I'm only halfway through the book but, so far, it's an incredible tale of American hubris. Enron started as a real energy company but found they could make much more with energy trading. Soon making energy deals was Enron's only real business and the pressure to keep the machine running eventually led to a dizzying array of accounting tricks. It couldn't go on and it didn't.
2 comments:
Kind of the story of America. We have shed most of our real industry - too dirty, ugly, unions, taxes, regulations, etc...
Instead we move around imaginary wealth and import Chinese stuff. Not a viable long-term plan.
It's simply astounding, then, that American industry has LOST ground during the 2000s: a period of deregulation, greater free trade, lower union membership and influence, targeted tax cuts, etc...
A conundrum! It's almost as if Bram's list of factors is incomplete... or as if his premise is faulty in some mysterious way...
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