The Indebted Society: Anatomy of an Ongoing Disaster

Rating:
Summary: Tedious and Academic
Review: If you are an economist you might find this book readable. If you are not trained in the dismal science you might just find this book to be dismal itself.

Far too often the author asserts points and then asks the reader to take his assumptions on faith while he builds up to his grand conculsions. This can serious hamper the lay reader in being able to follow the arguments made. Those with a more in depth understanding of fiscal policy might just find the conclusions themselves to be faulty and un practicle.

Written in 1996 this book is already out of date and rapidly becoming more of a hostorical document than a current events book.

Rating:
Summary: Tedious and Academic
Review: If you are an economist you might find this book readable. If you are not trained in the dismal science you might just find this book to be dismal itself.

Far too often the author asserts points and then asks the reader to take his assumptions on faith while he builds up to his grand conculsions. This can serious hamper the lay reader in being able to follow the arguments made. Those with a more in depth understanding of fiscal policy might just find the conclusions themselves to be faulty and un practicle.

Written in 1996 this book is already out of date and rapidly becoming more of a hostorical document than a current events book.

Rating:
Summary: Needs a "Caution" sign
Review: If you thought a book with a foreword by John Kenneth Galbraith would be a tax-and-spend, big-government screed ... well, in this case you would be right. The authors are probably too oblivious to even be embarrassed by the wrong-headed interpretations they put on such matters as productivity and the expected unending upward slope of interest rates to favor "the lenders." This is ham-handed analysis, often shockingly simplistic and tendentious, and now getting dated of course. But I give the book one star for at least touching on some interesting subjects and being reasonably readable, even if one must be cautious about its interpretations. I bought my copy remaindered for about three bucks -- about the right price.