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39 of 41 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
well-written, but ultimately unsatisfying, June 29, 2006
Peter Krass's biography of Andrew Carnegie is very well-written; he recounts the waypoints of Carnegie's life: his humble origins in Scotland, his jobs as a telegraph clerk, railroad executive, and steel magnate in the US, and his ultimate metamorphosis into a noted philanthropist and apostle for peace. When you first read this book, you really feel as if you are reading a good book. It's not until you start thinking about the claims Krass makes, and the lessons you think you have learned, that you realize it has gigantic holes.
My problem with this book is that Krass makes claims which are dubious, and doesn't furnish credible historical sources to substantiate his less flattering allegations. He doesn't do justice to the reality that Carnegie lived in a different time, nor does he seem to understand the dilemnas that Carnegie faced. Some examples: In the 1870s, the railroad industry was growing by leaps and bounds. When Carnegie won contracts to supply his own railroad-employer, he was one of the few people that the railroad's management knew to be capable, loyal as far as keeping trade secrets, and to have something to lose (his job), if problems arose later. Today this would be self-dealing and cronyism; back then, it happened all the time and sometimes was practically the only way to get the job done. By not putting this into the proper historical context, Krass portrays Carnegie in a false light. Similarly in the 1870s-1900s, the money supply and US economy oscillated between boom and bust. In bad times, when the sales of rails dropped by 85%, Carnegie had no choice but to lower wages at his mills, which Krass duly bemoans.
Krass's book is full of hints that Carnegie was an abusive employer. This is possible, but I wished he had provided wage data for Carnegie's employees, as well as for workers in the area and in comparable trades, so as to leave the reader in no doubt. Krass complains that Carnegie had his workers work either 56 hours a week in good times, and 84 in bad times, but doesn't mention most farmers could only dream of working 56 hours a week. How was Carnegie able to find employees for decades if he was a slave-driver? Krass makes much of the accidents that occurred in Carnegie's steel mills, and mentions that "Captain" Jones a plant manager who enjoyed both Carnegie's and the employees' trust and admiration, died in such a mishap. Jones was so close to both that when Carnegie offered Jones an equity stake in the company, he declined, lest the workers felt he had "sold out;" at this Carnegie paid Jones the salary of the President of the United States. I find it impossible to believe that a man of Jones' caliber would have let himself be forced to risk his life amidst unnecessarily unsafe machinery.
A serious historian won't discuss the safety records in those plants without mentioning other harsh facts of life in those days; the average life expectancy was in the order of 37 years, and presumably lower in the countries from which the many immigrants working in his steel plants had come. Jobs in the mills ultimately allowed the workers to provide their families with sanitation and other amenities that substantially reduced infant, child, and adult mortality. I can't say whether families were better off having their breadwinner work in workplaces that would be unacceptable by today's standards so that they could get out of unsanitary conditions that would be unacceptable by today's standards. But I can say that Krass, by ignoring that these trade-offs existed, and simply flinging mud, writes anti-history. One of Krass' "facts" is seriously wrong; no serious historian denies that the "Black Hand" was close to - perhaps even run by - influential circles in the Serbian army, but Krass does. Krass writes that the Habsburgs were intent on plunging Europe into war by insisting on an outside investigation of Prince Ferdinand's assassination, but doesn't explain how the Habsburgs could have afforded to let those who masterminded the murder of their crown prince go unpunished. This prompts me to question the extent of Krass's understanding of Carnegie's campaigns for peace.
None of this is to imply that Carnegie was beyond chicanery and reproach, but rather that Krass's case is utterly unpersuasive. The pity is that by consulting with competent economists, business historians, and management experts, Krass could have written a phenomenal book that would have inspired its readers, and many business students. Carnegie and his steel company was the Google or Microsoft of its day, and yet Krass has written a book that leaves its readers less enlightened at the end of the book than at the beginning.
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21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Gospel of Wealth, April 22, 2003
This review is from: Carnegie (Hardcover)
One thing I always ask myself when I pick up is why is the author writing this book? What makes the subject interesting to him? Where is the writer coming from? Answers here are in the subject. Andrew Carnegie was once the richest man in the world. At the height of his wealth he had $100 billion dollars in today's dollars. Bill Gates had $50 billion at the height of the stock market bubble. By the time he died Carnegie gave almost all of his money away. Carnegie was the first of the super-rich to become famous for his giving and tried to justify himself and build a philosophy around it. That philosophy centered around Herbet Spencer's theories of social darwinism that justified his accumulation of money through a fight to the death against competitors and cost cutting that brought slave wages to many of his workers. Krass notes that the money Carnegie committed to libraries in the 1880's was almost the same that he spent on wages. Carnegie wrote an important essay called the "gospel of wealth" in which he tried to explain his position in society - calling people like himself people who rose to the top due to superiority and whose wealth they used as a "trustee" for the better of society. That essay is Carnegie's central importance in history - he provided the philisophical underpinning for the "robber baron." Krass's book is the first major biography of Carnegie written in 30 years. It provides an excellent window into the era that Carnegie lived in and the more open and individualistic capitalism of the times. After Carnegie big business would be dominated by "trusts" and the "finance capitalism" of interlocking directorates and bankers. At one time the bank of Morgan had a person sitting on the board of directors of the 30 largest companies in America. But Carnegie orgininated the modern foundation and giving programs of the super-rich which continues until this day. Krass starts his book off with a discussion of the wide disparity between Carngies money and his treatment of his workers. As the book goes on though his portrayal of Carnegie mellows. In fact if you just read the first few pages and stopped you wouldn't get a good idea of what this book is really like. However, those first few pages give you an idea of what drew Krass to Carnegie - the role of the super-rich in society and the contradictions that they reveal. Although Carnegie thought he was superior to most people he believed he had a responsibility too.
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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Carnegie: the capitalist, philanthropist, peace-seeker, January 31, 2004
Peter Krass's biography, "Carnegie", is a terrific look at a man whose name most of us have known all of our lives, but whose life has remained something of a mystery. The name "Carnegie" evokes thoughts of money and power and in this mature biography, Krass has managed to give us a thorough look at Andrew Carnegie, from his hardscrabble boyhood days in Scotland, to his eventual rise to the top of the business world and to the monetary charity that marked his final years. Not only does the author spend time writing about Carnegie's achievements but he is careful to include the emotional state of his subject. Carnegie could be petty and vicious one minute then caring and loving the next. How that affected his business as well as his personal life is what makes this book so engrossing. While most of us know that Andrew Carnegie made his millions in the steel business, his knowledge of other businesses and how they intertwined with his own (especially the railroads) is fascinating. Through his gift-giving for the erection of hundreds of libraries around the world he made sure that Andrew Carnegie's name would be remembered for generations. No small ego here! It would seem that the author has given Carnegie a balanced look with the good side outweighing the bad in the final analysis. What I gleaned from Peter Krass is a part of Andrew Carnegie about which I hadn't known...his efforts in the "peace movement" of his day. How firmly committed to the abolishment of war was Carnegie and his means to that end are cleary laid out in this biography. Carnegie's close working relationships and correspondence with every president from Cleveland to Wilson is offered by Krass, giving an added bonus to those of us who enjoy biographies of U.S. presidents, and it marks some of the lighter moments of the book as Krass relates how Carnegie liked to meddle in the affairs of state, often without invitation. Through all of Andrew Carnegie's duplicity and vindictiveness toward his own workers and colleagues as he rose to the top, he more than made up for it in his philanthropic works later in life. Carnegie was that "rare breed" and Peter Krass has captured all of it.
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