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Why Wall Street Matters

by William D. Cohan  · 27 Feb 2017  · 113pp  · 37,885 words

January 2016. And then he paid homage to one of the most recognizable cultural touchstones about modern Wall Street when he referred to the famous “Greed is good” scene in Wall Street, the 1987 Oliver Stone film, where Gordon Gekko, played with oleaginous glee by Michael Douglas, lectures Bud Fox, his young and

Pay Any Price: Greed, Power, and Endless War

by James Risen  · 15 Feb 2014  · 339pp  · 99,674 words

all, Wall Street. He had been Michael Milken’s right-hand man in the heyday of Milken’s famous Beverly Hills trading desk during the “greed is good” era of insider trading in the 1980s. When a hungry federal prosecutor named Rudolph Giuliani went after Milken for insider trading, he tried to get

Adaptive Markets: Financial Evolution at the Speed of Thought

by Andrew W. Lo  · 3 Apr 2017  · 733pp  · 179,391 words

case of monetary gain, we call it capitalism. Our most fundamental reaction to monetary gain is hardwired into human physiology. Apparently, we know it instinctively: greed is good. To explore this notion of greed further, let’s return to Tversky and Kahneman’s prospect theory from chapter 2. The two psychologists discovered that

. But the culture of Homo economicus can sometimes be taken to the extreme, as reflected by one of the most famous lines in movie history: “Greed is good.” In fact, this is a slight adaptation of Michael Douglas’s actual line in the 1987 movie Wall Street, in which Douglas plays the sleazy

No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need

by Naomi Klein  · 12 Jun 2017  · 357pp  · 94,852 words

, but rather the culmination—the logical end point—of a great many dangerous stories our culture has been telling for a very long time. That greed is good. That the market rules. That money is what matters in life. That white men are better than the rest. That the natural world is there

The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans Are Doing Wrong to Get Ahead

by David Callahan  · 1 Jan 2004  · 452pp  · 110,488 words

testing? Growing temptations to cheat have been all the more seductive given the trumpeted morality of the free market. If competition is good—if even greed is good—than maybe questionable cutthroat behavior is also good. In principle, few Americans embrace the idea that "might makes right." In practice, this idea now flourishes

No Such Thing as Society

by Andy McSmith  · 19 Nov 2010  · 613pp  · 151,140 words

voice of the times in the USA. In 1989, Gordon Brown wrote an assessment of Thatcher’s record, to which he gave the title ‘Where Greed is Good’. Yet, having grown up in reasonable comfort, and having married a rich man when she was young, Mrs Thatcher herself was not greedy; the political

13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown

by Simon Johnson and James Kwak  · 29 Mar 2010  · 430pp  · 109,064 words

Title Page Copyright Dedication Introduction: 13 Bankers 1 Thomas Jefferson and the Financial Aristocracy 2 Other People’s Oligarchs 3 Wall Street Rising: 1980– 4 “Greed Is Good”: The Takeover 5 The Best Deal Ever 6 Too Big to Fail 7 The American Oligarchy: Six Banks Epilogue Notes Further Reading Acknowledgments INTRODUCTION 13

status as the paradigmatic bank of the 1980s, the same decade that produced the original Oliver Stone Wall Street movie, with Gordon Gekko’s famous “Greed is good” speech. Looking back, however, Salomon seems so … small. When the Business Week story was written, it had $68 billion in assets and $2.8 billion

7.25 percent, then the dealer only pays the company 0.25 percent (the difference between the floating and fixed rates), or $250,000. 4 “GREED IS GOOD” The Takeover Derivatives have been an extraordinarily useful vehicle to transfer risk from those who shouldn’t be taking it to those who are willing

raider Gordon Gekko (played by Michael Douglas). Although the movie’s story shows the corruption and ultimate downfall of Gekko, it is remembered for his “Greed is good” speech, which justified the pursuit of money above all else. As screenwriter Stanley Weiser wrote recently, many people would later tell him the movie made

perceived as the ultimate door-opener, a respectable way to make money and then, like Robert Rubin, go into public service. The point of the “Greed is good” speech was that by pursuing profits (both for your company and for yourself) you were contributing to the greater good. For college seniors, it was

Too Big to Fail” (lecture, Exchequer Club, Washington, D.C., October 21, 2009), available at http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/tarullo20091021a.htm. CHAPTER 4: “GREED IS GOOD” 1. Reported in Thomas B. Edsall, “Alan Greenspan: The Oracle or the Master of Disaster?” The Huffington Post, February 19, 2009, available at http://www

