One Market Under God: Extreme Capitalism, Market Populism, and the End of Economic Democracy

by Thomas Frank

In a book that has been raising hackles far and wide, the social critic Thomas Frank skewers one of the most sacred cows of the go-go '90 the idea that the new free-market economy is good for everyone. Frank's target is "market populism"—the widely held belief that markets are a more democratic form of organization than democratically elected governments. Refuting the idea that billionaire CEOs are looking out for the interests of the little guy, he argues that "the great euphoria of the late nineties was never as much about the return of good times as it was the giddy triumph of one America over another." Frank is a latter-day Mencken, as readers of his journal The Baffler and his book The Conquest of Cool know. With incisive analysis, passionate advocacy, and razor-sharp wit, he asks where we are headed—and whether we're going to like it when we get there.

Genres: Economics, Politics, Nonfiction, History, Business, Cultural, American History

466 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 2000

About the author

Thomas Frank is the author of Pity the Billionaire, The Wrecking Crew, and What's the Matter with Kansas? A former columnist for The Wall Street Journal and Harper's, Frank is the founding editor of The Baffler and writes regularly for Salon. He lives outside Washington, D.C.

Reviews

[Szplug · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me three tries to make it all the way through to the end of this sucker—it's of that lick'em-and-stick'em lunge-and-thrust apt to appeal more to the younger members of the cinched-lip smirkers, and I read it in my mid-thirties when weariness was settling into my bones to stay—for this sophomore effort from Thomas Frank has its faults: too repetitive, at times too trite and, at others, too simplified, and Frank strains too hard now and again in playing for those crowds he knows will be lapping this kind of slick shit up; but otherwise a cooly enthused and merciless evisceration of the Cult of the Market—one based upon the delusion that everybody could be an entrepreneur, make their mark, be a paper millionaire, a Davos debutante, if only that goddamn government would leave them alone! which was primed by itchy elites and fostered by the unleashing of a billion clicking mice and clattering keyboards—that was undoubtedly on order back in those halcyon swoosh logo days of the dawning of the new millennium ere Enron queasied the technocultural gut and Osama bin Laden became a game-changer.

[Aaron · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frank's book is a study of the pro-business, pro-"free-market", new-economy-and-stock-market-worshipping rhetoric of the 1990s. It was written in 2000. The overall theme of the book is that in the 1990s, business and its friends in the media made a renewed push to claim that they were for the little guy, that they were against elitism, that they were in favor of breaking up hierarchy wherever it existed. Ads and editorials gushed that now that everyone owned stocks, and everyone was an entrepreneur, old-economy constructs like labor unions and government regulation were no longer necessary. Some of the funniest parts of the book discuss the lunacy that is management theory and the management consulting industry-- cultish guru-worship at its worst, led by charlatans, in service of power and profit, but dressed up as intellectual and even spiritual advice. Of course, this kind of thing has been going on for a long time in the U.S.-- if this country is about anything, it's about making lots of money by teaching people the secret to a good life (see Dale Carnegie, Steven Covey, etc, etc). Long before that, the U.S. has always been a haven for religious nuts and their (sometimes deluded) followers.* As for criticism of management consultants, they've got that covered too: Frank notes a common conceit of management consultants is to claim that all other management gurus (or even they, at earlier stages) are frauds, but they are the real thing. Another wonderful (and scary) section of the book is its depiction of a conference of young PR industry hipsters, who seem to think that designing a brand is a revolutionary act. This section stands besides the better sections of Naomi Klein's book No Logo, in describing the grandiose, culture-altering importance that the PR industry and business intellectuals give to The Brand.

You'd think that a book with rhetoric as one of its main themes would be written in ghastly postmodernist jargon. But you'd be wrong. Frank harshly criticizes "cult studs" (cultural studies theorists) of the 1990s for focusing their attention on inane analyses of "sites of subversion" within pop culture and within miniscule subcultures, rather than on the massive demolition by business of New Deal-era and Progressive-era ideals of social democracy and collective action. He notes that cult studs have often been willing participants in the 90s-era transformation of consumption into a liberating act and "the market" into the world's main (or only) democratic arena-- this dovetails beautifully with the goals of the PR industry and editorialists like Thomas Friedman. Although they make much noise about fighting the "demon" religious right in the political correctness wars (and thus give hipster/outsider cred to some management theorists and new economy libertarians who subscribe to their theories), they have astonishing blind spots.** Thomas quotes media critic Robert McChesney (p. 291):

"Perhaps the stupidity-- and there is no better word for it-- of some cultural studies is best shown by its stance towards the market. I have heard leading figures in cultural studies argue that the market is not the top-down authoritarian mechanism that political economists claim, where bosses force the massed to swallow whatever they are fed. To the contrary, they exult, the market is where the masses can contest with the bosses over economic matters; it is a fight without a predetermined outcome. One cultural studies scholar goes so far as to characterize the market as 'an expansive popular system'."

