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An email from Tony Healy, Senior Fellow of the Institute for Policy Innovation, recommends a book that came out last year, William J. Bernstein, The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World Was Created.
Bernstein' perspective looks interesting because his day job is investment analyst, and editor of Efficient Frontier: An Online Journal of Practical Asset Allocation.
From an editorial blurb about the book:
Based upon the premise that mankind experienced virtually zero economic growth from the dawn of time until 1820, this provocative, big picture book identifies the four conditions necessary for sustained economic progress--property rights, scientific rationalism, capital markets, and communications and transportation technology-- and then analyzes their gradual appearance and impact throughout every corner of the globe.
From a review by the Economics Editor of the Sydney Herald:
The post-industrial economy requires even less land and, in some respects, labour than its industrial predecessor. While the new regime requires at least as much physical capital as the old one, its appetite for knowledge input, mainly in the form of technological innovation, is ravenous.
"The Western world did not arrive at such an agreeable state overnight," Bernstein concludes. "It took most of the second millennium to correct feudalism's suppression of property rights, throw off the intellectual stranglehold of the Church, overcome the lack of capital markets and rectify the absence of effective transport and communication.
"Only with the completion of these four tasks have citizens of the new industrial and post-industrial societies been able to enjoy the fruits of their labours." The Amazon reviews are good, though one has reservations, primarily because of some history errors.
posted by James DeLong @ 9:02 AM | Markets: Business, Investment & Innovation
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