A Mathematician Plays the Stock Market

by John Allen Paulos  · 1 Jan 2003  · 295pp  · 66,824 words

writing on the board many years ago. (Inspired by a remark by stock speculator Ivan Boesky, Gordon Gecko in the 1987 movie Wall Street stated, “Greed is good.” He misspoke. He intended to say, “e is good.”) Many of the formulas useful in finance are consequences of these two formulas: A = P(1

Fed Up: An Insider's Take on Why the Federal Reserve Is Bad for America

by Danielle Dimartino Booth  · 14 Feb 2017  · 479pp  · 113,510 words

watched the 1987 movie Wall Street. The corporate raider Gordon Gecko, played by a sleek Michael Douglas, was our role model. We adopted his mantra: “Greed is good.” We believed it, having arrived on Wall Street at the height of the dot-com mania. Yahoo went public, making instant millionaires of those who

Extreme Money: Masters of the Universe and the Cult of Risk

by Satyajit Das  · 14 Oct 2011  · 741pp  · 179,454 words

out of the boy. He actually had instructions, probably pinned on the wall: “Nothing from this office should go forth which discredits the capitalist system. Greed is good.”14 Like his mentor, Greenspan was his own splendid creation. Celebrity Central Banking Greenspan reveled in the age of celebrity central bankers: “The only central

Obliquity: Why Our Goals Are Best Achieved Indirectly

by John Kay  · 30 Apr 2010  · 237pp  · 50,758 words

Griftopia: Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and the Long Con That Is Breaking America

by Matt Taibbi  · 15 Feb 2010  · 291pp  · 91,783 words

The Ages of Globalization

by Jeffrey D. Sachs  · 2 Jun 2020

The Future of Capitalism: Facing the New Anxieties

by Paul Collier  · 4 Dec 2018  · 310pp  · 85,995 words

Circle of Greed: The Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Lawyer Who Brought Corporate America to Its Knees

by Patrick Dillon and Carl M. Cannon  · 2 Mar 2010  · 613pp  · 181,605 words

Money: Vintage Minis

by Yuval Noah Harari  · 5 Apr 2018  · 97pp  · 31,550 words

The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory

by Andrew J. Bacevich  · 7 Jan 2020  · 254pp  · 68,133 words

Third World America: How Our Politicians Are Abandoning the Middle Class and Betraying the American Dream

by Arianna Huffington  · 7 Sep 2010  · 300pp  · 78,475 words

Makers and Takers: The Rise of Finance and the Fall of American Business

by Rana Foroohar  · 16 May 2016  · 515pp  · 132,295 words

The Quants

by Scott Patterson  · 2 Feb 2010  · 374pp  · 114,600 words

Pound Foolish: Exposing the Dark Side of the Personal Finance Industry

by Helaine Olen  · 27 Dec 2012  · 375pp  · 105,067 words

How Money Became Dangerous

by Christopher Varelas  · 15 Oct 2019  · 477pp  · 144,329 words

The Enlightened Capitalists

by James O'Toole  · 29 Dec 2018  · 716pp  · 192,143 words

Gilded Rage: Elon Musk and the Radicalization of Silicon Valley

by Jacob Silverman  · 9 Oct 2025  · 312pp  · 103,645 words

The Economics of Enough: How to Run the Economy as if the Future Matters

by Diane Coyle  · 21 Feb 2011  · 523pp  · 111,615 words

Fortunes of Change: The Rise of the Liberal Rich and the Remaking of America

by David Callahan  · 9 Aug 2010

Power Hungry: The Myths of "Green" Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future

by Robert Bryce  · 26 Apr 2011  · 520pp  · 129,887 words

I.O.U.: Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay

by John Lanchester  · 14 Dec 2009  · 322pp  · 77,341 words

Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic

by John de Graaf, David Wann, Thomas H Naylor and David Horsey  · 1 Jan 2001  · 378pp  · 102,966 words

Capitalism: Money, Morals and Markets

by John Plender  · 27 Jul 2015  · 355pp  · 92,571 words

Bourgeois Dignity: Why Economics Can't Explain the Modern World

by Deirdre N. McCloskey  · 15 Nov 2011  · 1,205pp  · 308,891 words

Framing Class: Media Representations of Wealth and Poverty in America

by Diana Elizabeth Kendall  · 27 Jul 2005  · 311pp  · 130,761 words

Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole

by Benjamin R. Barber  · 1 Jan 2007  · 498pp  · 145,708 words

Phishing for Phools: The Economics of Manipulation and Deception

by George A. Akerlof, Robert J. Shiller and Stanley B Resor Professor Of Economics Robert J Shiller  · 21 Sep 2015  · 274pp  · 93,758 words

