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John A. Allison

The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure: Why Pure Capitalism is the World Economy's Only Hope Hardcover – September 27, 2012

by John Allison (Author)

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The #1 Wall Street Journal Bestseller

“Required reading. . . . Shows how our economic crisis was a failure, not of the free market, but of government.”
―Charles Koch, Chairman and CEO, Koch Industries, Inc.

“The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure is a sophisticated yet accessible analysis of the causes and solutions to America’s financial meltdown.”
―Ed Crane, President Emeritus of the Cato Institute

“An indispensable contribution to the debate about the future of the American economy.”
―Arthur Brooks, President, American Enterprise Institute

“No one is better equipped to understand what is going on today and the causes of the financial crisis. Please pay attention to what he says here.”
―Bernie Marcus, Chairman, The Marcus Foundation, and cofounder, Home Depot

“Allison explains the unintended consequences of government policies and their impact on the financial crisis . . . and recommends practical steps to improve the economy and individual liberty.”
―James M. Kilts, former Chairman and CEO, Gillette Company

“[This is] the best, deepest explanation of what caused the crisis and the consequences of our government’s response to it.”
―Yaron Brook, President and Executive Director, Ayn Rand Institute

“John Allison is superb with his comprehensive and thought-provoking explanation for our current economic crisis and a clear and compelling path to a brighter future.”
―Steve Reinemund, Dean, Wake Forest University Schools of Business, and retired Chairman and CEO, PepsiCo

“[John Allison] assembles evidence that shows that our financial crisis, followed by the Great Recession, was caused by Congress, the Federal Reserve, Freddie Mac, and Fannie Mae, and was helped along by the Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama White Houses.”
―Walter E. Williams, syndicated coumnist

Did Wall Street cause the mess we are in? Should Washington place stronger regulations on the entire financial industry? Can we lower unemployment rates by controlling the free market?

The answer is NO.

Not only is free market capitalism good for the economy, says industry expert John Allison, it is our only hope for recovery. As the nation’s longest-serving CEO of a top-25 financial institution, Allison has had a unique inside view of the events leading up to the financial crisis. He has seen the direct effect of government incentives on the real estate market. He has seen how government regulations only make matters worse.

And now, in this controversial wake-up call of a book, he has given us a solution. The national bestselling The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure reveals:

Why regulation is bad for the market―and for the world
What we can do to promote a healthy free market
How we can help end unemployment in America
The truth about TARP and the bailouts
How Washington can help Wall Street build a better future for everyone
With shrewd insight, alarming insider details, and practical advice for today’s leaders, this electrifying analysis is nothing less than a call to arms for a nation on the brink. You’ll learn how government incentives helped blow up the real estate bubble to unsustainable proportions, how financial tools such as derivatives have been wrongly blamed for the crash, and how Congress fails to understand it should not try to control the market―and then completely mismanages it when it tries. In the end, you’ll understand why it’s so important to put “free” back in free market.
It’s time for America to accept the truth: the government can’t fix the economy because the government wrecked the economy. This book gives us the tools, the inspiration―and the cure.

Print length

288 pages
Language

English
Publisher

McGraw Hill
Publication date

September 27, 2012
Dimensions

6.3 x 1.1 x 9.2 inches
ISBN-10

0071806776
ISBN-13

978-0071806770
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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Exclusive: Post-Election Commentary from Author John A. Allison

The 2012 election has reinforced for me that the U.S. has a simple choice – return to the principles that made us great or face economic decay and social unrest. One of the reasons I wrote my book is because it seemed to make sense to have someone who had an inside and comprehensive understanding of the causes of our financial problems to comment on the issue. In the aftermath of the recent election, it’s even more important for the public and policy makers to understand what drove the financial crisis and what choices we must make to revitalize our economy.

The media and other statists have created a myth that the financial crisis was caused by banking deregulation and greed on Wall Street. However, banks were not deregulated. In fact, three major new regulations were passes during the Bush Administration: The Privacy Act, The Patriot Act, and Sarbanes-Oxley. Banks were misregulated, not deregulated. Also, there has always been plenty of greed (and fear) on Wall Street. However, there is not one shred of evidence there was a greed plague that swept the Street.

The financial crisis and failed recovery were primarily caused by government policy. The two main culprits were errors made by the Federal Reserve and government housing policy, specifically as executed by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the giant government-sponsored enterprises that would never have existed in a free market.

My book, The Financial Crisis and The Free Market Cure covers this and other economic myths and misunderstanding such as the “shadow” banking system, fair value accounting, Pick-a-Payment mortgages and the like. However, as interesting as the economic discussion is, the real solution for our financial problems is philosophical and the cure was espoused by Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence: “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

People on all sides of the political spectrum defend liberty, but few people understand why liberty is essential to human well-being. Government regulations put “balls and chains” on innovators and entrepreneurs and thereby, slow and eventually stop progress. Given man’s nature, socialism and communism are doomed to failure.

