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Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy
A lively history seen through the fifty inventions that shaped it most profoundly, by the bestselling author of The Undercover Economist and Messy.
Who thought up paper money? What was the secret element that made the Gutenberg printing press possible? And what is the connection between The Da Vinci Code and the collapse of Lehman Brothers?
Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy paints an epic picture of change in an intimate way by telling the stories of the tools, people, and ideas that had far-reaching consequences for all of us. From the plough to artificial intelligence, from Gillette’s disposable razor to IKEA’s Billy bookcase, bestselling author and Financial Times columnist Tim Harford recounts each invention’s own curious, surprising, and memorable story.
Invention by invention, Harford reflects on how we got here and where we might go next. He lays bare often unexpected connections: how the bar code undermined family corner stores, and why the gramophone widened inequality. In the process, he introduces characters who developed some of these inventions, profited from them, and were ruined by them, as he traces the principles that helped explain their transformative effects. The result is a wise and witty book of history, economics, and biography.
Who thought up paper money? What was the secret element that made the Gutenberg printing press possible? And what is the connection between The Da Vinci Code and the collapse of Lehman Brothers?
Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy paints an epic picture of change in an intimate way by telling the stories of the tools, people, and ideas that had far-reaching consequences for all of us. From the plough to artificial intelligence, from Gillette’s disposable razor to IKEA’s Billy bookcase, bestselling author and Financial Times columnist Tim Harford recounts each invention’s own curious, surprising, and memorable story.
Invention by invention, Harford reflects on how we got here and where we might go next. He lays bare often unexpected connections: how the bar code undermined family corner stores, and why the gramophone widened inequality. In the process, he introduces characters who developed some of these inventions, profited from them, and were ruined by them, as he traces the principles that helped explain their transformative effects. The result is a wise and witty book of history, economics, and biography.
336 pages, Hardcover
First published July 6, 2017
About the author
Tim Harford
35 books1,767 followersTim Harford is a member of the Financial Times editorial board. His column, “The Undercover Economist”, which reveals the economic ideas behind everyday experiences, is published in the Financial Times and syndicated around the world. He is also the only economist in the world to run a problem page, “Dear Economist”, in which FT readers’ personal problems are answered tongue-in-cheek with the latest economic theory.
--from the author's website
--from the author's website
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 445 reviews
October 1, 2019
So many books have been written about all the great inventions that make our lives as comfortable as they are today. In fact, we take for granted most of them - inventions that help us travel to any part of the globe within hours, to communicate with people in any part of the world at the touch of a button, to process/store food without having to run behind it everyday, to change the landscape around us at will, to state a few. This book speaks about many such inventions too, but with a difference.
Without making a tale out of each of the inventions and delving into what led their inventors to their 'eureka!' moments, this book defines the inventions and the social-economic impact that these inventions had on the world around them. Crisp, clear and a pleasure to read.
Without making a tale out of each of the inventions and delving into what led their inventors to their 'eureka!' moments, this book defines the inventions and the social-economic impact that these inventions had on the world around them. Crisp, clear and a pleasure to read.
August 29, 2018
I am a sucker for Tim Harfords popular economics books so when I saw this at the airport it was an easy purchase to decide upon. It didn't disappoint, delving into arcane corners of modern life and illustrating how mundane products and processes help to shape our world. Worth a read.
October 26, 2017
Exellent, exactly the style and the quality i like for my commutes and chores at home.
September 14, 2017
"It was okay," the label for a 2 star review seems about right here.
I learned a fair amount in this quick tour through 50 inventions that shaped the modern economy. I felt, however, that the book would have been more enjoyable if he would have focused on fewer inventions and spent more in depth on individual inventions. Just as the author got into an interesting story (and there are many in here), it was time to move on to the next invention. I was often left wanting more.
I learned a fair amount in this quick tour through 50 inventions that shaped the modern economy. I felt, however, that the book would have been more enjoyable if he would have focused on fewer inventions and spent more in depth on individual inventions. Just as the author got into an interesting story (and there are many in here), it was time to move on to the next invention. I was often left wanting more.
July 16, 2022
Are you familiar with the game Musical Chairs? My experience here was rather similar. Material wasn't dry, as such, and the narrator a good fit; however, there came times, often in the middle of an entry where I felt suddenly compelled to stop the book rather than just think about exiting soon.
I'd recommend it... in small doses!
I'd recommend it... in small doses!
April 9, 2018
Cute little read - 50 bite-size essays on inventions, personalities, economic tradeoffs, and unexpected side effects. Hartford fuses human stories, market stories and historical vignettes, and in his hands modern economy doesn’t sound like the mind-numbing exercise of interpreting irrelevant statistics that nobody trusts.
Here is a sampling of the themes:
- Barbed wire as a lubricant of American territorial expansion, seller feedback as a lubricant of trust.
- Underappreciated role of welfare state as a hedge against radical change.
- We all know about The Pill and its effect on women’s choices and labor markets, but let’s not forget infant formula and tv dinners. (funny, the alleged liberating effects of washing machine were almost nil)
- Shipping container as a global trade transformer. The hard part was fighting through lobbies and bureaucracies, and solving vested interests and coordination problems (Malcolm McLean).
- Air Conditioning - effects on productivity, demographic migrations (e.g. US Sun Belt), skyscrapers, fridges in home, and the “cold chain”
- Billy Bookcase (Ikea). Sometimes the innovation is “merely” making quality things cheaper on a mass scale.
- Diesel Engine (Rudolf Diesel dies in poverty, suicide). Good case study for Brian Arthur’s path dependency. Alternative plausible paths through industrial revolution landscape.
- Chemical Fertilizer. Haber-Bosch process making it possible to both feed the world propelling population growth, and enabling chemical warfare. (Haber’s wife commits suicide after her husband’s invention and push for chemical weapons resulted in the infamous gas attack in Belgium 1915.)
- Leaded Gasoline and crime studies in US (50% drop after switching to unleaded?!); Concrete floors as a booster to test scores and IQ via improved sanitation and drop in childhood disease rates (Mexico).
- Never thought of Index funds as significant but Hartford makes a good case. LLCs are so obviously significant that he couldn’t not cover it. And then there is the boring Insurance which according to Hartford makes market specialization possible (speculative…).
- The S-bend pipe and flushing, avoiding smelly sewage – simple, remarkably effective, it is shocking that it wasn’t available till late 18th C… London’s Thames story sounds like a nightmare.
- And of course the inevitable discussion of iPhone and gov’t’s role in innovation and research. Hartford’s is a more nuanced version of Obama’s “you didn’t build that”, but wisely free of policy prescriptions. As a side note it occurred to me that most famous examples are from military, a sector that is somewhat unique in being necessary (unless you are libertarian), result-oriented, and competitive.
Here is a sampling of the themes:
- Barbed wire as a lubricant of American territorial expansion, seller feedback as a lubricant of trust.
- Underappreciated role of welfare state as a hedge against radical change.
- We all know about The Pill and its effect on women’s choices and labor markets, but let’s not forget infant formula and tv dinners. (funny, the alleged liberating effects of washing machine were almost nil)
- Shipping container as a global trade transformer. The hard part was fighting through lobbies and bureaucracies, and solving vested interests and coordination problems (Malcolm McLean).
- Air Conditioning - effects on productivity, demographic migrations (e.g. US Sun Belt), skyscrapers, fridges in home, and the “cold chain”
- Billy Bookcase (Ikea). Sometimes the innovation is “merely” making quality things cheaper on a mass scale.
- Diesel Engine (Rudolf Diesel dies in poverty, suicide). Good case study for Brian Arthur’s path dependency. Alternative plausible paths through industrial revolution landscape.
- Chemical Fertilizer. Haber-Bosch process making it possible to both feed the world propelling population growth, and enabling chemical warfare. (Haber’s wife commits suicide after her husband’s invention and push for chemical weapons resulted in the infamous gas attack in Belgium 1915.)
- Leaded Gasoline and crime studies in US (50% drop after switching to unleaded?!); Concrete floors as a booster to test scores and IQ via improved sanitation and drop in childhood disease rates (Mexico).
