The subprime mortgage crisis has already wreaked havoc on the lives of millions of people and now it threatens to derail the U.S. economy and economies around the world. In this trenchant book, best-selling economist Robert Shiller reveals the origins of this crisis and puts forward bold measures to solve it. He calls for an aggressive response--a restructuring of the institutional foundations of the financial system that will not only allow people once again to buy and sell homes with confidence, but will create the conditions for greater prosperity in America and throughout the deeply interconnected world economy.
Shiller blames the subprime crisis on the irrational exuberance that drove the economy's two most recent bubbles--in stocks in the 1990s and in housing between 2000 and 2007. He shows how these bubbles led to the dangerous overextension of credit now resulting in foreclosures, bankruptcies, and write-offs, as well as a global credit crunch. To restore confidence in the markets, Shiller argues, bailouts are needed in the short run. But he insists that these bailouts must be targeted at low-income victims of subprime deals. In the longer term, the subprime solution will require leaders to revamp the financial framework by deploying an ambitious package of initiatives to inhibit the formation of bubbles and limit risks, including better financial information; simplified legal contracts and regulations; expanded markets for managing risks; home equity insurance policies; income-linked home loans; and new measures to protect consumers against hidden inflationary effects.
This powerful book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how we got into the subprime mess--and how we can get out.
No matter who you are-investor, trader, homeowner, 401(k) holder, or CEO-you are bound to feel the impact of Alan Greenspan's �Age of Ignorance� for years to come.
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According to MSN Money columnist William A. Fleckenstein, Greenspan's nearly 19-year career as Federal Reserve Chairman is even worse than anyone imagined. Labeled �Mr. Bubble� by the New York Times, Greenspan was nothing less than a serial bubble blower with a long history of bad decision-making. His famous �Greenspan Put� fueled the perception of a Goldilocks economy-but, as this explosive expos� reveals, the bear has finally caught up with Goldilocks.
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Using transcripts of Greenspan's FOMC meetings as well as testimony before Congress, this eye-opening book delivers a timeline of his most devastating mistakes and weaves together the connection between every economic calamity of the past 19 years:
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The stock market crash of 1987.
The Savings And Loan crisis.
The collapse of Long Term Capital Management.
The tech bubble of 2000.
The feared Y2K disaster.
The credit bubble and real estate crisis of 2007.
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Fleckenstein explains just how far-reaching Greenspan's mess has been flung, and presents damning evidence that contradicts the former Fed chief's public naivet� concerning shifts in the market and economy. He also points to a disturbing fact, that throughout his career, Greenspan not only made costly mistakes, but made the same ones-over and over again. And not only was he never able to recognize or admit to those mistakes, he constantly rewrote his own history to justify them.
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Greenspan's Bubbles offers a lock-stock-and-barrel portrait of a flawed but fascinating man whose words and actions have led a whole generation astray, and whose legacy will continue to challenge us in the years ahead.
About this product: The Real ACT Prep Guide is the only book with insider test-taking tips and strategy, practice, and insight from the makers of the ACT.
About this product: Bruised and battered, Kaycee barely escapes the clutches of a serial killer, only to find herself with another dilemma--her attraction to the two men assigned to protect her from the killer.
Sam and Tyler Warren are criminal profilers for the F.B.I. They're also identical twins with a very unusual psychic connection, one that has left them with a bleak hope for the future and of finding wives. That is until they meet Kaycee and find a woman who might be able to love each of them.
While hiding from the killer still after Kaycee, they explore a passion none of them ever expected to find. But their newfound happiness will be shattered when the killer learns of her whereabouts and puts into motion a sick plan Sam and Tyler may not be able to stop.
Publisher's Note: This book contains explicit sexual content, graphic language, and situations that some readers may find objectionable: ménage (m/f/m), violence.
About this product: For many, the late 1960s/early 1970s meant a country in turmoil. Sit-ins. Vietnam War protests. Don't trust anyone over 30. Nixon was 'not a crook' - or so he claimed. At the other end of the spectrum was the intense rivalry between Woody Hayes, the legendary Ohio State football coach, and his nemesis, Bo Schembechler from Michigan. To them, the American heartland was still 'pure and sacred', and they were totally in command of their troops. Hayes idolized General Patton, the great war hero. Schembechler idolized President Ford, a former All-American football player. Rosenberg sets the stage brilliantly for this coming clash of cultural differences, as Hayes and Schembechler try desperately to win a national football championship while coping with a shifting political landscape. It all leads to a climatic, and in part tragic, downfall of an important era gone by.
