With penetrating insights for today, this vital history of the world economic collapse of the late 1920s offers unforgettable portraits of the f...
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reviews
Mar 14, 2010
AC
rated it: 
I returned to and finished this book on audible -- driving about the local streets -- to and from work -- and driving the kids hither & thither... what it lacks as a book (and my opinion about the issue of reparations has not been changed by L.A.'s arguments) -- that it is somewhat shallow qua analysis -- it gains as an audible -- in that it is very strong on narrative.
The result is that the author often strives for effect, rather than truth -- there is a rhetorical element, common t More...
The result is that the author often strives for effect, rather than truth -- there is a rhetorical element, common t More...
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(2 people liked it)
Mar 01, 2009
I'm three chapters in and this book is great. The author is a former finance guy who is a surprisingly good writer--a strong and interesting voice. This is no plodding, chronological history book. There's good insight into the times, orientation to the times with people other than the main characters, with nuggets of information (also known as gossip, my favorite part of history) and stuff that's applicable to current times. That fulfills all my requirements for history.
Dec 28, 2011
Michele
rated it: 
This explanation of the perfect storm that lead to the Great Depression was oddly reassuring in light of the current economic climate. Ahamed describes the sorry state of economic and monetary theory, the straightjacket that was the gold standard, and the mediocrities who were in charge of the world's money during the period between the wars. Today, he says, we have Keynes, we are not tethered to gold, and the crises that we have experienced have had the decency to occur one at a time with a de
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Sep 11, 2011
Crystal
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A lengthy but informative read about the key central bankers and actions that led up to the Great Depression. The author assumes the reader has some knowledge of certain economic relationships, in terms of the implications of deflation, inflation and using the gold standard, which twenty years after my last economics course required a little effort on my part to work out. I wouldn't have minded a little more explicit information to help make sense of all of it.
The author goes into grea More...
The author goes into grea More...
Apr 10, 2011
Marks54
rated it:
This is a history of the interactions leading up to and including the Great Depression among the chief central bankers of the US, Great Britain, France, and Germany. The story is well known, but the complex interactions between loans to Germany from the US, German reparation payments to allies, and allied debt repayment to the US is always worth some refreshing. In addition, the role of the gold standard in this is also important. Most importantly, this is a story about the strength of these
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Feb 08, 2011
Ramberto
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The best book I read last year. Very comprehensive description of how four men essentially drove the world into depression through monetary policies that were largely unregulated by their central governments. This isn't hyperbole, very little was understood about how the money supply, interest rates, and most importantly, the all important gold standard could be combined to create a perfect storm of currency instability. The stock market may have been the straw that broke the camel's back, bu
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Jan 30, 2011
Kendall
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Most books of this period focus on the war (WWI or WWII) or the human impact of the great depression. This was a great book about the bankers who tried (and failed) to guide world finance between WWI and WWII. It was interesting to see how the gold standard hampered the central banks (US, Britain, France, Germany) from responding to post WWI financial distress.
"Though J.P. Morgan & Co. was by no means the country's biggest bank, Pierpont Morgan himself had acquired an extraord More...
"Though J.P. Morgan & Co. was by no means the country's biggest bank, Pierpont Morgan himself had acquired an extraord More...
Oct 02, 2010
Doug
rated it:
For what most would probably consider a terribly dry topic, I find fascinating. Lords of Finance follows the lives of the central bankers of the four major powers of the world from 1914 through the 1930's: Benjamin Strong of the US Federal Reserve, Montague Norman of the Bank of England, Hjalmar Schacht of the German Reichsbank, and Emile Moreau of the Banque de France. Though most people have not heard of any of these men, Liaquat Ahamed argues that it was the decisions of these men rather tha
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Jul 25, 2010
Stella
rated it:
Fascinating account of the world of central bankers from just before the Great War to Roosevelt. Describes the life and times of the central bankers for England, USA, France and Germany, comparing and contrasting. Much discussion of the gold standard and also a fifth central character, Maynard Keynes, who wanted to get rid of it, which of course they did eventually. Basically confirms my belief that no one in high finance really understands the system, or what effect their actions will have o
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Jun 08, 2010
Andy
rated it:
I thought the author wrote a really entertaining account of what might seem like a pretty dry subject. The book looks at the policy decisions that led up to the Great Depression and explains the order in which economies collapsed in the U.S., England, France and Germany.
