Charles R. Morris

"Makes a reader feel like a time traveler plopped down among men who were by turns vicious and visionary."--The Christian Science Monitor The modern American economy was the creation of four men: Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould, and J. P. Morgan. They were the giants of the Gilded Age, a moment of riotous growth that established America as the richest, most inventive, and most productive country on the planet. Acclaimed author Charles R. Morris vividly brings the men and their times to life. The ruthlessly competitive Carnegie, the imperial Rockefeller, and the provocateur Gould were obsessed with progress, experiment, and speed. They were balanced by Morgan, the gentleman businessman, who fought, instead, for a global trust in American business. Through their antagonism and their verve, they built an industrial behemoth--and a country of middle-class consumers. The Tycoons tells the incredible story of how these four determined men wrenched the economy into the modern age, inventing a nation of full economic participation that could not have been imagined only a few decades earlier.

How Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould, and J. P. Morgan Invented the American Supereconomy

The Tycoons

The best-selling author of The Trillion Dollar Meltdown examines the perspectives and principles of three pillars of the financial world, as well as their judgments on the current economic crisis and their opinions as to what should be the best path to recovery.

Warren Buffett, George Soros, Paul Volcker, and the Maelstrom of Markets

The Sages

We are living in the most uncertain financial environment in recent history. A quarter - century of reckless lending, asset stripping, free - market zealotry and hedge - fund secrecy has ended with a dramatic collapse. And, according to Charles R. Morris, an even more profound economic and political restructuring is on its way. In The Two Trillion Dollar Meltdown, Morris explains how we got here and what we can expect next. With insight and clarity, he cuts through the guff to provide an indispensable guide to confusing times. ''''''''How we got into the mess we're in, explained briefly and brilliantly.'''''''' - New York Times Book Review Charles R. Morris is a lawyer and former banker. He is the author of ten books, including The Cost of Good Intentions, Money, Greed and Risk and The Tycoons. He has written for the Atlantic Monthly, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

Easy Money, High Rollers and The Great Credit Crash

The Two Trillion Dollar Meltdown

Charles H. Ferguson

A behind-the-scenes account of why IBM fell behind while other computer companies flourished lays out the terms by which computer firms will do business in the future

The Fall of IBM and the Future of Global Technology

Computer Wars

easy money, high rollers, and the great credit crash

The trillion-dollar meltdown

Examines the history of the American Catholic Church and its influence in national life, and discusses its attitudes toward the role of women, politics, and other issues

The Saints and Sinners who Built America's Most Powerful Church

American Catholic

In the thirty years after the Civil War, the United States blew by Great Britain to become the greatest economic power in world history. That is a well-known period in history, when titans like Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and J.P. Morgan walked the earth. But as Charles R. Morris shows us, the platform for that spectacular growth spurt was built in the first half of the century. By the 1820s, America was already the world's most productive manufacturer, and the most intensely commercialized society in history. The War of 1812 jumpstarted the great New England cotton mills, the iron centers in Connecticut and Pennsylvania, and the forges around the Great Lakes. In the decade after the War, the Midwest was opened by entrepreneurs. In this beautifully illustrated book, Morris paints a vivid panorama of a new nation buzzing with the work of creation. He also points out the parallels and differences in the nineteenth century American/British standoff and that between China and America today.

The First American Industrial Revolution

The Dawn of Innovation

We are living in the most reckless financial environment in recent history. Arcane credit derivative bets are now well into the tens of trillions. According to Charles R. Morris, the astronomical leverage at investment banks and their hedge fund and private equity clients virtually guarantees massive disruption in global markets. The crash, when it comes, will have no firebreaks. A quarter century of free-market zealotry that extolled asset stripping, abusive lending, and hedge fund secrecy will come crashing down with it. The Trillion Dollar Meltdown explains how we got here, and what is about to happen. After the crash our priorities will be quite different. But things are likely to get worse before they better. Whether you are an active investor, a homeowner, or a contributor to your 401(k) plan, The Trillion Dollar Meltdown will be indispensable to understanding the gross excess that has put the world economy on the brink—and what the new landscape will look like.

