From the New York Times's Global Economics Correspondent, a
masterwork of explanatory journalism that exposes how billionaires'
systematic plunder of the world--brazenly accelerated during the
pandemic--has transformed 21st-century life and dangerously
destabilized democracy.
Davos Man
will be read a hundred years from now as a warning. ... Deliciously
rich with searing detail, the clarity is reminiscent of Tom Wolfe.
--EVAN OSNOS
The history of the
last half century in America, Europe, and other major economies is in
large part the story of wealth flowing upward. The most affluent
people emerged from capitalism's triumph in the Cold War to loot the
peace, depriving governments of the resources needed to serve their
people, and leaving them tragically unprepared for the worst pandemic
in a century.
Drawing on decades
of experience covering the global economy, award-winning journalist
Peter S. Goodman profiles five representative Davos Men-members of
the billionaire class-chronicling how their shocking exploitation of
the global pandemic has hastened a fifty-year trend of wealth
centralization. Alongside this reporting, Goodman delivers textured
portraits of those caught in Davos Man's wake, including a
former steelworker in the American Midwest, a Bangladeshi migrant in
Qatar, a Seattle doctor on the front lines of the fight against
COVID, blue-collar workers in the tenements of Buenos Aires, an
African immigrant in Sweden, a textile manufacturer in Italy, an
Amazon warehouse employee in New York City, and more.
Goodman's rollicking
and revelatory exposé of the global billionaire class reveals their
hidden impact on nearly every aspect of modern society: widening
wealth inequality, the rise of anti-democratic nationalism, the
shrinking opportunity to earn a livable wage, the vulnerabilities of
our health-care systems, access to affordable housing, unequal
taxation, and even the quality of the shirt on your back.
Meticulously reported yet compulsively readable, Davos Man is
an essential read for anyone concerned about economic justice, the
capacity of societies to grapple with their greatest challenges, and
the sanctity of representative government.
