Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism

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Overview

The bestselling author reveals how the U.S. financial sector has hijacked our economy and put America's global future at risk

In American Theocracy, Kevin Phillips warned us of the perilous interaction of debt, financial recklessness, and the increasing cost of scarce oil. The current housing and mortgage debacle is proof once more of Phillips's prescience, and only the first harbinger of a national crisis. In Bad Money, Phillips describes the...
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More About This Book

Overview

The bestselling author reveals how the U.S. financial sector has hijacked our economy and put America's global future at risk

In American Theocracy, Kevin Phillips warned us of the perilous interaction of debt, financial recklessness, and the increasing cost of scarce oil. The current housing and mortgage debacle is proof once more of Phillips's prescience, and only the first harbinger of a national crisis. In Bad Money, Phillips describes the consequences of our misguided economic policies, our mounting debt, our collapsing housing market, our threatened oil, and the end of American domination of world markets. America's current challenges (and failures) run striking parallels to the decline of previous leading world economic powers-especially the Dutch and British. Global overreach, worn-out politics, excessive debt, and exhausted energy regimes are all chilling signals that the United States is crumbling as the world superpower.

"Bad money" refers to a new phenomenon in wayward megafinance-the emergence of a U.S. economy that is globally dependent and dominated by hubris-driven financial services. Also "bad" are the risk miscalculations and strategic abuses of new multitrillion-dollar products such as asset-backed securities and the lure of buccaneering vehicles like hedge funds. Finally, the U.S. dollar has been turned into bad money as it has weakened and become vulnerable to the world's other currencies. In all these ways, "bad" finance has failed the American people and pointed U.S. capitalism toward a global crisis. Bad Money is the perfect follow- up to Phillips's last book, whose dire warnings are now proving frighteningly accurate.
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Editorial Reviews

From Barnes & Noble
There is no one quite like Kevin Phillips. As a political strategist, he earned fame and presidential recognition as the author of The Coming Republican Majority, but since then his astute political and economic commentary has cut across party lines, excoriating leaders on both sides for ineptitude and cowardice. Bad Money might be best seen as the even more focused sequel to his American Theocracy. Clearly, Phillips thinks that the situation has grown worse since that 2006 book: "The parallel to the historical Achilles heels of previous leading world economic powers -- global over-reach, worn-out politics, excessive debt, financialization and exhausted energy regions -- are chilling." No simple jeremiad, Bad Money is an alarum against the politics of evasion.
Daniel Gross
Bad Money is perfectly timed for the present, as the foul stench of moldering debt and American decline lingers in the concrete canyons of Manhattan…Phillips is an entertaining writer. His prose is full of jabs and one-two combinations that keep things moving briskly.
—The New York Times
Library Journal

Longtime political and economic commentator Phillips continues the theme of his American Theocracy(2006)-also narrated by Scott Brick (www.scottbrickpresents.com)-with this gloomy projection of a major economic storm brewing on the horizon. Here, Phillips again draws parallels between our current situation and the declines of 17thcentury Spain, the 18thcentury Dutch Republic, and early 20thcentury Britain, parallels over which historians and economists will likely quibble. However, even if his moody pessimism is not entirely defensible, his warnings should provide useful fodder for enlightened, learned voters in the exhausting 2008 presidential campaign. Brick's steady pacing will help listeners sustain focus throughout this informationpacked read. Recommended for university libraries supporting business and economics curricula and for larger public libraries. [Also recorded by Books on Tape. 8 CDs. unabridged. ISBN 9781415949900
—Dale Farris

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Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781429592147
  • Publisher: Penguin Group (USA), Inc.
  • Publication date: 4/1/2008
  • Format: MP3
  • Edition description: Unabridged
  • Ships to U.S.and APO/FPO addresses only.

Meet the Author

Kevin Phillips
Kevin Phillips has been a political and economic commentator for more than three decades. A former White House strategist, he has been a regular contributor to the Los Angeles Times and National Public Radio, and has written for Harper's Magazine and Time. He is the author of ten books, including The New York Times bestsellers American Theocracy and American Dynasty.
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Table of Contents

Preface to the Revised Edition: After the Fall: The Inexcusable Failure of American Fianance xi

1 Introduction: The Panic of August 1

2 Finance: The New Real Economy? 29

3 Bullnomics: Its Favoritism and Fictions 69

4 Securitization: The Insecurity of It All 96

5 Peak Oil: A Potential Pivot of the 2010s 120

6 The Politics of Evasion: Debt, Finance, and Oil 154

7 The Global Crisis of American Capitalism 179

Afterword: Speculative Capitalism Endangered: The Domestic and Global Consequenses 210

Appendix: Global Public Opinion and the Loss of Respect for the United States, 2003-7 237

Notes 241

Index 261

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Customer Reviews

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