- Never thought of Index funds as significant but Hartford makes a good case. LLCs are so obviously significant that he couldn’t not cover it. And then there is the boring Insurance which according to Hartford makes market specialization possible (speculative…).
- The S-bend pipe and flushing, avoiding smelly sewage – simple, remarkably effective, it is shocking that it wasn’t available till late 18th C… London’s Thames story sounds like a nightmare.
- And of course the inevitable discussion of iPhone and gov’t’s role in innovation and research. Hartford’s is a more nuanced version of Obama’s “you didn’t build that”, but wisely free of policy prescriptions. As a side note it occurred to me that most famous examples are from military, a sector that is somewhat unique in being necessary (unless you are libertarian), result-oriented, and competitive.
September 29, 2023
Human progress is one domain on which I have spent the past few years studying and trying to gain better insights into how we have shaped the modern world. One does not need to be an optimist to view the world as a series of events that led to the progress of humanity; rather, one needs to be a 'possiblist' to acknowledge that the cascade of human progress is an eternal conflict between innovation that solves a problem and the solved problem creating a subsidiary problem, with further innovation solving the newly created problem, and so on. After reading 'Enlightenment Now' by Steven Pinker, 'The Rational Optimist' by Matt Ridley, 'Factfulness' by Hans Rosling, and 'Numbers Don’t Lie' by Vaclav Smil, I picked up this book with the assumption that the list of things that made the modern economy would include clichéd items such as the wheel, the computer, etc.
Though the fifty things mentioned are surprisingly unexpected, I would like to mention the five things that I found to be extremely important in shaping the modern economy.
1. Plough:
Yes, you read that right. The plough is a significant innovation from the Neolithic age that shaped the destiny of mankind, which was dependent on hunting and gathering until that point. Though the agricultural revolution in the form of selective breeding, irrigated fields, and storage ensured the food security of mankind, the plough also played a prominent role in sowing the seeds of modern-day gender inequality. Matt Ridley had touched upon this topic in 'The Rational Optimist,' proposing that the sexual division of labor and gender roles found prominence through two inventions: the plough and fire, where men were predominantly engaged in agriculture, and women were assigned the role of cooking. As much as fire and agriculture improved the caloric density of food and provided much energy for mankind to move from one place to another, it ruined the social relationship between man and woman.
2. Property Register
The Enlightenment idea rested on individual rights, and the right to property was the cornerstone of modern capitalism. Without the right to property, there is no incentive to produce, and with no incentive to produce, there is no economic growth. Raghuram Rajan, in his book 'Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists,' pointed out that property rights are the sole determiner of credit growth since credit serves as an incentive for the mankind to produce. The author makes an important observation that in countries where property registrations are easier and free from red-tapes and regulations, economic growth is vibrant with less corruption, more credit, and more private investments. One excerpt from the section serves as a testimony:
“In 1970s China, where the Maoists weren’t the rebels but the government, the very idea that anyone could own anything was seditious, bourgeois thinking. Farmers on collective farms were told by Communist Party officials: you don’t own a thing. Everything belongs to the collective. What about my teeth, asked one farmer? No, replied the official: even your teeth are owned by the collective.
But this approach worked terribly. If you don’t own anything, what incentive is there to work, to invest, to improve your land? Collective farming left farmers in desperate, gnawing poverty. In the village of Xiaoping in 1978, a group of farmers secretly met and agreed to abandon collective farming, divide up the land, and each keep whatever surplus they produced after meeting collective quotas. It was a treasonous agreement in Communist eyes, and the secret contact was hidden away from the officials.
But the farmers were eventually found out: the giveaway was that their farms had produced more in one year than the previous five years combined. It was a tremendously dangerous moment: the farmers were treated as criminals. But, as luck would have it, China had a new leader: Deng Xiaoping. And once Deng let it be known that this was the sort of experiment that had his blessing, 1978 was the beginning of China’s breakneck transformation from utter poverty to the largest economy on the planet. The experience in China shows that property rights are incredibly powerful. ”
3. Haber-Bosch Process
Now that we have discussed the plough and property rights, we need an efficient system of production. If there is one thing that makes modern agriculture efficient, it is fertilizer. Produced from easily available atmospheric nitrogen, ammonia serves as an essential growth promoter for crops. More than three billion people alive today and billions more in the future owe their existence to Fritz Haber.
4. Contraceptive Pills
While agriculture has subjugated much of the female population, modern medicine has liberated a few. The invention and approval of the contraceptive pill in the United States brought about a paradigm shift in the realms of education and employment, with women taking up professional courses like MBA and STEM, which were earlier dominated by men. Unplanned pregnancies often lead to higher dropout ratios and lower enrollments. However, the contraceptive pill offered autonomy and privacy to women. The pill revolutionized the economy in such a way that if a woman in her twenties can delay her motherhood by one year, her lifetime income would increase by ten percent. It is noteworthy that in Japan, where the approval for the pill came in the late 90s, gender inequality in education and the workplace is still higher. However, in India, over-the-counter contraceptive pills are still a taboo. If I am correct, even condoms are, in some places.
5. The Shipping Container
In Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, he devotes his third chapter to the idea that the benefits from the division of labor are limited by the extent of the market. Smaller markets = smaller benefits. If we want to expand the market, we need to trade. Without trade, there is no economic growth. But what made the trade easier? A simple invention: a corrugated steel box, 8 feet wide, 8.5 feet high, and 40 feet long - a shipping container. Imagine there is no shipping container. Without sea freight, there is no crude oil, industrial equipment, apparel, etc. If we want to do business and make it easier for people to do business, all that matters are well-built ports and quality containers.
There are forty-five other inventions discussed in the book. One additional invention that I found to be noteworthy is the Index Funds. In the long term, fewer than 10% of investors beat the market, and luck and chance play vital roles in this. However, index funds are based on the idea that if you cannot beat the market, you can at least mimic the returns of a broader index like Sensex or NIFTY. I have earlier written about John C. Bogle’s The Little Book of Common Sense Investing.
Though the fifty things mentioned are surprisingly unexpected, I would like to mention the five things that I found to be extremely important in shaping the modern economy.
1. Plough:
Yes, you read that right. The plough is a significant innovation from the Neolithic age that shaped the destiny of mankind, which was dependent on hunting and gathering until that point. Though the agricultural revolution in the form of selective breeding, irrigated fields, and storage ensured the food security of mankind, the plough also played a prominent role in sowing the seeds of modern-day gender inequality. Matt Ridley had touched upon this topic in 'The Rational Optimist,' proposing that the sexual division of labor and gender roles found prominence through two inventions: the plough and fire, where men were predominantly engaged in agriculture, and women were assigned the role of cooking. As much as fire and agriculture improved the caloric density of food and provided much energy for mankind to move from one place to another, it ruined the social relationship between man and woman.
2. Property Register
The Enlightenment idea rested on individual rights, and the right to property was the cornerstone of modern capitalism. Without the right to property, there is no incentive to produce, and with no incentive to produce, there is no economic growth. Raghuram Rajan, in his book 'Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists,' pointed out that property rights are the sole determiner of credit growth since credit serves as an incentive for the mankind to produce. The author makes an important observation that in countries where property registrations are easier and free from red-tapes and regulations, economic growth is vibrant with less corruption, more credit, and more private investments. One excerpt from the section serves as a testimony:
“In 1970s China, where the Maoists weren’t the rebels but the government, the very idea that anyone could own anything was seditious, bourgeois thinking. Farmers on collective farms were told by Communist Party officials: you don’t own a thing. Everything belongs to the collective. What about my teeth, asked one farmer? No, replied the official: even your teeth are owned by the collective.
But this approach worked terribly. If you don’t own anything, what incentive is there to work, to invest, to improve your land? Collective farming left farmers in desperate, gnawing poverty. In the village of Xiaoping in 1978, a group of farmers secretly met and agreed to abandon collective farming, divide up the land, and each keep whatever surplus they produced after meeting collective quotas. It was a treasonous agreement in Communist eyes, and the secret contact was hidden away from the officials.
