Best Books for Economics Study

Ray Dalio has provided me with invaluable guidance and insights that are now available to you in Principles.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational totally blew my mind.

Gabriel Coarna

Founder/Readable

[From the book "The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon"]

“The scholar argues that people are wired to see patterns in chaos while remaining blind to unpredictable events, with massive consequences. Experimentation and empiricism trumps the easy and obvious narrative,” Stone writes.

Jeff Bezos

CEO/Amazon

Recommended by Ola Olusoga (Co-founder/Populum)

Source: Interview with Ola Olusoga: How Books Have Guided His Path To Self-Discovery

I'd recommend reading anything that helps develop your ability to understand and solve a problem. Triaging issues by importance and properly identifying their causes is critical in almost every aspect of business. Without that, you can easily spend a lot of time on the wrong problem, or an ineffective solution, and your time is, more or less, your most valuable commodity. So I'd suggest books like A Certain Ambiguity by Gaurav Suri and Hartosh Singh Bal, or Freakonomics by Stephen Levitt‎ and Stephen Dubner - books which will explore different ways of delving into problems and understanding their impact.

Dave Child

Founder/Readable.io

My next book for A Year of Books is The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley.

Two of the books I've read this year -- The Better Angels of Our Nature: and Why Nations Fail -- have explored how social and economic progress work together to make the world better. The Better Angels argues for that the two feed off each other, whereas Why Nations Fail argues that social and political progress ultimately controls the economic progress a society makes. This next book argues the opposite -- that economic progress is the greater force is pushing society forward. I'm interested to see which idea resonates more after exploring both frameworks.

This is also the second one of Ridley's books I've read this year. Here's a photo from a few weeks back of me reading his book Genome with my dog Beast.

Mark Zuckerberg

CEO/Facebook

Winston Ma

Managing Director/China Investment Corporation

Recommended by Ola Olusoga (Co-founder/Populum)

Source: Interview with Ola Olusoga: How Books Have Guided His Path To Self-Discovery

This might feel like a weird book to include, but I think it presents another side of strategy that is too often forgotten. It’s not always about bold actors and strategic thrusts. Sometimes strategy is about subtle influence. Sometimes it is framing and small tweaks that change behavior. We can have big aims, but get there with little moves. This book has excellent examples of that kind of thinking and how it is changing politics, government and business. My favorite example is about the bumblebee that they started putting on urinals–which drastically reduced the amount of spray and spillage because it changed where men aimed when they peed. It’s not exactly the coolest strategy but it solved a problem. So we can learn from it.

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

My recommendation is to do little tests. Try a few months of living the life you think you want, but leave yourself an exit plan, being open to the big chance that you might not like it after actually trying it... The best book about this subject is Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert. His recommendation is to talk to a few people wo are currently where you think you want to be and ask them for the pros and cons. Then trust their opinion since they're right in it, not just remembering or imagining.

Derek Sivers

Founder/CDBaby

I want everybody I know to read "How to Make Wealth" and "Mind the Gap" (chapters 6 and 7), which brilliantly articulate the most commonly, and frustratingly, misunderstood core economic principles of everyday life.

Evan Williams

Co-creator/Blogger

Downes and Nunes provide some very thought-provoking guidance to existing businesses about how to compete, innovate, and win in this new world of the disruptive startup.

Michael Dell

CEO/Dell

It’s rare for a physician to become a prominent social scientist. It’s even rarer for that person to write a book that opens your eyes to a fresh way of understanding the world. Blueprint is a contrarian exploration of how good societies may be shaped less by historical forces and more by natural selection.

Adam Grant

Author

This book makes artificial intelligence easier to understand by recasting it as a new, cheap commodity--predictions. It's a brilliant move. I found the book incredibly useful.

Kevin Kelly

Co-Founder/Wired

An absolutely brilliant mind. The definition of left and right brain balance!!

Quincy Jones

Musician

Entrepreneurs largely celebrate the end of the dreaded 9-to-5 and are ready to dive headfirst into a world where they call the shots. The End of Jobs argues that rapid advancements in technology and globalization are leveraging points in the accumulation of wealth, meaning and freedom. This eye-opening book will give reluctant entrepreneurs the nudge they need, with sobering statistics on why the century-long growth in wages stopped in 2000, and why MBAs and JDs can't land jobs, let alone pay off their significant debt.

Sujan Patel

Co-Founder/Web Profits

A plethora of insights about nature and ourselves, revealed by one man's journey as he comes to terms with human exploitation of our planet.

James Hansen

Former Director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies

Every company – and every country – must succeed at digitalization to compete successfully in the 21st century. Winston Ma delivers a rare book that is both an outstanding survey of a fast-changing and vitally important economic landscape and a delightful ‘field guide’ that will enrich your understanding of what’s really happening on the ground.

Dominic Barton

CEO/McKinsey

Nadella is using this season to learn more in a variety of subjects. By the looks of it, he is interested in, among other things, virtual reality, the refugee crisis, and housing for the urban poor.

Satya Nadella

CEO/Microsoft

Anybody who thinks the Chinese just copy or steal technology from the West should read this book and think again. Jack Ma is part Bill Gates, part Steve Jobs, part Larry Page, part Sergey Brin, and part Mark Zuckerberg, all rolled into one.

Sir Martin Sorrell

CEO/WPP

Capital sparked a fantastic global discussion this year about inequality. Piketty kindly spent an hour discussing his work with me before I finished my review. As I told him, although I have concerns about some of his secondary points and policy prescriptions, I agree with his most important conclusions: inequality is a growing problem and that governments should play a role in reducing it. I admire his work and hope it draws in more smart people to study the causes of, and cures for, inequality.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Rifkin poses that the plummeting costs of doing business, brought on by dramatic increases in productivity and the Internet, are driving us toward a hybrid economy of capitalist market and "collaborative commons"--a place where shareable value is as important as exchange value.

Michael Dell

CEO/Dell

The Prosperity Paradox has the power to transform our thinking about philanthropy and social good. Aswe continue to grapple with how to lift people out of poverty, Clay Christensen, Efosa Ojomo and KarenDillon provide a new and innovative solution for millions of people around the world. It's a must-readfor anyone with an interest in global affairs who wants to create a truly thriving society.

Arianna Huffington

Founder/Thrive Global

In a 2009 interview with Knowledge@Wharton, he explained how Anderson's ideas were helping Haier transition from traditional manufacturer to information-based service provider.