Hive Mind: How Your Nation’s IQ Matters So Much More Than Your Own

by Garett Jones  · 15 Feb 2015  · 247pp  · 64,986 words

Culture and Prosperity: The Truth About Markets - Why Some Nations Are Rich but Most Remain Poor

by John Kay  · 24 May 2004  · 436pp  · 76 words

The Accidental Investment Banker: Inside the Decade That Transformed Wall Street

by Jonathan A. Knee  · 31 Jul 2006  · 362pp  · 108,359 words

Fed Up!: Success, Excess and Crisis Through the Eyes of a Hedge Fund Macro Trader

by Colin Lancaster  · 3 May 2021  · 245pp  · 75,397 words

Evil Geniuses: The Unmaking of America: A Recent History

by Kurt Andersen  · 14 Sep 2020  · 486pp  · 150,849 words

Competition Overdose: How Free Market Mythology Transformed Us From Citizen Kings to Market Servants

by Maurice E. Stucke and Ariel Ezrachi  · 14 May 2020  · 511pp  · 132,682 words

Defending the Free Market: The Moral Case for a Free Economy

by Robert A. Sirico  · 20 May 2012  · 267pp  · 70,250 words

For Profit: A History of Corporations

by William Magnuson  · 8 Nov 2022  · 356pp  · 116,083 words

Billionaire, Nerd, Savior, King: Bill Gates and His Quest to Shape Our World

by Anupreeta Das  · 12 Aug 2024  · 315pp  · 115,894 words

Cancelling Billionaires Before They Cancel Us: The Urgent Case for a Wealth Tax

by Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks  · 3 Mar 2026  · 291pp  · 83,422 words

The Man Who Broke Capitalism: How Jack Welch Gutted the Heartland and Crushed the Soul of Corporate America—and How to Undo His Legacy

by David Gelles  · 30 May 2022  · 318pp  · 91,957 words

Selfie: How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It's Doing to Us

by Will Storr  · 14 Jun 2017  · 431pp  · 129,071 words

Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work

by Dr. Paul Babiak and Dr. Robert Hare  · 7 May 2007  · 345pp  · 100,135 words

Snakes and Ladders: The Great British Social Mobility Myth

by Selina Todd  · 11 Feb 2021  · 598pp  · 150,801 words

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

by Yuval Noah Harari  · 1 Jan 2011  · 447pp  · 141,811 words

The Raging 2020s: Companies, Countries, People - and the Fight for Our Future

by Alec Ross  · 13 Sep 2021  · 363pp  · 109,077 words

Don't Be Evil: How Big Tech Betrayed Its Founding Principles--And All of US

by Rana Foroohar  · 5 Nov 2019  · 380pp  · 109,724 words

Blank Space: A Cultural History of the Twenty-First Century

by W. David Marx  · 18 Nov 2025  · 642pp  · 142,332 words

Eat People: And Other Unapologetic Rules for Game-Changing Entrepreneurs

by Andy Kessler  · 1 Feb 2011  · 272pp  · 64,626 words

The Classical School

by Callum Williams  · 19 May 2020  · 288pp  · 89,781 words

Life Inc.: How the World Became a Corporation and How to Take It Back

by Douglas Rushkoff  · 1 Jun 2009  · 422pp  · 131,666 words

Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture

by Ellen Ruppel Shell  · 2 Jul 2009  · 387pp  · 110,820 words

A Classless Society: Britain in the 1990s

by Alwyn W. Turner  · 4 Sep 2013  · 1,013pp  · 302,015 words

Ayn Rand and the World She Made

by Anne C. Heller  · 27 Oct 2009  · 756pp  · 228,797 words

Culture & Empire: Digital Revolution

by Pieter Hintjens  · 11 Mar 2013  · 349pp  · 114,038 words

People, Power, and Profits: Progressive Capitalism for an Age of Discontent

by Joseph E. Stiglitz  · 22 Apr 2019  · 462pp  · 129,022 words

Shape: The Hidden Geometry of Information, Biology, Strategy, Democracy, and Everything Else