But the farmers were eventually found out: the giveaway was that their farms had produced more in one year than the previous five years combined. It was a tremendously dangerous moment: the farmers were treated as criminals. But, as luck would have it, China had a new leader: Deng Xiaoping. And once Deng let it be known that this was the sort of experiment that had his blessing, 1978 was the beginning of China’s breakneck transformation from utter poverty to the largest economy on the planet. The experience in China shows that property rights are incredibly powerful. ”
3. Haber-Bosch Process
Now that we have discussed the plough and property rights, we need an efficient system of production. If there is one thing that makes modern agriculture efficient, it is fertilizer. Produced from easily available atmospheric nitrogen, ammonia serves as an essential growth promoter for crops. More than three billion people alive today and billions more in the future owe their existence to Fritz Haber.
4. Contraceptive Pills
While agriculture has subjugated much of the female population, modern medicine has liberated a few. The invention and approval of the contraceptive pill in the United States brought about a paradigm shift in the realms of education and employment, with women taking up professional courses like MBA and STEM, which were earlier dominated by men. Unplanned pregnancies often lead to higher dropout ratios and lower enrollments. However, the contraceptive pill offered autonomy and privacy to women. The pill revolutionized the economy in such a way that if a woman in her twenties can delay her motherhood by one year, her lifetime income would increase by ten percent. It is noteworthy that in Japan, where the approval for the pill came in the late 90s, gender inequality in education and the workplace is still higher. However, in India, over-the-counter contraceptive pills are still a taboo. If I am correct, even condoms are, in some places.
5. The Shipping Container
In Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, he devotes his third chapter to the idea that the benefits from the division of labor are limited by the extent of the market. Smaller markets = smaller benefits. If we want to expand the market, we need to trade. Without trade, there is no economic growth. But what made the trade easier? A simple invention: a corrugated steel box, 8 feet wide, 8.5 feet high, and 40 feet long - a shipping container. Imagine there is no shipping container. Without sea freight, there is no crude oil, industrial equipment, apparel, etc. If we want to do business and make it easier for people to do business, all that matters are well-built ports and quality containers.
There are forty-five other inventions discussed in the book. One additional invention that I found to be noteworthy is the Index Funds. In the long term, fewer than 10% of investors beat the market, and luck and chance play vital roles in this. However, index funds are based on the idea that if you cannot beat the market, you can at least mimic the returns of a broader index like Sensex or NIFTY. I have earlier written about John C. Bogle’s The Little Book of Common Sense Investing.
April 7, 2019
This was a better than expected read. While no list can be fully satisfying or comprehensive, both the history and the implications of each invention were narrated very interestingly. Sometimes this felt like a “new and improved” book of Malcolm Gladwell.
Picked it up to read a chapter or 2 while taking a break from work. Could also listen to it as its available as a podcast from BBC. Will be reading more by the author. Have listened to a few such books in podcast form by BBC now and will explore more.
Picked it up to read a chapter or 2 while taking a break from work. Could also listen to it as its available as a podcast from BBC. Will be reading more by the author. Have listened to a few such books in podcast form by BBC now and will explore more.
November 3, 2017
Word for word match to the series provided on BBC radio. It does have an index and excellent notes, plus an introduction and afterword, but it hasn't got any diagrams, pictures or timelines. If you've heard the radio series, it's probably not interesting to you. If you haven't, it's a good take on inventions that have impacted the economy.
My favorite - cuneiform.
My favorite - cuneiform.
December 4, 2019
Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy is a charming collection of anecdotes. It contains the kind of overarching ideas you’d expect from a book on inventions - whether inventions are more likely to come out of government intervention or are better left to the market, when the benefits of an invention do not make up for negative repercussions on those who lose out on its creation, etc. These ideas are, for the most part, subtly littered throughout, but are more fully sketched out in the conclusion. This means you can recognise these themes at your own pace and then get a wrap up at the end, confirming what you’ve seen and missed. This leaves the reader to enjoy learning about each invention as stand-alone story. This approach also serves two sets of readers - readers who are focused on learning the history of an invention in and of itself, and readers who want a trends and forces view of history.
December 23, 2021
Tim Harford es un economista americano que ha publicado varios libro con bastante éxito, el más conocido es "El economista camuflado". Ahora se dedica a las charlas Tedx y al podcast, principalmente.
El libro que acabo de terminar es de esos libros que son muy entretenidos de principio a fin. Trata de explicar las innovaciones más importante que a día de hoy han hecho que vivamos como vivimos, desde el aire acondicionado hasta conceptos más abstractos como es el derecho a la propiedad. Dividido por capítulos breves, te va contando no sólo el origen del invento, sino como ha sido el impacto en nuestras vidas.
Es un libro escrito en un lenguaje directo y asequible, al estilo ensayo divulgativo americano.
El libro que acabo de terminar es de esos libros que son muy entretenidos de principio a fin. Trata de explicar las innovaciones más importante que a día de hoy han hecho que vivamos como vivimos, desde el aire acondicionado hasta conceptos más abstractos como es el derecho a la propiedad. Dividido por capítulos breves, te va contando no sólo el origen del invento, sino como ha sido el impacto en nuestras vidas.
Es un libro escrito en un lenguaje directo y asequible, al estilo ensayo divulgativo americano.
February 17, 2023
Loved this one. Looks at invention that are not obviously important, but contributed to the society and world we live in today. This book is worth a re-read.
August 20, 2020
A few months ago my local bookstore had this 2017 hardback version in its Specials pile; at the same time there was a 2020 paperback follow-up book (entitled The Next Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy) on display in the main store. Intrigued by the three year gap in publications on more or less the same subject, I figured that it would be interesting to compare the two: so I purchased both, if only to learn something more about what is meant when one talks about the economy.
This book contains fifty specifically numbered Narratives or stories in seven separately titled Sections (more or less!). To be honest, the set-up of this book is rather strange: Narrative number 1 is followed by a non-numbered Introduction; then Sections I to VII follow, with each of these Sections having its own “introductory” section before the numbered Narratives continue — except that at the end of Section VII, Narrative number 49 is followed by a non-numbered entry entitled ‘Conclusion: Looking Forward”, and then this in turn is followed by Narrative number 50, entitled “Epilogue: The Lightbulb”. All rather weird. Nor am I convinced that this setting-out actually contributes to clarifying the content…
The content: each of the Narratives is interesting and informative in itself. Any reader will enjoy the clear prose and friendly tone of the author. The entries are not presented chronologically, but I assume that they are presented in Sections to link them conceptually (except, as I mentioned above, I’m not convinced this is necessarily the case). Overall, however, the book is an interesting read regardless. The intent appears to be to appeal to popular consumption. The total number of entries, of course, will ensure that not too much depth can be provided apart from the appeal of the stories themselves.
The impression I gained from the stories and their connection to the economy as set out in this book is more one of concern for First World countries as affected by the topics raised. We “rich” countries are familiar with these developments, and the stories tell of mostly long-term achievements (sometimes the origins could stretch back to ideas generated hundreds if not thousands of years ago!) often enough “improved” as time and new discoveries and insights permitted. Not all the stories are necessarily feel-good as far as some of the individuals are concerned, but the overall impression is that our special ability to be inventive and creative enough to confirm our basic satisfaction with our economies becomes paramount.
We have become so successful at this that there is a sense that complaining about or criticising aspects of our economies is missing the point — “It’s the economy, stupid!” — and life goes on… There is a deterministic element to all of this which we conveniently disregard precisely because we are so clever at solving real or imagined difficulties, aren’t we?
The current problems following on from the impact on our economies of the COVID-19 virus pandemic, unfortunately, may just turn out to prove us all wrong…
*
It was only as I had almost finished reading the 2020 paperback The Next Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy when Harford’s reference on page 253 to his earlier 2017 work entitled Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy made me pause… After checking, I confirmed that, in the UK, Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy is indeed the title of what appears in the US as Fifty Inventions that Shaped the Modern Economy.