Zhang Ruimin

CEO/Haier Group

My favourite book in 2018 was HEDGE by Nicolas Colin. The book resonated with me in many ways, but the two most important angles would be:

As a corporate strategist in the fintech vertical, the book has captured my imagination by surfacing a few important paradigm shifts, such as the rise of the multitude as a power structure in the corporate value-chain (end-users are now both consumers and suppliers), the implications of increasing returns to scale to business models, and the imperative of reinventing consumer finance and insurance based on how people will live and work in the future (more hunting, less settling, changing jobs faster, the new reality of continuous risks that are now part of people’s lives). As I grasped with this perspective, and then re-assessed the current fintech landscape, it gave me a new theory about the startups that might be the winners in this space – because there’s a difference between radical reinvention of finance and the simple digitization of it, by applying a layer of tech on top of existing practices.

Personally, the book resonated with me mostly by flagging the asymmetry between today’s job market realities (people hunt more and the career is re-defined as a series of gigs across the world), versus the policymakers’ failure to grasp with these new realities and create new institutions that are designed to remove the friction that comes with this unprecedented geographical and economic dynamism. Having changed countries twice in the past 2 years, I experienced first-hand the downside of economic-hunting and the failure of the current societal infrastructure to serve us – from banking services, to housing, to governmental institutions. But this vacuum creates opportunity, especially for existing or future entrepreneurs as the book clearly illustrates, and this opportunity is what has been keeping me up at night, lately.

Dan Colceriu

Creator/Strategy, Digested newsletter

The Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living since the Civil War: This book was a grind, but it had a lot of good stuff in it. It’s only 784 pages so it took more than a day to read it. If you are trying to understand what is going on in the current American economy, and why the future will not look like the past, this is a good place to start.

Brad Feld

Co-Founder/Foundry Group

Howard Marks’s Mastering the Market Cycle is a must-read, because the cycles covered in this book are important and because Howard is one of the investing greats of his generation.

Ray Dalio

Founder/Bridgewater Associates

Which books should be read by every single intelligent person on planet? [...] The Wealth of Nations (Smith) [to learn that capitalism is an economy of greed, a force of nature unto itself]. If you read all of the above works you will glean profound insight into most of what has driven the history of the western world.

Neil deGrasse Tyson

Astrophysicist, Author & Science Communicator

It took me 15 days to read all 1,165 pages of this monstrosity that chronicles the rise of Robert Moses. I was 20 years old. It was one of the most magnificent books I’ve ever read. Moses built just about every other major modern construction project in New York City. The public couldn’t stop him, the mayor couldn’t stop him, the governor couldn’t stop him, and only once could the President of the United States stop him. But ultimately, you know where the cliché must take us. Robert Moses was an asshole. He may have had more brain, more drive, more strategy than other men, but he did not have more compassion. And ultimately power turned him into something monstrous.

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

As for business, my favorite would be Good Strategy / Bad strategy by Richard Rumelt. When you read a title like this, you most likely end up wondering whether it is going to be another strategy book loaded with buzz words but lacking in articulate content. Well, this one clearly delivers. It paints an accurate picture of the problem surrounding strategy and explains why there’s so much bad strategy all around us. What a CEO or entrepreneur will find extra useful is the fact that the book also exposes what you need to do in order to create good strategies.

Radu Marcusu

CEO/Upswing

An invaluable resource for making sense of the world, making good decisions, and placing smart bets. A fast-paced and fun read jam-packed with useful information on every page. I wish I’d had this book ages ago!

Annie Duke

Author

Recommended by Marvin Liao (Partner/500 Startups)

Source: Book-Talk with Marvin Liao, Partner at 500 Startups, Avid Reader & Tsundoku

A standout for me this year was Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China, by Evan Osnos. Osnos spent eight years in China as a foreign correspondent, and his book helped me gain insight into today's China through stories of people, some well-known and others ordinary.

Dr. Sue Desmond-Hellmann

CEO/Gates Foundation

Don delivers entertaining and thoughtful insights into the inner workings of the art business, and does so in style! Check for Don's pointers on how to play the quiz of the contemporary art market. Very rewarding reading.

Sergey Skaterschikov

Founder/Skate's Art Market Research

Recommended by Ola Olusoga (Co-founder/Populum)

Source: Interview with Ola Olusoga: How Books Have Guided His Path To Self-Discovery

Allison Schrager’s An Economist Walks Into a Brothel is the best, most readable, most informative, most adventurous, and most entertaining take on risk you will find.

Tyler Cowen

Founder/Marginal Revolution University

Recommended by Bogdana Butnar (Head of Strategy/Poke)

Source: Bogdana Butnar - The Ultimate Books to Read List

It’s incredible how he almost single-handedly took a third world country and built it into a first-world country in one generation.

Will Shu

Founder/Deliveroo

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

Uwe Reinhardt was the moral conscience of our health care system, reminding us with evidence, clarity, and stand-up act humor how it is failing. He was joined in this enterprise by another great health care expert, his wife Mei Cheng. Every health care group craved Reinhardt as their keynote speaker and felt more virtuous after he berated them about the many ways in which they were failing. But he did not want adulation; he wanted things to change. By reading this powerful book and making something in the health system better, we can all honor his legacy.

Drew Altman

President & CEO/Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation

A lively and engaging book on one of the most important topics in the world today. Highly recommended!

Cass R. Sunstein

Author, Former Administrator/Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs

Recommended by Marvin Liao (Partner/500 Startups)

Source: Book-Talk with Marvin Liao, Partner at 500 Startups, Avid Reader & Tsundoku

Gerd Leonhard is most definitely a member of Team Human. Here s his convincing and heartfelt call for the reinstatement of people and purpose into the technology program.

Douglas Rushkoff

Author, Professor of Media Theory and Digital Economics

My next book for A Year of Books is Why Nations Fail by Daron Acemoğlu and James A. Robinson.

This book explores the different kinds of social institutions and incentives that nations have applied to encourage prosperity, economic development and elimination of poverty.

This is a good complement to our last book, Portfolios of the Poor, which focused on how people live in poverty. This one discusses why poverty exists and how to reduce it.

Mark Zuckerberg

CEO/Facebook

Who are the Indian nouveau riche and what do they want? James Crabtree’s The Billionaire Raj will prove the defining work on these questions. It is a must-read for anyone interested in wealth, inequality, India, or the evolution of capitalism.

Tyler Cowen

Author, Economics Professor, Host/Marginal Revolution blog

This is that rarity, a useful book.

Warren Buffett

CEO/Berkshire Hathaway

Recommended by Audrey Russo (President & CEO/Pittsburgh Technology Council)

Source: Audrey Russo, President & CEO of Pittsburgh Technology Council, Has an Active Reading List of 20 Books at a Time

Gang Leader for a Day is loosely related to the themes Better Angels in that it explores what life is like for those who don't live under effective governance. I'm looking forward to reading this and finishing up Better Angels.

