I felt like the book hit its stride halfway through. And by the time I was there, it was done (in a good way)! This is the third Tyler Cowen book I’ve read and, thanks in large part to his brevity, there will be more.

Essentially, we (America) fell into a hole because “We thought we were richer than we were.” I think most of us can agree in both the truth and the harm of that. However, after reading the book, I feel like there’s something less-economistic, more human about America’s stagnation that I tried to put into words here.

Another quote of note: “The more people trusted [Madoff], the easier it was for [him] to gain the trust of yet others. A small amount of initial trust snowballed into a larger amount of trust, yet most of that trust was based on very little firsthand information.”

The gripe makes clear sense. However, are there downsides to the alternative; a world in which trust is completely objective? Do we really want that? What do we make of the saying, “The people crazy enough to change the world are often the ones that do?” Doesn’t that mean that although some bad things can happen when we trust blindly, progress as a whole would likely halt as well?

Regardless of the unanswered questions I have, I wouldn’t think twice about recommending this book to my peers.