In Australia we are “blessed” (cursed?) in that we can have access to both UK and US versions; and in this case I was aware immediately on sighting the title of the first chapter of Fifty Inventions… (“The Plow”) that it was a US product (otherwise it would have read “The Plough”) — but I had never before been aware that the title of the book had been changed for the US consumer… I suspect this might be something to do with marketing, or some new form of inter-publishing house policy, but I’m not sure. Does Copyright not extend to the title of a book as well as to the book itself? Then again, perhaps this edition includes more changes other than peculiarly US spelling and punctuation? (See my comment in paragraph 2 above…)
In case you’re wondering,The Next Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy Kindle hardcover edition is titled Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy Series Two (no mention of ‘Inventions’ or ‘Shaping’). Apart from contributing to confusion, angst and frustration, is this an example of the laissez-faire attitude found in “It’s the economy, stupid!”? For me it comes across more of a “It’s the economy: Stupid!” situation.
This book contains fifty specifically numbered Narratives or stories in seven separately titled Sections (more or less!). To be honest, the set-up of this book is rather strange: Narrative number 1 is followed by a non-numbered Introduction; then Sections I to VII follow, with each of these Sections having its own “introductory” section before the numbered Narratives continue — except that at the end of Section VII, Narrative number 49 is followed by a non-numbered entry entitled ‘Conclusion: Looking Forward”, and then this in turn is followed by Narrative number 50, entitled “Epilogue: The Lightbulb”. All rather weird. Nor am I convinced that this setting-out actually contributes to clarifying the content…
The content: each of the Narratives is interesting and informative in itself. Any reader will enjoy the clear prose and friendly tone of the author. The entries are not presented chronologically, but I assume that they are presented in Sections to link them conceptually (except, as I mentioned above, I’m not convinced this is necessarily the case). Overall, however, the book is an interesting read regardless. The intent appears to be to appeal to popular consumption. The total number of entries, of course, will ensure that not too much depth can be provided apart from the appeal of the stories themselves.
The impression I gained from the stories and their connection to the economy as set out in this book is more one of concern for First World countries as affected by the topics raised. We “rich” countries are familiar with these developments, and the stories tell of mostly long-term achievements (sometimes the origins could stretch back to ideas generated hundreds if not thousands of years ago!) often enough “improved” as time and new discoveries and insights permitted. Not all the stories are necessarily feel-good as far as some of the individuals are concerned, but the overall impression is that our special ability to be inventive and creative enough to confirm our basic satisfaction with our economies becomes paramount.
We have become so successful at this that there is a sense that complaining about or criticising aspects of our economies is missing the point — “It’s the economy, stupid!” — and life goes on… There is a deterministic element to all of this which we conveniently disregard precisely because we are so clever at solving real or imagined difficulties, aren’t we?
The current problems following on from the impact on our economies of the COVID-19 virus pandemic, unfortunately, may just turn out to prove us all wrong…
*
It was only as I had almost finished reading the 2020 paperback The Next Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy when Harford’s reference on page 253 to his earlier 2017 work entitled Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy made me pause… After checking, I confirmed that, in the UK, Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy is indeed the title of what appears in the US as Fifty Inventions that Shaped the Modern Economy.
In Australia we are “blessed” (cursed?) in that we can have access to both UK and US versions; and in this case I was aware immediately on sighting the title of the first chapter of Fifty Inventions… (“The Plow”) that it was a US product (otherwise it would have read “The Plough”) — but I had never before been aware that the title of the book had been changed for the US consumer… I suspect this might be something to do with marketing, or some new form of inter-publishing house policy, but I’m not sure. Does Copyright not extend to the title of a book as well as to the book itself? Then again, perhaps this edition includes more changes other than peculiarly US spelling and punctuation? (See my comment in paragraph 2 above…)
In case you’re wondering,The Next Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy Kindle hardcover edition is titled Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy Series Two (no mention of ‘Inventions’ or ‘Shaping’). Apart from contributing to confusion, angst and frustration, is this an example of the laissez-faire attitude found in “It’s the economy, stupid!”? For me it comes across more of a “It’s the economy: Stupid!” situation.
October 17, 2018
The barbed wire, passports, robots, infant formula, TV dinners, the pill, the barcode, tally sticks, ikea´s iconic billy bookcase….what do all these things have in common? how have they shaped modern society?
When I read a book, I usually take a little notebook, a pen, and some sticky notes I like to use to keep track of all those quotes that make me go “ah!” at a given page.
Looking at my surprisingly-still-pristine copy, I can count thirty-three sticky notes: this book is filled with mind-blowing facts about the modern economy that should be shared, celebrated, and studied to see where do all these inventions that surround us come from, what role have they played in modern society and what can we expect from the future of innovation.
The cheeky analogies make the read entertaining and addictive: you would think Hardford compares the invention of the barbed wire to digital property rights for literary purposes, until you realize that it actually makes a lot of sense, and that our economy is based on inventions that are a lot more older than progressists would be comfortable with.
Given the current political situation regarding migration, it was particularly interesting to see the origins of invention #6 on the list: the passport.
The concept of a passport goes back to biblical times, but it was meant as a measure of protection: the carrier of the passport was protected by the authorities from any harm during their journey. In a world were most passports imply a limitation to enter a country (with the exception of a few countries like Japan, Singapore and Germany recently ranked as the most powerful passports with the biggest number of granted visas worldwide), the difference between the limitations that come with traveling with a certain passport strike bluntly against its original purpose: that of a safe passage.
My favourite chapter of the book is the one dedicated to baby formula. The invention was meant as a way to save starving orphans in the 19th century, but it also meant that poor victorian women who earned a living breastfeeding other rich family´s children lost their jobs.
Then, there is the impact on health of those babies fed with formula, with some research even arguing that the lack of a mother´s milk eventually results in a lower IQ and other development shortcomings for the baby. The author also mentions Nestle´s baby formula scandal in the 70s, giving a wholesome overview of several implications of this food as a controvesial and revolutionary creation.
Revolutionary, as we learn in this read, does not necessarily mean good, bad, both or neither. The lecture starts with arguing whether the invention of the plough -and as a consequence, a farming system altogether- is actually a good thing, as the dependance on agriculture has brought us both stability and overall progress by enabling the establishment of cities, but also social clashes, wars, and arguably, even an overweight problem as people no longer need to hunt and gather for food.
Harford has a really engaging way of intertwining seemingly positive inventions with the consequences they had on our economy, arguing that every advance comes with a handful of winners and losers: those who benefit from the invention and those who lose their jobs, health, habitat, and way of living as a consequence.
As I could not possibly go through all my sticky notes in just a post, I have to leave most of my favourite items out of this article, which include the fascinating story behind the radar, batteries, plastic, among other protagonists of our modern economy. But I will leave you with one of my favourite quotes, hoping it will entice you to dive into this book:
“The more human inventiveness we encourage, the better that´s likely to work out for us” Tim Harford.
When I read a book, I usually take a little notebook, a pen, and some sticky notes I like to use to keep track of all those quotes that make me go “ah!” at a given page.
Looking at my surprisingly-still-pristine copy, I can count thirty-three sticky notes: this book is filled with mind-blowing facts about the modern economy that should be shared, celebrated, and studied to see where do all these inventions that surround us come from, what role have they played in modern society and what can we expect from the future of innovation.
The cheeky analogies make the read entertaining and addictive: you would think Hardford compares the invention of the barbed wire to digital property rights for literary purposes, until you realize that it actually makes a lot of sense, and that our economy is based on inventions that are a lot more older than progressists would be comfortable with.
Given the current political situation regarding migration, it was particularly interesting to see the origins of invention #6 on the list: the passport.
The concept of a passport goes back to biblical times, but it was meant as a measure of protection: the carrier of the passport was protected by the authorities from any harm during their journey. In a world were most passports imply a limitation to enter a country (with the exception of a few countries like Japan, Singapore and Germany recently ranked as the most powerful passports with the biggest number of granted visas worldwide), the difference between the limitations that come with traveling with a certain passport strike bluntly against its original purpose: that of a safe passage.
My favourite chapter of the book is the one dedicated to baby formula. The invention was meant as a way to save starving orphans in the 19th century, but it also meant that poor victorian women who earned a living breastfeeding other rich family´s children lost their jobs.
