Lords of Finance

> Lords of Finance Oh, yes, great book! And good read. Two things stuck in my mind: A) How slow things were back then. The British finance minister (“Chancellor and Under-Treasurer of Her Majesty's Exchequer”) would get on a steam ship, incognito, for a month or so to visit his counterpart in the US, then skipper back, and months later respond to the crisis. B) How few people saw things coming. People thought the skirmishes that ended up precipitating WW I would soon be over, Irvin Fisher confidently declaimed just before the 1929 stock market crash that “stock prices have reached what appears to be a permanently high plateau”, people didn’t pay much attention to this obscure Adolf Hitler guy. Every time, by the time the true dimensions became obvious, it was too late to do something (flee, sell, ...). With respect to the current “15 cases going down to zero, we are doing great, we have it under control” flu, draw your own conclusions. Edit: typos

If you’re interested in fiat currency and the fed, I highly recommend the book Lords of Finance. The author does a really good job of showing just what central banks do and how their responses to economic events shape outcomes. The book entirely focuses on the Great Depression and the central banks of the USA/Europe but it’s really well written and really helped me appreciate what the fed does.

I recently picked up Tim Geithner's book 'Stress Test' (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IN73B9E) ...but in the first few pages he referenced that HE was recently reading a different book, which sounded more interesting, so now I'm reading that: Liaquat Ahamed - Lords of Finance (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001QIGZEK) ...so far so good; if you're into historical stuff.