In 2012, Ben Bernanke, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, gave a series of lectures about the Federal Reserve and the 2008 financial crisis, as part of a course at George Washington University on the role of the Federal Reserve in the economy. In this unusual event, Bernanke revealed important background and insights into the central bank's crucial actions during the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Taken directly from these historic...

Writing in the June 1965 issue of theEconomic Journal, Harry G. Johnson begins with a sentence seemingly calibrated to the scale of the book he set himself to review: "The long-awaited monetary history of the United States by Friedman and Schwartz is in every sense of the term a monumental scholarly achievement--monumental in its sheer bulk, monumental in the definitiveness of its treatment of innumerable issues, large and small . . . monumental,...

The world runs on the US dollar. From Washington to Beijing, governments, businesses, and individuals rely on the dollar to conduct commerce and invest profitably and safely. But how did the greenback achieve this planetary dominance a mere century and a half after President Lincoln issued the first currency backed only by the credit-and credibility-of the federal government? In “Greenback Planet”, acclaimed historian H. W. Brands charts the...

"An examination of the challenges facing Fed chair Ben Bernanke as he addresses the problems affecting the U.S. economy inherited from his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, informed by a historical look at how other central bankers have dealt with similar crises"--Provided by publisher.

The ultimate Federal Reserve insider offers insights into the inner workings of the Fed over the past fifty years.