Then, there is the impact on health of those babies fed with formula, with some research even arguing that the lack of a mother´s milk eventually results in a lower IQ and other development shortcomings for the baby. The author also mentions Nestle´s baby formula scandal in the 70s, giving a wholesome overview of several implications of this food as a controvesial and revolutionary creation.
Revolutionary, as we learn in this read, does not necessarily mean good, bad, both or neither. The lecture starts with arguing whether the invention of the plough -and as a consequence, a farming system altogether- is actually a good thing, as the dependance on agriculture has brought us both stability and overall progress by enabling the establishment of cities, but also social clashes, wars, and arguably, even an overweight problem as people no longer need to hunt and gather for food.
Harford has a really engaging way of intertwining seemingly positive inventions with the consequences they had on our economy, arguing that every advance comes with a handful of winners and losers: those who benefit from the invention and those who lose their jobs, health, habitat, and way of living as a consequence.
As I could not possibly go through all my sticky notes in just a post, I have to leave most of my favourite items out of this article, which include the fascinating story behind the radar, batteries, plastic, among other protagonists of our modern economy. But I will leave you with one of my favourite quotes, hoping it will entice you to dive into this book:
“The more human inventiveness we encourage, the better that´s likely to work out for us” Tim Harford.
October 8, 2018
A fun fast paced book with some interesting insights into how the modern economy evolved. The 'things' that Tim Harford looks into are necessarily the ones you expect, and even the familiar ones are looked at from a different angle. While unlikely to change your views on modern economics, its definitely and enjoyable and interesting read.
July 12, 2019
Um livro que contém alguns capítulos que poderiam ser discutidos em sala de aula.
April 16, 2020
This book is a great look at how inventions and innovation shaped the world. Harford shows 50 examples of how people solved problems. Then Harford explains the consequences of those solutions: good, bad, intended, and unintended.
The book is broken up into short stories about each of the 50 inventions. This made it easy to read a few sections at a time and understand the information.
I would recommend this book to anyone interested in history, business, and/or problem solving.
The book is broken up into short stories about each of the 50 inventions. This made it easy to read a few sections at a time and understand the information.
I would recommend this book to anyone interested in history, business, and/or problem solving.
April 13, 2023
It was a fun read, especially to read aloud. Harford makes some interesting connections for sure. Perhaps not the best for those who question capitalism itself though 😂
April 17, 2020
Timbo Harford. Really enjoy these sort of books.
September 3, 2020
Книга чудова в першу чергу тим, що спонукає подумати. А яким би був світ, якби в ньому не з'явилися гормональні контрацептиви? Як би розвивалися інформаційні технології, якби пані Гоппер не вигадала компілятор? Чи розвинулася б економіка Китаю, якби не існувало транспортних контейнерів?
Винаходи, що їх розглядає в своїй книзі Тім Гарфорд, не очевидні, як, наприклад, колесо, але вплинули на економіку світу і зробили можливим сучасне життя в тому вигляді, в якому ми його знаємо зараз. Чи це не диво?
Винаходи, що їх розглядає в своїй книзі Тім Гарфорд, не очевидні, як, наприклад, колесо, але вплинули на економіку світу і зробили можливим сучасне життя в тому вигляді, в якому ми його знаємо зараз. Чи це не диво?
December 13, 2017
I had so much fun listening to this. A quick and easy book, filled with tons of fascinating stories.
Highly recommended!
Highly recommended!
July 9, 2017
Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy (2017) by Tim Harford is a history of fifty very important technologies that have had a huge impact on the modern economy. It's a bit like James Burke's superb TV shows Connections and the Day the Universe changed but for the loyal listener set. Chapters from the book were first put into a podcast series that is also very interesting and well done.
Harford was a professional economist before becoming a writer for the Financial Times and then a presenter on BBC radio. He's written a number of books on economics and has now written this one looking at a range of technologies. He hasn't tried to pick the most important items, like the wheel, or light, because so many other people have looked at them. Instead it's an inspired list of varying items and the tales behind them.
The items include : The Plough, Barbed Wire, Robots, The Welfare State, Infant Formula, TV Dinners, The Pill, Video Games, Market Research, Air Conditioning, Department Stores, The Dynamo, The Shipping Container, The Barcode, Tradable Debt and the Tally Stick, The Billy Bookcase, The Elevator, Cuneiform, Public Key Cryptography, Double-Entry Bookkeeping and the Light Bulb. They vary considerably.
Each chapter is very interesting on its own and the whole is even greater than the sum of the parts. The chapters are also quite short and so the book can be read in nice short chunks if desired. Each chapter has extensive references as well so anyone who wants to go into more depth can easily go off and read books about the inventions.
It's really a great read and something that is really informative. Even if you have listened to the podcasts you'll also find more in the book. It's definitely one of Harford's best books and for anybody at all interested in technology or the impacts of technology it's highly recommended.
Harford was a professional economist before becoming a writer for the Financial Times and then a presenter on BBC radio. He's written a number of books on economics and has now written this one looking at a range of technologies. He hasn't tried to pick the most important items, like the wheel, or light, because so many other people have looked at them. Instead it's an inspired list of varying items and the tales behind them.
The items include : The Plough, Barbed Wire, Robots, The Welfare State, Infant Formula, TV Dinners, The Pill, Video Games, Market Research, Air Conditioning, Department Stores, The Dynamo, The Shipping Container, The Barcode, Tradable Debt and the Tally Stick, The Billy Bookcase, The Elevator, Cuneiform, Public Key Cryptography, Double-Entry Bookkeeping and the Light Bulb. They vary considerably.
Each chapter is very interesting on its own and the whole is even greater than the sum of the parts. The chapters are also quite short and so the book can be read in nice short chunks if desired. Each chapter has extensive references as well so anyone who wants to go into more depth can easily go off and read books about the inventions.
It's really a great read and something that is really informative. Even if you have listened to the podcasts you'll also find more in the book. It's definitely one of Harford's best books and for anybody at all interested in technology or the impacts of technology it's highly recommended.
January 5, 2022
Our world is a Jenga tower made up small, simple bricks.
Inventions like computers, railways, electricity and telephones are obvious but this book explores some inventions that changed the world forever.
My favourite bricks:
1. Infant formula: Women entered the workforce in big numbers during WWII. Men returned to the workforce and led to a baby boom after 1945. Infant formula allowed these young mothers to keep working and gave them economic freedom.
2. Shipping container: Globalisation and cheap manufacturing have been enabled by shipping containers. The rise of global supply chain has also created interdependence amongst countries where the costs of war have become too unbearable. Containers = Trade = Peace.
3. Barbed wire: Farming started when humans started cultivating the same piece of land every year. The value of land became increase but ownership of this land was possible only after the advent of barbed wire. This invention could also be called the root of global inequality that divided landowners and labourers.
4. Department Stores: Salesmen were proud of cajoling, convincing and negotiating with customers. All that changed with the advent of department stores. Customers started walking through long aisles and spending more time in stores. Customers could now be trusted to make up their own minds and led to the rise of Marketing v/s Selling.
5. Limited liability: With limited downside and unlimited upside, people could now own a business without being worried about it's failure. The world's oldest public limited company became so profitable that it ended up ruling over 25% of world's population.
Each chapter in the book can be read in less than 5 minutes & I hope you enjoyed reading this review.🙂
Akshay Deshpande
Inventions like computers, railways, electricity and telephones are obvious but this book explores some inventions that changed the world forever.
My favourite bricks:
1. Infant formula: Women entered the workforce in big numbers during WWII. Men returned to the workforce and led to a baby boom after 1945. Infant formula allowed these young mothers to keep working and gave them economic freedom.
2. Shipping container: Globalisation and cheap manufacturing have been enabled by shipping containers. The rise of global supply chain has also created interdependence amongst countries where the costs of war have become too unbearable. Containers = Trade = Peace.
3. Barbed wire: Farming started when humans started cultivating the same piece of land every year. The value of land became increase but ownership of this land was possible only after the advent of barbed wire. This invention could also be called the root of global inequality that divided landowners and labourers.
4. Department Stores: Salesmen were proud of cajoling, convincing and negotiating with customers. All that changed with the advent of department stores. Customers started walking through long aisles and spending more time in stores. Customers could now be trusted to make up their own minds and led to the rise of Marketing v/s Selling.