So, again, I say, the US has a simple choice: The laws of mother nature and human nature are not subject to popularity or political whim. Capitalism or decline. You choose.

From the Publisher

John A. Allison is the longest-serving CEO of a top-25 financial institution, having served as Chairman of BB&T for twenty years. He currently serves as President and CEO of the Cato Institute and as a distinguished professor at the Wake Forest University Schools of Business. He is also one of the lead spokespersons for banking and policy reform today, appearing at universities and business groups nationwide and serving on the board of directors of the Ayn Rand Institute. He received a Lifetime Achievement Award from American Banker and was named one of the decade’s top 100 most successful CEOs by Harvard Business Review.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ McGraw Hill; 1st edition (September 27, 2012)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0071806776
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0071806770
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.23 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.3 x 1.1 x 9.2 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #412,964 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #348 in International Economics (Books)
- #506 in Theory of Economics
- #997 in Economic History (Books)

Customer Reviews:
243 ratings

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A. Hilse

Clear and powerful

Reviewed in the United States on June 2, 2013

Verified Purchase

This book was written by John Allison, who served as the CEO of BB&T Bank for many years, and helped that company to grow into one of the largest and most successful financial institutions in the country. His knowledge, insights and years of experience working within the financial industry and with the government agencies, politicians and bureaucrats form a solid basis from which he lays out a clear and compelling case for the causes of the financial crisis and following Great Recession.

Although I had a couple of minor issues with the book (being not a financial person myself, a little bit better explanation of certain financial terms would have been nice in a couple of places, and there were a number of typos), overall I was extremely impressed with Allison's clear explanations of various aspects of the financial industry, including the use of good, simple metaphors to help concretize complex issues or aspects of the industry that are on a scale too large to easily contemplate without financial expertise.

Furthermore, he digs very deeply not just into the proximate causes of the financial crisis (the "housing bubble," a massive misallocation of money encouraged by Federal Reserve monetary policy and political incentives pushing home ownership), but also into the deeper underlying economic problems that government agencies and policies represent (such as the impossibility of the sort of currency manipulation that the Federal Reserve attempts to do, the inevitable and damaging inflation that necessarily results, the monopolizing effect of agencies such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, etc.). Allison shows clearly why it is not just that the current political and bureaucratic actors in these agencies made poor decisions (which they did), but that no one in any sort of "centralized control" position in an economy can ever make correct or good decisions - there is simply no way that one person, or one group of people, can make economic and financial decisions which actually need to be made by every single individual who is in any way part of the economy. Allison also hits very hard against the idea of any company being "too big to fail," pointing out that in fact the bigger a company is, the more important it is to allow it to fail if it does poorly, so that the people and resources of that company can be re-allocated and reinvested into parts of the economy where they will actually do some good.

One aspect of the book that I especially liked were his points about incentives and human action. While laying blame on both government actors and the management/employees of various companies where it is due, he is also careful to point out the reasons why a certain CEO acted in a certain way even though it was harmful to his company in the long-term, and why a political appointee or a lifetime bureaucrat are going to have incentives that are necessarily in conflict with individuals trying to act in a market economy. He explains, often in detail, how various government regulations that are supposed to make the economy "safer" and more stable in fact have the exact opposite affect; by providing a "safety net," companies are in fact incentivized to take on more risk, rather than less, and it is U.S. taxpayers who then have to bear the burden when inevitably that risk-taking (which would not have happened in a truly free market) has negative consequences.

Lastly, Allison takes his analysis one level deeper, and looks at the underlying philosophical premises in our culture today that encourage government intervention in the economy despite its proven negative consequences, and the philosophical ideas that we will need to learn (or in some cases relearn) in order to move towards a freer and more stable economy. His treatment of these issues is perhaps somewhat brief, but fits well into the context of the book, and he provides clear suggestions of further sources for a more in-depth look at the connection between philosophical and political/economic ideas.

I enjoyed this book a great deal, and I definitely learned a lot. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the financial crisis and the economic, political and philosophical issues surrounding it, especially if you are looking for the views of a knowledgeable and qualified insider, and a very non-mainstream point-of-view.

One person found this helpful

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Ira E. Stoll

A Must-Read

Reviewed in the United States on October 5, 2012

Verified Purchase

I was pretty much of the belief that the last thing America needed was yet another book on the financial crisis.

But this book is so good that it's worth reading. Mr. Allison brings to the table both a free-market perspective and firsthand experience as a bank executive (CEO of BB&T) during the crisis. Few if any of the journalists, economists, and government officials who have written that bookshelf-full of other books on the topic have that to offer.