Frank's weaknesses stem in part from the timing of the book, and in part from the goal of his book. Since the book was written in 2000, and was focused on the overheated internet/New Economy rhetoric of the 1990s, Frank misses the fact that IT can be fruitfully used to help social movements. He uses "internet" almost as a dirty word. Of course, it nearly impossible to use the internet 100% ethically, without supporting corporations that deny workers' rights for collective representation (hello Microsoft), that lobby for monopolistic and civil-liberties-destroying laws (hello Verizon, AT&T, Microsoft), and that benefit from huge privatization giveaways (hello Google/M-Books).
But there's no easy way to lead an ethical life, online or offline. Of course, one could argue that court decisions and legislation over the past 15 years has molded the internet into a place where you can't click a link or view a web page without giving money to a huge corporation. That would lead one to support the Free Open Source Software movement, in so far as it is possible. As with environmental issues****, I think it's a waste of time to become an individual purist. Much better and more effective to advocate for societal change that will make it easier for everyone to use alternatives to huge corporations, or reform the worst aspects of those corporations.

* Yes, yes, I know, the alternative of no religious freedom is much, much worse. Of course, the American ideal of religious freedom is a great ideal, and the "religious nuts" sometimes have good ideas that use the best part of their own systems of ethics.

** Frank acknowledges that these blind spots, and cult studs' entire outlook, are in part an overreaction to charges of economism levelled against the Left. He also notes that a large part of the standard cult studs argument is derived from sociologist Herbert Gans' criticism of the Frankfurt School for the latter's "elitist" critique of mass culture, though this is rarely acknowledged by cult studs (p. 279-80).

**** As in, rather than hectoring working class people for driving too much, support public transportation, give incentives to make it easier-to-use/cheaper, etc.

Cross-posting from my blog.

[Clif · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thomas Frank, the incisive, delightfully humorous critic of the promoters of the "free market" perfectly timed the writing of this thorough denunciation of the monkey business of business in the years leading up to the dot-com crash of 2000.

Frank wants the American people to retake control of our society and in the aftermath of the dot-com crash he had powerful reinforcement for his ideas from that greatest of all teachers, reality.

Yet, it was not long until housing replaced internet startups as the investment craze. Predictably, that brought an even bigger crash called The Great Recession. But greed never dies and here we are in 2018 with stock prices higher than ever, the real estate market bubbling again and corporate stock buy-backs providing another market pump that has nothing to do with making any product or providing any service.

Ultimately, capitalism faces the hard fact that the planet has limits while the urge for more wealth by the already wealthy does not. Significantly, global warming is denounced at the top more strongly than ever. It's clear that for the almost 20 years that have passed since Frank wrote his indictment, things are even further today from control by We the People in what is claimed to be a democracy.

Even so, One Market, Under God still stands with no need of correction, a comprehensive warning we need to heed, more so with each passing day as the trillions of dollars needed to moderate the Great Recession have been spent by central banks and the world is in unprecedented debt at every level from national governments to individual citizens. In fact, when this book was written, there was a U.S. budget surplus, now replaced with incredible debt in order to perpetuate a system this book decries and one that must change.

The flamboyant dot-com CEO's that were such juicy targets for Frank are largely gone, but the promotion of "the free market" as the answer to all things and a suitable replacement for government regulation is as strong as it has ever been and the American people have elected a con man to the presidency who can be as easily skewered as any described in this book. The biggest con of all uniting all "trust the market" con men, the drive to privatize Social Security, has only temporarily been beaten back.

The secret of bamboozling the public is to do as state lotteries do - convince people that anyone can win big by purchasing lottery tickets, or company stocks. People DO win the lottery and people DO make killings on the stock market. I made good money on AOL before it tanked. It was effortless. I made a guess and it paid off. What a rush. As the old Publishers Clearing House ads said, you can't win if you don't play.

The prospect of sudden easy wealth beguiles people into acting irrationally. The proof is endlessly booming Las Vegas where all the lights, sounds, food and attractions present only the delights of success while never mentioning that it is all paid for by those who lose at gambling: almost everyone. The people are fleeced differing only in the degree they are while the casino owners never lose. Not only do the owners win, guaranteed, they can sit as Sheldon Adelson did and wait for politicians to beg their favor. And yet, the crowds come back to be taken again, not realizing that they are participating in a real example of letting the market decide.

