Author: John Perkins
Publisher: Broadway Books (An imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House)
ISBN: 978-0-307-58992-7

Click Here To Purchase Hoodwinked: An Economic Hit Man Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded--and What We Need to Do to Remake Them

John Perkins is the bestselling author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and he has now come out with another great read with his Hoodwinked. The secondary title of Hoodwinked is An Economic Hit Man Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded- and What We Need to Do to Remake Them, which just about succinctly sums up the book's theme.

Perkins was an economic hit man (EHM) who, as he informs us in his introduction, was a “hired gun” engaged to promote the interests of important corporations as well as certain sectors of the US government. He admits that although he was given the fancy title of Chief Economist with a staff of highly qualified economists, management consultants, and financial analysts, his real job was to deceive and plunder the Third World. This was accomplished by seduction, bribery, and the extortion of these countries' leaders into exploiting their own people and accepting loans that the country could never repay, privatizing their national assets, legalizing the destruction of fragile environments, and ultimately selling these coveted resources to American corporations at bargain prices. Perkins further states that he and his team were so successful that they implemented similar strategies in the USA and across the world. What resulted was the unsustainable form of predatory capitalism that is the driving force of the economic mess we are experiencing today. Furthermore, as we read, at the highest levels it is difficult to separate between the people who run our biggest enterprises and those in charge of government. Perkins refers to these individuals as the “corporatocracy” that are made up of CEOs who don't understand the concept of ethical behavior and who are able to earn unprecedented riches, wherein the salary of the average CEO has grown more than 400 times the salary of the average worker. We were hoodwinked, as these individuals gained such enormous power, and sadly, we let them get away with it, because they were devious in deceiving us.

Hoodwinked is divided into two parts, the first maps out the problem as Perkins weaves well-researched, gripping references to back up his arguments that what we are experiencing today is a misguided form of geopolitics and capitalism that thinks very little of encouraging a widespread exploitation of the many to benefit a small number of the very wealthy. The second part provides us with concrete solutions.

Among the topics examined in the first part of the book are: the economics of Keynes and Friedman, economic mercenaries, the modern robber barons, deregulation, the regulation of scam, fake accounting, double standards, and the militarized paper economy. The second part explores such topics as how capitalism must be changed, a look at what has happened in China, the creation of a new economy, new rules for business and government where there would be the adoption of attitudes that encourage ethical stewardship, accepting consumer responsibility, and honoring our individual passions.

What Perkins advocates sounds worthy of consideration, however, do we have the passion and will to carry out these suggestions? That is the big question.

This book is indeed a weighty tome with much to digest, but one that will contribute immensely to the debate that all of us must partake. As Perkins closing remarks states: “This choice does not lie with Barack Obama. Or John McCain. Or any other politicians. The choice is ours.”

Click Here To Purchase Hoodwinked: An Economic Hit Man Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded--and What We Need to Do to Remake Them