Mark Zuckerberg

CEO/Facebook

You might think you don’t want to read a whole book about shipping containers. And Levinson is pretty self-aware about what an unusual topic he chose. But he makes a good case that the move to containerized shipping had an enormous impact on the global economy and changed the way the world does business. And he turns it into a very readable narrative. I won’t look at a cargo ship in quite the same way again.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

I know from personal experience that stepping into the public square to announce that foreign aid is important and effective can be lonely work. Charles Kenny’s elegant book on the impact of aid carefully documents how the quality of life—even in the world’s poorest countries—has improved dramatically over the past several decades. With reams of solid data to support his case, he argues that governments and aid agencies have played an important role in this progress.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Business books come and go, with the times and trends but anything by Peter Drucker, as in the collection of The Essential Drucker.

Audrey Russo

President & CEO/Pittsburgh Technology Council

If you want to get into stock trading or in case you want to become an investor, then I definitely would recommend to read the book I already mentioned and in addition: A Random Walk Down Wall Street by Burton Malkiel.

Michael Hebenstreit

Founder/MH Themes

As for non-fiction, Half the Sky (about crimes against women, especially in the developing world) and Whatever it Takes (about the Harlem Children’s Zone and the work of Geoffrey Canada) both changed my world-view enormously, and I thought they were both super compelling.

Julia Enthoven

Co-Founder/Kapwing

Recommended by Fabrice Grinda (Serial Entrepreneur, Investor)

Source: Serial Entrepreneur & Investor Fabrice Grinda Reads Almost 100 Books Each Year

It's often said that the only constancy in life is change. Cass Sunstein weaves threads from diverse traditions in behavioral science to explain how big shifts get started.

Angela Duckworth

Author

The authors make a case for a future world that is better, not worse, than the one we inherited. That may seem far-fetched given the problems we see flashing across our screens every day. But there is reason for optimism, and it starts and ends with one of my favorite things, technology.

Michael Dell

CEO/Dell

From the very first page I was consumed with an overwhelming imperative: everyone needs to read this book as an act of digital self-defense. With tremendous lucidity and moral courage, Zuboff demonstrates not only how our minds are being mined for data but also how they are being rapidly and radically changed in the process. The hour is late and much has been lost already—but as we learn in these indispensable pages, there is still hope for emancipation.

Naomi Klein

Author

The Complacent Class: The Self-Defeating Quest for the American Dream by Tyler Cowen who is not only one of my favorite authors, he is a personal hero.

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

This novel is the second book in a great saga detailing the intense competition between two shipping magnates and their battle over the gateway to China: the very lucrative island of Hong Kong. Set in the tumultuous period during which the British had seized Hong Kong before it was known as England’s crown jewel, it is an exciting and fun ride detailing Hong Kong as a melting pot of political and economic interests with no shortage of intrigue. It’s a must read for sure.

Alan Pierce

CEO/Ansuz Balder Magni Investments

Sometimes the only way to get the full story is to put yourself into it as an ‘immersion journalist.’ Shane Bauer wanted to know more about for-profit prisons so he got a job in one as a correction officer, or guard, and reports his experiences grippingly while weaving in the social and economic factors that give rise to these horrors. His book reveals much that that we didn’t want to know about but, having learned about, can never forget.

Barbara Ehrenreich

Author

Recommended by Madalina Uceanu (Managing Partner/CareerAdvisor)

Source: HR expert Madalina Uceanu shares with us her favourite books

Katherine Boo spent three years getting to know the people of Annawadi, a slum of about 3,000 people on the edge of a sewage-filled lake in India’s largest city. Her book is a poignant reminder of how much more work needs to be done to address the inequities in the world. But it’s also an uplifting story of people striving to make a life for themselves, sacrificing for their families, and in their own way, being innovative and entrepreneurial in creating a vibrant local economy.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

An important examination on how technology can shape a better future by one of the smartest thinkers on the subject.

Eric Ries

Founder/Long-Term Stock Exchange

Ruimin cites Shirky's book as another example of contemporary thought leadership influencing Haier's direction. In the book, Shirky offers examples of companies which have thrived in the absence of traditional organizational structures. The ideas have clearly influenced Ruimin. He tells strategy business: We used to have a pyramid-style structure for our sales in China. The people in charge of sales had to manage business at the national, provincial, and city levels. After the arrival of the internet age, we realized that under this triangular hierarchical structure, people had a difficult time adapting to the requirements of the times. So we reorganized ourselves as an entrepreneurial platform. We flattened everything out, taking out all the middle management. We decentralized the structure to one with more than 2,800 counties. Each county organization has seven people or fewer.

Zhang Ruimin

CEO/Haier Group

Buffett says that the former secretary of the U.S. Treasury's book about the financial crisis is a must-read for any manager.

Warren Buffett

CEO/Berkshire Hathaway

A simple but in depth guide to economics that isn’t patronising. Always good to know about money & financial systems once you start earning!

Ella Botting

Founder/CyberWomen.co.uk

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

Recommended by Eric Weinstein (Managing Director/Thiel Capital)

Source: Eric Weinstein on Twitter

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

Recommended by Eric Weinstein (Managing Director/Thiel Capital)

Source: Eric Weinstein on Twitter

Recommended by Eric Weinstein (Managing Director/Thiel Capital)

Source: Eric Weinstein on Twitter

Recommended by Marvin Liao (Partner/500 Startups)

Source: Book-Talk with Marvin Liao, Partner at 500 Startups, Avid Reader & Tsundoku

I am currently reading Why Minsky Matters: An Introduction to the Work of a Maverick Economist by Randall Wray. I am an enthusiast of Modern Money Theory and participate in a group interested in financial systems, the nature of money, and economic policy. I am hoping to get closer to the expert level of understanding that others in that group have so that I can contribute more to the discussion. I believe that if we want to make real change in the world, we need to be looking at the most fundamental aspects of our social lives, and there is nothing more fundamental in society than the point system we use to track IOUs between each other.

Lucas Morales

Founder & CEO/Zeall.us

Folks frequently ask “What are the books that changed your life?” If I tell them, they are usually radically disappointed. I find that curious. I just cleared out of an office, and these are books that mattered enough to me to bring home. So here they are.

Eric Weinstein

Managing Director/Thiel Capital

The book is a quick read at just over 200 pages. Although I don’t agree with everything in Hiroshi’s program, I think he has a number of good ideas. He talks about bringing more women into the workforce and encouraging more people to learn and use English. And I would love to see Japanese companies become more innovative -- not just because it will make them more competitive, but because the whole world benefits from great ideas and technologies, whoever invents them.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

It is a summary of the major things Hardin has learned in a lifetime. He is a real thinker. That is a fabulous book [...] I advise you to read it twice (which I did)... because it is the condensed wisdom of a very smart man.