So it is with us in modern America as we are skillfully indoctrinated by millionaires who always want more and refuse to see any of it taken from them for the public good. Let Apple (that pays no taxes at all) decide in general what is good for you and quite specifically what is good for Apple's employees.

It was no surprise that one of the champions of welfare destruction, Margaret Thatcher, said that there is no such thing as community, only individuals. The homeless person deserves to be homeless and the millionaire deserves every penny he has. To keep to the gambling analogy - let the chips fall where they may. Somehow the idea of fairness has been lost with the fallacy that the penniless man and the billionaire are fairly rewarded. The former only has to make more of an effort to be like the latter. This is the kind of stomach turning logic that Thomas Frank is dedicated to refuting.

The technique of portraying every man as a potential millionaire plays perfectly to the idea of the rugged American individual taking control, refusing to listen to the experts and in a short time rising from the multitude to riches. One Market, Under God is an unrestricted attack on BS. Thomas Frank does it effortlessly and elegantly, providing lots of laughs while conclusively showing the absurdity of the idea that the market is on the side of the little guy. If nothing else, read this book to discover the degree to which people who consider themselves highly intelligent and perceptive will make themselves into fools in pursuit of the dollar.

[Scott Holstad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Possibly more relevant now than then...

[Kevin Carson · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's an entertaining read with some worthwhile observations, but Frank's analysis is also incredibly lazy in a lot of ways. He apparently from the observation that assorted neoliberal "market populists" like Tom Peters, Newt Gingrich, Jack Kemp et al talk a lot about "flattening hierarchies," decentralization, distributed networks, and so forth, and then jumps to the incredible conclusion that any discussion of decentralization or replacing hierarchies with networks must be a neoliberal propagandist. He winds up defending bureaucracy and hierarchy as such, and treating the bureaucratic mass production corporation of the mid-20th century as inherently progressive, and any criticism of it as a right-wing Trojan horse. In so doing, he lumps together everything networked and horizontal into an "icky things I don't like" category that includes a lot of the most progressive strands on the left like commons-based peer production.

He reminds me a lot of Doug Henwood, who in a Twitter exchange argued that copyright was progressive and that left-wing currents based on open source, post-scarcity, horizontalism, etc., "sounded like Newt Gingrich."

Frank is far more accurately described as a 20th century managerialist liberal of the Galbraith and Chandler school than a leftist. (I wrote more about this ideological tendency here: https://c4ss.org/content/3094).

[April · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a book I purchased in college, close to the time it was published, maybe for a class or maybe for my thesis paper, which was about cultural appropriation for profit (which I do not condone). At first, I didn’t understand what the author was so angry about because some of what he was writing about is so ingrained now into our everyday life that it seems normal. But back then, it wasn’t yet normal or ingrained. I wonder what the author thinks and feels now about how society has treated the market and how the market has grown and matured and fared up until now. What he thinks about entrepreneurs and what they've done, Elon Musk and all of these folks. I’m sure I could look up recent articles by him or something.

Book coincidences: just that I recently read There There by Tommy Orange and he has a character in his book named Thomas Frank, which is the name of this book’s author.

Vocab words (there were more but I stopped keeping track):
vituperation (n) - bitter and abusive language

“Aside from the technological advances of recent years (which may or may not live up to the world-historical importance we routinely ascribe to them), very little of the New Economy is new. What the term describes is not some novel state of human affairs but the final accomplishment of the long-standing agenda of the nation’s richest class. Industries come and industries go, but what has most changed about America in the nineties is the way we think about industries, about economies. Once Americans imagined that economic democracy meant a reasonable standard of living for all—that freedom was only meaningful once poverty and powerlessness had been overcome. Today, however, American opinion leaders seem generally convinced that democracy and the free market are simply identical. There is precious little that is new about this idea, either: For nearly a century, equating the market with democracy was the familiar defense of any corporation in trouble with union or government; it was the standard-issue patter of corporate lobbyists like the National Association of Manufacturers. What is ‘new’ is this idea’s triumph over all its rivals; the determination of American leaders to extend it to all the world; the general belief among opinion-makers that there is something natural, something divine, something inherently democratic about markets. A better term for the New Economy might simply be ‘consensus.’” pg. 15

“The most powerful symbolic weapon in the arsenal of market populism was the astonishing new information technology of the decade, to which all manner of cosmic significance could be attributed and from which no end of lessons could be drawn. . . . As one might expect, [Kevin] Kelly’s goal was to break that distinction down, to show how man-made objects were becoming ever more like biological things. Along the way, of course, he had to settle on a definition of biological things that would permit such a conclusion, and what he came up with was networks. In nature, as in the coming robotic world, everything is connected to everything else; knowledge and power are distributed; relationships are so complex that individuals can’t possibly fathom the whole.” pg. 57

