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Whoops!: Why everyone owes everyone and no one can pay |  | Author: John Lanchester
Publisher: Allen Lane
List Price: £20.00
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Rating:  25 reviews
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 240
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.5 x 5.4 x 1.1
ISBN: 1846142857
EAN: 9781846142857
Publication Date: January 28, 2010
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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Product Description
There's probably a word in German for that feeling you get when you can understand something while it's being explained to you, but lose hold of the explanation as soon as it stops. A lot of writing about the credit crunch has that effect. This title makes it possible for all of us to grasp how we found ourselves in this predicament.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 25
 The Twist in the Tale! June 30, 2010
Chuck E (UK)
15 out of 16 found this review helpful
John Lanchester takes on the litany of insanity that constitutes orthodox economic theory - the myth of the rational market, the unhinged reliance on such slippery concepts as Value at Risk, the alphabet soup of MBSs, CDOs and CDSs and the conflicts of interest that were justified by the term `free market' (which seems to have become synonymous with `anarchy'). The major players are paraded for ritual humiliation - from the investment banks, to the ratings agencies, the `regulators' and government - all in thrall to a deeply flawed theoretical construct that served their own interests. The neoliberal ideal is ridiculed and exposed as the ideological construct that lay behind the rhetoric. Alan Greenspan is given special pride of place as the high priest of the Randian religion of self-interest.
And then ... just as the laissez-faire creed is lying prostrate on the canvas, after a pasting that makes Rocky Balboa's injuries look superficial, it's allowed to haul itself up on the count of nine and land a sucker punch direct to the chin of Lanchester's argument. It's as if the Donald Sutherland character in Invasion of the Bodysnatchers, who has been on your side all through the film suddenly turns and points the finger directly at you, screeching the high pitched whine of There Is No Alternative. It's as if Superman has turned out to be the bastard offspring of Lex Luther; as if Gary Cooper decides to throw his badge in the dust and hop on the noon train - Lanchester simply ditches his opposition and joins the enemy.
OK, so the bankers are wearing the black hats, but it's you townsfolk that are complicit. You may not have been eligible for social housing, you may have been living with your parents, you may have been prey to the enticements of Kirsty and Phil, you may have believed all (or almost all) of the `expert' opinion telling you that the problems of running modern economies had been solved, but you still made the CHOICE to take out a mortgage. Your wages may have stagnated, but you still listened to the siren bankers calling you to credit card island. Politicians may have been relaxed about the 'filthy rich', newspaper columnists may have been (almost) universally trumpeting the Murdoch mantra, even the BBC may have been co-opted on pain of a licence review - but YOU took the bait.
Then, having apparently slain the dragon of `free markets', Lanchester ends by accepting that orthodox (i.e. neoliberal) solutions are the only game in town. Slashing the public sector, laying off doctors, nurses, teachers and policemen. He doesn't explain how excising these jobs at a time when aggregate demand is already heading off a cliff will lead to anything other than a classic deflationary death spiral. It's as if aliens have wiped the views of Keynes - whom he quotes glowingly throughout - and Krugman from his memory banks. He perpetuates the canard that the public and private sectors are set in opposition, rather than symbiosis. He doesn't say why putting nurses and teachers on the dole will improve the prospects of private sector workers. Nurses and teachers buy cars and houses, furniture and TVs, restaurant meals and groceries - if they stop spending while the private sector remains in the land of the living dead, how does this help the economy in a downturn? How does halting the building of hospitals, schools and roads help laid off construction workers? Yes, borrowing will have to be reined in but, as in 1937, 'Grant us chastity and continence, only not yet.' Of course, Keynes would argue that a synchronised retrenchment of the kind Lanchester accepts as inevitable is the last thing the world economy needs - but by this time he's been airbrushed out of history as cackhandedly as Trotsky in a group shot of the Politburo.
This kind of argument is more insidious than the overt propaganda we get from right-wing economists because, while it parades all the obvious inconsistencies inherent in their economic models, it ends with the same message: THERE IS NO ALTERNATIVE to the dismantling of welfare and open warfare on public services. If I was a Friedmanite I would be smiling in smug satisfaction.
 An enjoyable tubthumping rant May 30, 2010
Stefan43 (Brussels, Belgium)
This is not a neutral calm dispassionate detailed account of the financial crisis. Lanchester is not an economist, and seems to hold the profession in contempt. The book is a bit general and short on detail in places, and contains some silly mistakes (fortunately the UK deficit is not over £160 billion - that would be truly scary - it is the national debt). Rather this book is a polemical rant against banks, which were taken over by mathematicians but totally failed to calculate risk correctly, politicians and regulators who stood by and watched it happen, and also the public, which lapped up the easy credit. Anger drips off every page. Lanchester is an adoring admirer of the Western liberal social-democratic democraties, and considers that everything went wrong when the fall of the Berlin wall led to a 20-year-long victory party of unbridled capitalism. The last chapter is the best, and can be read as a stand-alone: Lanchester's conclusion is quite simply that the Anglo-Saxon brand of capitalism has failed. But an underlying theme is also that our current western standard of living is economically (and environmentally) unsustainable, and that we cannot determine our society on the basis of economics alone, which takes as its premiss that people constantly want more of everything.
A good read but.... May 27, 2010
Tony Alto (UK)
I purchased this book after reading a review of it in a magazine. In depth and done with a light touch was the essence of the review. I certainly found the book readable and a fascinating insight into the appalling issues surrounding the current economic climate of the UK and the World.
However, it is a bit dense in terms of content and presentation with few paragraphs breaking up the content. I did find it neccessary to keep a scrap pad nearby to use to work through the examples quoted.
Given the immense complexity of the financial sectopr I found this book fascinating and for a relative layperson in this area a worthwhile read, if you have an interest in the topic. I finished the book 'a sadder but wiser man!!'
 Excellent Book May 18, 2010
P. MACDONALD
I really did enjoy this book. Its about the right length for a quick read and it touches just enough on the technicals of the credit crunch with generally good explanations (there was just one accounting description which I had some issue with).
Immensely enjoyable, absolutely hit the spot - well written John Lanchester.
Everyone should read this! May 2, 2010
Dave (UK)
An easy to read and enjoyable (except for what the book reveals). The book shows how the UK and US governments and their regulators allowed the financial crisis of the past two years to occur. The banks and associated financial institutions have been carry out ridiculous financial schemes, without any regard for risk or the consequences. Absolute stupidity.
Everybody should read this book and then get their governments to take control and enforce regulation to make sure this cannot occur again.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 25
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