Genres: Economics
Dark PR – Grant Ennis
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Dark PR walks readers through all the “framing” companies do to minimize their responsibility so that they can keep doing the terrible shit they are doing. From car companies showing us all their “magic” features that will save lives, to blaming some random person walking on the street for not being visible enough (victim blaming)
Foreverism – Grafton Tanner
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In Foreverism, Grafton Tanner, examines the push towards nostalgia shown in society today. From endless reboots, which are safer than new properties thus more likely to profit, to gadgets that continue to get improved so that we always have a fresh one to purchase, capitalism doesn’t want our consumerism to die as that would stop
Everything and Less – The Novel in the Age of Amazon
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This is a fairly academic look at how Amazon has affected the world of literary fiction, and genre fiction. It takes a brief look at the enshittification cycle that Amazon is embarking on as it changes it’s stance from growing the sellers on it’s platform, to driving prices down and extracting as much profit as
The Bill Gates Problem – Tim Schwab
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While we may think that Bill Gates and the Gates Foundation is a benevolent Billionaire philanthropist, it’s not quite so clear. This book shows how Gates has used his many dollars and foundations to avoid taxes and push a Big Tech capitalist mindset on assisting other countries. Yes your tax dollars pay for about 50%
Basic Income for Canadians – Evelyn L Forget
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This is a long form look at many studies on basic income. Overall, people use the money to improve their lives and continue to work. They don’t get lazy, but employers may complain because it gets harder to find people willing to work for low wages as they now have more financial freedom and don’t
The Shock Doctrine – Naomi Klien
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Naomi Klien looks at how natural disasters, war and terrorism are used by government and business to further capitalism and take away benefits to poor people. Most often non-white Americans, or entire other countries, bear the brunt of the capitalist push to use a shock to reset what is normal. Purchase The Shock Doctrine on
Scarcity – Sendhil Mullainathan & Eldar Shafir
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I continue to come back to this book as one that informs my thoughts about many scenarios, especially when I’m faulting someone for a decision I think is a bad one. Scarcity makes a great case, though not explicitly, for universal basic income, because if we can take away monetary scarcity from people they have
Book Wars – John B Thompson
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John B Thompson covers the rise of the ebook and what it meant for publishing. From the dominance of Amazon, to the metoric rise, then slow dwindle of ebook readers…there is something here for anyone that is interested in the industry of writing and books. Read my longer review of Book Wars Purchase Book Wars
Automation and the Future of Work
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The purpose of this book is to explore the possibilities of a post scarcity society and whether work should really be the center of meaning in our world. According to the author we must start to move past capitalism towards a way of organizing society that doesn’t put your only value as work in exchange
The Devils Curve – Arno Kopecky
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What does Canada do with it’s mining interests on the edge of the Amazon? Arno Kopecky brings us a well researched book showing that we’re willing to destroy the land somewhere that’s not our backyard if it brings us profit. We’re willing to collude with terrible government regimes that violently remove their citizens as long
