As Daniel Gross wittily puts it in Newsweek’s cover story, “Bleak is the new black.” There are good reasons to be gloomy about the economy’s future—ask anyone who’s been out of work for innumerable months with no solid prospects, or who is stuck in a crapola job (or mortgage). It’s hard to get all pompon-wavy about the Dow Jones Industrial Average from that vantage point.
As you read this, keep in mind that I have a job, and one that allows for creativity, initiative, and learning. Still, while it’s true that there are a lot of pundits and economists shuffling about in moody black turtlenecks, I can’t help detecting a countertrend: upbeatniks.
Maybe it’s because it’s been an exceptionally sweet spring here in the Twin Cities. But there do seem to be a lot of sharp observers who’ve donned the affable pastels and kente-cloth garments of optimism lately. Daniel Gross himself is a prime example: “America is coming back stronger, better, and faster than nearly anyone expected,” he writes. The New York Times’ David Brooks also shed some sunbeams on our nation’s future. A sign of a benign form of intellectual climate change?
It's optimism into which many caveats are woven. Most observers still expect a slow, steady recovery—a realistic view. Still, Ben Bernanke’s “green shoots" do appear to be sprouting crocuses and daffodils.
Several books coming out later this spring are veritable gardens for upbeatniks. As a business book reviewer, I’ve read them pre-publication—they’re all worth pre-ordering. None are uniformly sunny. Optimism should never wear rose-tinted specs. But if there’s no optimism, there will be no real recovery.
So score yourself a pair of bongos and dig these crazy sounds:
• The Great Reset, by Richard Florida (The Rise of the Creative Class). "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste," we've heard it said. Florida offers some ways not to waste it, while touting the USA’s cultural and economic resilience. But it would be stupid to try recreating the gilded age of 1985 or 2005: Top-down “growth” doesn’t trickle down much. One of Florida’s more controversial (but sensible) ideas: Drop the market-distorting mortgage-interest deduction. (How likely is that to happen? Well, um . . .) In fact, we shouldn’t prop up the housing market at all. For many, renting makes more sense.
• Young World Rising, by Rob Salkowitz. A global view of those crazy Millennials (who too often get slapped hard with a broad brush). Wireless networks are bringing more entrepreneurial opportunities worldwide, particularly to those countries with a large cohort of tech-savvy teens and 20-year-olds. Good tidings for India, Brazil, and even many sub-Saharan African countries and the USA—not so good for Western Europe and China.
• The Rational Optimist, by Matt Ridley. A short, insightful, provocative history of human prosperity from earliest times to today. What has allowed humanity to flourish? Entrepreneurial trade. What slows and even kills off that prosperity? Large, centralized bureaucracies and networks in government and business that are obsessed with self-preservation.
• Not in the cautious-optimism vein, but both excellent, entertaining works for those who dig business history: Lords of Finance, by Liaquat Ahamed; and The First Tycoon, by fellow Carleton grad T. J. Stiles (whom I don't know personally, BTW). Both won Pulitzers this week.
More spring sun: Schwinn isn’t much of an American brand anymore, but another Chicago-born brand, Dad’s root beer, still is. And it’s making a comeback. Muy fabuloso. Any Twin Cities–area distributors picking it up?
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