Charlie Munger

Vice Chairman/Berkshire Hathaway

Studwell produces compelling answers to two of the greatest questions in development economics: How did countries like Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and China achieve sustained, high growth? And why have so few other countries managed to do so? His answers come in the form of a simple—and yet hard to execute—formula:

• (1) create conditions for small farmers to thrive,
• (2) use the proceeds from agricultural surpluses to build a manufacturing base focused on exports, and
• (3) nurture both these sectors with financial institutions closely controlled by the government.

The agriculture section of the book was particularly insightful. It provided ample food for thought for me as well as the whole Agriculture team at our foundation. And it left us thinking about whether parts of the Asian model can apply in Africa.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Recommended by Dominic Steil (CTO/Dapps Inc)

Source: Blockchain Books & Myths: Interview with Dominic Steil, CTO of Dapps Inc

Recommended by Eric Weinstein (Managing Director/Thiel Capital)

Source: Eric Weinstein on Twitter

The fact that top-down development methods are great on paper but have not produced benefits ("so far") is a point Easterly has made before, heavily influencing yours truly in the formation his own argument against naive interventionism and the collection of "humanitarians" fulfilling their personal growth and shielding themselves from their conscience... This is more powerful: the West has been putting development ahead of moral issues, patronizingly setting aside the right of the people to decide their own fate, including whether they want these "improvements", hence compounding failure and turning much of development into an agenda that benefits the careers (and angst) of "humanitarians", imperial policies, and, not least, local autocrats *without* any moral contribution. Talking about a sucker problem.

***

To put it in an aphorism, they didn't ask the people if they would rather get respect and no aid rather than aid and no respect.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

Recommended by Sir Martin Sorrell (CEO/WPP)

Source: Books CEOs Will Be Reading This Summer

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

You are a hot shot in a company, though not the boss. You are paid extremely well, but, again you have plenty of bosses above you (say the partners of an investment firm). Is it better than deriving a modest income being your own boss? The counterintuive answer is NO. You will live longer in the second situation, even controlling for diet, lifestyle, and genetic predispositions.

Marmot spent years poring over data; he left no stone unturned and is well read in the general literature on human nature. This idea of people living longer when they exert control over their lives has not spread yet. That people lead longer lives when they trust their neighbors and feel part of a community is far reaching. Just think of the implications on social justice etc. Also think that everything you learn on human preferences and well-being in both economics and medicine is either incomplete (medicine) or bogus (economics).

The book is well written, humorous at times, and rigorous --it reads like a well-translated scientific paper. But it feels that it is just the introduction to a topic. Please, write the continuation.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

Fault Lines provides an excellent analysis of the lessons to be learned from the financial crisis, and the difficult choices that lie ahead. Of the many books written in the wake of our recent economic meltdown, this is the one that gets it right.

George A. Akerlof

Co-author/Animal Spirits and Identity Economics

Recommended by Lucas Morales (Founder & CEO/Zeall.us)

Source: Lucas Morales, Founder & CEO of Zeall.us, Gave Entrepreneurship Its First Shot at the Age of 14

Collier’s latest book is a thought-provoking look at a topic that’s top of mind for a lot of people right now. Although I don’t agree with him about everything—I think his analysis of the problem is better than his proposed solutions—his background as a development economist gives him a smart perspective on where capitalism is headed.

Bill Gates

Founder/Microsoft

As Secretary of the Treasury, Bob Rubin ranked with the best. This drama-packed account of his years on the job should be read by all who are interested in what happens when politics and economics intersect.

Warren Buffett

CEO/Berkshire-Hathaway

I have mixed feelings about The Price of Inequality: How Today’s Divided Society Endangers Our Future by Joseph E. Stiglitz. Stiglitz’s contributions are important in that he really does a good job of articulating the issues of inequality and the economic factors that underlie it. He raises important questions about whether it’s getting harder for people in the U.S. to move up the economic ladder. He makes a pretty rational case for keeping things like the estate tax and for increasing taxes as part of how you close the budget deficit. On these ideas, I found a lot of common ground with Stiglitz. But he seems to think that government is totally benign, and he is very skeptical of the private sector. The private sector’s obligations and its relative contributions to the economy are an interesting topic for discussion. But Stiglitz seems to demonize the category as a whole. I wonder if many of his policy solutions would make things worse by incentivizing business to put even more money and effort into currying favor with Washington.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

I think [Mohamed A. El-Erian] is one of the smartest guys in the world. We’re going to crash... El-Erian is saying the same thing. He’s saying we have less than three years. He’s saying we’re at a T-junction in the economy. A T-junction means the end of the road. We cannot keep doing what we’re doing. Something is going to force us to change. And what [El-Erian is] talking about is the Fed and the central banks, like the European Central Bank, the Bank of Japan, People’s Bank of China. We’re going down. The good news is you make more money on a crash than you do going up.

Robert Kiyosaki

Best-selling Author

This book is highly relevant not only for young professionals but also for any and all professionals, leaders, entrepreneurs- everyone. We are nearing the start of an era known as the ‘fourth industrial revolution’ which is set to fundamentally changing the way we live, work and relate with one another. In this book, Klaus Schwab, who is the Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, provides insights and advice for understanding and thriving in this new era.

Miracle Olatunji

Founder & CEO/OpportuniMe

Recommended by Francisco Perez Mackenna (CEO/Quineñco)

Source: Books CEOs Will Be Reading This Summer

Recommended by Henry Medine (Co-Founder/Space Jam Data)

Source: Henry Medine, Co-Founder of Space Jam Data, Talks About His Favorite Books

Free information sounds great on paper, but it causes all sorts of deep, systemic problems when implemented at scale. For one, it spawns an extremely aggressive and intrusive advertising model. For two, the economics of data collection create a situation where a small number of servers collect all the data and gain terrifying amounts of power…and then inevitably abuse that power (*cough* Facebook). For three, when software eats the world, it generates greater inequality, not less. For four, when all information becomes free, it becomes valueless and meaningless. People feel entitled to start believing whatever they want, since it’s always unclear what information is more valuable than other information. For five–he can keep going… and does.

Mark Manson

Founder/MarkManson.net

The Evolution of Everything by Matt Ridley, one of my favorite authors. I’ve read everything of his, and reread everything of his.

