Download or read book The Selling of the American Economy written by Micheline Maynard and published by Crown Currency. This book was released on 2009-10-20 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today, many Americans regard globalization as a significant threat to our work force, and to our very way of life. As unemployment soars, the American automotive and manufacturing industries crumble, countless jobs continue to ship overseas, and the retail sector faces the worst slump in decades, cries of “Buy American” have grown louder and louder - in our communities, in the headlines, and in the halls of Washington. But at a time when an Italian company has bailed out one of our oldest and most iconic automakers; a French-German consortium is closing in on a multibillion dollar military contract to build our tanker planes and helicopters; companies based everywhere from Switzerland to India to Belgium are stocking our grocery aisles; and the assets of some of our most venerable financial institutions have been stripped down and bought up by banks from Hong Kong and London, what does “Buy American” mean any more? That said, there is a great deal of discomfort about the influence that foreign companies are exerting on our economy. Are they making us more competitive in the global marketplace, or less? Are they creating jobs for Americans, or importing their own workforces? Are they a threat to our national security, or are they bringing us technology that actually makes us safer? When they open plants and factories on our shores, are they siphoning money from our economy, or bolstering it? In welcoming their investments, are we, as some critics contend, selling our economy to the highest bidder? In THE SELLING OF THE AMERICAN ECONOMY, New York Times senior business correspondent Micheline Maynard argues that despite the lingering xenophobia that colors American perception of foreign-owned companies, foreign investments are actually an overwhelmingly positive force. Not only do they create thousands of jobs and pump billions of dollars into national and local economies, she says, they reinvigorate and strengthen communities, foster innovation and diversity in the marketplace, and teach Americans new ways to live and work. At a time when our most cherished home-grown institutions, still reeling from the financial crisis, are downsizing, shuttering plants and factories, and filing for bankruptcy, the need for foreign investment has never been greater. In this compelling narrative, Maynard shows that if we are in fact selling our economy to the highest bidder, this may be very good news for America. Through moving stories of workers whose lives have been transformed by the arrival of companies like Toyota, Airbus, and Tata, probing interviews with a host of government officials and local leaders who have fought to lure foreign companies to their communities and states, and revealing conversations with both American and foreign executives (including a rare and hard-won visit with Toyota’s elusive young new president) Maynard paints a fascinating portrait of the paradigm shift that is transforming the American economy - and remaking the American dream.
Download or read book Rewriting the Rules of the American Economy An Agenda for Growth and Shared Prosperity written by Joseph E. Stiglitz and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2015-11-02 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It’s time to rewrite the rules—to curb the runaway flow of wealth to the top one percent, to restore security and opportunity for the middle class, and to foster stronger growth rooted in broadly shared prosperity. Inequality is a choice. The United States bills itself as the land of opportunity, a place where anyone can achieve success and a better life through hard work and determination. But the facts tell a different story—the U.S. today lags behind most other developed nations in measures of inequality and economic mobility. For decades, wages have stagnated for the majority of workers while economic gains have disproportionately gone to the top one percent. Education, housing, and health care—essential ingredients for individual success—are growing ever more expensive. Deeply rooted structural discrimination continues to hold down women and people of color, and more than one-fifth of all American children now live in poverty. These trends are on track to become even worse in the future. Some economists claim that today’s bleak conditions are inevitable consequences of market outcomes, globalization, and technological progress. If we want greater equality, they argue, we have to sacrifice growth. This is simply not true. American inequality is the result of misguided structural rules that actually constrict economic growth. We have stripped away worker protections and family support systems, created a tax system that rewards short-term gains over long-term investment, offered a de facto public safety net to too-big-to-fail financial institutions, and chosen monetary and fiscal policies that promote wealth over full employment.
