BOOK CLUB FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

Executive summary: The Age of turbulence by Alan Greenspan.


Alan Greenspan was the former chairman of the US federal reserve. I can start by saying this book is striking. Mr. Greenspan’s book is mainly divided in two parts. The first one is his autobiography since his parents arrived to New York and the second part is about the major economic events that happened in the US and around the world, along with some tentative predictions of what things might be like in 2030. The author links all that to the new globalized economy that we are facing nowadays, including the rise of China and India.

Greenspan drives us through his Washington Heights childhood, his passion for the ideas of Adam Smith and Ayn Rand, to his career in economic forecasting, then through four decades in public service, including nearly eighteen years as Chairman of the Federal Reserve. In the second half of the book, Greenspan presents his conclusions about the state of the global economy and its future. He begins with a brief history of capitalism and goes on to discuss, chapter by chapter, the economic successes and challenges of recent decades in Japan, China, India, Russia, and Latin America.
I find the development of Russia during the past decade interesting to explore and Alan did not discuss about it. Alan Greenspan is an eloquent and convincing speaker for market capitalism and globalization. He explains the transition from manufacturing to a service economy in the US in a way that anyone can understand and get a better idea of what’s going on in the US in the past decade and even more. This is where I think the book is good at explaining. A lot of his analysis is based on understanding inflation rates, growth rates and the Fed rates, which he should well know, since he was the chairman of the Fed for so long. I felt that Greenspan is a smart man, well-intentioned, but susceptible to political pressures. He is bright, educated, but politically naïve especially about Russia.

I think that this book should be read by people living in the 21st century especially by future managers because it gives a lot of insights and explanation of our global economy. Moreover there are lots of explanations about the economic environment we are living in and how people should take advantage of the rising countries such as china and India. Greenspan experience as the Chairman of the Fed led him to take major decisions especially after September 11th 2001. Lowering interest rates, grating loans to airline companies, trying to reduce the likelihood of a recession, all these are strategies that he used to try to boost up the US economy after this event.
It is important to say that Mr. Greenspan is very charismatic. He criticizes a lot in the book president Bush especially on tax issues and the war in Iraq. He agreed that the invasion of Iraq was only to provide the US the oil it needs to survive within the next fifty years or so. However, I noticed that he doesn’t give any concrete example or actions that people should take about the environment and other critical issues that everyone of us should be taking care of like health, access to education etc.



The first idea that I find interesting in this book is about President Bush and the republicans. "They (Republican party) swapped principle for power. They ended up with neither. They deserved to lose." That’s what Greenspan said in the book and I agree with him. Greenspan, who during his tenure as chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank had been famous for his tight-lipped stoicism, also accuses President George W. Bush of abandoning Republican principles on the economy. The Bush administration did not know how to manage politics and the economy. They invaded Iraq and now the US economy might be facing soon a recession due to the huge expenses of the military activities. What every one of us should understand after looking and understating the Iraq war is that it is completely immoral nowadays to spend money on wars. We have so many issues to deal with, and all this billion dollars spent on munitions can rather be spent on education, access to health in developing countries or by trying to invest in research and development to eradicate thousands of diseases such as Aids, cancer and so on.


Secondly, in chapter 21, Greenspan talks about education and income inequality. In today’s world, it is very important to focus on education and to get specialized in a field. The demand for skilled managers in the 21st century is drastically increasing and so people should take advantage of that. The global world is being connected by sophisticated technologies and the internet is allowing people to do business without borders. And what drives our global economy is competition. However, in the United States, there is a big gap between rich and poor people. Politicians are responsible to create and design specific economic policies to help citizens survive and succeed in the business world.

Thirdly, talking about the future is everyone’s responsibility and that’s what greenspan does in his chapter. He says that he doesn’t have answers about what’s going to happen, however everyone of us should take actions to improve our intellectual thinking, our environment and the way to behave to become great managers as Mr. Greenspan was.

Finally, if you want to have an idea about who Greenspan is and what he did as a chairman of the US fed, this is a great book plenty of history, knowledge and facts.