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Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism
- Author
- Anne Case
- Narrator
- Kate Harper
- Publisher
- Princeton University Press
- Publish Date
- 17 March 2020
- Run Time
- 11 hours 48 minutes
- Format
- Audiobook
What to expect
A
New York Times Bestseller
A
Wall Street Journal Bestseller
A
New York Times Notable Book of 2020
A
New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
Shortlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year
A
New Statesman Book to Read
This audiobook narrated by Kate Harper reveals how the flaws in capitalism are fatal for America's working class, and includes an introduction and preface read by the authors themselves—economist Anne Case and Nobel Prize winner Angus Deaton
Life expectancy in the United States has recently fallen for three years in a row—a reversal not seen since 1918 or in any other wealthy nation in modern times. In the past two decades, deaths of despair from suicide, drug overdose, and alcoholism have risen dramatically, and now claim hundreds of thousands of American lives each year—and they're still rising. Anne Case and Angus Deaton, known for first sounding the alarm about deaths of despair, explain the overwhelming surge in these deaths and shed light on the social and economic forces that are making life harder for the working class. They demonstrate why, for those who used to prosper in America, capitalism is no longer delivering.
Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism paints a troubling portrait of the American dream in decline. For the white working class, today's America has become a land of broken families and few prospects. As the college educated become healthier and wealthier, adults without a degree are literally dying from pain and despair. In this critically important book, Case and Deaton tie the crisis to the weakening position of labor, the growing power of corporations, and, above all, to a rapacious health-care sector that redistributes working-class wages into the pockets of the wealthy. Capitalism, which over two centuries lifted countless people out of poverty, is now destroying the lives of blue-collar America.
This book charts a way forward, providing solutions that can rein in capitalism's excesses and make it work for everyone.
Critics Review
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"Elaborately explained and well-presented. . . . Case and Deaton's well-written and gloomy book was meant as a warning. Relentlessly fighting an infectious disease, the U.S. government seems to have treated it as a handbook."---Joakim Book, American Institute for Economic Research
American Institute for Economic Research
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"A highly important book."---Arlie Russell Hochschild, New York Times Book Review
New York Times Book Review
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"Excellent."
Joyce Carol Oates on Twitter
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"Gripping. . . . [Case and Deaton] do not merely rehearse decades of mortality and wage statistics. Rather, they seek to catalogue how an entire way of life first frayed and then fell apart over the past half-century, and the cruelty of an American meritocracy that heaps lavish rewards on the winners while increasingly leaving others to rot."---Joshua Chaffin, Financial Times
Financial Times
See more reviews See fewer reviews
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"A remarkable new book."---John Harris, The Guardian
The Guardian
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"Disturbing. . . . . Case and Deaton do a great job making the case that something has gone grievously wrong."---Jim Zarroli, NPR
NPR
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"I highly, highly recommend it."---Cardiff Garcia, NPR Planet Money's The Indicator
NPR Planet Money's The Indicator
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"[A] remarkable and poignant book."---Dani Rodrik, Project Syndicate
Project Syndicate
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"The system is broken and every bit of it needs fixing. This is a sobering – and essential – book."---Diane Coyle, Enlightened Economist
Enlightened Economist
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"Finalist for the Best Non-Fiction Book, Digital Book World Awards"
Digital Book World Awards
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"One of the Financial Times Selected Titles for 2020 Visions: The Year Ahead in Books"
Financial Times
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"One of New Statesman's Books to Read in 2020"
New Statesman
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"A New York Times Bestseller"
New York Times
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"We Americans are reluctant to acknowledge that our economy serves the educated classes and penalizes the rest. But that's exactly the situation, and Deaths of Despair shows how the immiseration of the less educated has resulted in the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives, even as the economy has thrived and the stock market has soared."---Atul Gawande, New Yorker
New Yorker
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"The rise in premature deaths among working-class whites has become a national crisis, and the authors tie the problem to the weakening position of labor, the growing power of corporations, and to a health-care sector that redistributes working-class wages to the wealthy."—Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly
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"Well-researched, compassionate."---Susan Babbitt, New York Journal of Books
New York Journal of Books
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"Timely and important."---Ed Balls, Financial Times
Financial Times
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"Case and Deaton explain how every detail of this crisis unfolded, examining recent historical events and rightly placing much of the blame on the United States' distinctive strain of capitalism, designed to protect and grow the assets of the wealthy few."---Keri Leigh Merrit, Common Dreams
Common Dreams
