To use our price comparison to get the cheapest price, please click on the "Find the Cheapest Price" button located above for Enough: True Measures of Money, Business, and Life by John C. Bogle (ISBN-10: 0470398515, ISBN-13: 9780470398517).
At this time we have not yet written a review for Enough: True Measures of Money, Business, and Life by John C. Bogle (ISBN-10: 0470398515, ISBN-13: 9780470398517). Please continue to keep checking back to this page as we are constantly adding reviews.
Summaries and Customer Reviews are supplied by Amazon.com
For a critical element of American society, including many of its wealthiest and most powerful, there seems to be no limit today on what "enough" entails.
The excesses are most starkly visible in the continuing crisis in banking and investment, and even in the two enormous government-sponsored (but publicly owned) mortgage lenders, to say nothing of the billion-dollar-plus annual paychecks that top hedge-fund managers draw down and the excessive compensation paid to CEOs, regardless of performance.
Throughout his legendary career, John Bogle—founder of the Vanguard mutual fund group, and creator of the first index mutual fund—has helped investors build wealth the right way and led a tireless campaign to restore common sense to the investment world. Along the way, he’s seen how destructive an obsession with financial success can be. Now, with Enough, he puts this dilemma in perspective.
Bogle offers his unparalleled insights on money, on the values we should emulate in our business and professional callings, and on what we should consider as the true treasures in our lives. By explaining what "enough" truly is, he demonstrates how close everyone can be to having it.
This book is Filled with VALUABLE KNOWLEDGE for everyone !
| Customer Rating:  | John Bogle has encapsulated a lifetime of knowledge in the investment business (founder of Vanguard) into this book. The most fundamental knowledge provided here is the basic economic proofs that broad based long term investment in the market trumps speculative buy/sell approaches to investment, and the case against financial industry costs as reducing returns to the investor.
The book gets into understandable explanations of how the current financial crisis came about and points out the financial industry's interest in complexity for it's own financial gain rather than value to the investing public.
Truly one of the most valuable and easy to grasp books I've ever read on the subject of investment and economics.
|
Enough is enough!
| Customer Rating: | | Great perspective on investing, economics and life. An insight into the mindset that has built one of the most trusted brands in the investment world. Great job Mr. Bogel. |
A Must read
| Customer Rating: | This book is a "Must Read" for every American who has an interest in investing, saving or the financial industry in general.
It's a wake up call for what's happened to our society and country. Please, read this book and learn from it. |
After reading the book one will probably sit and reflect over what has been said.
| Customer Rating:  |
This book was a fun read. It is small and not too long. In fact, it was short. If it had been formatted a little differently it probably could have been sold as a pamphlet instead of as a book. But I liked it.
As I examined the Table of Contents, something you can see if you go to the Search Inside that Amazon offers, I got the feeling I was reading a book from some old timer who considered himself mature, knowledgeable, and a fairly smart guy. Oh yeah, maybe full of wisdom, too? :)
As I turned the pages I kept thinking about the old line I heard growing up: Son, as long as you do your best, that is all we can ask for. Well, who is to say - What is my best? As far as I am concerned, I can always throw in a little extra effort and do better.
So who is to say - What is enough? The author tries to explain it. But I thought he fell short. He fell short in the same way my folks fell short when they told me I only had to do my best. When terms are relative they are not easily defined. And a book devoted to defining a term that is basically undefinable is bound to be viewed as a failure or at least come up short. This book is not a failure I will have you know.
The book makes a valid point. When determining what is enough the judge (maybe you?) must perform a balancing test. You'll have to figure out what is too much, and what is not enough. And whatever you determine is "just right" IS enough. The author provides us with 10 chapters split into three parts: Money (chapters 1-3), Business (chapters 4-7), and Life (chapters 8-10). He makes some good points. And after reading the book one will probably sit and reflect over what has been said. But does it do a good job defining the term? I think not. 4 stars! |
Outstanding and Very Timely!
| Customer Rating: | An excellent overview of what ails American society today.
Bogle begins by noting that the world of finance is marked by too much cost and not enough value, too much speculation and not enough investment, and too much complexity. On balance, the financial system subtracts value from our society. During 2006 the financial sector accounted for $215 billion of the $711 billion earned by the S&P 500, more if earnings of financial subsidiaries (eg. G.E. Capital) are included).
Bogle then explains some of the problematic new devices. Structured investment vehicles (SIVs) are essentially money market funds that borrow short and lend long. Solvency of the SIV may be at risk if the value of the long-term security falls below that of the short-term securities. Second, there is a liquidity risk, possibly necessitating a forced sale of the long-term asset. To sell SIVs, banks often issue "puts" - guarantees to repurchase the SIVs at face value on demand. (Citigroup ended up holding $55 billion of CDOs and $25 billion of SIVs that were "put" back to the bank.
Collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) are a modern version of alchemy - eg. 5,000 B- or BBI rated mortgages (lead) are miraculously turned into eg. 75% rated AAA (gold), 12% AA, 4% A, and 9% BBB through supposedly risk-reducing diversification.
An interest-rate derivative's (estimated $400 trillion, vs. the world's GDP of $62 trillion) underlying asset is the right to pay or receive a (usually notional) amount of money at a given interest rate. An estimated 80% of top companies use these to control their cash flow.
Credit Default Swaps are often used to provide coverage for a CDO failing to pay. They are unregulated (unlike insurance) and one doesn't need an insurable interest (eg. CDO ownership). In the current market, credit obligations subject to default swaps are valued at $2 trillion, vs. swaps totaling $62 trillion.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have provided some $5 trillion of mortgage loans, using high leverage (eg. 40:1). Faced with a credit crisis the Treasury placed them in a federal conservatorship. (Bogle laments we have privatized rewards, socialized risks here.)
Bogle also believes most mutual funds underperform the market. During the 25 years ended 2005, fund investors on average received a 482% increase, vs. index fund returns of 1,718%. Their survival rates are nothing to brag about either - of the 6,126 mutual funds at the start of 2001, 3,165 were gone by mid-2008.
Bogle then moves on to business (mis)finance. At the market peak of early 2000, nearly all firms raised their assumptions of return on pension assets, some to 10% (actually 1% or less this decade). Security analysts over the past two decades have, on average, projected annual earnings growth of 11.5%, vs. reality of 6%. Recently earnings reported under GAAP have quietly changed to "operating" (without writeoffs) earnings, and auditor-certified earnings restatements soared from 90 in 1997 to 1,577 in 2006.
Why has Avis been sold 18 times since its 1946 inception, each time with fat fees, bonuses, and new theories? Not for any useful reason, per Bogle. Meanwhile, the average compensation of a CEO vs. average worker has risen from 42X in 1980 to 520X; mutual funds hold about 35% os all U.S. stocks. |
|
