Roger Lowenstein, While America Aged: How Pension Debts Ruined General Motors, Stopped the NYC Subways, Bankrupted San Diego, and Loom as the Next Financial Crisis – an interesting read on some of the worst pension abuses. It reaffirmed my believe in balance – the worst political situation is when any interest group gains a foothold which allows them to run their agenda at someone else’s expense. The NY teacher’s at one time would retire at 130% of salary! Can you imagine that? And this was after 30 years of service. Do you think anyone would not retire on the first day possible?
Monthly Archives: April 2013
The End of Wall Street
Another book about the rise and fall of LTCM.
Inventing Money
Inventing Money: The Story of Long-Term Capital Management and the Legends Behind It – a technical take on LTCM compared to Lowenstein’s version + bibliographic information on the main players. Unlike Lowenstein, Nicholas doesn’t let the reader ease into, even guess, how the assumptions of volatility, liquidity, and normality impacted LTCM. He is quite direct. I also liked the explanation of derivative trades as off-book since they are effectively highly leveraged.