Gloss at any Economics or Business best-seller list these days, and you will see a sign of the times. While the year 2000 brought us The Millionaire Mind, by Thomas J. Stanley, The Millionaire Next Door, by William Danko and Thomas Stanley (Stanley kept busy) and Jack, by Jack Welch, 2006 brought us Why We Want You to be Rich, by Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki, The Tao of Warren Buffett, By Mary Buffett and David Clark, as well as The Starbucks Experience, by Joseph A. Michelli. 2009, however, is turning out to be a different story.
These days you will see The Black Swan, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, A Drunkard’s walk, by Leonard Mlodinow and Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell. How are these so different? Well, The Black Swan is about how unforeseen events can control our lives; a Drunkard’s Walk is about how Randomness rules our lives, and Outliers discusses how the luck of the draw has more of a say in success than any innate abilities. Add to these the obvious Ultimate Depression Survival Guide, by Martin D. Weiss and Suze Orman’s 2009 Action Plan, by Suze Orman and you can see where the trend is. Also worrying is the inevitable emergence of books such as The Myth of the Rational Market by Justin Fox.
Our guess is that, while the recession continues, we will see more of these, and many more like House of Cards, by William D. Cohan (about the fall of Bear Sterns) while companies keep requiring bailouts and declaring bankruptcy. Meanwhile, Thomas J. Stanley hasn’t written a book since 2000.
