Strassmann reveals the hidden costs versus value of information technology, including how to realize the alignment of IT and business plans, how spending interacts with revenue, overhead costs, and personnel related to IT, and the idea of workload without payoff. One strategy is outsourcing and the perspective that the best companies do not outsource massive amounts of data manipulation, but rather study good reasons for outsourcing and manage it effectively without decaying their information assets.

A passionate, articulate argument detailing how the United States political system has failed to adapt to the economic challenges of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The American economy is in peril. It has fallen hostage to a casino of financial speculation, creating instability as well as inequality. Tens of millions of workers are vulnerable to layoffs and outsourcing, health care and retirement burdens are increasingly being shifted from employers to individuals. Here Kuttner debunks alarmist claims about supposed economic hazards and exposes the genuine dangers: hedge funds and private equity run amok, sub-prime lenders, Wall Street middlemen, and America's dependence on foreign central banks. He then outlines a persuasive, bold alternative, a new model of managed capitalism that can deliver security and opportunity, and rekindle democracy as we know it.