Naval Ravikant

CEO & Co-Founder/AngelList

Here is what I wrote in my endorsement: Emanuel Derman has written my kind of a book, an elegant combination of memoir, confession, and essay on ethics, philosophy of science and professional practice. He convincingly establishes the difference between model and theory and shows why attempts to model financial markets can never be genuinely scientific. It vindicates those of us who hold that financial modeling is neither practical nor scientific. Exceedingly readable.

From the remarks here, people seem to be blaming Derman for not having written the type of books they usually read... They are blaming him for being original! This is very philistinic. This book is a personal essay; if you don't like it, don't read it, there is no need to blame the author for not delivering your regular science reporting. Why don't you go blame Montaigne for discussing his personal habits in the middle of a meditation on war inspired by Plutarch?

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

The physics behind biology, cities, economics and companies. Do they grow, scale and die by the same math equations? New insights that are enlightening and delightful.

Vinod Khosla

Co-Founder/Sun Microsystem

Recommended by Audrey Russo (President & CEO/Pittsburgh Technology Council)

Source: Audrey Russo, President & CEO of Pittsburgh Technology Council, Has an Active Reading List of 20 Books at a Time

Iain Robertson takes a deep dive into the international art market, in an account that is both impressive in its depth and breadth. He explains the processes by which art is created and valued within the socio-economic context of post-war consumerist society, with a painstakingly curated choice of art and artists from around the world and across the centuries. This is a must-read for anyone involved in the art trade, as well as the casual reader curious about how a single painting can be valued at more than $250 million

Sundaram Tagore

Owner/Sundaram Tagore Galleries

I will only recommend you read these books if you are into collaborative & shared resources startups. They talk about the rise of crowd based capitalism - a new way of organizing economic activity that may supplant the traditional corporate-centered model. They allow you to make quick comparisons & brainstorm ideas with the existing peer-to-peer platforms such as Airbnb, Uber, TaskRabbit, China's Didi Kuaidi, and India's Ola.

Erik Cheong

Co-Founder/Park N Parcel

Recommended by Leah Lizarondo (Co-Founder/412 Food Rescue)

Source: Leah Lizarondo, Food Waste Fighter, Talks About the Pleasures of Reading Fiction

Brian Gunia is an expert on negotiating, and he does something unusual here: he offers insights about bargaining that are both novel and useful.

Adam Grant

Author

Recommended by Barack Obama (Former USA President)

Source: Every book Barack Obama has recommended during his presidency

An insightful and well-written book, describing the hard transition of foraging communities in Namibia from relative affluence during the Stone Age to contemporary poverty and misery. Avoiding both modern conceits and romantic fantasies, Suzman chronicles how economics and politics have finally conquered some of the last outposts of hunter-gatherers, and how much humankind can still learn from the disappearing way of life of the most marginalized communities on earth.

Yuval Noah Harari

Historian

It's a history of the world written by an intellectual who lived in the 1300s. It focuses on how society and culture flow, including the creation of cities, politics, commerce and science.

While much of what was believed then is now disproven after 700 more years of progress, it's still very interesting to see what was understood at this time and the overall worldview when it's all considered together.

Mark Zuckerberg

CEO/Facebook

"My father recommended this book long ago,” says Nadella of the 1944 classic by a Hungarian-American writer who chronicles the development of England’s market economy and argues that society should drive economic change.

Satya Nadella

CEO/Microsoft

Smil is one of my favorite authors, and this is his masterpiece. He lays out how our need for energy has shaped human history—from the era of donkey-powered mills to today’s quest for renewable energy. It’s not the easiest book to read, but at the end you’ll feel smarter and better informed about how energy innovation alters the course of civilizations.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

An autobiography of Nobel laureate Herbert A. Simon, a remarkable polymath who more people should know about. In an age of increasing specialization, he’s a rare generalist — applying what he learned as a scientist to other aspects of his life. Crossing disciplines, he was at the intersection of “information sciences.” He won the Nobel for his theory of “bounded rationality,” and is perhaps best known for his insightful quote “A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”

Charlie Munger

Vice Chairman/Berkshire Hathaway

Ruimin mentions Schumpeter's classic in the course of explaining Haier's philosophy on innovation. In a sentence, Ruimin says, that philosophy is: "Never follow only a single road."

Diving deeper, Ruimin refers to Schumpeter's definition of innovation in Business Cycles: "The reorganization of the factors of production." Here's what that means, from Ruimin's perspective: Generally speaking, your company and your competitors have access to the same resources. So the ongoing challenge of innovation is finding new ways to differentiate yourself, given the comparable access to those resources (talent, cash, raw materials).

"It's like poker. Everyone has the same number of cards," Ruimin tells strategy business. "It's how you play your hand that matters."

Zhang Ruimin

CEO/Haier Group

Mervyn King asks, ‘Why has almost every industrialized country found it difficult to overcome the stagnation that followed the financial crisis in 2007–2008, and why did money and banking, the alchemists of a market economy, turn into its Achilles heel?’ He addresses these questions, and much more. For those endeavoring to understand the greatest financial crisis of our time and the future of finance, this highly provocative book is a must-read.

Alan Greenspan

Former Chairman/Federal Reserve of the United States

The title is a question that seems to get more attention every year. The authors are good about not pointing fingers but instead talking about how America’s labor market affects the cost of college. My view is that as long as there’s a scarcity of college graduates, a college degree will be quite valuable. So people will pay more to get one. And if they will pay more, then colleges and universities—whose labor is provided mostly by people who paid a lot for their own degrees—can ask for more. Until you get an excess supply of graduates, then you don’t really get any price competition.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

People vote with their wallet --particularly when they do it a second time, when they REpurchase. Those who believe in the "revelation of preferences" should note that there are books one buys again when a copy is lost --particularly when they are read cover to cover.

I am buying another copy of this book as mine was lost or misplaced. That should speak volumes.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

This was the most important book I read this year. It’s the only one I framed a passage from to put on my wall. It was the only one I thought was so good I bought for multiple other people this year (it also inspired the one piece of writing I am most proud of this year). Cowen’s books have always been thought provoking, but this one changes how you see the future and help explain real pain points in our new economy–both good and bad. Although much of what Cowen proposes will be uncomfortable, he has a tone that borders on cheerful. I think that’s what makes this so convincing and so eye opening. A hollowing out is coming and you’ve got to prepare yourself (and our institutions) as best you can.

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

Very useful book, particularly in what concerns alternative L-Stable distributions. True, not too versed in financial theory but I'd rather see the author erring on the side of more physics than mathematical economics. As an author I don't ask much from books, just to deliver what they indend. This one does.

Clear historical description of Einstein/Bachelier. Hopefully one day we will call derivatives pricing the Bachelier valuation.