Studying history in high school, I had always been taught that protectionist policies like the Smoot-Hawley tariffs caused the Depression, but Ahamed explains why this was actually a minor factor and that the real cause More...
Studying history in high school, I had always been taught that protectionist policies like the Smoot-Hawley tariffs caused the Depression, but Ahamed explains why this was actually a minor factor and that the real cause More...
Apr 22, 2010
Tony
rated it:
Ahamed, Liaquat. LORDS OF FINANCE. (2009). ***. Subtitled “The Bankers Who Broke the World,” this was this year’s Pulitzer Prize winner for History. It’s a massive book, extremely well researched, but...it’s boring. Maybe if you were an Econ major, this would be for you and really get you turned on. I’m a chemist and it didn’t do anything for me. Ahamed’s thesis is that the Great Depression and the economic meltdown was caused by a small number of central bankers that were also responsi
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Apr 20, 2010
todd
rated it:
Written by someone with a firm grasp of monetary finance, this book is a fascinating history of the people and events that dominated central banking from prior to WW I to the outbreak of WW II. Reading about the few wise moves, the considerable political posturing, and the many outright blunders that drove Germany to hyperinflation and most major economies into depression provides a wonderful backdrop to today's real time debate.
Through a lively description of the events we learn th More...
Through a lively description of the events we learn th More...
Jan 29, 2010
Will
rated it:
Ahamed has written a fascinating account of how four central bankers were at the core of the economic madness that gripped the world after World War I and led to the second great war.
The personalities are interesting, and the scent of the times wafts from the pages to sting the nostrils. This is a book written for a popular audience. No great knowledge of economics is required. But they sure would help. It is not only our elected officials, Wall Street brokers and government officials More...
The personalities are interesting, and the scent of the times wafts from the pages to sting the nostrils. This is a book written for a popular audience. No great knowledge of economics is required. But they sure would help. It is not only our elected officials, Wall Street brokers and government officials More...
Sep 29, 2009
Oldesq
rated it:
Lords of Finance is an informative and extremely detailed account of the money policies of Britain, France, Germany and the United States from the close of the First World War through 1933- with a brief foray into the years of the Second World War. The subtitle “the Bankers Who Broke the World” refers to the four heads of the central banks but is not particularly relevant as Ahamed fails to fully explain how the bankers broke the world- they certainly did not do so in concert. What is most hel
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Jun 11, 2009
Frank
rated it:
Ahamed's one of those lucky authors who spends a decade working on a book and then pop! it lands at Borders the second its subject supposedly becomes essential to global salvation. Suddenly every anchor with 5 spare minutes wants an interview.
Ahamed wrote a book on central banking and the Great Depression and it came out just as the economic world fell to crap. Lucky him. It also received ridiculously positive reviews from everybody.
To my mind it was tedious, pl More...
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Jan 28, 2010
Jennifer
rated it:
Conceptually really interesting discussion of the four bankers who ran the monetary policy of England, France, Germany and the US during the late 1920s and early 1930s...reinforces the case that reparations caused the collapse of Germany's economy and set the ground for WWII, also that all that worry about the gold standard (which nearly sunk Britain's economy in the late 1920s) was for nothing...makes you wonder what we're assuming now that's not true. Also, lots of deja vu if you've been foll
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Jan 18, 2010
Courtney
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This book centers on four fallible men whose decisions, over more than a decade, contributed to and exacerbated the Great Depression.
