The Rise and Fall of American Growth

Bill Gates CEO/MicrosoftI did find his historical analysis, which makes up the bulk of the book, utterly fascinating. (Source)

Brad Feld Co-Founder/Foundry GroupThe Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living since the Civil War: This book was a grind, but it had a lot of good stuff in it. It’s only 784 pages so it took more than a day to read it. If you are trying to understand what is going on in the current American economy, and why the future will not look like the past, this is a good place to start. (Source)

Satya Nadella CEO/MicrosoftCovering everything from the combustion engine to the flush toilet—and judging recent breakthroughs with a skeptical eye—this work of economic history “concludes that innovation is the ultimate source of dramatic improvements in the human condition,” says Nadella. (Source)

Diane Coyle Dani Rodrik is somebody who, for a long time, has been cautioning about the very gung-ho attitude many economists had towards liberalising trade, including financial flows. For a long time, certainly up until the financial crisis and for a bit afterwards, he was a bit of an outlier among economists because, for most economists, more free trade is without question better. (Source)

Dan Price @RossSchumann Read “The Rise and Fall of American Growth”. It’s a history book. No politics. It will clear it up for you. Wishing you the best. Also, read dark money to learn more about origin of current economic orthodoxy. (Source)

Stephanie Flanders Why this book is really a fantastic read, is the way he goes through economic history, and points to how all the improvements…changed people’s lives without really being reflected in economic statistics. (Source)