Here are some examples of things that I was unaware of until I read Mr. Allison's book, even though I have already read a lot of other books, reports, and articles and watched a lot of congressional hearings and commission meetings about the financial crisis:

*When the FDIC took over Washington Mutual, it paid uninsured depositors in full using money that would have gone to bondholders. Writes Mr. Allison: "This was in complete contradiction to past practice. The bondholders suddenly realized that there is no rule of law when government regulators are involved...The decision to treat WaMu bondholders this way closed the capital markets for banks."

* "Banks spend hundreds of millions of dollars hedging mortgaging servicing rights," which are "an accounting fiction." He writes, "I once had a highly ranked partner at one of the biggest accounting firms tell me that no more than 10 people understood all the interconnections among mortgage servicing rights, mortgage origination income, and derivatives valuation. I think he exaggerated. I do not think anyone understood."

* "The Patriot Act represents a practically impossible regulatory environment for banks because it is in direct conflict with the Privacy Act (which was also passed during the Bush administration). The Privacy Act requires banks not to violate your privacy. The Patriot Act requires that banks violate your privacy." Banks spend hundreds of millions of dollars mailing Privacy Act notices each year. Mr. Allison says one bank CEO ran a test to see if anyone reads the notices and sent out thousands of the notices with a last line offering a $100 prize if the recipient returned the notice to the bank. Only one customer did.

As the comments on the Patriot Act and the Privacy Act indicate, Mr. Allison does not go easy on President George W. Bush. "The panic atmosphere during the recent financial crisis was totally the result of massive mishandling of the financial system by government policy makers in the Bush administration," he writes. "When the head of the Federal Reserve, the Treasury, and the president announced that Western civilization would end unless Congress approved a $700 billion bailout, people panicked."

Mr. Allison's prescriptions for policy cures are similarly direct. "The most fundamental cure for this crisis and future financial crises would be to eliminate the Federal Reserve," he writes. He also wants to reduce federal spending, including on the military: "It is clear that the defense budget of the United States could be cut at least 25 (and probably 50) percent while making the United States better defended than it is today." He also wants "to eliminate the minimum wage, or at least reduce the minimum-wage rate back to its prerecession level of $5.15 per hour." (He writes that the minimum wage, which has been increased to $7.25 an hour, is "the primary cause of the high unemployment levels in the United States today," pushing jobs to China that would otherwise have been done in America. He suggests eliminating bank loan loss reserves and instead have banks take loan losses when they occur. And he suggests eliminating government deposit insurance and replacing it with a private system.

As for the big picture, Mr. Allison writes that the "fundamental cause" of the financial crisis is the philosophy taught in American liberal arts colleges. "The long term key to success is to recapture the elite universities from the Left," he writes.

I'm not endorsing all of Mr. Allison's analysis or conclusions. But he's succeeded at something that isn't easy: writing a new must-read book on the financial convulsions and their aftermath.

97 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

park3r

So many nuggets of good information.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 1, 2018

Verified Purchase

Superb break down of major components of what caused the financial crash of 2007/08. I stumbled across his speech on YouTube and thought it was superb. The book is more detailed and clear. I think it’s a gold mine of information about the crash, but also banks and government regulations. I’m interested in finance and economics and found this book extremely enlightening.

Colkhis

A good concise analysis of recent financial crisis

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 25, 2013

Verified Purchase

This book provides a really good, concise analysis of recent financial crisis from the point of view of Austrian school
of economic thought. I think It can be read (and most of it understood pretty well) without a prior knowledge of economic theory. First three quarters of the book, that address the economic questions, are of really good quality. I was not impressed with last chapters (21-25) in which the author addresses the philosophical issues.

Matias Rodriguez

It was all right, I agree with the concepts ...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 30, 2015

Verified Purchase

It was all right, I agree with the concepts, but as far as the clarity of the book is concerned...

Anshuman Arun

Balanced and fair!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 12, 2016

Verified Purchase

Well balanced book!

Celestra Cassidyne-Hook

Excellent first-hand analysis. Highly recommended!

Reviewed in Canada on August 19, 2016

Verified Purchase

"When politics mixes with business, whether as subsidization or regulation, the inevitable by-product isn't merely economic disarray and decay, but moral corruption." p.102

This is a very comprehensive account of how government regulations and incentives imposed on US banks caused a massive misallocation and redistribution of wealth culminating in the 2008 Financial Crisis. John Allison provides a wide-angle systemic view that illustrates how short-sighted bureacratic interventions distort and corrupt what would otherwise be a productive, self-correcting market economy. He takes you through the short- and long-term consequences of government interference from an insider's---a CEO's---first-hand perspective.

What I also loved about this book is that the author provides positive, well thought out, and principled recommendations on how America can transition from an economy crippled by an increasingly destructive welfare state to a moral and productive economy with limited government. Highly recommended! This book should be part of the curriculum in colleges and universities.

One person found this helpful

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