John Kenneth Galbraith

"Names? You want names? No one knows better ones than John Kenneth Galbraith" (San Diego Union-Tribune). With the dazzling insight, humor, and literary skill that mark Galbraith as one of the most distinguished writers of our time, Name-Dropping charts the political landscape of the past sixty-five years. Drawing on a lifetime of access to many great public figures, the famous economist offers a clear-eyed, unsparing, and amusing "look at prominent people . . . he] has known, from FDR on" (Larry King, USA Today) and offers a rich and uniquely personal history of the century -- a history he helped to shape.

John Kenneth Galbraith's international bestseller The Affluent Society is a witty, graceful and devastating attack on some of our most cherished economic myths. As relevant today as when it was first published over forty years ago, this newly updated edition of Galbraith's classic text on the 'economics of abundance', lays bare the hazards of individual and social complacency about economic inequality. Why worship work and productivity if many of the goods we produce are superfluous - artificial 'needs' created by high-pressure advertising? Why begrudge expenditure on vital public works while ignoring waste and extravagance in the private sector of the economy? Classical economics was born in a harsh world of mass poverty, and has left us with a set of preconceptions ill-adapted to the realities of our own richer age. And so, too often, 'the bland lead the bland'. Our unfamiliar problems need a new approach, and the reception given to this famous book has shown the value of its fresh, lively ideas. 'A compelling challenge to conventional thought' The New York Times 'He shows himself a truly sensitive and civilized man, whose ideas are grounded in the common culture of the two continents, and may serve as a link between them; his book is of foremost importance for them both' The Times Literary Supplement John Kenneth Galbraith (1908-2006) was a Canadian-American economist. A Keynesian and an institutionalist, Galbraith was a leading proponent of 20th-century American liberalism and progressivism. Galbraith was the author of 30 books, including The Economics of Innocent Fraud, The Great Crash: 1929, and A History of Economics.

A unique document in the history of the Kennedy years, these letters give us a firsthand look at the working relationship between a president and one of his close advisers, John Kenneth Galbraith. In an early letter, Galbraith mentions his "ambition to be the most reticent adviser in modern political history." But as a respected intellectual and author of the celebrated The Affluent Society, he was not to be positioned so lightly, and his letters are replete with valuable advice about economics, public policy, and the federal bureaucracy. As the United States' ambassador to India from 1961 to 1963, Galbraith made use of his position to counsel the President on foreign policy, especially as it bore on the Asian subcontinent and, ultimately, Vietnam. Written with verve and wit, his letters were relished by a president who had little patience for foolish ideas or bad prose. They stand out today as a vibrant chronicle of some of the most subtle and critical moments in the days of the Kennedy administration--and a fascinating record of the counsel that Galbraith offered President Kennedy. Ranging from a pithy commentary on Kennedy's speech accepting the 1960 Democratic presidential nomination (and inaugurating the "New Frontier") to reflections on critical matters of state such as the Cuban Missile Crisis and the threat of Communism in Indochina, Letters to Kennedypresents a rare, intimate picture of the lives and minds of a political intellectual and an intellectual politician during a particularly bright moment in American history.

Japan’s economic reconstruction after total defeat in the Second World War has been an extraordinary phenomenon. In Japan’s Capitalism, Shigetu Tsuru, one of Japan’s most eminent economists gives a comprehensive account of the recovery process, and a unique interpretation of the post-war Japanese economy. He analyses the significance of Japan’s money-oriented affluence and the emergence of a distinctive ‘corporate capitalism’. His conclusion is that Japan’s inspired creative response to defeat has itself led to a new set of intractable problems.

A book explaining the history of economics; including the powerful and vested interests which moulded the theories to their financial advantage; as a means of understanding modern economics.

What is surprising about these essays is not the insight and grace with which they are written—we have come to expect that—but the fact that nobody has expressed matters in quite this way before. John Kenneth Galbraith writes about what advice the poor nations (as, avoiding euphemism, he calls them) ought to offer to the more fortunate countries. In this little book there are essential lessons to ponder—for the governments of the rich countries, for those of the poor lands, and for the concerned citizens of both.

The richly adventurous memoirs of one of the most dazzling public figures to dominate the American scene over the last decades "As a raconteur and a literary stylist he stands with the best. . . . As entertainment, the book is a total success."--The New York Times Book Review "Absorbing and irresistible."--The New Yorker "A highly perceptive commentary on all our yesterdays . . . anecdotal, amusing, animated and above all, illuminating."--John Barkham Reviews "An enjoyable book, full of fun, full of wisdom, and full of rare insights into the history of our times."--The New Republic "A delightfully teeming book . . . John Kenneth] Galbraith's comic voice is a distinctive and durable literary achievement."--Atlantic Monthly