or read book The Power Structure of American Business written by Beth A. Mintz and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1987-06-30 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mintz and Schwartz offer a fascinating tour of the corporate world. Through an intensive study of interlocking corporate directorates, they show that for the first time in American history the loan making and stock purchasing and selling powers are concentrated in the same hands: the leadership of major financial firms. Their detailed descriptions of corporate case histories include the forced ouster of Howard Hughes from TWA in the late fifties as a result of lenders' pressure; the collapse of Chrysler in the late seventies owing to banks' refusal to provide further capital infusions; and the very different "rescues" of Pan American Airlines and Braniff Airlines by bank intervention in the seventies.
Download or read book Makers and Takers written by Rana Foroohar and published by Currency. This book was released on 2017-09-12 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is Wall Street bad for Main Street America? "A well-told exploration of why our current economy is leaving too many behind." —The New York Times In looking at the forces that shaped the 2016 presidential election, one thing is clear: much of the population believes that our economic system is rigged to enrich the privileged elites at the expense of hard-working Americans. This is a belief held equally on both sides of political spectrum, and it seems only to be gaining momentum. A key reason, says Financial Times columnist Rana Foroohar, is the fact that Wall Street is no longer supporting Main Street businesses that create the jobs for the middle and working class. She draws on in-depth reporting and interviews at the highest rungs of business and government to show how the “financialization of America”—the phenomenon by which finance and its way of thinking have come to dominate every corner of business—is threatening the American Dream. Now updated with new material explaining how our corrupted financial system propelled Donald Trump to power, Makers and Takers explores the confluence of forces that has led American businesses to favor balance-sheet engineering over the actual kind, greed over growth, and short-term profits over putting people to work. From the cozy relationship between Wall Street and Washington, to a tax code designed to benefit wealthy individuals and corporations, to forty years of bad policy decisions, she shows why so many Americans have lost trust in the system, and why it matters urgently to us all. Through colorful stories of both “Takers,” those stifling job creation while lining their own pockets, and “Makers,” businesses serving the real economy, Foroohar shows how we can reverse these trends for a better path forward.
Download or read book A History of American Business written by Keith L. Bryant and published by Pearson. This book was released on 1990 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A chronological/topical survey of business history in America. Designed as a core text.
Download or read book American Entrepreneur written by Larry Schweikart and published by Amacom Books. This book was released on 2010 with total page 535 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Weaving together vivid narrative with economic analysis, "American Entrepreneur" vividly illustrates the history of business in the United States from the point of view of the enterprising men and women who made it happen.
Download or read book Big Business written by Tyler Cowen and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2019-04-09 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An against-the-grain polemic on American capitalism from New York Times bestselling author Tyler Cowen. We love to hate the 800-pound gorilla. Walmart and Amazon destroy communities and small businesses. Facebook turns us into addicts while putting our personal data at risk. From skeptical politicians like Bernie Sanders who, at a 2016 presidential campaign rally said, “If a bank is too big to fail, it is too big to exist,” to millennials, only 42 percent of whom support capitalism, belief in big business is at an all-time low. But are big companies inherently evil? If business is so bad, why does it remain so integral to the basic functioning of America? Economist and bestselling author Tyler Cowen says our biggest problem is that we don’t love business enough. In Big Business, Cowen puts forth an impassioned defense of corporations and their essential role in a balanced, productive, and progressive society. He dismantles common misconceptions and untangles conflicting intuitions. According to a 2016 Gallup survey, only 12 percent of Americans trust big business “quite a lot,” and only 6 percent trust it “a great deal.” Yet Americans as a group are remarkably willing to trust businesses, whether in the form of buying a new phone on the day of its release or simply showing up to work in the expectation they will be paid. Cowen illuminates the crucial role businesses play in spurring innovation, rewarding talent and hard work, and creating the bounty on which we’ve all come to depend.
Download or read book The American Business Cycle written by Robert J. Gordon and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2007-11-01 with total page 882 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent decades the American economy has experienced the worst peace-time inflation in its history and the highest unemployment rate since the Great Depression. These circumstances have prompted renewed interest in the concept of business cycles, which Joseph Schumpeter suggested are "like the beat of the heart, of the essence of the organism that displays them." In The American Business Cycle, some of the most prominent macroeconomics in the United States focuses on the questions, To what extent are business cycles propelled by external shocks? How have post-1946 cycles differed from earlier cycles? And, what are the major factors that contribute to business cycles? They extend their investigation in some areas as far back as 1875 to afford a deeper understanding of both economic history and the most recent economic fluctuations. Seven papers address specific aspects of economic activity: consumption, investment, inventory change, fiscal policy, monetary behavior, open economy, and the labor market. Five papers focus on aggregate economic activity. In a number of cases, the papers present findings that challenge widely accepted models and assumptions. In addition to its substantive findings, The American Business Cycle includes an appendix containing both the first published history of the NBER business-cycle dating chronology and many previously unpublished historical data series.