5. Limited liability: With limited downside and unlimited upside, people could now own a business without being worried about it's failure. The world's oldest public limited company became so profitable that it ended up ruling over 25% of world's population.
Each chapter in the book can be read in less than 5 minutes & I hope you enjoyed reading this review.🙂
Akshay Deshpande
November 18, 2020
Yesterday evening, I finished Tim Harford’s “Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy”. Tim Harford is a journalist, economist, and broadcaster who currently is a senior columnist at the Financial Times and is the host of a BBC World Service program. The book was published in 2017.
The book is Tim’s attempt at identifying fifty illuminating stories about inventions that have shaped the modern economy. He was explicit in saying that it is not an attempt to define the fifty most significant inventions in economic history.
I write this review at the immediate aftermath of the #LekkiShooting that trail the #EndSARS movement in Nigeria and while I had read this part before the protests started, writing this review now makes me wonder how I will answer the question the author posed at the beginning of the book:
“Surrounded by the wreckage of modernity, without access to the lifeblood of modern technology, where do you start again? What do you need to keep yourself — and the embers of civilization — alive?”
With what you know right now, which piece of technology would you choose?
Some of the inventions Tim wrote about are ridiculously simple, like the plow, the barbed wire, and even writing (any kind of writing), while some are complex, like Google Search and Chemical fertilizer. However, regardless of their simplicity or complexity, there is no denying the fact that they have shaped where and how you are right now.
For example, when farming was well established — two thousand years ago in Imperial Rome, nine hundred years ago in Song dynasty China — these farmers were five or six times more productive than the foragers they had replaced. Think about that: It becomes possible for a fifth of a society’s population to grow enough food to feed everyone. What do the other four-fifths do? Well, they’re freed up to specialize in other things: baking bread, firing bricks, felling trees, building houses, mining ore, smelting metals, constructing roads — making cities; building civilization.
#WILT The word “ream” — 500 sheets of paper — is derived from the Arabic rizma, meaning “bundle” or “bale.”
Some of the inventions were used as tools of oppression. While the barbed wire for instance helped with property rights as Europeans settled in America, the American tribes hated it so much that they named it “the devil’s rope”.
For some other inventions it’s simply difficult to comprehend how life was before them. It’s hard to remember just how bad search technology was before Google. In 1998, for instance, if you typed “cars” into Lycos — then a leading search engine — you’d get a results page filled with porn websites. Why? Owners of porn websites inserted many mentions of popular search terms like “cars,” perhaps in tiny text or in white on a white background. The Lycos algorithm saw many mentions of “cars” and concluded that the page would be interesting to someone searching for cars. It’s a system that now seems almost laughably simplistic and easy to game. But at the time, nothing better was available.
Some of the other inventions mentioned were not for the purpose they are known for right now. Air conditioning is a prime example. Air-conditioning as we know it began in 1902, and it had nothing to do with human comfort. Read the book to find out its original purpose. Air conditioning is such an important invention that it has been argued that it elected Ronald Reagan.
If you meet me randomly and asked me about the Passport as an invention, I would be befuddled. Of course if I had time to think about it, I will admit that it is an invention. But the thought that anyone could generally get on their feet and go anywhere they want in the world without applying to go there just didn’t occur to me. To further confuse me, the passport as we know it today was invented as late as 1920.
Trivia: How much might global economic output rise if anyone could get on their bikes to work anywhere without the need of a passport? Some economists have calculated global GDP would double.
#DoYouKnow Baby formula is arguably more addictive than tobacco or alcohol. No wonder baby food was a source of conflict in my household. Now, I have a viable argument for my wife.
The “one-price” approach, where a customer is quoted a fair price and told to take it or leave it, was considered totally unprecedented, and at the time considered radical. A certain store using this approach once hired a particularly skilled salesman who was appalled to hear that he would not be allowed to apply his finely tuned skill of sizing up the customer’s apparent wealth and extracting as extravagant a price as possible. He resigned on the spot, telling the youthful Irish shopkeeper he’d be bankrupt within a month. By the time the owner of the store died, over five decades later, he was one of the richest men in New York.
#DoYouKnow the first focus group was conducted in 1941 by an academic sociologist, Robert K. Merton. He later wished he could have patented the idea and collected royalties.
If you read my reviews, you already know that I read all my books with Nigeria in mind. Reading how revolutionary the shipping container is offers some lessons. Goods produced in faraway ends of the earth get to us because of this simple invention. Yet Africa is unable to enjoy the true wonder of this invention because of poor infrastructure. Many ports in poorer countries still look like New York in the 1950s and are unable to enjoy the benefits of the containerization revolution. Without the ability to plug into the world’s container shipping system, Africa continues to be a costly place to do business.
While some inventions like the plow are standalone, for some others they are most useful when they combine with other inventions: think of the elevator, air-conditioning, and reinforced concrete, which together gave us the skyscraper.
Talking of elevators, we don’t tend to think of them as mass transportation systems, but they are: they move hundreds of millions of people every day. They are so important to modern China that the country alone is installing 700,000 elevators a year. And oh, many people are nervous of elevators, yet they are safe — at least ten times safer than escalators.
The lightbulb is a miracle. That’s a chapter you have to read. But think about this: When you switch off a lightbulb for an hour, you are saving illumination that would have cost our ancestors all week to create. Light bulb moment for you?
The myths behind writing really caught my attention. People used to believe that the ability to write came from the gods. The Greeks believed that Prometheus had given it to mankind as a gift. The Egyptians also thought that literacy was divine, a benefaction from baboon-faced Thoth, the god of knowledge. Mesopotamians thought the goddess Inanna had stolen it for them from Enki, the god of wisdom.
How about the development of cryptography? Two thousand years ago, Julius Caesar sent encrypted messages to far-flung outposts of the Roman Empire — he’d arrange in advance that recipients should simply shift the alphabet by some predetermined number of characters. So, for instance, “jowbef Csjubjo,” if you substitute each letter with the one before it in the alphabet, would read “invade Britain.”
Some names in the list make you scratch your head but upon closer look, you can’t but acknowledge their roles in our civilization. The limited liability corporation is one. Management Consultants is another. Globally, consulting firms charge their clients a total of about $125 billion. Are they worth these fees? There are arguments for both sides of the divide. For perspective, Nigeria’s annual budget hovers around the $30 billion mark.
When Americans go on and on about China copying their ideas, would someone point out to this new generation that America was built on the ideas copied by their ancestors from Britain and Europe? Charles Dicken was so livid at his pirated books that he took a trip to Boston to decry his losses. The U.S. economy was in full-blown copying mode: Americans wanted the cheapest possible access to the best ideas that Europe could offer. The United States finally began to respect international copyright in 1891, 50 years after Dickens’s campaign. And a similar transition is occurring in developing countries today: the less those countries copy other ideas and the more they create of their own, the more they protect ideas themselves. There’s been a lot of movement in a brief time: China didn’t have a system of copyright at all until 1991.
I find the chapter on copyrights intriguing. Some notable economists have said that what truly unleashed steam-powered industry was the expiration of the patent. Some have even argued that intellectual property be scrapped as it unleashes innovation. They point to Tesla’s opening up access to its patent archive in an effort to expand the industry as a whole as an example of how scrapping intellectual property does not mean the idea creator would lose out.
#WILT In the United States, copyrights originally lasted fourteen years, and were renewable once.
As expected, most of the inventors encountered in the book are male, and no wonder — who knows how many brilliant women, like Clara Immerwahr (notable story), were lost to history after having their ambitions casually crushed. Fortunately, we’re already a long way toward learning one big lesson about encouraging inventiveness: most societies have realized that it isn’t sensible to waste the talents of half their populations.
Trivia: What is the most profitable invention in history? You’d probably not guess right. Read the book.