"Lords of Finance" is no dry accounting. It's a dense, but thrilling, examination of the leaders of the world's most powerful central banks -- in the U.S., France, Germany and Britain -- and their efforts to sustain their countries through World War I, and to rebuild when the fighting stopped. These men's ideas were often wrong, built on the f More...
"Lords of Finance" is no dry accounting. It's a dense, but thrilling, examination of the leaders of the world's most powerful central banks -- in the U.S., France, Germany and Britain -- and their efforts to sustain their countries through World War I, and to rebuild when the fighting stopped. These men's ideas were often wrong, built on the f More...
Nov 12, 2011
Zhifei
rated it:
It's a good book leading people back to reality from conspiracy theory. The author in this book tries to demonstrate that it's the four major bankers' limited wisdom that finally culminated in the Depression. The author described how decisions were made at different situations with detailed motivations.
There are many implications for contemporary society, especially when we are talking about sovereign debts these days. As noted by the author "many banks experiencing withdrawals would More...
There are many implications for contemporary society, especially when we are talking about sovereign debts these days. As noted by the author "many banks experiencing withdrawals would More...
Aug 05, 2011
Liam
rated it:
"'Financiers in fright do not make a heroic picture.'" (quoting Lloyd George in July 1914, 32)
"He was 'gay and whimsical and civilized' with 'that gift of amusing and surprising, with which very clever people, and only very clever people, can by coversation give a peculiar relish to lige,' remembered the art critic Clive Bell." (on Keynes, 113)
"'At particular times a great deal of stupid people have a great deal of stupid money. ... At intervals . More...
"He was 'gay and whimsical and civilized' with 'that gift of amusing and surprising, with which very clever people, and only very clever people, can by coversation give a peculiar relish to lige,' remembered the art critic Clive Bell." (on Keynes, 113)
"'At particular times a great deal of stupid people have a great deal of stupid money. ... At intervals . More...
Apr 15, 2009
Bookmarks Magazine
rated it:
Almost all critics praised Lords of Finance for its command of economic history and engaging, lucid prose. Ahamed, noted the New York Times, illuminates wise parallels between the misplaced confidence that spawned the global depression in the 1930s and the illusory calculations of risk that led to the current financial crisis. His compelling biographies also personalize economic history. While critics disagreed about whether lay readers will, in a century's time, care about Norman, Moreau, and S
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Jun 05, 2010
Keith
rated it:
This is a good historical book. I like the approach of describing the actual lives of the bankers in question, who actually come across as sympathetic figures. Actually, they led pretty interesting lives, and this woven in with all the economic stuff is the main strength of the book. You get the sense that he is talking about people, not economics theory.
I don't think that the book quite supports the conclusion on the dust jacket, that the "decisions taken by a small number of central More...
I don't think that the book quite supports the conclusion on the dust jacket, that the "decisions taken by a small number of central More...
Nov 14, 2009
Emily
rated it:
In the early 1930s, a reporter asked John Maynard Keynes whether anything like the Great Depression had ever happened before. His reply: "Yes, it was called the Dark Ages, and it lasted four hundred years." This book is about the four central bankers (of the U.S., Great Britain, France, and Germany) who presided over the economic collapse between the World Wars. Imagine something much worse than the banking crisis of 2007 taking place after a brutal war in which millions of men were ki
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Jul 01, 2009
Barry
rated it:
This is a book that everyone should read. Most won’t, of course, and ‘tis a pity. Lords of Finance will be one of the best finance or history books published this year and quite likely will be one of the best of any book released in 2009.
Admittedly the story of four central bankers in the 1920s and 30s doesn’t sound like it would be on anyone’s must read list. But Liaquat Ahamed uses the outsize personalities of the bankers of the U.S., Britain, France and Germany to give a human More...
Admittedly the story of four central bankers in the 1920s and 30s doesn’t sound like it would be on anyone’s must read list. But Liaquat Ahamed uses the outsize personalities of the bankers of the U.S., Britain, France and Germany to give a human More...