The book in short provides an excellent perspective on the statistical approach to asset price dynamics. Very clear and to the point.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

There are two methods to consider in a risky strategy.

1) The first is to know all parameters about the future and engage in optimized portfolio construction, a lunacy unless one has a god-like knowledge of the future. Let us call it Markowitz-style. In order to implement a full Markowitz- style optimization, one needs to know the entire joint probability distribution of all assets for the entire future, plus the exact utility function for wealth at all future times. And without errors! (I have shown that estimation errors make the system explode.)

2) Kelly's method (or, rather, Kelly-Thorpe), developed around the same period, which requires no joint distribution or utility function. It is very robust. In practice one needs to estimate the ratio of expected profit to worst- case return-- dynamically adjusted to avoid ruin. In the case of barbell transformations, the worst case is guaranteed (leave 80% or so of your money in reserves). And model error is much, much milder under Kelly criterion. So, assuming one has the edge (as a sole central piece of information), engage in a dynamic strategy of variable betting, getting more conservative after losses ("cut your losses") and more aggressive "with the house's money". The entire focus is the avoidance of gambler's ruin.

The first strategy was only embraced by academic financial economists --empty suits without skin in the game -- because you can make an academic career writing BS papers with method 1 much better than with method 2. On the other hand EVERY SURVIVING speculator uses explicitly or implicitly method 2 (evidence: Ray Dalio, Paul Tudor Jones, Renaissance, even Goldman Sachs!) For the first method, think of LTCM and the banking failure.

Let me repeat. Method 2 is much, much, much more scientific in the true sense of the word, that is rigorous and applicable. Method 1 is good for "job market papers" . Now this book presents all the major papers for the second line of thinking. It is almost exhaustive; many great thinkers in Information theory and probability (Ed Thorpe, Leo Breiman, T M Cover, Bill Ziemba) are represented... even the original paper by Bernouilli.

Buy 2 copies, just in case you lose one. This book has more meat than any other book in decision theory, economics, finance, etc...

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

Recommended by Bogdana Butnar (Head of Strategy/Poke)

Source: Bogdana Butnar - The Ultimate Books to Read List

I've been meaning to read this book for a while, and after I did I bought copies for everyone at my company (since we produce books and other kinds of content). In the book, Seabrook explains how just a few men and women are responsible for producing nearly every hit song you hear on the radio, see on YouTube or listen to on Spotify. He explains the economics of the music industry in a way that allows you to understand why music is the way that is today (the good parts and the bad parts). As someone who tends to listen to songs on repeat while I write--usually bad songs--it was interesting to hear how many of them were made. My only gripe: He neglects a couple people I would have liked to hear more about like Sia and Linda Perry who are just as prolific as Dr. Luke and Max Martin.

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

Sabin chronicles the public debate about whether the world is headed for an environmental catastrophe. He centers the story on Paul Ehrlich and Julian Simon, who wagered $1,000 on whether human welfare would improve or get worse over time. Without ridiculing either proponent, Sabin shows how their extreme views contributed to the polarized debate over climate change and other issues that continues today.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

I read this book twice. The first time, I thought that it was excellent, the best compendium of ideas of social science by arguably the best thinker in the field. I took copious notes, etc. I agreed with its patchwork-style approach to rational decision making. I knew that it had huge insights applicable to my refusal of general theories [they don't work], rather limit ourselves to nuts and bolts [they work].

Then I started reading it again, as the book tends to locate itself by my bedside and sneaks itself in my suitcase when I go on a trip. It is as if the book wanted me to read it. It is what literature does to you when it is at its best. So I realized why: it had another layer of depth --and the author distilled ideas from the works of Proust, La Rochefoucault, Tocqueville, Montaigne, people with the kind of insights that extend beyond the ideas, and that makes you feel that a reductionist academic treatment of the subject will necessary distort it [& somehow Elster managed to combine Montaigne and Kahneman-Tversky]. So as an anti-Platonist I finally found a rigorous treatment of human nature that is not Platonistic --not academic (in the bad sense of the word).

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

Recommended by Eric Weinstein (Managing Director/Thiel Capital)

Source: Eric Weinstein on Twitter

There are lots of books on aspiring to something. Very little are from actual people who aspired, achieved, and lost it. With each and every successful move that he made, Jim Paul, who made it to Governor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, was convinced that he was special, different, and exempt from the rules. Once the markets turned against his trades, he lost it all — his fortune, job, and reputation. That’s what makes this book a critical part in understanding how letting arrogance and pride get to your head is the beginning of your unraveling. Learn from stories like this instead of by your own trial and error. Think about that next time you believe you have it all figured out. (Tim Ferriss recently produced the audiobook version of this, which I recommend.)

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

On the other side of things, which is a bit more like inspirational and a bit more tactical, it would probably be Rise of the Robots. Focuses all on the rise of artificial intelligence. Has some really interesting pieces on how people are disrupting in a bunch of different verticals for like ED Tech, health, 3D printing, and a bunch of other areas, and the impact that that has on jobs in the future. I love those two books at the moment.

Matthew Barby

Global Head of Growth and SEO/HubSpot

Dianne Dumanoski understands, as few have, the scale of the changes coming at us from our warming planet, and the scale of the changes we must make in return. A timely book, and a deep one.

Bill McKibben

Founder/350.org

I love history and am very curious how South East Asia economies are dominated by only fifty families whose interests range from banking to real estate, shipping to sugar, gambling to lumber etc. It is so amazing to know how all these groups of entrepreneurs overcome both political and economic challenges by turning it into opportunity, grow their business and becoming who they are today.

Erik Cheong

Co-Founder/Park N Parcel

Another great book I read recently was The Quest, by Daniel Yergin. For anyone interested in the dynamics shaping our energy future and all of the innovation around energy, it’s a fantastic book. In addition to my review of his book, I’ve also posted a response from the author to the follow-up questions I had about the important topics covered in his book.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Although we tend to elect leaders that we believe know better and follow them hoping for a better future, better life & a safer life. Surprisingly in many cases the wisdom of the crowd has proven to be more accurate than most of our smartest leaders. The message for me is to learn to listen to the people and to learn from them assuming you know nothing with that you will learn a lot!

Nadia Al Sheikh

Founder/Deal’n

An academic exploration of how coveted legal, financial, and consulting jobs are filled, which is frustratingly unfair and tipped in favor of the wealthy. But every chapter offers lessons that any job seeker can benefit from. I reworked my resume because of this book. I interview candidates more thoughtfully now, too.

