An authoritative exposé of the mysterious and potentially dangerous world of private equityFew people realize that the top private equity firms, such as Blackstone Group, Carlyle Group, and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, have become the nation’s largest employers through the businesses they own. Using leveraged buyouts that load their acquired companies with loans, private equity firms have generated more than $1 trillion in new debt—which will come due just when these b...

An insightful and devastating account of how Wall Street lost its way from an insider who experienced the culture of Goldman Sachs first-hand.On March 14, 2012, more than three million people read Greg Smith's bombshell Op-Ed in the New York Times titled "Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs." The column immediately went viral, became a worldwide trending topic on Twitter, and drew passionate responses from former Fed chairman Paul Volcker, legendary General Electric CEO...

Top economist Gary Shilling shows you how to prosper in the slow-growing and deflationary times that lie aheadWhile many investors fear a rapid rise in inflation, author Gary Shilling, an award-winning economic forecaster, argues that the global economy is going through a long period of de-leveraging and weak growth, which makes deflation far more likely and a far greater threat to investors than inflation. Shilling explains in clear language and compelling logic w...

An award-winning reporter chronicles the calamitous story of Washington Mutual, the single-largest bank failure in American history, in this fast-paced, compelling, and gripping saga of greed and excess.During the most dizzying days of the financial crisis, Washington Mutual, a bank with hundreds of billions of dollars in its coffers, suffered a crippling bank run. The story of its final, brutal collapse in the autumn of 2008, and its controversial sale to JPMorgan...

BP - Where did it all go wrong? is a quick-read business biography; it is a history and current breakdown of British Petroleum. The book introduces the reader to BP, how the company was formed, the chequered past it has, and discusses the recent disaster of one of the biggest oil spills in history. The book is skillfully written by Paul Andrews, who interprets many of the more advanced technological points, and explains them to the reader in more readable, plain English. The book asks - an...

“A rich history of a company whose cars, for better and worse, have touched millions of lives, a character study of a brilliant but deeply flawed leader, and a case study in how a corporate culture can turn toxic.” —Bethany McLean, New York Times Book ReviewFaster, Higher, Farther chronicles a corporate scandal that rivals those at Enron and Lehman Brothers—one that will cost Volkswagen more than $22 billion in fines and settlements. Through metic...

How Excessive Risk Destroyed Lehman and Nearly Brought Down the Financial Industry“Uncontrolled Risk will ruffle feathers—and for good reason—as voters and legislators learn the diffi cult lessons of Lehman’s collapse and demand that we never forget them.”Dr. David C. Shimko, Board of Trustees, Global Association of Risk Professionals“Uncontrolled Risk is a drama as gripping as any work of fiction. Williams’s recomm...

After carving up the once lovingly cared-for downtowns of Small Town America, Wal-Mart launched a frontal assault on mom-and-pop businesses all over the globe. With 1.5 million employees operating more than 3,500 stores, Wal-Mart is now the world's largest private employer. In this third edition of How Wal-Mart Is Destroying America (and the World), intrepid Texas newspaperman Bill Quinn continues the fight. Featuring detailed accounts of Wal-Mart's questionable business practices...

An expert helps readers understand what the big economic picture means for their money—and how to respond.Today's investors must play an active role in managing their money. This guide introduces the leading U.S. economic indicators and shows how to use them to make better investment decisions.Indicators covered include: national output; employment; consumer reports; housing and construction; and inflation.• The recession: the days of putti...

The global beauty business permeates our lives, influencing how we perceive ourselves and what it is to be beautiful. The brands and firms which have shaped this industry, such as Avon, Coty, Estée Lauder, L'Oréal, and Shiseido, have imagined beauty for us. This book provides the first authoritative history of the global beauty industry from its emergence in the nineteenth century to the present day, exploring how today's global giants grew. It shows how successive generations of entrepr...

The collection of lectures and publications from the Schumacher Center for a New Economics represents some of the foremost voices on a new economics.David Ehrenfeld examines the consequences of "the extraordinary proliferation of administration, of bureaucracy, of management, the increasing percentage of people in our society who control events but do not themselves produce anything real." He gives examples of management that has become itself a raison d'etre, grown far beyond a si...

In the blink of an eye, vast economic forces have created new types of communities and reinvented old ones. In The New Geography, acclaimed forecaster Joel Kotkin decodes the changes, and provides the first clear road map for where Americans will live and work in the decades to come, and why. He examines the new role of cities in America and takes us into the new American neighborhood. The New Geography is a brilliant and indispensable guidebook to a funda...