While America Aged

[Angio333]

Has anyone read the new book, "While America Aged" by Roger Lowenstein? It looked really good and I was thinking about buying it. If you read it, was it good or was it a waste of money/time?

I can't provide a link since I don't have enough posts yet.

[rob62521]

Hey, Angio -- why not borrow it from the library? Then you can decide if it's worth owning after you read it.

[Angio333]

I really don't use the library too much. I tend to beat up on the books that I'm reading and they often take me awhile due to time constraints.

[Angio333]

I ended up buying this book, and I have read about half of it. I highly reccomend it. It talks about the pension crisis in great detail and it uses GM, the New York Transit system, and the city of San Diego as examples. What's great about the book is that it puts the blame on both sides.

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

Both sides? What are the two sides? I get tired of issues being presented as having only two sides, two arguments. That tends to stomp out the kind of thinking that can lead to solutions. There are very very often multiple sides to consider.

[Angio333]

It showed how unions kept demanding more and more benefits that the company couldn't afford in the long run, or for crazy benefits like the job bank at Delphi/GM.

It also showed how the companies made promises to fund pensions, because they were a future expense that did not immediatley show up on their books. Now more workers have retired than are working and the systems are near collapse since the companies underfunded them while the unions turned a blind eye to it.