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"Finalist for the Best Book Published by a University Press, Digital Book World Awards"
Digital Book World Awards
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"Why economics really matters is illustrated in Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism. . . . The authors argue that the capitalism that lifted countless people out of poverty is now destroying blue-collar America. They have solutions to make it work for all. They had better be right."—New Scientist
New Scientist
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"One of the Strategy+Business Best Business Books 2020 in Economics"
Strategy+Business
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"Complementing their candid prose with enlightening charts and graphs, Case and Deaton make the scale and immediacy of the problem crystal clear. This is an essential portrait of America in crisis."—Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly
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"A Wall Street Journal Bestseller"
Wall Street Journal
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"One of Next Big Idea Club's Most Anticipated Nonfiction Books of Spring"
Next Big Idea Club
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"A New York Times Editors' Choice"
New York Times
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"One of the Financial Times' Summer Books of 2020: Economics"
Financial Times
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"[Case and Deaton] dive into and weave the data through different demographic and clinical lenses — race, gender, age, social connectedness, work history, and the most important through-line: education. Thus Case and Deaton connect the dots, literally, in the many charts that explain what factors are driving the Deaths of Despair."---Jane Sarasohn-Kahn, Health Populi Blog
Health Populi Blog
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"One of The Sunday Times' Best Business Books of 2020"
The Sunday Times
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"Winner of the William G. Bowen Book Award, Industrial Relations Section of Princeton University"
Industrial Relations Section of Princeton University
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"An excellent book."---Nicholas Kristof, New York Times
New York Times
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"The policies that the authors advocate not only would address deaths of despair, they would improve the health and welfare of the American people more generally."---David Canning, Science
Science
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"[a] hard-hitting study of US capitalism."---Andrew Robinson, Nature
Nature
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"Deaths of Despair is designed to shine a light on a generational catastrophe that could—perhaps will—become a multigenerational disaster. It does this with chilling precision."---Mike Jakeman, Strategy+Business
Strategy+Business
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"One of The New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2020"
New York Times
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"Finalist for the PROSE Award in Economics, Association of American Publishers"
Association of American Publishers
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"Shortlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year"
Financial Times
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"Through simple figures and clear prose, it presents a huge bodyof evidence from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's WONDER database and other sources that the arc of the white working class's fate over the last two decades is long, but it bends toward nihilism and an early grave."---Gabriel Rossman, Washington Examiner
Washington Examiner
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Details
- Author
- Anne Case
- Narrator
- Kate Harper
- Duration
- 11 hours 48 minutes
- Release Date
- 17 March 2020
- ISBN
- 9780691205038
- Format
- Audiobook
- Publisher
- Princeton University Press
- Genre
- Economics, Public health and preventive medicine
Synopsis
A New York Times Bestseller A Wall Street Journal Bestseller A New York Times Notable Book of 2020 A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Shortlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year A New Statesman Book to Read This audiobook narrated by Kate Harper reveals how the flaws in capitalism are fatal for America's working class, and includes an introduction and preface read by the authors themselves—economist Anne Case and Nobel Prize winner Angus Deaton Life expectancy in the United States has recently fallen for three years in a row—a reversal not seen since 1918 or in any other wealthy nation in modern times. In the past two decades, deaths of despair from suicide, drug overdose, and alcoholism have risen dramatically, and now claim hundreds of thousands of American lives each year—and they're still rising. Anne Case and Angus Deaton, known for first sounding the alarm about deaths of despair, explain the overwhelming surge in these deaths and shed light on the social and economic forces that are making life harder for the working class. They demonstrate why, for those who used to prosper in America, capitalism is no longer delivering. Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism paints a troubling portrait of the American dream in decline. For the white working class, today's America has become a land of broken families and few prospects. As the college educated become healthier and wealthier, adults without a degree are literally dying from pain and despair. In this critically important book, Case and Deaton tie the crisis to the weakening position of labor, the growing power of corporations, and, above all, to a rapacious health-care sector that redistributes working-class wages into the pockets of the wealthy. Capitalism, which over two centuries lifted countless people out of poverty, is now destroying the lives of blue-collar America. This book charts a way forward, providing solutions that can rein in capitalism's excesses and make it work for everyone.
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