Abundance
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Abundance
Narrated by:
Ezra Klein, Derek Thompson
Buy for $14.99
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Narrated by:
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Ezra Klein
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Derek Thompson
“A must-read for progressives who want a blueprint for reforming government so it can deliver for working people.” —Barack Obama • “A terrific book...Powerful and persuasive.” —Fareed Zakaria • “Spectacular…Offers a comprehensive indictment of the current problems and a clear path forward…Klein and Thompson usher in a mood shift. They inspire hope and enlarge the imagination.” —David Brooks, The New York Times
From bestselling authors and journalistic titans Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, Abundance is a once-in-a-generation, paradigm-shifting call to renew a politics of plenty, face up to the failures of liberal governance, and abandon the chosen scarcities that have deformed American life.
To trace the history of the twenty-first century so far is to trace a history of unaffordability and shortage. After years of refusing to build sufficient housing, America has a national housing crisis. After years of limiting immigration, we don’t have enough workers. Despite decades of being warned about the consequences of climate change, we haven’t built anything close to the clean-energy infrastructure we need. Ambitious public projects are finished late and over budget—if they are ever finished at all. The crisis that’s clicking into focus now has been building for decades—because we haven’t been building enough.
Abundance explains that our problems today are not the results of yesteryear’s villains. Rather, one generation’s solutions have become the next generation’s problems. Rules and regulations designed to solve the problems of the 1970s often prevent urban-density and green-energy projects that would help solve the problems of the 2020s. Laws meant to ensure that government considers the consequences of its actions have made it too difficult for government to act consequentially. In the last few decades, our capacity to see problems has sharpened while our ability to solve them has diminished.
Progress requires facing up to the institutions in life that are not working as they need to. It means, for liberals, recognizing when the government is failing. It means, for conservatives, recognizing when the government is needed. In a book exploring how we can move from a liberalism that not only protects and preserves but also builds, Klein and Thompson trace the political, economic, and cultural barriers to progress and propose a path toward a politics of abundance. At a time when movements of scarcity are gaining power in country after country, this is an answer that meets the challenges of the moment while grappling honestly with the fury so many rightfully feel.
Accolades & Awards
Best of 2025
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A must read for those who want America to Build
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Simultaneously enraging and inspiring
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There are some riveting stories about the heroic successes which have made America the World Leader in innovation, from invention to wide-spread delivery of life-changing successes like the light bulb (Thomas Edison) and the automobile (Henry Ford).
They even use the story of penicillin, an English triumph, which was discovered by Alexander Fleming, but then effectively commercialized by the US using the discoveries of Howard Florey and Ernest Chain. In this latter situation, penicillin quickly progressed from a small success in the lab to the world-wide phenomenon that saved millions of lives in World War II and later. In this situation, the US government provided limited financial support. This success was accomplished without the regulatory constraints that we experience everywhere today.
The disappointment in the book is in the conclusion, namely that all we need is for the government to "reimagine" itself. The authors seem to believe that their Party can establish a Think Tank and suddenly a leader will emerge who will carry us all into the Promised Land.
The story recognizes the importance of Hero Leaders in making things happen, and today we find many Hero Leaders in our midst, like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and others.
Surely, the authors have a better solution than suggesting that "government can reimagine itself". Better to challenge their Party to back our Heroes and eliminate the regulations and bureaucracy.
Recitation of Problems With No Real Solutions
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Ideas that were well thought out and original.
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Brilliant analysis
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