Download or read book Building the New American Economy written by Jeffrey D. Sachs and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-02-07 with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The influential economist offers a persuasive strategy for a more just and sustainable economy—with a forward by Bernie Sanders. The New York Times has said that Jeffrey D. Sachs is “probably the most important economist in the world.” Now, in a book that combines impassioned manifesto with a plan of action, Sachs charts a path to move America toward sustainable development. Sustainable development is a holistic approach to public policy that unifies economic, social, and environmental objectives. By focusing too much on short-term economic growth, the United States has neglected rising inequality and dire environmental threats—all while putting our long-term economic growth at risk. Sachs explores issues that have captivated national discourse, including infrastructure, trade deals, energy policy, the proper size and role of government, the national debt, and income inequality. In accessible language, he illuminates the forces at work in each case and presents specific policy solutions. His argument rises above the stagnation of partisanship to envision a brighter way forward both individually and collectively. “Sachs demonstrates expertise on vastly different policy fields and makes a convincing case that abdicating the toxic intersection of militarism and exceptionalism is key to building a brighter future.”—Global Policy Journal
Download or read book Past Due written by Peter S. Goodman and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2009-09-15 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How Main Street was hit by—and might recover from—the financial crisis, by The New York Times's national economics correspondent When the financial crisis struck in 2008, Main Street felt the blow just as hard as Wall Street. The New York Times national economics correspondent Peter S. Goodman takes us behind the headlines and exposes how the flow of capital from Asia and Silicon Valley to the suburbs of the housing bubble perverted America's economy. He follows a real estate entrepreneur who sees endless opportunity in the underdeveloped lots of Florida—until the mortgages for them collapse. And he watches as an Oakland, California-based deliveryman, unable to land a job in the biotech industry, slides into unemployment and a homeless shelter. As Goodman shows, for two decades Americans binged on imports and easy credit, a spending spree abetted by ever-increasing home values—and then the bill came due. Yet even in a new environment of thrift and pullback, Goodman argues that economic adaptation is possible, through new industries and new safety nets. His tour of new businesses in Michigan, Iowa, South Carolina, and elsewhere and his clear-eyed analysis point the way to the economic promises and risks America now faces.
Download or read book The Lords of Easy Money written by Christopher Leonard and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-01-11 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The New York Times bestselling business journalist Christopher Leonard infiltrates one of America’s most mysterious institutions—the Federal Reserve—to show how its policies spearheaded by Chairman Jerome Powell over the past ten years have accelerated income inequality and put our country’s economic stability at risk. If you asked most people what forces led to today’s unprecedented income inequality and financial crashes, no one would say the Federal Reserve. For most of its history, the Fed has enjoyed the fawning adoration of the press. When the economy grew, it was credited to the Fed. When the economy imploded in 2008, the Fed got credit for rescuing us. But the Fed also has a unique power to reshape the American economy for the worse, which it did, fatefully, on November 4, 2010 through a radical intervention called quantitative easing. In just a few short years, the Fed more than quadrupled the money supply with one goal: to encourage banks and other investors to extend more risky debt. Leaders at the Fed knew that they were undertaking a bold experiment that would produce few real jobs, with long-term risks that were hard to measure. But the Fed proceeded anyway...and then found itself trapped. Once it printed all that money, there was no way to withdraw it from circulation. The Fed tried several times, only to see market start to crash, at which point the Fed turned the money spigot back on. That’s what it did when COVID hit, printing 300 years’ worth of money in two short months. Which brings us to now: Ten years on, the gap between the rich and poor has grown dramatically, stock prices are trading far above what’s justified by actual corporate profits, corporate debt in America is at an all-time high, and this debt is being traded by big banks on Wall Street, leaving them vulnerable—just as they were during the mortgage boom. Middle-class wages have barely budged in a decade, and consumers are buried under credit card debt, car loan debt, and student debt. The Lords of Easy Money tells the shocking, riveting tale of how quantitative easing is imperiling the American economy through the story of the one man who tried to warn us. This will be the first inside story of how we really got here—and why we face a frightening future.
Download or read book The Bank of the United States and the American Economy written by Edward Kaplan and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 1999-09-30 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An account of the history, structure, and operation of the First and Second Banks of the United States, this study examines how the banks performed as national and central institutions, and what happened to the economy when the charter of the Second Bank was allowed to expire in 1836. Historians have paid little recent attention to the early history of central banking in the United States, and many Americans believe that the Federal Reserve, created in 1913, was our first central bank. The economic crisis during the American Revolution actually led to the founding of a national bank, called the Bank of North America, during the period of Confederation. Although it became a private bank before the Constitution was ratified in 1788, it proved to be such a success that in 1791 Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury, was able to convince President Washington that a similar bank should be established. While the First Bank of the United States performed well during its tenure, its charter was allowed to lapse in 1811. A Second Bank of the United States was created five years later in 1816, and it prospered under the leadership of its third president, Nicholas Biddle, from 1823 to 1830, when central banking was practiced. This success ended with the 1828 election of Andrew Jackson, who refused to recharter the bank and withdrew the government's funds in 1833. Severely weakened, the Bank continued, but its charter finally expired in 1836, much to Biddle's dismay.
