Finance Industry

In The Truth Machine, Michael J. Casey and Paul Vigna demystify the blockchain and explain why it can restore personal control over our data, assets, and identities; grant billions of excluded people access to the global economy; and shift the balance of power to revive society’s faith in itself. They reveal the disruption it promises for industries including finance, tech, legal, and shipping.

Leaving no stone unturned, this indispensable manual takes the sting out of relocation and selling the family home, helps keep retirees from outliving their savings, and offers a step-by-step guide to retirement abroad.

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. Case and 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.

J. P. Morgan is more than just the name on one of the largest banks in America. He was a man who altered the course of American finance and the chief financier for the strategic interests of the titans of the day, such as Carnegie and Rockefeller. He also financed new and ingenious technologies developed by Thomas Edison and was a visionary who saw the potential in Nikola Tesla. Hear all about him and find areas that you may have in common with this towering titan.

For the past few decades, Americans have spent billions of dollars on personal finance products. As salaries have stagnated and companies have cut back on benefits, we've taken matters into our own hands, embracing the can-do attitude that if we're smart enough, we can overcome even daunting financial obstacles. But that's not true. In this meticulously reported and shocking audiobook, journalist and former financial columnist Helaine Olen goes behind the curtain of the personal finance industry to expose the myths, contradictions, and outright lies it has perpetuated.

Medicare is one of the biggest decisions you'll make as you move towards retirement. There's no question, though, that it can be really, REALLY confusing. That's where author Matt Feret comes in. His goal is to provide Medicare Advantage PPO, HMO, Medicare Supplement plans, Medicare Part D, Medicare Part A and Medicare Part B insurance advice, and an industry insider's expert perspective that will save you time and money.

Banking on It is the firsthand account of one woman's quest to rebuild Britain's broken banking system. After a lengthy career at the top of some of Britain's leading banks, Anne Boden had become disillusioned with the status quo - the financial crash had broken trust in the whole sector, but there seemed to be little appetite to make the most of emerging technologies to revolutionise customer experience. Increasingly frustrated with the inertia within the industry, she decided to shake things up herself by doing something totally radical - setting up her own bank.

Far more than a rhetorical exercise, this book is designed to inform, inspire, and spur action. Based on Sachs' 14 years as director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and as special advisor to the United Nations Secretary-General on the Millennium Development Goals and Sustainable Development Goals, The Age of Sustainable Development is a landmark publication and a clarion call for all who care about our planet and global justice.

Uwe Reinhardt was a towering figure and moral conscience of health care policy in the United States and beyond. Famously bipartisan, he advised presidents and Congress on health reform and originated central features of the Affordable Care Act. In Priced Out, Reinhardt offers an engaging and enlightening account of today's US health care system, explaining why it costs so much more and delivers so much less than the systems of every other advanced country, why this situation is morally indefensible, and how we might improve it.

Disruption dominates innovation theory and practice. But disruption is destructive—displacing jobs, companies, and even entire industries. Are we missing better, and even bigger, opportunities to innovate and grow? With three decades of research, W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne reveal another way to innovate and grow. Beyond Disruption redefines and expands the existing view of innovation by introducing a new approach—nondisruptive creation—that is free from the destructive displacement that happens when innovators set out to disrupt.

More and more business is being conducted online, so online payment solutions are an increasingly accepted and desired transaction. Money can be transferred in real-time, where in the past, someone might have to wait days for a check to arrive, hoping it would arrive at all and not get lost in the mail, and then take it to the bank to deposit and wait for funds to clear. Now, because of the strict regulatory measures that protect online payments, transfers are often available to the recipient immediately or within a few hours of transfer.

The digital revolution poses a mortal threat to the major creative industries - music, publishing, television, and the movies. The ease with which digital files can be copied and distributed has unleashed a wave of piracy with disastrous effects on revenue. Cheap, easy self-publishing is eroding the position of these gatekeepers and guardians of culture. Does this revolution herald the collapse of culture, as some claim? In Digital Renaissance, Joel Waldfogel argues that digital technology is enabling a new golden age of popular culture, a veritable digital renaissance.

Leading experts from business and academia consider coffee's history, global spread, cultivation, preparation, marketing, and the environmental and social issues surrounding it today. They discuss, for example, the impact of globalization; the many definitions of organic, direct trade, and fair trade; the health of female farmers; the relationships among shade, birds, and coffee; roasting as an art and a science; and where profits are made in the commodity chain.

In From Hoodies to Suits: Innovating Digital Assets for Traditional Finance, leading finance innovator Annelise Osborne bridges the gap between the "hoodies" who invented the technology behind digital assets and the "suits" who run traditional financial markets, in an entertaining and insightful guide for implementing digital assets in an institutional environment.

In Curable journalist and health care advocate Travis Christofferson looks at medicine through a magnifying glass and asks an important question: What if the roots of the current US health care crisis are psychological and systemic, perpetuated not just by corporate influence and the powers that be, but by you and me? Curable outlines the future of medicine, detailing brilliant examples of new health care systems that prove we can do better. It turns out we have more control over our health (and happiness) than we think.

When the head of Columbia Pictures, David Begelman, got caught forging Cliff Robertson's name on a $10,000 check, it seemed, at first, like a simple case of embezzlement. It wasn't. The incident was the tip of the iceberg, the first hint of a scandal that shook Hollywood and rattled Wall Street.

It's the end of an era for the legacy pot growers of California. The green rush has turned into a crush, and the small farmer is being left behind. With regulations being complicated and burdensome and big business hitting the industry hard, you must evolve or go extinct. Your survival is not dependent on changing who you are but, rather, how you conduct business. The good news is that you have everything you need to succeed.

Quickly join the ranks of the happiest, healthiest, wealthiest Top 2% in the world! Researchers have confirmed what many of us have intuitively known for most of our lives: the Top 2% of Americans set the trend for clothes, cars, entertainment, even food. But, more importantly, they are also healthier and happier (despite any myths you may have heard), and have greater control of their time.

An engaging, info-packed listen to turn the tables on the timeshare industry. Timeshares have notoriously been taking advantage of people for decades on end. It is time that you put your foot down and finally understand how you can make them work for you.

There is no one better qualified to tell us about the failures of the American financial system and the grotesque abuses that have taken place in recent years than John C. Bogle, founder and former chief executive of the Vanguard mutual-fund group. This legendary mutual-fund pioneer has witnessed firsthand the innermost workings of the financial industry for more than 50 years and has set the standards for sound investment strategies and stewardship.