Angela Pham

Content Strategist/Facebook

Recommended by Barack Obama (Former USA President)

Source: Barack Obama on Facebook

Recommended by Jeff Tan (Peak Performance Pilot/REV Inspires)

Source: Jeff Tan, Peak Performance Pilot at REV Inspires, Shares the Readings that Inspired Him to Dare

Recommended by Barack Obama (Former USA President)

Source: Every book Barack Obama has recommended during his presidency

It's mind-blowing that almost half the world — almost 3 billion people — live on $2.50 a day or less. More than one billion people live on $1 a day or less.

This book explains how these families invest their money to best support themselves.

I hope reading this provides some insight into ways we can all work to support them better as well.

Mark Zuckerberg

CEO/Facebook

A more centric version of Flashpoints: The Emerging Crisis in Europe (or the other way around).

Bobby Voicu

Founder/the CEO Library

A remarkable biography of one of my personal heroes: Chuck Feeney. This is probably the book that’s inspired me most in my professional career.

Rand Fishkin

Founder/Moz

The other book that I have given hundreds of copies to is Free to Choose by Milton Friedman. It kind of lays out why the private sector is really the answer to a lot of problems that we have and not government. I think it’s a real great philosophic kind of a book about how to approach our problems, if it is education, if it is economic growth, all of those various kinds of different issues. He lays it out. It’s a very simple book to read, but it is very good and it makes an impact on your when you read it.

Arnold Schwarzenegger

Actor, Politician & Businessman

One of Smil’s books makes my list of favorites pretty much every year. This time it’s his look at the world’s use of materials, from silicon to wood to plastic and cement. If anyone tries to tell you we’re using fewer materials, send him this book. With his usual skepticism and his love of data, Smil shows how our ability to make things with less material—say, soda cans that need less aluminum—makes them cheaper, which actually encourages more production. We’re using more stuff than ever.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Recommended by Dominic Steil (CTO/Dapps Inc)

Source: Blockchain Books & Myths: Interview with Dominic Steil, CTO of Dapps Inc

I will only recommend you read these books if you are into collaborative & shared resources startups. They talk about the rise of crowd based capitalism - a new way of organizing economic activity that may supplant the traditional corporate-centered model. They allow you to make quick comparisons & brainstorm ideas with the existing peer-to-peer platforms such as Airbnb, Uber, TaskRabbit, China's Didi Kuaidi, and India's Ola.

Erik Cheong

Co-Founder/Park N Parcel

Robert Kuok's Memoir - biography of a Malaysian born business magnate and investor who made his fortunes building commodity empires and international hotel brands. It’s interesting to read up on the way he approached business in this part of the world (Asia) and how they had the general economic foresight to spot opportunities (and disasters).

Jack Wong

Co-Founder/Shoe Mo

Inside story of how Britain decided to exit the EU. Economic self-destruction or national liberation? Repercussions to play out for decades.

Marc Andreessen

Co-Founder/Andreessen Horowitz

The Age of Migration has been the main textbook for migration studies since it first appeared in 1993; I have relied on it both as a resource for my own research and a text for my upper-division undergraduate and graduate courses on the politics of immigration. The fifth edition continues the excellent coverage of migration theories and history, the politics of immigration, and issues such as race and ethnicity, while bringing in new material on topics like the impact of climate change. The authors are to be commended for addressing critical issues in a time of global change.

Terri E. Givens

PhD/Department of Government,University of Texas at Austin

Reading Keynes will make you smarter about securities and markets, I'm not sure reading most economists would do the same.

Warren Buffett

CEO/Berkshire Hathaway

Escape from Freedom examines what happened to the human psyche when we went from a medieval caste system to the modern world. As we gained freedom from all sorts of oppressions, we also got detached from a predictable and safe role in society. That anxiety is often difficult to cope with, especially when things don’t turn out the way we aspired to. Fromm argues that we need to balance this freedom from with just as much freedom to. Positive freedom, not just negative freedom.

The book was written in 1941 and obviously colored by the rise of fascism and the world wars. But it’s message is as timely today, in an age of populism and unease. It draws a compelling connection between the loss of identity and belonging with the appeal of authoritarian figures. That it’s a human response to turn away from freedom when that freedom turns life into anxiety and disappointment. So from Trump to Erdogan, there’s strong public support.

David Heinemeier Hansson

Co-Founder/Basecamp

I'm glad I didn't have to do the job that these three ‘fire chiefs’ did. I learned much from this book I had not previously known. Its cautions for the future should be required reading for all policy makers.

Warren Buffett

Investor, CEO/Berkshire Hathaway

The problem is that modern society requires community engagement to function well. When everyone is just off doing their own thing, a lot of institutions and social necessities begin to fall apart. My own takeaway from this, having studied human happiness for years, is that people rely on a sense of community and shared effort to maintain healthy and stable lives. The fact that people are opting out of these opportunities for community and local impact, in a ceaseless obsession of online media and global fame, likely explains a lot of the social changes going on today. And a lot of the drops in mental health, as well.

Mark Manson

Founder/MarkManson.net

My favorite non-business book is Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power by Jon Meacham because I am a history nut, and I am fascinated by Thomas Jefferson.

Ken Coleman

Host/The Ken Coleman Show

One of the author, Baz, gave me a copy of this book when it came out and it went to sleep in my library as I was not in a finance mood. I forgot about it until this week as I was stuck on a problem related to risk-neutral pricing and the Girsanov theorem concerning changes in probability measure. I looked at every passage on the the subject until I hit on it. Then I realized that I should have read it before: it is a condensed, but extremely deep , and complete exposition of the subject of theoretical finance.

No financial book has the clarity of this text. Other quant books do not have such notions as "pricing kernel" and economic theoretical matters.

I would recommend it as a necessary piece of the "quant" toolkit. Every quant should have it as a background tool as the usual quant literature is standalone and devoid of these concepts.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

All over the world, elite institutions from governments to media to academia are losing their authority and monopoly control of information to dynamic amateurs and the broader public. This book, until now only in samizdat (and Kindle) form, has been my #1 handout for the last several years to anyone seeking to understand this unfolding shift in power from hierarchies to networks in the age of the Internet.

Marc Andreessen

Co-Founder/Andreessen Horowitz

One of the key factors that impact our quality of life is our finances. This book is relevant to the concerns and questions that myself and fellow young professionals have as we enter or navigate our lives and careers in our 20s and beyond!

