Freaks of Fortune: The Emerging World of Capitalism and Risk in America
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.25 (504 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0674736354 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 432 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2017-07-01 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
This is a powerful and important book. (Publishers Weekly 2012-08-20)Levy provides a fascinating glimpse into the history of financial risk. (James Grant Wall Street Journal 2012-11-02)Engrossing account of the rise of the financial sector of the U.S. (D. It is an indispensable absorber, he suggests, of the shocks of the free marketFreaks of Fortune is a formidable work of scholarship--hats off to the author for the depth and breadth of his research. (Benjamin M. Levy's insights will substantially enrich our understanding of the American past.
Eye-opening, insightful, scholarly, every page a pleasure This book has opened my eyes to depths and meanings of risk, risk transfer, insurance, and a great array of related topics, I never grasped at anything like this level before. (I'm a law teacher of some 3 decades' experience, without a formal finance background.) In this sweeping canvas, we also witness a seafaring adventu. Jonathan Brown said I found this to be a fascinating discussion of the. I found this to be a fascinating discussion of the concept of risk and insurance in the US. It is a historical treatment that gave me a lot of insight into the thinking of how insurance works today and how those concepts developed.. fascinating Heather i keep trying to get other people to get other people to read this book. as soon as they see the title, they get intimidated. no, no! its not like that. this is a completely engrossing read.
To be a free individual, whether an emancipated slave, a plains farmer, or a Wall Street financier, was to take, assume, and manage one's own personal risk. Until the early nineteenth century, "risk" was a specialized term: it was the commodity exchanged in a marine insurance contract. For at the heart of risk's rise was a new vision of freedom. Freaks of Fortune tells the story of how the modern concept of risk emerged in the United States. Born on the high seas, risk migrated inland and became essential to the financial management o
Jonathan Levy is Associate Professor of History at the University of Chicago.