“Friedman set about his subject in the usual manner, seeking to prove that the global triumph of free-market capitalism had brought democracy to the peoples of the world. He told of the ‘democratization of technology,’ in which we would all get computers and telephones; he marveled at the ‘democratization of finance,’ in which we would all get to invest in whatever we wanted; he described a miraculous ‘democratization of information,’ in which we would get more TV channels than ever before. All of these forces had combined to bring down the mighty and subvert top-down hierarchies of all kinds, he asserted, citing (like Wriston) a list of former dictatorships that had been laid low by the humble VCR, TV, and Internet. This last, of course, was something of a market-populist wonder-worker, an institution that Friedman found to be both the most democratic on earth as well as the very ‘model of perfect competition.’” pg. 65-66

“It is not a coincidence that each of these necessities—pensions, shelter, education—were things Americans had once sought to ensure through union activity or government intervention, things that Americans once believed were theirs simply by virtue of being citizens, things that could and should be available to everyone in a democratic society.” pg. 135

“Since managers back then did not have large stakes in the companies they managed, they had little incentive to perform the sort of stunts that would bring about the short-term appreciations that are Wall Street’s greatest joy in life. Since they were a professional group in their own right, there was every danger that, ‘out of professional pride,’ managers might pay workers too much or produce goods of too high a quality. The answer devised in the eighties was to compensate managers in shares as well as salaries. This now-standard practice ensured that managers would forevermore see things the shareholders’ way, would stop at nothing to deliver the ever-ascending price curve that became such a symbol of the nineties. Granting options to top executives changed the class dynamics of the corporation dramatically: Not only did the uppermost managers of the nineties now receive compensation packages that towered over those of their predecessors, but as Wall Street placed a very predictable value on layoffs and downsizing, CEOs often saw their own pay rise in direct proportion to the number of employees they could expel from the firm.” pg. 191

“The new knowledge workers were demanding ‘a job that’s cool,’ where they wouldn’t have to wear ties or even suits, where they could walk around in bare feet, where they could drink beer, where they could play with their pets—this last being a phenomenon that Fortune focused on with a curious singularity (‘Yo, Corporate America! I want a fat salary, a signing bonus, and a cappuccino machine—oh, and I’m bringing my bird to work.’). That this was a full-blown labor uprising there could be no doubt: One group of young knowledge workers even threatens a walkout if they aren’t allowed to bring a refrigerator into the office. But this was the kind of workers’ action that sent Fortune into paroxysms of ecstasy, not outrage—the fridge fringe even got their photos in the magazine, goateed and posing goofily for the camera. This was the myth of the ‘business revolution’ in a nutshell: Whatever was changing in the workplace was changing because the People, through their agent the market, were changing it. Companies would no longer have to offer stable employment because workers these days were just too cool, too hip for that sort of square 1950s arrangement. Fortune, which had spent decades leading the fight against the traditional labor movement, wished this workers’ uprising the best.” pg. 203 [I didn’t know this model of the workplace was happening already in the late 90s. I thought it started with the likes of Google (which, interestingly, wasn’t mentioned anywhere in this book, likely because it wasn’t big enough yet at the time of this book’s writing). But I guess Google had to have a model for their workplace from somewhere.]

“While it was true that unions had been rolled back so comprehensively that economic democracy basically ceased to exist, Fast Company, along with an entire industry of social thinkers, energetically assured Americans that they had nothing to fear. The market, if we would only let it into our hearts and our workplaces, would look after us; would see that we were paid what we deserved; would give us kind-hearted bosses who listened, who recycled, who cared; would bring a democratic revolution to industry that we could only begin to imagine.” pg. 219

“In the works of the cult studs the consensus era comes off as a time of scholarly practice so degraded it is scarcely worth remembering. Patrick Brantlinger, for example, recounted how the discipline of American Studies (a slightly older rival of cultural studies) was founded in the years after World War II as a deliberate venture in national myth making and rips it as ‘an academic cultural chauvinism’ whose ‘ultimate goal,’ despicably, was ‘social harmony.’ Lawrence Levine runs over the same story again in his 1996 book on the culture wars, tarring American Studies, in his characteristic connect-the-dot style, as nothing less than pre-meditated intellectual collaboration with the Cold War state. Nelson and Gaonkar remember it as a ‘McCarthy-era pact [with ‘state power’] guaranteeing silence and relevance from the humanities and collaboration from the social sciences. . . .’ By contrast, any proper cult stud is out to develop, as Henry Giroux once put it, ‘a radical politics of difference,’ to revel in cultural and identity fragmentation, to pose boldly on the ramparts of the culture wars, to provoke and savor the denunciations of half-witted fundamentalists.” pg. 289 [I just thought the reference to American Studies here was interesting, since that was one of the majors I chose to study in college.]

