Helen Plum Library

The author explores his theory that the food industry's used three essential ingredients to control much of the world's diet Traces the rise of the processed food industry and how addictive salt, sugar, and fat have enabled its dominance in the past half century, revealing deliberate corporate practices behind current trends in obesity, diabetes, and other health challenges

Perhaps no one is better acquainted with the intersection of finance and politics than Robert B. Reich, and now he reveals the cycles of power and influence that have perpetuated a new American oligarchy, a shrinking middle class, and the greatest income inequality and wealth disparity in eighty years. He makes clear how centrally problematic our veneration of the "free market" is, and how it has masked the power of the moneyed interests to tilt the...

"Heather C. McGhee's specialty is the American economy--and the mystery of why it so often fails the American public. As she dug into subject after subject, from the financial crisis to declining wages to collapsing public infrastructure, she found a common problem at the bottom of them all: racism--but not just in the obvious ways that hurt people of color. Racism has costs for white people, too. It's the common denominator in our most vexing public...

"Two bestselling authors overturn conventional wisdom about how economies work, revealing the untold story of who wins and who loses the rewards of prosperity, in a work that fundamentally transforms how we look at and understand the world"-- Artificial intelligence and other innovative technologies won't guarantee a rising standard of living for workers, according to this lucid manifesto. MIT economists Acemoglu and Johnson explore historical instances...

"In a revelatory dispatch from the frontier of capitalist extremism, an acclaimed historian of ideas shows how free marketeers are realizing their ultimate goal: an end to nation-states and the constraints of democracy"--

"With reality tv shows, glossy bridal magazines, and fanciful Pinterest boards leading the way, it can be easy for a recently engaged couple to slide from wedding planning into wedding madness. Inspiration and ideas abound; what couples really need is clear guidance on how to assess this information and sort the useful from the disastrous. Enter A Practical Wedding Planner, the (practical) companion volume to A Practical Wedding. Meg Keene walks couples...

A major bestseller in Italy, this is a heroic young man's impassioned account of the decline of Naples under the rule of the Camorra, an organized crime network with a large international reach and stakes in construction, high fashion, illicit drugs, and toxic-waste disposal. Known by insiders as "the System," the Camorra affects cities and villages along the Neapolitan coast, and is the deciding factor in why Campania, for instance, has the highest...

"Climate change is an increasingly well understood problem: modern economies are emitting greenhouse gases at an unprecedented rate, leading to a higher concentration of gases in the atmosphere and a rapid warming of the planet. Most investors understand this, but they have waited for government policy on climate change to provide guidance on where to allocate capital. That is now changing. Investment capital is rapidly moving out of assets that contribute...

"Thomas Piketty's bestselling Capital in the Twenty-First Century galvanized global debate about inequality. In this audacious follow-up, Piketty challenges us to revolutionize how we think about politics, ideology, and history. He exposes the ideas that have sustained inequality for the past millennium, reveals why the shallow politics of right and left are failing us today, and outlines the structure of a fairer economic system. Our economy, Piketty...