Download or read book One Perfect Day written by Rebecca Mead and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2008-07-29 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Astutely observed and deftly witty, One Perfect Day masterfully mixes investigative journalism and social commentary to explore the workings of the wedding industry-an industry that claims to be worth $160 billion to the U.S. economy and which has every interest in ensuring that the American wedding becomes ever more lavish and complex. Taking us inside the workings of the wedding industry-including the swelling ranks of professional event planners, department stores with their online registries, the retailers and manufacturers of bridal gowns, and the Walt Disney Company and its Fairy Tale Weddings program-New Yorker writer Rebecca Mead skillfully holds the mirror up to the bride's deepest hopes and fears about her wedding day, revealing that for better or worse, the way we marry is who we are.
Download or read book The Betrayal of American Prosperity written by Clyde Prestowitz and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-05-11 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: CONSIDER THIS SHOCKING FACT: while China’s number one export to the United States is $46 billion of computer equipment, the number one export from the U.S. to China is waste—$7.6 billion of waste paper and scrap metal. Bestselling author Clyde Prestowitz reveals the astonishing extent of the erosion of the fundamental pillars of American economic might—beginning well before the 2008 financial crisis—and the great challenge we face for the future in competing with the economic juggernaut of China and the other fast-rising economies. As the arresting facts he introduces show, the U.S. is rapidly losing the basis of its wealth and power, as well as its freedom of action and independence. If we do not make dramatic changes quickly, we will confront a painful permanent slide in our standard of living; the dollar will no longer be the world’s currency; our military strength will be whittled away; and we will be increasingly subject to the will of China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and various malcontents. But it doesn’t have to be that way. As Prestowitz shows in a masterful account of how we’ve come to this fateful juncture, we have inflicted our economic decline on ourselves—we abandoned the extraordinary approach to growth that drove the country’s remarkable rise to superpower status from the early days of the republic up through World War II. For most of our history, we supported our home industries, protected our market against unfair trade, made the world’s finest products—leading the way in technological innovation—and we were strong savers. But in the post-WWII era, we reversed course as our leadership embraced a set of simplistically attractive but disastrously false ideas—that consumption rather than production should drive our economy; that free trade is always a win-win; that all globalization is good; that the market is always right and government regulation or intervention in the economy always causes more harm than good; and that it didn’t matter that our factories were fleeing overseas because we were moving to the "higher ground" of services. In a devastating account, Prestowitz shows just how flawed this orthodoxy is and how it has gutted the American economy. The 2008 financial crisis was only its most blatant and recent consequence. It is time to abandon these false doctrines and to get back to the American way of growth that brought us to world leadership; Prestowitz presents a deeply researched and powerful set of highly practical steps that we can begin implementing immediately to reverse course and restore our economic leadership and excellence. The Betrayal of American Prosperity is vital reading for all Americans concerned about the future of the economy and of our power in the coming era.
Download or read book Service America in the New Economy written by Karl Albrecht and published by McGraw-Hill Companies. This book was released on 2002 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this world of technological commerce customer loyalty is waning. This guide, using innovative techniques and methodologies combined with real-life examples, provides insight into strategies to confront the either do it bigger or do it better imperative and the truth of what service means.
Download or read book Confessions of an Economic Hit Man written by John Perkins and published by Berrett-Koehler Publishers. This book was released on 2004-11-09 with total page 430 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Perkins, a former chief economist at a Boston strategic-consulting firm, confesses he was an "economic hit man" for 10 years, helping U.S. intelligence agencies and multinationals cajole and blackmail foreign leaders into serving U.S. foreign policy and awarding lucrative contracts to American business.
Download or read book The American Economy written by and published by . This book was released on 1960 with total page 64 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The American Economy written by Anton Brender and published by Centre for European Policy Studies. This book was released on 2018-04-24 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Each year, 25% of the world's output is produced by less than 5% of the planet's population. The juxtaposition of these two figures gives an idea of the power of the American economy. Not only is it the most productive among the major developed economies, but it is also a place where new products, services and production methods are constantly being invented. Even so, for all its efficiency and its capacity for innovation, the United States is progressively manifesting worrying signs of dysfunction. Since the 1970s, the American economy has experienced increasing difficulty in generating social progress. Worse still, over the past twenty years, signs of actual regression are becoming more and more numerous. How can this paradox be explained? Answering this question is the thread running throughout the chapters of this book. Anton Brender and Florence Pisani, economists with Candriam Investors Group, offer the reader an overview of the history and structure of the American economy, guided by a concern to shed light on the problems it faces today.