by Jordan Ellenberg  · 14 May 2021  · 665pp  · 159,350 words

The Upswing: How America Came Together a Century Ago and How We Can Do It Again

by Robert D. Putnam  · 12 Oct 2020  · 678pp  · 160,676 words

The Wisdom of Frugality: Why Less Is More - More or Less

by Emrys Westacott  · 14 Apr 2016  · 287pp  · 80,050 words

The Asylum: The Renegades Who Hijacked the World's Oil Market

by Leah McGrath Goodman  · 15 Feb 2011  · 553pp  · 168,111 words

The Nanny State Made Me: A Story of Britain and How to Save It

by Stuart Maconie  · 5 Mar 2020  · 300pp  · 106,520 words

Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism: And Other Arguments for Economic Independence

by Kristen R. Ghodsee  · 20 Nov 2018  · 211pp  · 57,759 words

The Cult of We: WeWork, Adam Neumann, and the Great Startup Delusion

by Eliot Brown and Maureen Farrell  · 19 Jul 2021  · 460pp  · 130,820 words

Spite: The Upside of Your Dark Side

by Simon McCarthy-Jones  · 12 Apr 2021

Limitarianism: The Case Against Extreme Wealth

by Ingrid Robeyns  · 16 Jan 2024  · 327pp  · 110,234 words

Big Bucks: The Explosion of the Art Market in the 21st Century

by Georgina Adam  · 14 Jun 2014  · 231pp  · 60,546 words

Rethinking Narcissism: The Bad---And Surprising Good---About Feeling Special

by Dr. Craig Malkin  · 6 Jul 2015  · 259pp  · 67,261 words

How the Mind Works

by Steven Pinker  · 1 Jan 1997  · 913pp  · 265,787 words

The Wisdom of Finance: Discovering Humanity in the World of Risk and Return

by Mihir Desai  · 22 May 2017  · 239pp  · 69,496 words

The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves

by Matt Ridley  · 17 May 2010  · 462pp  · 150,129 words

The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap

by Matt Taibbi  · 8 Apr 2014  · 455pp  · 138,716 words

Keynes Hayek: The Clash That Defined Modern Economics

by Nicholas Wapshott  · 10 Oct 2011  · 494pp  · 132,975 words

Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History

by Kurt Andersen  · 4 Sep 2017  · 522pp  · 162,310 words

WTF?: What's the Future and Why It's Up to Us

by Tim O'Reilly  · 9 Oct 2017  · 561pp  · 157,589 words

Business Lessons From a Radical Industrialist

by Ray C. Anderson  · 28 Mar 2011  · 412pp  · 113,782 words

The Theory of the Leisure Class

by Thorstein Veblen  · 10 Oct 2007  · 395pp  · 118,446 words

The Transformation Of Ireland 1900-2000

by Diarmaid Ferriter  · 15 Jul 2009

The Economists' Hour: How the False Prophets of Free Markets Fractured Our Society

by Binyamin Appelbaum  · 4 Sep 2019  · 614pp  · 174,226 words

Strategy: A History

by Lawrence Freedman  · 31 Oct 2013  · 1,073pp  · 314,528 words

Lab Rats: How Silicon Valley Made Work Miserable for the Rest of Us

by Dan Lyons  · 22 Oct 2018  · 252pp  · 78,780 words

Fantasyland

by Kurt Andersen  · 5 Sep 2017

Chokepoint Capitalism

by Rebecca Giblin and Cory Doctorow  · 26 Sep 2022  · 396pp  · 113,613 words

Everyday Utopia: What 2,000 Years of Wild Experiments Can Teach Us About the Good Life

by Kristen R. Ghodsee  · 16 May 2023  · 302pp  · 112,390 words

As Gods: A Moral History of the Genetic Age

by Matthew Cobb  · 15 Nov 2022  · 772pp  · 150,109 words

Hate Inc.: Why Today’s Media Makes Us Despise One Another

by Matt Taibbi  · 7 Oct 2019  · 357pp  · 99,456 words

Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy

by Adam Jentleson  · 12 Jan 2021  · 400pp  · 108,843 words

Rentier Capitalism: Who Owns the Economy, and Who Pays for It?