“Journalists interested in the new way could read in Pew publications about do-it-yourself vox populi projects like ‘YOUtv,’ a bunch of cameras in public places that are explained as a way of ‘democratizing television,’ of giving ‘ordinary people access’ to what is ordinarily an ‘elitist tool.’” pg. 316 [Before YouTube!]

“Equipped with the microchip the capitalist is ‘no longer entangled in territory, no longer manacled to land, capital, or nationality.’ The chosen of history but also free of history, free of corporeality, he is free of the laws of man and nature. He is pure idea, pure spirit, a god in his own right.” pg. 347

“Had you purchased shares of Amazon.com on the day its CEO was named Time magazine’s Person of the Year, or bought into Priceline.com on the day that Forbesproclaimed that company’s CEO a ’new age Edison,’ you would have lost 90 percent and 98 percent of your investment, respectively. . . .
Whether or not these favorites recover some part of their 1999 value over the years to come, the lessons of the Nasdaq meltdown seem clear. Lurid fantasies about the future produced by a babbling flock of far-right ideologues and self-proclaimed ‘crazy’ management theorists are hardly an adequate foundation for the economic well-being of the nation. Nor are stock markets really a superior mechanism for the distribution of society’s wealth. Nor is it a good idea to pay everyone in options.” pg. 361-362

Book: will donate to the neighborhood little free library.

[Bob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Frank's second book covers the stock market rise of the 90s, the first dot com boom and the popular intellectual climate in which it all thrived, which he dubs "market populism." The phrase epitomizes the stance of everyone from the "gurus" of business writing, elected representatives, and the advertisements of the stodgiest companies, repositioning themselves as "revolutionary", all of which can be summarized as "a completely unfettered free market is the only true source of democracy."

The book is long with each chapter is focused on a specific manifestation of the reigning paradigm: the loss of power of traditional labor unions being replaced with "Brand You" (i.e., no employment security, benefits or pensions); the biggest wave since the 1920s of certainty that anyone could invest in the stock market and get rich; the unbelievable nonsense that crowded (and continues to crowd) bookstore shelves, everything from "Seven Habits…" to the autobiographies of various captains of industry, to the more theoretical likes of Jaron Lanier, and so on. He gives relevant historical overviews as needed and, while focused on the 90s, his sense of history is such that there's no real schadenfreude when the dot com crash arrives – permanent prosperity was never a realistic notion in his analysis.

The book does not feel remotely dated, as the concentration of wealth upward continues to get even worse and we've already been through another cycle of boom and bust when the housing bubble of the mid-00s once again duped the 99% (not to color my impartial review with polemics).

Certain passages could have been written last week, e.g.:

The new tech millionaires are "...flooding into Bohemian neighborhoods like San Francisco's Mission District, chatting with the guys in the band...leaping on their trampolines, typing out a few last lines on their laptop before paragliding, riding their bicycles to work,...drinking beer in the office,...startling the board members with their streetwise remarks..."

Or this, which I particularly liked...

"...however little it did by way of legislation, the Republican Congress...was notable for its ferociously populist understanding of the GOP mission, powered by a gang of supposedly incorruptible "freshmen" who were determined to do nothing less than "shut it down" if they didn’t get their way."

...because it was written about the Newt Gingrich-led Congress of 1994!

[Jon]

I always wondered who reads the many how-to-get-rich books in the Business section at the library I work for. One person who has apparently read them all--or as many as he could stand without going insane--is Thomas Frank, whose analysis of feel-good business lit. is one of the high points of this left-oriented screed. Apparently those books have two different messages: for workers, shut up and take your lumps, for managers, here's how to screw over the workers. Frank's attack on capitalist excess has logical problems itself--for one thing, the consumers he wants government regulators to protect from corporate depredations may want their Big Macs and trash TV more than they want such protection. While Frank wants more government regulation, he admits the US government hasn't done much of anything to help workers since the New Deal (which he tends to idealize). How to get the kind of government he wants, what it should do, and who will regulate the regulators are issues he, perhaps understandably, leaves unresolved.

[Public Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

Kind of disappointing if I'm honest. This is the third book I've ready by Thomas Frank and I really like his work. What's the Matter with Kansas? and The Wrecking Crew were terrific and the essays he writes nowadays are also great. This was Frank's first book I believe, and it shows. I don't think he had really found his groove yet and you can still see a little bit of the post-doctoral academic in his writing style.

