The Origin of Wealth

This book makes the novel and, to me, fascinating case that the economy is an evolutionary system that is constantly changing, implying that the static equilibria of conventional trade models are not usefully predictive. It also made it clear to me, from a different perspective, that the industries in which a country succeeds are path-dependent.

If you are a mosquito, the next evolutionary mutation will not produce an elephant. Likewise, it is much easier to design and manufacture 3 nanometer-scale chips if you have already designed and manufactured 5 nanometer-scale chips. This drove home to me how important retaining the… show more.

Talking about money with people, the subject of rich and wealthy often comes up since people may think that’s what true retirement is.

Questions while developing my book came up like what is wealth and how is wealth created? Is there a difference between wealthy and being rich? How can everyday people use understanding wealth in their own personal financial affairs? Do you really need to be wealthy or rich to retire?

To answer these questions, a brief historical context discussed in this book helps us understand the evolution of wealth from how many sheep or other specialized skills you… show more.

This is a big book with big ideas.

Beinhocker looks at an economy as an evolutionary social system and builds on complex adaptive systems theory to describe the way that economies evolve to produce new goods and services, and in the process, increase wealth.

The book describes the evolution of the global economy from primitive times to the present, and explains how institutions such as financial markets have developed to facilitate economic activity. The book is well-written and a joy to read.

If you start reading the book, you will be compelled to finish it.