Science Wealth

Ryan D'Agostino wanted to know how the extremely wealthy in America got that way. So he asked. Knocking on 500 doors in 20 neighborhoods in the most affluent ZIP codes in America, D'Agostino met with 50 regular (but very rich) men and women who welcomed him in and shared some of their most difficult financial decisions, toughest setbacks, greatest strategies, most triumphant moments, and deepest insights into what it means to have money.

In the recent past, humanity marveled at the onset of an unparalleled technological revolution with the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI), a culmination of decades of scientific fervor. As the frontiers of AI advanced daily, a select group of visionaries conceived a revelation that would thrust humanity into uncharted territory—a realization beyond mere algorithms and datasets.

In The Opportunity Index, BlackRock managing director and cofounder of the #Talkaboutblack movement Gavin Lewis skillfully plots the origins of the racial wealth gap and its impact on the inequalities faced by the Black community today. Weaving a personal and at times moving narrative through some of the most disruptive events of our time, he offers a blueprint for businesses and individuals to understand the risks and opportunities presented by inequality and issues an urgent call to action.

From the American Revolution through the Civil Rights movement, Americans have long mobilized against political, social, and economic privilege. Hierarchies based on inheritance, wealth, and political preferment were treated as obnoxious and a threat to democracy. Mass movements envisioned a new world supplanting dog-eat-dog capitalism. But over the last half-century that political will and cultural imagination have vanished. Why? The Age of Acquiescence seeks to solve that mystery.

Nari Alhara has one task—recover the private journal of Abdul Rahal, the late founder of Telsemar University and infamous treasure hunter. This shouldn’t be hard for the most cunning rogue of a formidable secret order. But things do not go according to plan. Another thief is also seeking the journal, and hidden hands are pulling both of their strings in unexpected directions. Nari cannot afford failure. She must rely on her sharp mind, natural instincts, and an unlikely ally to uncover the true source of Abdul Rahal’s wealth and power.

Ambassador C. Donald Johnson's The Wealth of a Nation is an authoritative history of the politics of trade in America from the Revolution to the Trump era.

In this Very Short Introduction, Philip N. Jefferson explores how the answers to these questions lie in the social, political, economic, educational, and technological processes that impact all of us throughout our lives. The degree of vulnerability is all that differentiates us. He shows how a person's level of vulnerability to adverse changes in their life is very much dependent on the circumstances of their birth, including where their family lived, whether it was peacetime or wartime, whether they had access to clean water, and whether they are male or female.

Minimalism will set you free. Minimalism is an idea that can be used for good living. It is a tool that leads to blissful liberation from whatever fear has come to plague the human population over time. It also offers freedom from the very world we have created about ourselves as consistent consumers. It allows us to stop worrying about everything. We have a choice to take control of our lives and become fulfilled.

The Agile City engages the fundamental question: what to do about it? Journalist and urban analyst James S. Russell argues that we'll more quickly slow global warming - and blunt its effects - by retrofitting cities, suburbs, and towns. The Agile City shows that change undertaken at the building and community level can reach carbon-reduction goals rapidly. Adapting buildings (39 percent of greenhouse-gas emission) and communities (slashing the 33 percent of transportation related emissions) offers numerous other benefits that tax gimmicks and massive alternative-energy investments can't match.

It's time for planet Earth to get a new perspective on economics; it's time to breathe new life into a boring subject; it's about time someone plays around with your economic fancies. Is it really about the money, or is it really about what money buys? Can you imagine a whole new economy centered on liberty and freedom, a world in which many call the root of evil takes a back seat to civilized bartering?

Dr. Josh Luke is a former hospital CEO, industry disruptor, and award-winning healthcare futurist who breaks down America’s complex and greed-ridden healthcare delivery system. Health-Wealth: Is Healthcare Bankrupting Your Business is the guide to understanding how your company can provide enhanced, personalized, and specialized healthcare options for your employees, while at the same time reducing overall spending on healthcare.

Many of the central concerns of the twenty-first century—racial inequity, white supremacy movements, greater inclusiveness of diverse peoples—are rooted in facing and overcoming prejudices, both common and hidden. Another great challenge—the role of wealth and innovation in solving the climate crisis—is also riddled with disabling prejudices about how corporations work, and about the rights and needs of consumers and world citizens. In his twenty-first book, Bruce Piasecki argues that a set of five recurring prejudices, from 1900 to 2020, have held up real progress on climate action.

When our species first learned how to farm and build permanent settlements, things may have gone well at first. All those who worked to grow food (instead of having to find it, as we did for about 200,000 years before) got to consume it themselves and trade any left over for other goods or services. Then, one day, someone with a big club said to most everyone else, “I'm no longer doing all this hard work; you grow the food for me and, if you do as I say, I’ll let you have some of it back so you won’t starve…or else!”

During the next 20 years, more than $500 billion is expected to pour into the philanthropic sector. Some of it will come from retiring baby boomers, but even more will come from newly rich Silicon Valley billionaires. Since 2006, the idea of "giving while living" has grown in its appeal such that many philanthropic donors now expect not just to give money during their lifetimes, but to create organizations or ventures - some for profit, others not for profit - whose missions are expected to be completed within the lifetime of the donors.

Burdened with visions of the end, mourning the loss of her allies, and desperate to save a lover trapped under her enemy’s control, Aletheia seeks aid in the opulent city-state of Dahran. A family friend there reveals the location of her father’s papers, the key to stopping the flood and understanding her enemy’s power. It seems like the perfect heist - until the friend betrays her, stealing the papers and locking Aletheia in a gladiator prison.

Achieve your own greatest potential through the lens of Aligned, the personal development handbook of Nic Gregoriades, martial arts master, entrepreneur, podcaster, and transformational coach, a man who overcame extraordinary physical and psychological challenges, ultimately learning how to help himself and other men become the heroes of their own stories. Motivational and practical, this no-fluff guide distills a lifetime of wisdom into 20 essential action steps to becoming the man you were born to be.

What every human wants is fairness, a chance to belong that offers everyone opportunities to get ahead by our own merit and a say when decisions are made. Even before the global upheavals, our system was failing - it wasn’t fair at all. Now that it’s unraveling, it’s time for a new arrangement that’s actually sustainable on our resource-depleted planet that doesn’t favor wealthy insiders. Those gorging on inequality will never accept reforms that strip away their unearned privileges, and so the only practical way forward is a Hacker’s Teleology.

Ben Price reveals that our constitution and legal system were intentionally designed to give more rights to the wealthy propertied class than the rest of us, and exposes how this hamstrings our ability to effectively address a host of pressing social and environmental problems - and what we can do about it. Many of today’s most serious issues - homelessness, gun violence, fracking, prison privatization, predatory lending, and many more - resist resolution because the “rights of property” undermine the rights of people.

This is not your average, dull, academic treatise on government! Spread This Wealth is an easy-to-understand, common sense explanation of what is happening to American liberty and how average citizens can defend it. The author is an ordinary citizen with an extraordinary perspective on the wisdom of the Founding Fathers and the passion of the millions of men and women who have fought to gain and maintain the freedom all Americans enjoy.

When the Bush Administration invaded Iraq in 2003, it was promised that Iraqi Kurdistan would be developed into one of the most productive oil and natural gas regions in the world, and the profits would be used to win the war and rebuild the country. More than ten years later, those dreams lie in tatters. What happened to the oil wealth?