The content of the book is solid, but it takes some endurance to get through it all. The Market Populism fad hasn't completely disappeared even today. There is a lot of solid criticism in this volume. Reading some of the things that were said in the business press during the 1990s can be laugh out loud funny after the dot-com crash and the 2008 financial crisis. Yet somehow, zombie-like, many of these ideas still shamble on. Worth reading if you have ever questioned whether free markets can really solve everything.

[Danny · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I prefer Frank more as an essayist than a book-length writer, if this is any indication. I think he could have made his points (and they are mostly points I agree with) more effectively with half as many examples drawn from marginal seeming ad campaigns, remainder-table CEO hagiographies, and long forgotten business mag special editions. And 50% less snark. Yes, the old understanding of the cause of populism has been hijacked and turned on its ear- and the "new consensus" get pulled more right-ward every election cycle it seems. But, this reads more like a bitterly sarcastic admission of defeat and a complaint that the referee wasn't looking when the courts and the business lobby kept punching the labor unions below the belt. I just wish he had written more about the best way to counter-punch.

[Liam Porter · Rating 5 out of 5]

One Market Under God (written 2001) is an analysis of business culture in the United States (and occasionally Britain), with respect to the overhaul of self-image in the post-reagan era. It criticizes a philosophically free-market language within the PR industry which has attempted cultural appropriation of populist, democratic language to soften the self-interested motives of the wall street elite.

Yet more sinisterly, it explains how this enthusiasm for the wisdom of the "Market" successfully managed to suppress criticism of the existing financial structures, and to cast a death blow for already ailing organised labour.

[The Capital Institute · Rating 5 out of 5]

Frank argues in One Market Under God that the “new economy” that emerged in the 1990’s was not as successful and beneficial as the mainstream might think, and that market populism is a faulty theory, promoted by corporate and partisan interests. Frank pointed out the relationship between banking practices in the 90s with those in the 1930s, and showed the way the income disparity between the very rich and very poor has steadily increased.
The New York Times, considers the book enlightening and important in the understanding of corporate culture and how it has changed in the last decades.

[Sharon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very lengthy explanation of why unregulated markets were allowed to slowly erode American workers' compensation and security to enrich those who employed them and profited from speculation and ridiculous theories concocted to justify unrestrained greed. Not fun reading, but required anyway.

[Andrew Vaccaro · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good arguments and information but simply unreadable.

[Mark Lisac · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some 23 years after its publication, this book has transformed from commentary on current affairs to history. Under the microscope are changes in the structure and manipulation of public ideas. The book remains a highly useful (and entertaining) effort because so much of what happened in the 1980s and 1990s continues to affect society and politics today. The sense of it being cultural archeology is reinforced by the discovery of rubble — mostly in the surprisingly large numbers of names of then-prominent corporations that quickly disappeared or became irrelevant.
Also often disappeared from current awareness are many of the influential books on management theory and other matters that informed the cultural and economic debates of the 1990s. But Frank's scathing summaries of them provide the historical context of their intellectual and political legacies today. Some of what he wrote about has changed and much has not. It's also surprising to read how much of what is considered quite recent was already present in the 1990s: working from home, for example, was already a noticed trend back then and not merely a response to covid in the early 2020s.
The general theme is that populism was being subverted by well-moneyed agents in the service of profit and power. The typical path was to accuse "elites" and "arrogant" old establishments of frustrating the popular will and denigrating "the people." The strategy has astonishingly continued to be successful. The Trump phenomenon saw its evolution, recruiting millions into the service of lawbreaking billionaires and into support for policies that oppose the interests of the very people supporting those leaders and policies. The relentless sneers against "elites" and "experts" have also been crucial in the odd anti-masking and anti-vaccination movements. But from what I read in the reviews, Frank's most recent books have strongly criticized "progressive" politicians and activists for ignoring the populist base, in effect living up to the very charges that they are arrogant elites who don't know or care about ordinary folks and the concerns of those folks.
The detail in the book usefully supports the arguments but can feel repetitive. It does drag on a bit. On the other hand, Frank's funny, energetic and incisive prose makes the trip worthwhile. What's left now, in 2023, is to figure out how much of what he saw still affects the world we live in (a lot, I think).

[Mlhoganjr · Rating 4 out of 5]

If there were two overall themes guiding this book, I'd say it was these:

During the late 1990s, it was pretty obvious that a rising tide was not lifting all boats. And for a very long time now, conservative and many liberal economists, business owners, investors, business writers and assorted pundits have equated democracy with the ebbs and flows of the free market.

