My name is Carl Rhodes, and I am a Professor of Management and Organization at the University of Technology Sydney. Like many others, in recent years I have become increasingly concerned, sometimes angry even, about how the organization of business and the economy is creating massive economic injustice. I am convinced that the economic system that has billionaires at its apex is deeply unfair, creating hardship, pain, and even death for too many people around the world. I am also convinced that we do not have to accept this gross injustice as being inevitable.
I wrote...
Stinking Rich: The Four Myths of the Good Billionaires
Ingrid Robeyns opens her book provocatively. She poses the question: ‘Can a person be too rich?’ Her answer is ‘yes’! I value this book because it opens bold new ways of thinking about what can be done about inequality. Robeyns coined the term ‘limitarianism’ to explore how democratic societies might enforce specific caps on wealth.
This limitarianism is, for Robeyns, a ‘regulative ideal’ that should inform government policy and regulation. While limitarianism may appear idealistic at first glance, I found Robeyns book to offer very practical solutions as they relate to providing true socially funded equal opportunity, implementing progressive taxation and wealth capping, and a re-orientating society to valuing equality.
"A powerful case for limitarianism-the idea that we should set a maximum on how much resources one individual can appropriate. A must-read!" -Thomas Piketty, bestselling author of Capital in the Twenty-First Century
An original, bold, and convincing argument for a cap on wealth by the philosopher who coined the term "limitarianism."
How much money is too much? Is it ethical, and democratic, for an individual to amass a limitless amount of wealth, and then spend it however they choose? Many of us feel that the answer to that is no-but what can we do about it?
How do billionaires become so rich? One story is that it is all about hard work, initiative, and special talents. If you believe that story, then you might conclude that billionaires deserve their extreme wealth. What I found especially insightful about Chuck Collins book is that he painstakingly shows that this story is bogus.
Collins delves into the realities of what he calls the ‘agents of inequality’–the accountants and lawyers who ensure that the world’s richest people maintain and extend their wealth over generations. This fascinating book lifts the veil on how the rich use everything from cash hoarding to tax evasion to trust funds to ensure that the world’s economic system remains unequal.
For decades, a secret army of tax attorneys, accountants and wealth managers has been developing into the shadowy Wealth Defence Industry. These 'agents of inequality' are paid millions to hide trillions for the richest 0.01%.
In this book, inequality expert Chuck Collins, who himself inherited a fortune, interviews the leading players and gives a unique insider account of how this industry is doing everything it can to create and entrench hereditary dynasties of wealth and power. He exposes the inner workings of these "agents of inequality", showing how they deploy anonymous shell companies, family offices, offshore accounts, opaque trusts, and…
The Connector's Advantage: : 7 Mindsets to Grow your Influence and Impact
by
Michelle Tillis Lederman,
Connecting matters. Your relationships make the difference in the results you achieve, the impact you have, and the speed with which you make things happen.
On top of all that, connections make you happier and healthier.
With the remote, hybrid, and global workplace as the new normal, connections―particularly diverse and…
Davos is a small town in the Swiss Alps that is the venue for the World Economic Forum, an annual meeting where billionaires, politicians, and celebrities get together to try to come up with solutions to the world’s problems. Peter S. Goodman’s book focuses on what he calls the ‘Davos Men’–the Davos attending billionaires (who are largely men) who speak out about the world’s wrongs while exploiting the global economy for their own financial gain.
What I found especially revealing in Goodman’s book was his meticulous and unrelenting unraveling of the deceitful realities of billionaire power and his trenchant call for the government to free themselves of the vastly undue political influence of the ultra-rich.
A San Francisco Chronicle Bestseller * An NPR Best Book of the Year
The New York Times's Global Economics Correspondent masterfully reveals how billionaires' systematic plunder of the world-brazenly accelerated during the pandemic-has transformed 21st-century life and dangerously destabilized democracy.
"Davos Man will be read a hundred years from now as a warning." -Evan Osnos
"Excellent. A powerful, fiery book, and it could well be an essential one." -NPR.org
The history of the last half century in America, Europe, and other major economies is in large part the story of wealth flowing upward. The most affluent people emerged from capitalism's…
Guido Alani’s book traces the history of rich people in the West from the Middle Ages to now. What I especially illuminating about this book was that as far back as the 14th century people were calling for rich people to be expelled from democratic societies because they held too much power.
Alfani confronts us with the reality that the rich pretend to be ‘gods among men’ as if they do not have to play by the same rules as the rest of us. But all is not lost. Alfani insists that the rich have a fragile position in society because they are always at risk of the majority turning against them.
How the rich and the super-rich throughout Western history accumulated their wealth, behaved (or misbehaved) and helped (or didn't help) their communities in times of crisis
The rich have always fascinated, sometimes in problematic ways. Medieval thinkers feared that the super-rich would act 'as gods among men'; much more recently Thomas Piketty made wealth central to discussions of inequality. In this book, Guido Alfani offers a history of the rich and super-rich in the West, examining who they were, how they accumulated their wealth and what role they played in society. Covering the last thousand years, with frequent incursions into…
The Bridge provides a compassionate and well researched window into the worlds of linear and circular thinking. A core pattern to the inner workings of these two thinking styles is revealed, and most importantly, insight into how to cross the distance between them. Some fascinating features emerged such as, circular…
Jonathan Taplin’s excellent book focuses on just four billionaires–Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, and Marc Andreessen. What I found special about this book is that it shows how these billionaires have created and sold utopian futures to the world, whether they come in the form of the metaverse, cryptocurrency, space travel, or transhumanism.
Even more disturbing is Taplin’s argument that under the pretense of these utopias, billionaires have been able to grow their wealth and power without interference from the government. Meanwhile, inequality continues to expand, nature is replaced with technology, and oligarchy gets more and more entrenched. In short, billionaire utopian visions are a distraction from the real and present danger of gross economic inequality.
'A wake-up call ... fascinating' Scott Galloway, author of The Four
'Please read this' Jaron Lanier, author of Ten Arguments For Deleting Your Social Media
From the author of Move Fast and Break Things comes a withering takedown of four billionaires (from Andreessen to Zuckerberg) who are selling us fantasies while the world burns.
At a time when multiple crises are compounding to create epic inequality, four billionaires are hyping schemes that are designed to divert our attention away from issues that really matter. Each scheme - from the metaverse to cryptocurrency, space travel and transhumanism - is an existential…
The immense power billionaires possess cannot be explained by their wealth alone. Coupled with the financial resources they command is a set of myths portraying them as a ‘force for good.’ These myths shield billionaires from being held to account by society for the inequality they represent in such an excessive and vulgar form.
The myths of the good billionaires position them as heroic, generous, and meritorious geniuses serving as modern-day vigilantes who can save the world. My book exposes these myths as a sham standing in the way of economic justice and equality. The book calls for a new political imagination that will reinvigorate the democratic promise of a world where wealth created by human activity is shared by many, not hoarded by few.
The scenario we are facing is scary: within a few decades, sea levels around the world may well rise by a metre or more as glaciers and ice caps melt due to climate change. Large parts of our coastal cities will be flooded, the basic outline of our world will…
Louise-Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun: Portrait of an Artist, 1755-1842
by
Judith Lissauer Cromwell,
This biography follows the remarkable life of Louise-Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, whose portraits of European high society hang in many of the world’s most important galleries.
As a young woman in the male dominated society of late 18th century France, she was denied an artistic education and forced to nurture…
