Most Influential Books Read in 2022 (or before)
Article #1
The audience that I intend to serve is comprised of people who understand that the world is unstable and changing, who hope for change that is for the better but who also fear that it could be for the worse. My audience will hopefully be people who understand that geopolitics, economics, demographics, energy, commodities, money, interest rates, debt, deficits, and markets are all very important to their futures, but who don’t have the time and/or the interest to follow these topics as closely as I do. My goal is to distill what is important and relevant about these topics into easy-to-consume and digest articles that enlighten and inform so that my audience can make and/or advise their loved ones on better investment decisions and career choices, and otherwise be prepared for the changes ahead.
My approach to launching The X Project is to start by summarizing the books that have been the most influential in shaping my perspective and my way of thinking about where we have been, where we are, and where we are headed in the context of these ten topics I listed above. As a Gen Xer going to high school in the mid-1980s, I relied on Cliffs Notes when I couldn’t get to read the assigned books. For those who know or remember what Cliffs Notes was, one way to think about my service is I will be providing Cliffs Notes-like summaries of important books and other important analyses, commentators, theories, hypotheses, or other considerations related to those topics.
And of course, one of the reasons why I needed to rely on Cliffs Notes as a Gen Xer is because I watched a lot of David Letterman. And thanks to Dave, Top 10 lists have been forever ingrained in me. My use of them however will not be nearly as funny.
And so here is the Top 10 list of the most influential books that I read in 2022 or before:
I. The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy by Neil Howe and William Strauss, December, 1996
II. The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century by George Friedman, January, 2009
III. This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly by Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff, September, 2009
IV. The Accidental Superpower by Peter Zeihan, November, 2014
V. Flashpoints: The Emerging Crisis in Europe by George Friedman, January, 2015
VI. The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan, August, 2015
VII. The Absent Superpower by Peter Zeihan, December, 2016
VIII. Fed Up: An Insider’s Take on Why The Federal Reserve is Bad for America by Danielle DiMartino Booth, February, 2017
IX. The Storm Before the Calm by George Friedman, February, 2020
X. Disunited Nations: The Scramble for Power in an Ungoverned World by Peter Zeihan, March, 2020