I read the chapter about Diesel Engines three times. The concept of Path Dependence struck me. Path Dependence is a self-reinforcing cycle in which existing investments and infrastructure mean we keep doing things in a certain way, even if we’d do them differently if only we could start from scratch. As late as 1914, steam was at least as viable as crude oil for powering cars, but the growing influence of the oil industry ensured that much more money was going into improving the internal combustion engine than the steam engine. With equal investment in research and development, who knows where breakthroughs might have happened; perhaps today we’d be driving next-generation steam-powered cars. Or may be vegetable oils. In 1912, a year before his death, the inventor of Diesel Engine demonstrated and predicted that vegetable oils would become as important a source of fuel as petroleum products.
#DoYouKnow Paper money sometimes called fiat money is from the Latin word which means “Let it be done.” The Great Khan announces that officially stamped mulberry bark is money — and lo, let it be done. Money it is.
Discussions about inventions like Radar, which spawned ten Nobel laureates, Plastics, S-bend, and Two-part pricing were nothing short of enthralling. It’s interesting that I have been found explaining the concept of Environmental Kuznets Curve several times, but I didn’t know there is a name for it.
In many parts, the author hailed how people left to their own devices can come up with great innovations, but in other parts he cautions that without regulation, we may hurt ourselves in more ways than we can imagine.
Throughout the book, I was looking for answers to a particular question for Nigeria: How do you spur innovation? One of the answers is, if we want to encourage more good ideas, we need to concentrate minds by offering prizes for problem solving. The Longitude Prize inspired the creation of clocks. The DARPA Grand Challenge, which began in 2004, helped kick-start progress in self-driving cars.
But more generally, there are no easy answers with regards to laws and regulations that encourage innovation. The natural assumption is that bureaucrats should err on the side of getting out of the way of inventors, and this does pay dividends. A laissez-faire approach gave the world the remarkable M-Pesa. But it also gave the world the slow-motion disaster of leaded gasoline; there are some inventions that governments really should be stepping in to prevent.
This was a book I enjoyed reading and for which I will definitely come back to read specific chapters.
The book is Tim’s attempt at identifying fifty illuminating stories about inventions that have shaped the modern economy. He was explicit in saying that it is not an attempt to define the fifty most significant inventions in economic history.
I write this review at the immediate aftermath of the #LekkiShooting that trail the #EndSARS movement in Nigeria and while I had read this part before the protests started, writing this review now makes me wonder how I will answer the question the author posed at the beginning of the book:
“Surrounded by the wreckage of modernity, without access to the lifeblood of modern technology, where do you start again? What do you need to keep yourself — and the embers of civilization — alive?”
With what you know right now, which piece of technology would you choose?
Some of the inventions Tim wrote about are ridiculously simple, like the plow, the barbed wire, and even writing (any kind of writing), while some are complex, like Google Search and Chemical fertilizer. However, regardless of their simplicity or complexity, there is no denying the fact that they have shaped where and how you are right now.
For example, when farming was well established — two thousand years ago in Imperial Rome, nine hundred years ago in Song dynasty China — these farmers were five or six times more productive than the foragers they had replaced. Think about that: It becomes possible for a fifth of a society’s population to grow enough food to feed everyone. What do the other four-fifths do? Well, they’re freed up to specialize in other things: baking bread, firing bricks, felling trees, building houses, mining ore, smelting metals, constructing roads — making cities; building civilization.
#WILT The word “ream” — 500 sheets of paper — is derived from the Arabic rizma, meaning “bundle” or “bale.”
Some of the inventions were used as tools of oppression. While the barbed wire for instance helped with property rights as Europeans settled in America, the American tribes hated it so much that they named it “the devil’s rope”.
For some other inventions it’s simply difficult to comprehend how life was before them. It’s hard to remember just how bad search technology was before Google. In 1998, for instance, if you typed “cars” into Lycos — then a leading search engine — you’d get a results page filled with porn websites. Why? Owners of porn websites inserted many mentions of popular search terms like “cars,” perhaps in tiny text or in white on a white background. The Lycos algorithm saw many mentions of “cars” and concluded that the page would be interesting to someone searching for cars. It’s a system that now seems almost laughably simplistic and easy to game. But at the time, nothing better was available.
Some of the other inventions mentioned were not for the purpose they are known for right now. Air conditioning is a prime example. Air-conditioning as we know it began in 1902, and it had nothing to do with human comfort. Read the book to find out its original purpose. Air conditioning is such an important invention that it has been argued that it elected Ronald Reagan.
If you meet me randomly and asked me about the Passport as an invention, I would be befuddled. Of course if I had time to think about it, I will admit that it is an invention. But the thought that anyone could generally get on their feet and go anywhere they want in the world without applying to go there just didn’t occur to me. To further confuse me, the passport as we know it today was invented as late as 1920.
Trivia: How much might global economic output rise if anyone could get on their bikes to work anywhere without the need of a passport? Some economists have calculated global GDP would double.
#DoYouKnow Baby formula is arguably more addictive than tobacco or alcohol. No wonder baby food was a source of conflict in my household. Now, I have a viable argument for my wife.
The “one-price” approach, where a customer is quoted a fair price and told to take it or leave it, was considered totally unprecedented, and at the time considered radical. A certain store using this approach once hired a particularly skilled salesman who was appalled to hear that he would not be allowed to apply his finely tuned skill of sizing up the customer’s apparent wealth and extracting as extravagant a price as possible. He resigned on the spot, telling the youthful Irish shopkeeper he’d be bankrupt within a month. By the time the owner of the store died, over five decades later, he was one of the richest men in New York.
#DoYouKnow the first focus group was conducted in 1941 by an academic sociologist, Robert K. Merton. He later wished he could have patented the idea and collected royalties.
If you read my reviews, you already know that I read all my books with Nigeria in mind. Reading how revolutionary the shipping container is offers some lessons. Goods produced in faraway ends of the earth get to us because of this simple invention. Yet Africa is unable to enjoy the true wonder of this invention because of poor infrastructure. Many ports in poorer countries still look like New York in the 1950s and are unable to enjoy the benefits of the containerization revolution. Without the ability to plug into the world’s container shipping system, Africa continues to be a costly place to do business.
While some inventions like the plow are standalone, for some others they are most useful when they combine with other inventions: think of the elevator, air-conditioning, and reinforced concrete, which together gave us the skyscraper.
Talking of elevators, we don’t tend to think of them as mass transportation systems, but they are: they move hundreds of millions of people every day. They are so important to modern China that the country alone is installing 700,000 elevators a year. And oh, many people are nervous of elevators, yet they are safe — at least ten times safer than escalators.
The lightbulb is a miracle. That’s a chapter you have to read. But think about this: When you switch off a lightbulb for an hour, you are saving illumination that would have cost our ancestors all week to create. Light bulb moment for you?
The myths behind writing really caught my attention. People used to believe that the ability to write came from the gods. The Greeks believed that Prometheus had given it to mankind as a gift. The Egyptians also thought that literacy was divine, a benefaction from baboon-faced Thoth, the god of knowledge. Mesopotamians thought the goddess Inanna had stolen it for them from Enki, the god of wisdom.
How about the development of cryptography? Two thousand years ago, Julius Caesar sent encrypted messages to far-flung outposts of the Roman Empire — he’d arrange in advance that recipients should simply shift the alphabet by some predetermined number of characters. So, for instance, “jowbef Csjubjo,” if you substitute each letter with the one before it in the alphabet, would read “invade Britain.”
Some names in the list make you scratch your head but upon closer look, you can’t but acknowledge their roles in our civilization. The limited liability corporation is one. Management Consultants is another. Globally, consulting firms charge their clients a total of about $125 billion. Are they worth these fees? There are arguments for both sides of the divide. For perspective, Nigeria’s annual budget hovers around the $30 billion mark.
When Americans go on and on about China copying their ideas, would someone point out to this new generation that America was built on the ideas copied by their ancestors from Britain and Europe? Charles Dicken was so livid at his pirated books that he took a trip to Boston to decry his losses. The U.S. economy was in full-blown copying mode: Americans wanted the cheapest possible access to the best ideas that Europe could offer. The United States finally began to respect international copyright in 1891, 50 years after Dickens’s campaign. And a similar transition is occurring in developing countries today: the less those countries copy other ideas and the more they create of their own, the more they protect ideas themselves. There’s been a lot of movement in a brief time: China didn’t have a system of copyright at all until 1991.
