In 2008, the Queen posed a question at the London School of Economics: how come nobody saw the economic crisis coming? She received a variety of answers, both on the day and at later discussions. No doubt economists take some comfort in debating that question, but the fact is that plenty of people saw the [...]
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Two kinds of more
This week I’ve been browsing a book my wife got me for Christmas, Margaret Atwood’s In other worlds: Science fiction and the human imagination. It’s a diverse collection of the novelist’s lectures and articles on SF, superheroes and mythology, but here’s a pertinent thought from the mix: There are two kinds of ‘more’, says Atwood [...]
Book review: Voluntary Simplicity, by Duane Elgin
There’s a long list of classic environment and lifestyle titles from past decades on my reading list. Every once in a while I pick one up – The Limits to Growth, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Silent Spring – and see how it has stood the test of time. Usually it confirms the impression I got [...]
Books of the year, 2011
It’s been another good year on the book front, and it’s time for my annual attempt to pick my favourites. With a baby in the house it’s a slightly shorter list to choose from, but in no particular order, here are the best things I’ve read this year: Treasure Islands, by Nicholas Shaxson Shaxson’s book shines [...]
Some unexpected words from Bill Bryson
I won’t bother to review it here, but I’ve just finished Bill Bryson‘s book At Home: a short history of private life. It’s a long and fascinating journey through our everyday lives, looking at the stories behind our homes and the things that fill them. It’s an entertaining read, but tucked away on the last page [...]
Book review: Alias Papa, by Barbara Wood
Alias Papa is a biography by Fritz Schumacher’s daughter Barbara. It’s a straightforward chronological account of the man and his ideas, from his childhood in Germany, his peripatetic early adulthood, through to his career as an economist and finally as an early environmental spokesman. Along with the facts of his life, Wood devotes considerable attention [...]
It’s E F Schumacher week
Several years ago I came across a book in a second hand shop: ‘Small is Beautiful: economics as if people mattered‘. I bought it on the title alone, and having never heard of Ernest Friedrich Schumacher, I read it with no pre-conceptions. It was rambling, patriarchal and a little dated in style, but full of [...]
The life of Fritz Schumacher
This is Schumacher week here on Make Wealth History. To kick us off, a brief biographical post. Fritz Schumacher was German, born in Bonn in 1911. His father was an economics professor at a time when economics really mattered in Germany. The inter-war years saw the infamous devaluation, a subsequent recovery and the rapid emergence [...]
Book review: Whoops! by John Lanchester
Here’s a book that’s been much recommended to me, that I’ve finally got round to. Whoops! Why everyone owes everyone and no one can pay by John Lanchester a layman’s guide to the financial crisis, and it’s not just understandable, it’s also entertaining. Quite a tall order for a book on financial collapse, I’m sure [...]
The importance of knowing a little economics
I’ve just started reading John Lanchester’s Whoops! Why everyone owes everyone and no one can pay, a much recommended book on the financial crisis. In the introduction, he talks about the knowledge gap between the world of finance and the average citizen. “There is a need to narrow that gap” he says, “if members of the [...]
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