Unintended Consequences : Why Everything You've Been Told about the Economy Is Wrong

by Conard, Edward

• ISBN13: 9781591845508
• ISBN10: 1591845505
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-06-07
• Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover

Summary

In the aftermath of the Financial Crisis, many commonly held beliefs have emerged to explain its cause. Conventional wisdom blames Wall Street and the mortgage industry for using low down payments, teaser rates, and other predatory tactics to seduce unsuspecting home owners into assuming mortgages they couldn't afford. It blames average Americans for borrowing recklessly and spending too much. And it blames the tax policies and deregulatory environment of the Reagan and Bush administrations for encouraging reckless risk-taking by wealthy individuals and financial institutions. But according to Unintended Consequences, the conventional wisdom masks the real causes of our economic disruption and puts us at risk of facing a slew of unintended-and potentially dangerous-consequenc Unintended Consequencesis not a book that takes a couple of insights and expands them into 300 pages; rather, it covers the entire scope of the economy. It's a fascinating and contrarian case for how the economy reallyworks, what went wrong over the past decade, and what steps we can take to start growing again. Whether you agree with the book's provocative and counterintuitive conclusions or not, Unintended Consequenceswill reward you with a sophisticated understanding of the contemporary economy, one no other book has yet provided. To read an excerpt from Unintended Consequences, please visit http://www.edwardconard.com/book-excerpt For up-to-date information on everything related to Unintended Consequences, visit www.edwardconard.com

Author Biography

Edward Conard was a partner at Bain Capital from 1993 to 2007. He served as the head of Bain’s New York office and led the firm’s acquisi­tions of large industrial companies. He sits on several boards of directors including the boards of Waters Corporation and Sensata Technologies. Prior to Bain, Conard worked for Wasserstein Perella, an investment bank that specialized in mergers and acquisitions, and Bain & Company, a management consulting firm, where he headed its industrial practice. He is a graduate of Harvard Business School and the Uni­versity of Michigan.

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Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 1
What Went Right
A Brief History of the U.S. Economy	p. 11
The Role of Investment	p. 30
The Role of the Trade Deficit	p. 52
The Role of Incentives	p. 72
What Went Wrong
The Role of Banks, Credit Rating Agencies, and Regulators	p. 113
The Role of Short-Term Debt and Government Policy	p. 158
What Comes Next
Preventing Another Bank Run	p. 195
Reducing Unemployment	p. 219
Redistributing Income	p. 254
Conclusion	p. 275
Acknowledgments	p. 287
Notes	p. 289
Illustration Sources	p. 301
Index	p. 305
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