My intro to Frank came through this book with it's marathon chapters, sometimes repetitive thesis', and thoroughly damning evidence of our nation's continuing problems with a form of tulip mania and the delusion that a janitor/schoolteacher/truck driver playing the stock market with a few shares has economic parity with someone like Warren Buffett.

The title itself is an interesting look at the subject matter here: free market economics has long been a dogma among Americans. We are told time and time again that collective bargaining, state investment, and regulations over wages will lead us down the path to destruction. Also, supposedly, if we allow the foxes to guard the hen house, someday we can all be rich.

Frank points out that this isn't a new ideology but it has become more and less popular over time. The end of the 20th century resembled the beginning more than any other time; the middle class was slowly eroding and obscene wealth consoled obscene lack of wealth with idea that even if you're living in poverty, you can just make a couple of smart investments, spend wisely, and the idea of the American Dream will be fulfilled and you'll get wealthy.

This might all seem painfully obvious, but Frank deserves credit for actually documenting it.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

While the book focuses on the dot.com boom of the 1990s, it nonetheless presents a concise and thorough analysis of how the 1 percent and the right wing tricked Americans by co-opting the concept of "populism" and branded anyone who wasn't for free markets an "elitist," which is truly ironic considering the GOP and the 1 percent are the real elites.

The mantra that markets are true democracy what nothing but a trick to allow employers, especially those employers own by the 1 percent, to shove a worker's retirement planning and responsibility onto the worker so employers didn't have to over pensions. It let employers off the hook because if employees made poor choices with their investments, Ie 401Ks, they only had themselves to blame. And employees seldom had the economic wherewithal to truly influence markets the same as how the elites could. Average Americans saw their retirement nest eggs ravaged by market downturns in the early 2000s and again in 2007, but the true elites made a killing and the GOP protects them.

As Bob Dylan sang long ago, the worker remains on the caboose of the train, yet continues to vote against their self interests. Frank has a very acerbic and direct style that is a joy to read.

[Marisav · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was a fan of Thomas Frank in high school and college, in the 90s and early oughts. But now? I cannot take arguments that the parties are the same, and I am done with sarcastic complaining. Frank's books is a polemic but not one that aims to explain or persuade. It's just pages and pages of argument by assertion. Sarcastically describing the news might prove to me you you don't like the current state of affairs, but it doesn't give me much to work with. My politics are still radical, but for arguments I want a bit more meat on the bone- and something to work for. Over 400 pages of sneering complaints is a good 380 more than I can handle.

Full review: https://acallidryas.wordpress.com/201...

acallidryas.wordpress.com

[Scott Ford · Rating 4 out of 5]

Written in 2000 as an overview of the previous decade's march into what Thoma Frank identifies as market populism, the commentary and perspectives are striking in their accuracy when reading the book twenty-one years after it was published. This is definitely worth the read in that it helps shed light on how we ended up on January 6, 2021 and the storming of Congress.

[Yapaag · Rating 5 out of 5]

i like it

[Josh · Rating 3 out of 5]

First up - the book ends on page 358 with the next 40pp consisting of end notes and another 15pp as the index. 414 total, not 464.

On to the writing.

I find myself agreeing with a majority of Frank's arguments / points (enough that it would be filibuster-proof in the Senate), but I didn't care for the manner in which those arguments were made.

Frank is incredibly wordy and verbose; this is made worse by the intentional denseness of his writing style. He relies on end notes quite heavily. This wouldn't be an issue if the end notes were solely citations, but there were more than a few that would go on for paragraphs at a time providing elaboration for points in the main text. If it's that important that your reader needs it - put it as a footnote OR in the actual text itself. This lead to a constant flipping back and forth and was unbelievably annoying.

Chapter 8 was utterly useless. More than 2/3 of the way into the book, Frank decided that it was suddenly important to explore an entirely different side of academia (Cultural Studies) and go through its entire history (which, strangely, spends a lot of time going through its own history) solely to blast it for not studying business / market consumerism. All of his arguments stand alone without bringing in an additional boogeyman for us to be upset with in addition to business writers and the ubiquitous 'market'.

After chapter 8, it was easy to check out and stop caring. While his argument on the importance of a free press is important, Chapter 9 reads more as a bitter, concentrated attack on Gannett / USAToday / Neuharth. I agree that Gannett / Neuharth are problems for journalism in the US, but I'm not sure that this was the best way to address issues with the increased consumerization of "the news". Chapter 10 is utterly forgettable other than to drive home the point that "experts" (in this case - Gilder) can have massive impacts on stock valuation and purchasing trends just based on their approval / disapproval of a certain company.

