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Title details for Supercapitalism by Robert B. Reich - Available

Supercapitalism

The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life

by Robert B. Reich
Dick Hill
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available
Since the 1970s, and notwithstanding three recessions, the U.S. economy has soared. Consumers have been treated to a vast array of new products, while the prices of standard goods and services have declined. Companies have also become far more efficient and the stock market has surged. In short, American capitalism has been a triumph, and it has spread throughout the world.


At the same time, argues former secretary of labor Robert B. Reich, the effectiveness of democracy in America has declined. It has grown less responsive to the citizenry, and people are feeling more and more helpless as a result. In Supercapitalism, Reich discusses how capitalism has spilled over into politics, how it threatens democracy, and how citizens both benefit from and lose out because of supercapitalism.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    September 15, 2007

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781400124619
      • File size: 276771 KB
      • Duration: 09:36:36

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Robert Reich's latest book is a wide-ranging discussion of the role of global corporations in today's democracy. Narrator Dick Hill sounds like he's stepped into the skin of the author as he mimics the former secretary of labor's conversational style, professorial expertise, and subtle humor. The energy of the reading is infectious, allowing the listener to take on ideas that might be new--such as the possibility that corporate social responsibility is diversionary and the today's American consumer might have a better deal than today's American citizen. Refreshingly, neither the narrator nor the author gets bogged down in taking himself too seriously--as do many political/economic commentators these days. R.M. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      July 16, 2007
      In this compelling and important analysis of “the triumph of capitalism and the decline of democracy,” former labor secretary Reich urges us to rebalance the roles of business and government. Power, he writes, has shifted “away from us in our capacities as citizens and toward us as consumers and investors.” While praising the spread of global capitalism, he laments that “supercapitalism” has brought with it alienation from politics and community. The solution: “to separate capitalism from democracy, and guard the border between them.” Plainspoken and forceful, if somewhat repetitious, the book urges new and strengthened laws and regulations to restore authority to “the citizens in us.” Reich’s proposals are anything but knee-jerk liberal: he calls for abolishing the corporate income tax and labels the corporate social responsibility movement distracting and even counterproductive. As in 2004’s Reason
      , Reich exhibits perhaps too much confidence in Americans’ ability to think and act in their own best interests. But he refuses to shift blame for corporations’ dominance to the usual suspects, instead pointing a finger at “consumers like you and me who want better deals, and from investors like us who want better returns,” he writes. Provocatively argued, this book could help begin a necessary national conversation.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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