Despite all the wrenching chaos, giddy enthusiasm and reckless financial waste, it turns out bubbles are the driving force of economic progress and the American economy.
Daniel Gross is one of the leading economics and business writers in America today. His prolific commentary and unnerving insights are a staple of Slate, The New York Times, Fortune, Wired, New York magazine and dozens of other publications. In this lively romp, Gross makes a counter–intuitive argument. America in the first decade of the new century is not thriving despite the folly of the Y2K bubble–nor has it made a surprisingly quick recovery from the devastation of the crash in 2001 and 2002. Our current economic growth–and, indeed, the globalization that is a part of that growth–is a product of that wasteful bubble.
Pop! will take readers on a fast–paced tour of economic history where the reckless expansion of previous eras in railroads and automobiles, telegraphs and land, streetcars and stocks all led to unsustainable booms, collapses and, then, surprising blossoms of prosperity. Gross is gifted writer with a deep well of historical knowledge and easy grasp of economic conflicts. His book will re–orient our view of recent economic history and re–color our understanding of American growth throughout the national experience.