eBook CAP-COM The Economics Of Balance download

CAP-COM, The Economics of Balance is, to say the least, a thought-provoking and interesting read. Kent Welton has quite obviously devoted extraordinary efforts in composing the provocative economic and cultural theories in this work. I am always open to a new perspective and fresh material that could shed light on the unfathomably complex economic environments of both the past and the present.

The Pros: Although this is certainly not an exhaustive list, I particularly appreciated the extensive historical research and reference that was put into this book. I can only speculate at the number of years it must have taken to compile this much information and assemble it into a logical progression of economic thought, cultural study, and governmental policy in the course of known history and beyond. This work delves delves far deeper than basic economics to explore the most fundamental ideals and principles of human cultures that resulted in the governmental and economic stances that modern economics strives to explain.

The Cons: I think that Mr. Welton, for the sake of keeping this material in the form of a manageable read, has drawn many conclusions - some a bit controversial - but hasn't provided enough evidence or persuasion to convince me of their likelihood. Using myth and mythology to define the fundamentals of prehistoric societies preceding those that history vaguely remembers is risky at best to establish the foundation for the explanations outlined here. Most specifically, the idea that a female dominated society would be far more nurturing and peaceful than the war-mongering male-dominated societies we have known may be somewhat naive, if not contradicted by those violent cultures in history's pages that actually were led by women. That being said, his basis for these conclusions - namely, the fact that no known cultures in history were entirely female dominated - are certainly reasonable, leaving the matter open to such speculation.

This book is certainly worth the read, and its theories are more than worth consideration, most especially in the quest for finding peaceful balance between the greatest extremes in world economics and power distribution among classes. While my personal feeling is somewhat right of that perfect balance, I think that very few of us can say that we are either 100% left or 100% right-wing in an unadulterated fashion.

I am rating this book at 4 stars because of the factors outlined above, and while I understand that too much foundation building can lead to a nightmarish and barely digestible tome, I still thought it needed at least more psychological research behind the conclusions that history neither allows to prove or disprove. With that enhancement, this would rate at least a 4.5, if not an outright 5 in my humble opinion.

Speaking of barely digestible tomes, this review may have gone a bit long (sorry!), so I'll finish by expressly thanking Mr. Welton for causing me to think deeply on this material, which I think may be even more important than 100% correctness in every conclusion.

Not sure why another reviewer was so upset by this book. I enjoyed reading this book very much. It makes for a good history lesson in economics. The section on the enclosure movements and its effects on the definition of free markets was particularly interesting. This is a challenging read with in-depth chapters on free trade, Adam Smith vs Karl Marx, labor and wages, growth-ism, money and banking, population and environment, and limits to wealth, etc. I would recommend this for economics students and history/policy wonks.

The Author must find it satisfying that a few individuals will acctually take the time to read this! Worse still, some of them may acctually believe that what the Author has to say here makes sense. It's the same group of people who elected our President and cheered at every word which fell from his lips, simply because "He sounded so intelligent, only to find out that he could care less what the "will" of the American people wanted, as long as he got elected, so he could pursue his own agenda, which has little or nothing to do with the America I grew up in! This Author may actually believe in what he has to say, but that does not make him any more or less sane!