This took me well over to read and I am not pleased with it. For that much time invested, I expected something far better. I see that "Pity the Billionaire" is a far slimmer tome - perhaps Frank improved his delivery as he matured as a writer - but, frankly, I don't know if I have the energy to try to plow through another of his treatises, especially when considering that I already agree with many of the points he's making. Preaching to the choir isn't appealing to me, especially when I prefer my non-fiction reading to expand my perceptions, knowledge, ideas and worldview - not pander to it.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frank tells the story of how revolutionary imagery and ideas were co-opted by the advertising and financial businesses, and how free market ideology took over discourse about politics, education, high art, pop culture, labor rights, the environment, and pretty much everything else. The author can get a little hyperbolic at times, but this book goes a long way in answering questions like: "why do we talk about education as if it's a business?" "how is deregulation still taken seriously?" "why do we talk about government as if it's a business?" "why were the 90s so weird?" and "how did we get here?"

Pairs well with such Negativland albums as, Dispepsi, The Perfect Cut, Escape from Noise, Guns, and Crosley Bendix: the Radio Reviews.

[Andrew Canfield · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thomas Frank is a writer whose stuff I can enjoy in small doses. His columns are interesting, and his long form writing (as far as books go) is pretty good stuff as well.

His bias shows through at some points, but he can do it without sound like too much of a bitter partisan. Even readers not fully on board with his views can at least be able to see where his starting point of view is.

One Market Under God is the type of book you might see from a William Greider, critiquing the developments of capitalism over the last half-century or so. He definitely takes a jaundiced view of the 90s-000s type of economy, and asks questions about what direction the future is headed which the reader is then expected to use as a basis to ask their own inquiries.

He doesn't write with quite the power of a Thomas Friedman, and his books remind more of sitting through a lecture at UT Arlington UTA than they do anything else. The prose is witty only rarely, although he does at least make an effort to achieve this.

I did learn a good bit about the financial crisis from reading this, but it was a bit of a clunk read and could have been a little more focused in the hands of a more skilled writer.

Andrew Canfield UT Arlington UTA Centenary College

[Josephus FromPlacitas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great piece from the halcyon days of The Baffler. I actually interviewed Frank when he was promoting this book and put it on the radio. I'll try to find my review I wrote for it when it came out and post it here.

It's funny how his newer stuff -- What's The Matter With Kansas, The Wrecking Crew, which you could more or less characterize as "more partisan" without meaning it as an insult -- has made him something of a star, while the earlier books, oriented more toward economic democracy, flew under the radar. Maybe more people think it's more fun to hate Republicans than hip-talking Internet CEOs. Personally, I take equal joy from both.

[Beth Barnett · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very witty and enjoyable exposé of the marketing theories and economic mumbo-jumbo of business writing gurus. Frank critiques the idea of "market populism" and the libertarian mentality of market cheerleaders. He predicted, and explained the busted stock market bubble before it blew out. Frank explains how history shows this kind of market mania has happened before, and will happen again. Armed with Frank's entertaining book, you can see it coming all the better next time.

[Nona · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am giving this book far more stars than it deserves because it's one of the only dissections of the cult of free market internet driven economics of the 1990's. That he endlessly repeats himself with the same vitreous tone that makes small (baffler) pieces wonderful.. in book form it's stomach churning. Like a 700 Club episode. First 60 pages and you've firmly grasped everything you need to know. Unfortunately you really do need to know.

[Adam Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really interesting book examining the way the market was treated in the decade of the 1990s. Frank uses wit and scholarship to show that everyone, left, right, and center, turned the market into an idol to be worshipped, and that corporate PR used the language of the 60s counterculture to reinforce the system of inequality already in place. Always captivating, he shows just how pervasive this idea has become.

[Ben Byrne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Was decent but not actually the book I wanted to be reading, which is a critique of "market populism" rather than dissection of its rise to dominance. Some chapters were much more interesting than others... the management theory chapter, for example, was very predictable. But later chapters, such as the one touching on academia, were better.

[Leet · Rating 4 out of 5]

For someone that was mostly too young to process this aspect of development in our society's collective attitude about the economy, this was a great book to read. It explains so much about where we are today and how ingrained some attitudes seem to be without much explanation. My only complaint is the book was a bit longer than I felt it needed to be to accomplish what Frank set out to do here.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh, you're a clever one...having time to both play baseball for the White Sox AND to criticize the social attitudes of the roaring nineties. Wait a minute...was that Frank Thomas or Thomas Frank that goes by the moniker "the big hurt"?