About this product: Are you getting deeper and deeper into debt while they make bigger and bigger profits? Not after you read...Debt Cure$ "They" Don't Want You To Know About!
In this new book, Kevin Trudeau blows the lid off the banking and credit card industries, exposing the greatest rip off of our citizens in this nation's history. The credit card industry is one of the most profitable industries in this country, but they don't want you to know it. You can fight back! You can apply Kevin's solutions to your debt problems, and keep more money in your pocket today. You can learn how to use credit to build wealth! Read Debt Cure$ and cure your debt forever.
You will learn: - How the credit lending business is rigged against you! - How the financial industry wants to keep you in debt! - How the banks and credit card companies are making obscene profits off of you and how you can change that! - How to reduce or possible totally eliminate your debt! - How you could cut your payments in half! - How to correct your credit with two magic words! - How to improve your credit virtually overnight! - How to get free money that you never have to pay back! - Find out why the financial industry wants to keep you in debt. - Turn bad debt into good credit. - Create wealth through financial health.
About this product: A hilarious blast of scathing irreverence from the award-winning actor and comedian.
A pissed off Leary is the best Leary, says one critic of the writer and comic. In Why We Suck, Dr. Denis Leary uses his common sense, and his biting and hilarious take on the world, to attack the politically correct, the hypocritical, the obese, the thin--basically everyone who takes themselves too seriously. He does so with the extra oomph of a doctorate bestowed upon him by his alma mater Emerson College. Sure its just a celebrity type of thing--they only gave it to me because Im famous. Leary explains. But its legal and it means I get to say Im a doctor--just like Dr. Phil.
In Why We Suck, Learys famously smart style and sardonic wit have found their fullest and fiercest expression yet. Zeroing in on the ridiculous wherever he finds it, Leary unravels his Irish Catholic upbringing, the folly of celebrity, the pressures of family life, and the great hypocrisy of politics with the same bright, savage, and profane insight he brought to his critically acclaimed one-man shows No Cure for Cancer and Lock n Load, and his platinum-selling song, Asshole.
Proudly Irish American, defiantly working class, with a reserve of compassion for the underdog and the overlooked, Leary delivers blistering diatribes that are penetrating social commentary with no holds barred. Learys book will find wide appeal among people who want to laugh out loud or find a guide who matches their view of whats wrong in America and the world-at-large; and fans of his one-man shows, his many movies, and Rescue Me, Learys Golden Globe and Emmynominated television show. Why We Suck is the latest salvo from one of Americas most original and biting comic satirists.
The Challenge Built to Last, the defining management study of the nineties, showed how great companies triumph over time and how long-term sustained performance can be engineered into the DNA of an enterprise from the verybeginning.
But what about the company that is not born with great DNA? How can good companies, mediocre companies, even bad companies achieve enduring greatness?
The Study For years, this question preyed on the mind of Jim Collins. Are there companies that defy gravity and convert long-term mediocrity or worse into long-term superiority? And if so, what are the universal distinguishing characteristics that cause a company to go from good to great?
The Standards Using tough benchmarks, Collins and his research team identified a set of elite companies that made the leap to great results and sustained those results for at least fifteen years. How great? After the leap, the good-to-great companies generated cumulative stock returns that beat the general stock market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, better than twice the results delivered by a composite index of the world's greatest companies, including Coca-Cola, Intel, General Electric, and Merck.
The Comparisons The research team contrasted the good-to-great companies with a carefully selected set of comparison companies that failed to make the leap from good to great. What was different? Why did one set of companies become truly great performers while the other set remained only good?
Over five years, the team analyzed the histories of all twenty-eight companies in the study. After sifting through mountains of data and thousands of pages of interviews, Collins and his crew discovered the key determinants of greatness -- why some companies make the leap and others don't.
The Findings The findings of the Good to Great study will surprise many readers and shed light on virtually every area of management strategy and practice. The findings include:
Level 5 Leaders: The research team was shocked to discover the type of leadership required to achieve greatness.
The Hedgehog Concept (Simplicity within the Three Circles): To go from good to great requires transcending the curse of competence.
A Culture of Discipline: When you combine a culture of discipline with an ethic of entrepreneurship, you get the magical alchemy of great results. Technology Accelerators: Good-to-great companies think differently about the role of technology.
The Flywheel and the Doom Loop: Those who launch radical change programs and wrenching restructurings will almost certainly fail to make the leap.
“Some of the key concepts discerned in the study,” comments Jim Collins, "fly in the face of our modern business culture and will, quite frankly, upset some people.”
Perhaps, but who can afford to ignore these findings?
BOOK