by Brett Christophers  · 17 Nov 2020  · 614pp  · 168,545 words

After the New Economy: The Binge . . . And the Hangover That Won't Go Away

by Doug Henwood  · 9 May 2005  · 306pp  · 78,893 words

The Tyranny of Experts: Economists, Dictators, and the Forgotten Rights of the Poor

by William Easterly  · 4 Mar 2014  · 483pp  · 134,377 words

The Second Curve: Thoughts on Reinventing Society

by Charles Handy  · 12 Mar 2015  · 164pp  · 57,068 words

Predictably Irrational, Revised and Expanded Edition: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions

by Dan Ariely  · 19 Feb 2007  · 383pp  · 108,266 words

Zero-Sum Future: American Power in an Age of Anxiety

by Gideon Rachman  · 1 Feb 2011  · 391pp  · 102,301 words

Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right

by Arlie Russell Hochschild  · 5 Sep 2016  · 435pp  · 120,574 words

A Little History of Economics

by Niall Kishtainy  · 15 Jan 2017  · 272pp  · 83,798 words

Brexit, No Exit: Why in the End Britain Won't Leave Europe

by Denis MacShane  · 14 Jul 2017  · 308pp  · 99,298 words

Buy Now, Pay Later: The Extraordinary Story of Afterpay

by Jonathan Shapiro and James Eyers  · 2 Aug 2021  · 444pp  · 124,631 words

Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World

by Malcolm Harris  · 14 Feb 2023  · 864pp  · 272,918 words

The Lonely Century: How Isolation Imperils Our Future

by Noreena Hertz  · 13 May 2020  · 506pp  · 133,134 words

The Rough Guide to New York City

by Rough Guides  · 21 May 2018

Private Equity: A Memoir

by Carrie Sun  · 13 Feb 2024  · 267pp  · 90,353 words

England: Seven Myths That Changed a Country – and How to Set Them Straight

by Tom Baldwin and Marc Stears  · 24 Apr 2024  · 357pp  · 132,377 words

They All Came to Barneys: A Personal History of the World's Greatest Store

by Gene Pressman  · 2 Sep 2025  · 313pp  · 107,586 words

The Irrational Bundle

by Dan Ariely  · 3 Apr 2013  · 898pp  · 266,274 words

Peak Everything: Waking Up to the Century of Declines

by Richard Heinberg and James Howard (frw) Kunstler  · 1 Sep 2007  · 235pp  · 65,885 words

The Impulse Society: America in the Age of Instant Gratification

by Paul Roberts  · 1 Sep 2014  · 324pp  · 92,805 words

The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers--And the Coming Cashless Society

by David Wolman  · 14 Feb 2012  · 275pp  · 77,017 words

Red Roulette: An Insider's Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today's China

by Desmond Shum  · 6 Sep 2021  · 277pp  · 85,191 words

The Purpose Economy: How Your Desire for Impact, Personal Growth and Community Is Changing the World

by Aaron Hurst  · 31 Aug 2013  · 209pp  · 63,649 words

Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science (Fully Revised and Updated)

by Charles Wheelan  · 18 Apr 2010  · 386pp  · 122,595 words

The Skeptical Economist: Revealing the Ethics Inside Economics

by Jonathan Aldred  · 1 Jan 2009  · 339pp  · 105,938 words

More: The 10,000-Year Rise of the World Economy

by Philip Coggan  · 6 Feb 2020  · 524pp  · 155,947 words

Where Good Ideas Come from: The Natural History of Innovation

by Steven Johnson  · 5 Oct 2010  · 298pp  · 81,200 words

Fall Out: A Year of Political Mayhem

by Tim Shipman  · 30 Nov 2017  · 721pp  · 238,678 words

Working the Street: What You Need to Know About Life on Wall Street

by Erik Banks  · 7 Feb 2004

Bedsit Disco Queen: How I Grew Up and Tried to Be a Pop Star

by Tracey Thorn  · 7 Feb 2013

Samuelson Friedman: The Battle Over the Free Market

by Nicholas Wapshott  · 2 Aug 2021  · 453pp  · 122,586 words

A Pelican Introduction Economics: A User's Guide

by Ha-Joon Chang  · 26 May 2014  · 385pp  · 111,807 words

Little Failure: A Memoir

by Gary Shteyngart  · 7 Jan 2014

Drink: A Cultural History of Alcohol

by Iain Gately  · 30 Jun 2008  · 686pp  · 201,972 words

The Elements of Statistical Learning (Springer Series in Statistics)

by Trevor Hastie, Robert Tibshirani and Jerome Friedman  · 25 Aug 2009  · 764pp  · 261,694 words

The Rapture of the Nerds

by Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross  · 3 Sep 2012  · 311pp  · 94,732 words

The People's Republic of Walmart: How the World's Biggest Corporations Are Laying the Foundation for Socialism

by Leigh Phillips and Michal Rozworski  · 5 Mar 2019  · 202pp  · 62,901 words

Reimagining Capitalism in a World on Fire

by Rebecca Henderson  · 27 Apr 2020  · 330pp  · 99,044 words