The Crash of the Millennium: Surviving the Coming Inflationary Depression

Remember the Great Depression of 1990? If not, it's because it didn't happen. That year ushered in a decade of prosperity for the United States. Ravi Batra, the author of not one but two bestsellers predicting that depression, is back with The Crash of the Millennium. Why do so many readers listen to Professor Batra when the economy ignores him? One reason is that he is a serious professional economist with well-reasoned arguments for his positions. His combination of demand-side neoclassical market theory with neutral interventionist government is old-fashioned but respectable. He is also a gifted writer, which makes the dense mathematical parts of his discussion painless and the apocalyptic crescendos breathtaking. Finally, he has the breadth of vision to incorporate history and spirituality into his analysis, and the market savvy to add a happy ending to his most calamitous forecasts. His analyses are perfect, except that they're so often wrong. Taken in that spirit, this is a valuable book. Readers will learn a lot of economics. They will find ammunition to deflate the popular ""the stock market only goes up"" theories of their friends. And they can have the thrill of a summer disaster thriller while learning something about economics. (Sept.)