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Aug 23, 2010
Bob
rated it:
This book provides a wonderful backdrop for today's economic recession. It's not that you recognize history repeating itself, which, of course, precisely what history does not do. It's that economic forces and cycles outrun those who try to control them, and economies are too complex to be reduced to mathematics, however hard experts try. In following the lives and decisions of the central bankers for the U.S., the UK, France and Germany from 1910 to 1940, Ahamed lets us see the struggles the
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May 22, 2009
Matthew
rated it:
Good and readable history of how the Great Depression came to be. Rather light on the statistics surrounding the GD, which makes it less useful for someone wanting a comprehensive explanation (admittedly the causes of the GD are still under debate, but there could've been more thorough presentation of the various hypotheses and evidence). Better for a sense of the historical context in the decade leading up to the GD. His theses is that sticking to the gold standard, and the insistence on full w
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Jan 26, 2010
Lynn
rated it: 
You may think this is about our current financial crisis, but it was about the events in the early twentieth century through the 1930’s. This book is well over 400 pages long, and if you’re not all that interested in finance, 400 pages too long. He goes to great lengths to convince us the primary cause of the great depression was the gold standard. He seemed convincing, but I think Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz already closed the book on the causes of the great depression years ago, and I
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Jun 16, 2009
Paul
rated it:
According to the author, the Depression resulted from a 'perfect storm'. Several crises occurred within a short time (approx. 2 years). Even the best bankers were hampered by their blinkered dogmatism, which led them to endorse the gold standard. By the time the crises started to happen in the late 20's, the best three bankers had been sidelined. The head of the NY Fed, Benjamin Strong, died in 1928. The heads of the Bank of England and the Reichsbank (respectively Montagu Norman and Hjalmar Sch
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Aug 24, 2010
Jennifer (JC-S)
rated it:
‘More than anything else, therefore, the Great Depression was caused by a failure of intellectual will, a lack of understanding about how the economy operated.’
Looking back at the Great Depression of the 1930s and its consequences, it’s easy to believe that the causes were beyond the control of individuals or government. Liaquat Ahamed contends that this was not the case, and makes a case that the decisions taken (or perhaps not taken) by a small number of central bankers were the p More...
Looking back at the Great Depression of the 1930s and its consequences, it’s easy to believe that the causes were beyond the control of individuals or government. Liaquat Ahamed contends that this was not the case, and makes a case that the decisions taken (or perhaps not taken) by a small number of central bankers were the p More...
Feb 09, 2010
Mike
rated it:
I read this book thinking that I'd learn something and know a bit more about how the world of finance works. I was expecting to have to trudge through it an even left myself the option of just not reading it and then trading it in at Powell's. I was half right.
There's a lot in the book about how the world's finances worked in the late 1800's and early and mid 1900's. Some of it was, frankly, beyond me. I understood the implications but not the actual mechanics at times. Bu More...
There's a lot in the book about how the world's finances worked in the late 1800's and early and mid 1900's. Some of it was, frankly, beyond me. I understood the implications but not the actual mechanics at times. Bu More...
Apr 20, 2009
getAbstract
rated it:
Gripping account of Depression-era economics
Who knew that a study of central bankers could be a page-turner? Investment manager Liaquat Ahamed spins a fast-moving yarn about central bankers’ disastrous monetary policy decisions in the 1920s and early 1930s. The story itself yields little suspense – you already know how it ends, but Ahamed uses thorough research and gripping detail to paint a complete picture of how the world economy collapsed. The Great Depression preceded today’s c More...
Who knew that a study of central bankers could be a page-turner? Investment manager Liaquat Ahamed spins a fast-moving yarn about central bankers’ disastrous monetary policy decisions in the 1920s and early 1930s. The story itself yields little suspense – you already know how it ends, but Ahamed uses thorough research and gripping detail to paint a complete picture of how the world economy collapsed. The Great Depression preceded today’s c More...
