Abstract
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Highlights
IntroductionWhile Galbraith wrote as an economist; Ferguson writes as an historian of finance
John Kenneth Galbraith, the Harvard economist, was fond of asking two important questions about money: ‘Whence it comes? Where it goes?’ It is precisely these questions that Niall Ferguson, who is based at Harvard, wishes to address here albeit with an important difference
While Galbraith wrote as an economist; Ferguson writes as an historian of finance. They share an ethical passion in common: the need to educate the layperson by contributing to the challenge of financial literacy. Again, they share a common preoccupation with the problem of economic downturns and financial crises in the Anglo-American world; which, more often than not, is not just a theoretical question for academics but takes on the form of a difficult lived experience for large sections of the population when the viability of firms, investments, or livelihoods might be at stake
Summary
While Galbraith wrote as an economist; Ferguson writes as an historian of finance They share an ethical passion in common: the need to educate the layperson by contributing to the challenge of financial literacy. What Galbraith and Ferguson are determined to get across in their work is the simple, but oft-forgotten, lesson that financial crises are endemic to capitalism as such and cannot be solved merely as a set of contingent, technical, problems of the macro-economy Instead, they must be understood in terms of how crises repeat themselves within the history of economics and finance; it is important to know where financial institutions are coming from, why they were set up, the constraints under which they function, the regulatory provisions that determine their boundaries, and so on, in order to understand what they are up to at any point in time
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