Miracle Olatunji

Founder & CEO/OpportuniMe

It’s a highly readable account for anyone who wants to know more about Chris [Murray’s] work and why it matters. As Smith says, it is ‘the story of a huge independent effort, years in preparation, to do nothing less than chart everything that threatens the health of everyone on Earth, and make that information publicly available to doctors, health officials, political leaders, and private citizens everywhere.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

"Second Chance" - a book written by Robert Kiyosaki in 2014/2015 has also created a huge impact on me in that by having the real financial education, we, the human being, have the power to choose what we want in our lives. We work not because we have but we choose to and that's the key. In the end, the word is "Choice!"

Jack H. M. Wong

Trainer & Author

Democracy for Realists is an eye-opening and sober look at the data on democracy and what makes it effective/ineffective. Hint: people are stupid.

Mark Manson

Founder/MarkManson.net

I’m especially interested in the central question that Doris Kearns Goodwin raises in The Bully Pulpit. How does social change happen? Can it be driven by a single inspirational leader, or do other factors have to lay the groundwork first? Sometimes a single leader can make a big difference: In the field of global health, Jim Grant almost single-handedly created a global constituency for children, sparking a movement to double vaccination rates and save millions of lives. But Roosevelt’s case was different. Although he tried to push through a number of political reforms earlier in his career, he wasn’t really successful until journalists at McClure’s and other publications had rallied public support for change.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

I don't have time for a full review for now; all I have to say is that we have the account of a person who says it the way it was, revealing the types of truths that don't fit the New York Times and others pawns. When history is written, this will be used, not the spin by the bankers' slaves and soldiers (Geithner, Rubin et al.) Bravo Sheila!

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur

This year’s fierce election battle prompted me to pick up this 2014 book, by an Oxford University scholar who has studied political leadership—good, bad, and ugly—for more than 50 years. Brown shows that the leaders who make the biggest contributions to history and humanity generally are not the ones we perceive to be “strong leaders.” Instead, they tend to be the ones who collaborate, delegate, and negotiate—and recognize that no one person can or should have all the answers. Brown could not have predicted how resonant his book would become in 2016.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

She’s talking about how business schools teach students, the best and brightest business students in America and the world, they teach them to manipulate the stock market, not to grow businesses. That’s why I dropped out of business school. They’re teaching kids to be financial engineers, which creates derivatives, and all these toxic things. Student loan debt and all this. But they don’t teach them how to grow a business. Today our stock market is propped up because CEOs are using debt to prop up the stock price and sell their options and exit. It screws the investors and the workers. That’s what they’re teaching at business school today.

Robert Kiyosaki

Best-selling Author

There’s a guy who I just had on my podcast, Mark Deresiewicz, who wrote a book called Excellent Sheep. He was a Yale professor, and took a look at the essentially what was wrong with higher education, at these elite institutions, primarily places like Amherst and Yale and Harvard. And one of the things he said is that we’re breeding excellent sheep. You’ve got 31 flavors of vanilla.
These kids are so obsessed with essentially achievement for its own sake, not fulfillment or meaning, but rather achievement for its own sake, so they can get into a great – become rich doctors or lawyers, or consultants or investment bankers. And even that becomes an extension of what they’ve been doing their whole life, which was hey, I want to please my boss, jump through these loopholes and be in an elite person. And it’s an interesting book. But one of the things he talked about was that these elite institutions are – there’s a feeder system of about 100 high schools in this country, about 100 high schools, and that’s it, that provide students to these universities. So something like QuestBridge is desperately needed, so that we can create an equality of opportunity. That’s always what it is, right?

Bryan Callen

Co-Host/The Fighter and the Kid

Recommended by Barack Obama (Former USA President)

Source: Every book Barack Obama has recommended during his presidency

Recommended by Richard Branson (Founder/Virgin Group)

Source: My top 65 books to read in a lifetime

Recommended by Barack Obama (Former USA President)

Source: Every book Barack Obama has recommended during his presidency

Older biographies are better in my experience. This one is 50+ years old and that’s right in the sweet spot. It didn’t have to be trendy, it didn’t have to psychoanalyze, it didn’t have to be political correct or controversial. It just had to be a sweeping, conclusive picture of the man. Modern enough to be historically accurate, old enough to still have respect for ambition. No question, this is a big book but I learned a lot. For instance, I had no idea that Edison had been mostly deaf (and that that deafness fueled and improved many of his sound inventions). I didn’t know about his friendship with Henry Ford or what a shrewd businessman Edison was. If you like big biographies, read this.

Ryan Holiday

Founder/Brass Check

I just finished reading The Most Powerful Idea in the World: A Story of Steam, Industry and Invention by William Rosen. It focuses on the Industrial Revolution basically from the Newcomen atmospheric engine in 1712 to the Stephen Rocket Locomotive in 1850. It does a great job of explaining how thousands of innovations were driven during this period by many elements coming together: increased literacy, patents, societies, scientist/tinkerers, the cotton industry, trade/shipping, measurement, etc. It is a great book although its helps to have an interest in how steam engines actually work since it chronicles how they changed over time in some depth. This book is very worthwhile, and I’ll have more to say about it also in a longer review.

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Recommended by Marvin Liao (Partner/500 Startups)

Source: Book-Talk with Marvin Liao, Partner at 500 Startups, Avid Reader & Tsundoku

Liveris has taken a liking to "Australia’s Second Chance" no doubt out of interest in his mother country.

Andrew Liveris

CEO/Dow

This stimulating book provides a major new interpretation of the alliance between egalitarian social movements and partisan politics to achieve some of the most notable liberal victories in the American past. Sean Wilentz has done more than anyone else to blend social and political history in a manner that offers powerful new insights.

James M. McPherson

Pulitzer Prize Winner & Author of Battle Cry of Freedom

It's a heart-wrenching but eye-opening look at the safe ways America looks back at slavery and its impact on modern capitalism. During an election cycle focused on populism and anger, this is a book every American should read.

Cory Ondrejka

VP of Engineering/Facebook

When consulting firm McKinsey and Co. asked a group of CEOs in July what was on their reading list this summer, the two titles on Dimon’s to-read list were The Conservative Heart: How to Build a Fairer, Happier, and More Prosperous America, by American Enterprise Institute president Arthur C. Brooks and Ronald Reagan, by Slate Group chairman Jacob Weisberg.

Jamie Dimon

CEO/JPMorgan Chase

Recommended by Marvin Liao (Partner/500 Startups)

Source: Book-Talk with Marvin Liao, Partner at 500 Startups, Avid Reader & Tsundoku

Maggie Mahar had the courage to take a look at what was behind all of this religious belief in markets. Clearly I do not understand how she was able to work as a journalist when she has the attitude and mindset of a truth-seeker. I spent some time looking at the difference between her book and Lowenstein's: not even possible to start comparing. One needs to be a trader to value her work.

Read this book now; wait a while then read it again.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Flaneur