Download or read book Freefall America Free Markets and the Sinking of the World Economy written by Joseph E. Stiglitz and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2010-10-04 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An incisive look at the global economic crisis, our flawed response, and the implications for the world’s future prosperity. The Great Recession, as it has come to be called, has impacted more people worldwide than any crisis since the Great Depression. Flawed government policy and unscrupulous personal and corporate behavior in the United States created the current financial meltdown, which was exported across the globe with devastating consequences. The crisis has sparked an essential debate about America’s economic missteps, the soundness of this country’s economy, and even the appropriate shape of a capitalist system. Few are more qualified to comment during this turbulent time than Joseph E. Stiglitz. Winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Economics, Stiglitz is “an insanely great economist, in ways you can’t really appreciate unless you’re deep into the field” (Paul Krugman, New York Times). In Freefall, Stiglitz traces the origins of the Great Recession, eschewing easy answers and demolishing the contention that America needs more billion-dollar bailouts and free passes to those “too big to fail,” while also outlining the alternatives and revealing that even now there are choices ahead that can make a difference. The system is broken, and we can only fix it by examining the underlying theories that have led us into this new “bubble capitalism.” Ranging across a host of topics that bear on the crisis, Stiglitz argues convincingly for a restoration of the balance between government and markets. America as a nation faces huge challenges—in health care, energy, the environment, education, and manufacturing—and Stiglitz penetratingly addresses each in light of the newly emerging global economic order. An ongoing war of ideas over the most effective type of capitalist system, as well as a rebalancing of global economic power, is shaping that order. The battle may finally give the lie to theories of a “rational” market or to the view that America’s global economic dominance is inevitable and unassailable. For anyone watching with indignation while a reckless Wall Street destroyed homes, educations, and jobs; while the government took half-steps hoping for a “just-enough” recovery; and while bankers fell all over themselves claiming not to have seen what was coming, then sought government bailouts while resisting regulation that would make future crises less likely, Freefall offers a clear accounting of why so many Americans feel disillusioned today and how we can realize a prosperous economy and a moral society for the future.
Download or read book One Hundred Thirteen Million Markets of One written by Chris Norton and published by Hillcrest Publishing Group. This book was released on 2012 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The recent focus on the one percent, a group that has come to be associated with wealth and power, obscures where the real source of capital and power lies today. Seventy seven per cent of discretionary spending--the engine that drives the American economy--comes from just 46 percent of the population. This largely undetected group is responsible for those parts of the American economy that are thriving despite the toughest conditions in living memory. We call them NEOs, short for the New Economic Order, as their spending adds up to an economy within an economy wherever they are. So far, they have remained undetected by businesses and government. If you're in business, you need to know who they are and what they really value. But more importantly, their discovery points to blueprint for building a sustainable economic engine, capable of powering America out of its current crisis and through the next century. The NEO Economy exists, but its potential has barely been tapped.
Download or read book Secret Weapon written by Kevin D. Freeman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-01-16 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times bestseller! Who’s really to blame for America’s catastrophic financial meltdown and devastating national recession? Contrary to what the “Occupy Movement” might tell you, it’s not just greedy Wall Street executives (though they certainly earned their share of scorn). It’s not just failed regulation (even though Washington has failed miserably, both Republicans and Democrats, to protect us). As one of America’s top financial professionals reveals in this shocking new book, the failures of Wall Street and Washington have opened us up to economic warfare, with our foreign enemies exploiting our lurking financial weaknesses. In Secret Weapon, Kevin D. Freeman unveils how all the evidence—including motive, means, and opportunity—points to America’s foreign enemies as deliberately pushing our economy over the brink.
Download or read book Railroads and American Economic Growth written by Robert William Fogel and published by . This book was released on 1994 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Defending the Free Market written by Robert Sirico and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-05-21 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thirty years ago, the economic system of the Soviet empire—socialism—seemed definitively discredited. Today, the most popular figures in the Democratic Party embrace it, while the shapers of public opinion treat capitalism as morally indefensible. Is there a moral case for capitalism? Consumerism is an appalling spectacle. Free markets may be efficient, but are they fair? Aren’t there some things that we can’t afford to leave to the vicissitudes of the market? Robert Sirico, a onetime leftist, shows how a free economy—including private property, legally enforceable contracts, and prices and interest rates freely agreed to by the parties to a transaction—is the best way to meet society’s material needs. In fact, the free market has lifted millions out of dire poverty—far more people than state welfare or private charity has ever rescued from want. But efficiency isn’t its only virtue. Economic freedom is indispensable for the other freedoms we prize. And it’s not true that it makes things more important than people—just the reverse. Only if we have economic rights can we protect ourselves from government encroachment into the most private areas of our lives—including our consciences. Defending the Free Market is a powerful vindication of capitalism and a timely warning for a generation flirting with disaster.
