They Did Their Homework (800 Years of It) | about the book "This Time It's Different"

New York Times ^ | 07/02/2010 | CATHERINE RAMPELL

[Lloyd227]

THE advertisement warns of speculative financial bubbles. It mocks a group of gullible Frenchmen seduced into a silly, 18th-century investment scheme, noting that the modern shareholder, armed with superior information, can avoid the pitfalls of the past. “How different the position of the investor today!” the ad enthuses. Enlarge This Image Mary F. Calvert for The New York Times Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff at Ms. Reinhart’s Washington home. They started their book around 2003, years before the economy began to crumble. It ran in The Saturday Evening Post on Sept. 14, 1929.

A month later, the stock market crashed. “Everyone wants to think they’re smarter than the poor souls in developing countries, and smarter than their predecessors,” says Carmen M. Reinhart, an economist at the University of Maryland. “They’re wrong. And we can prove it.”

[Lloyd227]

Anyone here read this book? It seems interesting, interesting in ways not normal for a history/economics tome.

Just fishing to see if anyone else has read this before I buy it.

[GeronL]

If the NY Times gave it a good review it probably isn’t worth buying. lol. /sarcasm

[sefarkas]

http://www.amazon.com/This-Time-Different-Centuries-Financial/product-reviews/0691142165/ref=cm_cr_dp_all_summary?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending

[Lloyd227]

"If the NY Times gave it a good review it probably isn’t worth buying."

True, but if you read the review, they seemed to have a difficult time classifying the book and seem somewhat confused as to why anyone would take a historical view of economics. That's what makes it seem interesting to me. :-)

[6SJ7]

Didn’t read “This Time it’s Different”, but tangentially, I can highly recommend “The Forgotten Man” by Amity Shlaes. This book is specific to the aftermath of the Great Depression and how the government went about *ahem* ‘fixing’ it.

[razorback-bert]

Sounds interesting, I may get it.

[Smokin' Joe]

bflr

[hinckley buzzard]

I don't think the reviewer got it. At all. That's why she wasted half the review on idle biographical background. But she shouldn't feel bad. Lapdog Brooks didn't get it either.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Lloyd227.

[mainsail that]

I read the first chapter (I think) for free online and then several paragraphs tied to the Greek and EU crisis. Shows how /why kings defaulted and how the bankers actually run the world—no financing no army raised.