I find the chapter on copyrights intriguing. Some notable economists have said that what truly unleashed steam-powered industry was the expiration of the patent. Some have even argued that intellectual property be scrapped as it unleashes innovation. They point to Tesla’s opening up access to its patent archive in an effort to expand the industry as a whole as an example of how scrapping intellectual property does not mean the idea creator would lose out.
#WILT In the United States, copyrights originally lasted fourteen years, and were renewable once.
As expected, most of the inventors encountered in the book are male, and no wonder — who knows how many brilliant women, like Clara Immerwahr (notable story), were lost to history after having their ambitions casually crushed. Fortunately, we’re already a long way toward learning one big lesson about encouraging inventiveness: most societies have realized that it isn’t sensible to waste the talents of half their populations.
Trivia: What is the most profitable invention in history? You’d probably not guess right. Read the book.
I read the chapter about Diesel Engines three times. The concept of Path Dependence struck me. Path Dependence is a self-reinforcing cycle in which existing investments and infrastructure mean we keep doing things in a certain way, even if we’d do them differently if only we could start from scratch. As late as 1914, steam was at least as viable as crude oil for powering cars, but the growing influence of the oil industry ensured that much more money was going into improving the internal combustion engine than the steam engine. With equal investment in research and development, who knows where breakthroughs might have happened; perhaps today we’d be driving next-generation steam-powered cars. Or may be vegetable oils. In 1912, a year before his death, the inventor of Diesel Engine demonstrated and predicted that vegetable oils would become as important a source of fuel as petroleum products.
#DoYouKnow Paper money sometimes called fiat money is from the Latin word which means “Let it be done.” The Great Khan announces that officially stamped mulberry bark is money — and lo, let it be done. Money it is.
Discussions about inventions like Radar, which spawned ten Nobel laureates, Plastics, S-bend, and Two-part pricing were nothing short of enthralling. It’s interesting that I have been found explaining the concept of Environmental Kuznets Curve several times, but I didn’t know there is a name for it.
In many parts, the author hailed how people left to their own devices can come up with great innovations, but in other parts he cautions that without regulation, we may hurt ourselves in more ways than we can imagine.
Throughout the book, I was looking for answers to a particular question for Nigeria: How do you spur innovation? One of the answers is, if we want to encourage more good ideas, we need to concentrate minds by offering prizes for problem solving. The Longitude Prize inspired the creation of clocks. The DARPA Grand Challenge, which began in 2004, helped kick-start progress in self-driving cars.
But more generally, there are no easy answers with regards to laws and regulations that encourage innovation. The natural assumption is that bureaucrats should err on the side of getting out of the way of inventors, and this does pay dividends. A laissez-faire approach gave the world the remarkable M-Pesa. But it also gave the world the slow-motion disaster of leaded gasoline; there are some inventions that governments really should be stepping in to prevent.
This was a book I enjoyed reading and for which I will definitely come back to read specific chapters.
October 21, 2017
Having been a literature major, and being technologically illiterate, I can’t really explain why I picked this book up as I was shelving books at the library. Maybe it was reading Steve Jobs, and maybe it’s my recent trend towards Apple products, but I picked the book up and started reading and fell in love.
The reader may at first read Harford’s title and amuse that the book is just a list of fancy products and what they do. But upon reading this book Harford’s aesthetic goal is far more relevant. Rather than just writing about these inventions, Harford explores the history, economics, politics, and cultural background of each devise trying to understand how the machine was made, and how the device fit into the culture. These machines and inventions are not just products, they are part of the history of humanity and the consciousness. These machines have a background that can be beautiful, tragic, or simply ridiculous, but whatever the case they have lasted and remain a part of the human experience.
A book like Fifty Iventions is a lovely read because each chapter is short, giving the reader a chance to read just a few chapters in small intervals throughout the day. And taking these small moments the book steadily builds into one large enjoyable experience. I can’t recommend this book enough, if only so people can learn about the strange history of the iPhone and realize that they’re holding government intelligence equipment in their pocket.
The reader may at first read Harford’s title and amuse that the book is just a list of fancy products and what they do. But upon reading this book Harford’s aesthetic goal is far more relevant. Rather than just writing about these inventions, Harford explores the history, economics, politics, and cultural background of each devise trying to understand how the machine was made, and how the device fit into the culture. These machines and inventions are not just products, they are part of the history of humanity and the consciousness. These machines have a background that can be beautiful, tragic, or simply ridiculous, but whatever the case they have lasted and remain a part of the human experience.
A book like Fifty Iventions is a lovely read because each chapter is short, giving the reader a chance to read just a few chapters in small intervals throughout the day. And taking these small moments the book steadily builds into one large enjoyable experience. I can’t recommend this book enough, if only so people can learn about the strange history of the iPhone and realize that they’re holding government intelligence equipment in their pocket.
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September 19, 2017В последние годы держится мода на «микроистории» вещей, изменивших мир. Интересные и полные неожиданных нюансов, они тем не менее часто оставляют после себя ощущение, что автор хватил лишку. Носки, конечно, вещь нужная, но так, чтобы они кардинально изменили ход истории? Вряд ли. Тиму Харфорду, автору колонки Undercover Economist в Financial Times и нескольких хороших книг об экономике окружающей нас повседневности, похоже, удалось избежать близорукости и мозаичности. Все пятьдесят отобранных изобретений, от плуга до криптовалюты, не висят в вакууме, а связаны в единую ткань новых возможностей как с последующими, так и с предыдущими. А чтобы было интереснее, Харфорд оставил за бортом несколько уже под��адоевших хитов рейтингов вроде компьютера и колеса. Помимо конкретных вещей (колючая проволока, таблетки от зачатия, «телеужин», iPhone) это и концепции (консалтинг, право собственности, государство всеобщего благосостояния, банки), и технологии (радар, процесс Габера, на который и сейчас уходит 1% всей вырабатываемой энергии). Злоключения изобретателей и инициаторов — отдельный большой бонус.
December 11, 2018
Before this, I’m pretty sure I’ve never read a book about economics (and I know I’ve been bored to tears by fantasies more focused on economics) for fun before. And, actually, Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy was a lot of fun.
Harford goes through fifty inventions that have had effects on the modern economy, be they good or terrible. It’s part economics and part history, and it was really, really interesting. Often, sadly, it’s the ones that worked to our detriment long term that were the most fascinating. The book’s short, funny, and concise with a lot of information that was new to me. There’s a little bit of repetition, but less than is often the case in these sorts of list-y nonfiction titles.
If you enjoy history or nonfiction presented in a highly engaging way, but with a bit less detail and focus, absolutely check out Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy.
Harford goes through fifty inventions that have had effects on the modern economy, be they good or terrible. It’s part economics and part history, and it was really, really interesting. Often, sadly, it’s the ones that worked to our detriment long term that were the most fascinating. The book’s short, funny, and concise with a lot of information that was new to me. There’s a little bit of repetition, but less than is often the case in these sorts of list-y nonfiction titles.
If you enjoy history or nonfiction presented in a highly engaging way, but with a bit less detail and focus, absolutely check out Fifty Inventions That Shaped the Modern Economy.
January 1, 2019
Harford doesn't pretend to select the 50 most important inventions ever, nor does he try to discuss the chosen inventions in full detail. What he does is explain and reprise, which each new bite-size account of world-shaping things and ideas, the concept of externalities. The stories themselves are persuasively written, and juuust enough to get you thinking about the topics. And if you want more, there's a reference list, which I for one plan to use to further increase my already never ending TBR pile.
September 23, 2017
Ugh. Kind of a mess. Is the welfare state really an invention? Market research? Hmmm. What about GPS? PCR? Or fracking? Not included. Interesting chapters on barbed wire and the S-bend pipe, however. Too often it seemed as if the author wanted to write a book about social justice and, if he wanted to do that, he should have written a book about social justice and left the word invention out of the title.
September 20, 2017
Great book about the 50 "not-so-obvious-inventions" that shaped the modern economy. If you know the BBC program, then you won't read anything new I guess.
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