John Lanchester - Whoops! Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay

Details
Hardback

"There's probably a word in German for that feeling you get when you 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: you can grasp it while it's going on, and then as soon as it's over, you can no longer remember the difference between a CDO, a CDS, an MBS, and a toasted cheese sandwich. Whoops! is different. It makes it possible for all of us to grasp how we found ourselves in this predicament. What went wrong? In 2000, the total GDP of Earth--the sum total of all the economic activity on the planet--was $36 trillion. At the start of 2007 it was $70 trillion. Now that growth has gone suddenly and sharply into decline, with an effect roughly resembling that of putting a car into reverse while doing 70 down a motorway. In Whoops! John Lanchester, whose need to understand is as great as anyone's, travels with a cast of characters including reckless banksters, snoozing regulators, complacent politicians, predatory lenders, credit-drunk spendthrifts and innocent bystanders. All modern financial life is here, from a way to lose money on the property market to the difference between how we behave; some of the chief villains of the piece are mathematical equations. Vivid, funny and full of emotion, Whoops! is a book for all of us who want to understand, in a deep and genuine way, what is happening and why we feel the way we do. The perfect book to have with us as we sit among the wreckage and wonder what to do next."--Jacket.

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