Download or read book American Turnaround written by Edward Whitacre and published by Business Plus. This book was released on 2013-02-05 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ed Whitacre is credited with taking over the corporate reins at General Motors (GM) when the automotive manufacturer was on the brink of bankruptcy during 2009 and turned the company around in magnificent fashion. In this business memoir, the native Texan explores his unique management style, business acumen and patriotism. It was President Obama who reached out to Ed Whitacre to come out of retirement and take over GM in 2009. A down-to-earth, no-nonsense Texas native with a distinctive Texas twang in his voice, Whitacre was reluctant to come out of retirement to work at GM. But Whitacre is that rare CEO with great charisma and extraordinary management instincts. And when he got to Detroit, he started to whittle down the corporate bureaucracy right away - and got GM back on track in record time. Before being pulled out of retirement to run GM by Obama, Ed Whitacre had spent his entire corporate career in the telecom business, where he ultimately ended up running AT&T.
Download or read book The Business of Slavery and the Rise of American Capitalism 1815 1860 written by Jack Lawrence Schermerhorn and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2015-01-01 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Focuses on networks of people, information, conveyances, and other resources and technologies that moved slave-based products from suppliers to buyers and users." (page 3) The book examines the credit and financial systems that grew up around trade in slaves and products made by slaves.
Download or read book American Prison written by Shane Bauer and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2019-06-11 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An enraging, necessary look at the private prison system, and a convincing clarion call for prison reform.” —NPR.org New York Times Book Review 10 Best Books of 2018 * One of President Barack Obama’s favorite books of 2018 * Winner of the 2019 J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize * Winner of the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism * Winner of the 2019 RFK Book and Journalism Award * A New York Times Notable Book A ground-breaking and brave inside reckoning with the nexus of prison and profit in America: in one Louisiana prison and over the course of our country's history. In 2014, Shane Bauer was hired for $9 an hour to work as an entry-level prison guard at a private prison in Winnfield, Louisiana. An award-winning investigative journalist, he used his real name; there was no meaningful background check. Four months later, his employment came to an abrupt end. But he had seen enough, and in short order he wrote an exposé about his experiences that won a National Magazine Award and became the most-read feature in the history of the magazine Mother Jones. Still, there was much more that he needed to say. In American Prison, Bauer weaves a much deeper reckoning with his experiences together with a thoroughly researched history of for-profit prisons in America from their origins in the decades before the Civil War. For, as he soon realized, we can't understand the cruelty of our current system and its place in the larger story of mass incarceration without understanding where it came from. Private prisons became entrenched in the South as part of a systemic effort to keep the African-American labor force in place in the aftermath of slavery, and the echoes of these shameful origins are with us still. The private prison system is deliberately unaccountable to public scrutiny. Private prisons are not incentivized to tend to the health of their inmates, or to feed them well, or to attract and retain a highly-trained prison staff. Though Bauer befriends some of his colleagues and sympathizes with their plight, the chronic dysfunction of their lives only adds to the prison's sense of chaos. To his horror, Bauer finds himself becoming crueler and more aggressive the longer he works in the prison, and he is far from alone. A blistering indictment of the private prison system, and the powerful forces that drive it, American Prison is a necessary human document about the true face of justice in America.
Download or read book The Internet and American Business written by William Aspray and published by MIT Press (MA). This book was released on 2008 with total page 616 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The effect of a commercialized Internet on American business, from the boom in e-commerce and adjustments by bricks-and-mortar businesses to file-sharing and community building.
Download or read book A History of Small Business in America written by Mansel G. Blackford and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2003-11-20 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the colonial era to the present day, small businesses have been an integral part of American life. First published in 1991 and now thoroughly revised and updated, A History of Small Business in America explores the central but ever-changing role played by small enterprises in the nation's economic, political, and cultural development. Examining small businesses in manufacturing, sales, services, and farming, Mansel Blackford argues that while small firms have always been important to the nation's development, their significance has varied considerably in different time periods and in different segments of our economy. Throughout, he relates small business development to changes in America's overall business and economic systems and offers comparisons between the growth of small business in the United States to its development in other countries. He places special emphasis on the importance of small business development for women and minorities. Unique in its breadth, this book provides the only comprehensive overview of these significant topics.
Download or read book The Entrepreneurs written by Robert Sobel and published by Beard Books. This book was released on 2000 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A well-researched, informative book in which Robert Sobel, the noted financial historian, explores the lives and careers of nine representative innovators in business during the last 200 years, men frequently overlooked by contemporary social and political historians: Francis Cabot Lowell, John Wanamaker, Cyrus McCormick, James Hill, James Duke, Theodore Vail, Marcus Loew, Donald Douglas, and Royal Little. Each one was selected to illustrate a different aspect of American business tradition. All share the ability to grasp opportunity and to oppose conventional wisdom when necessary, both of which contributed to the fabric of modern corporate life. In the aggregate they created new organizational traditions that were imitated throughout the Western world. Book jacket.
Download or read book Masters of Enterprise written by H. W. Brands and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Here, in a wittily told and deeply insightful history, is a complete set of portraits of America's greatest generators of wealth. Only such a collective study allows us to appreciate what makes the great entrepreneurs really tick. As H.W. Brands shows, these men and women are driven, they are focused, they deeply identify with the businesses they create, and they possess the charisma necessary to persuade other talented people to join them. They do it partly for the money, but mostly for the thrill of creation.
