I have 2. The People's Republic of Walmart is one. Maybe I feel this way because I work in the industry and I'm a little familiar with central planning techniques... but I just thought it was all fluff with little substance. I felt like more than one chapter was just "Walmart and Amazon do central planning so it's possible" without getting into a lot of the details. Very little about the nuts and bolts of central planning. Throw in a good dose of anti-Stalinism when the man oversaw successful central planning... I just didn't get anything out of it. Might be OK if you want a real basic introduction behind the ideas of planning but honestly I bet like 95% of you already know more about it than you realize.
And I love Graeber but jeez, I couldn't even finish Bullshit Jobs. It felt like a good article that was blown out into a book. Maybe my expectations were too high but I felt like he spent way too many pages getting into minutiae about what is/isn't a bullshit job without actually making a broader point.
Capitalist Realism raises a load of good points but then stuffs in a load of anti-communist stuff and just random incomprehensible bullshit.
I was talking to someone about it at a bar and she said “it should either be a third of it’s length so only the actually useful bits are in it, or three times longer so it can properly justify these ideas”
I read this entire book a few years ago and can't remember a single word of it besides its main point, that capitalism is considered the only realistic thing to do.
What kind of bars do you go to?
It was my best friend’s 21st and he invited a hot anarchist girl that I hit it off pretty well with, so we got to talking about music and theory
She got friends?
He rambles on about his students a bit too much, IMO. Write what you know, I guess.
Agreed. I think it's telling that people only ever reference the first few chapters.