Easy Money, High Rollers, and the Great Credit Crash

The Trillion Dollar Meltdown

Describes the fall of IBM as a leading computer firm

The Post-IBM World

The Great Crash of 1929 profoundly disrupted the United States' confident march toward becoming the world's superpower. The breakneck growth of 1920s America--with its boom in automobiles, electricity, credit lines, radio, and movies--certainly presaged a serious recession by the decade's end, but not a depression. The totality of the collapse shocked the nation, and its duration scarred generations to come. In this lucid and fast-paced account of the cataclysm, award-winning writer Charles R. Morris pulls together the intricate threads of policy, ideology, international hatreds, and sheer individual cantankerousness that finally pushed the world economy over the brink and into a depression. While Morris anchors his narrative in the United States, he also fully investigates the poisonous political atmosphere of postwar Europe to reveal how treacherous the environment of the global economy was. It took heroic financial mismanagement, a glut-induced global collapse in agricultural prices, and a self-inflicted crash in world trade to cause the Great Depression. Deeply researched and vividly told, A Rabble of Dead Money anatomizes history's greatest economic catastrophe--while noting the uncanny echoes for the present.

The Great Crash and the Global Depression: 1929–1939

A Rabble of Dead Money

Economia americană modernă este creația a patru oameni: Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould și J.P. Morgan. Ei au fost giganții epocii de aur, un moment de dezvoltare fără precedent care a făcut din America cea mai bogată, mai inovatoare și mai productivă țară a planetei. Charles R. Morris îi readuce la viață pe magnatul oțelului Carnegie, regele petrolului Rockefeller și vrăjitorul căilor ferate Gould, cei obsedați de progres, experimentare și viteză, precum și pe finanțistul Morgan, omul de afaceri gentleman, care a luptat pentru o încredere globală în afacerile americane. Magnații este incredibila poveste a oamenilor hotărâți care au clădit economia americană, creând un colos industrial – și o întreagă țară de consumatori din clasa de mijloc.

Magnații. Cum au inventat Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould și J.P. Morgan supereconomia americană

Charles R. Morris's The Trillion Dollar Meltdown (2008) was the first book to warn of the impending financial crash in all its horrific scale and speed. Now, with Comeback, Morris reveals that the United States is on the brink of a strong recovery that could last for twenty years or more. The great economic boom times in American history have come because of fortuitous discoveries. Natural resources (coal first, then oil) fueled vast economic and industrial expansions, which in turn helped create and supply new markets. The last genuine economic game changer was the technology boom of the 1990s, which gave the U.S. a global competitive advantage for a while based on electronics and silicon. One of the first writers and analysts in the U.S. to predict that the tech boom would lead to a period of sustained economic growth was Charles Morris. In defiance of the recessionary times (in 1990), he saw the coming boom. Now, in 2013, he sees the threshold of another. This time the gift is natural gas. The amount and distribution of gas in American shale is so vast that it has the potential to transform the manufacturing economy, creating jobs across the country, and requiring a new infrastructure that will benefit the nation as a whole. Because of fracking, jobs that once would have been outsourced abroad will return home, America can become a net exporter of energy, and cheap energy will provide the opportunity for innovation and competition. In light of this new opportunity, and other complementary developments Morris explores in this book, the U.S. ought to be approaching the future with a robust self-confidence it has not experienced in a while. But we could fumble it away. The gold-rush style of shale boom companies does not make them good neighbors. A counter-reaction could put their industry, and the new era of national prosperity, at risk. We also have a political system that has the capacity to spoil the benefits of this huge boon. If the wealth locked in the continental shelf is not shared for the general economic good, but is instead exploited in short-term profiteering, then many of the opportunities that exist will be choked off by a few very rich corporations. Managing the great bonus of the vast store of cheap energy is going to become a defining political challenge in the years ahead. At the threshold of a thrilling opportunity, Morris is a brilliantly perceptive guide.

Charles R. Morris

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