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What Money Can't Buy
- The Moral Limits of Markets
- Narrated by: Michael J. Sandel
- Length: 7 hrs and 28 mins
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Publisher's summary
Should we pay children to read books or to get good grades? Should we allow corporations to pay for the right to pollute the atmosphere? Is it ethical to pay people to test risky new drugs or to donate their organs? What about hiring mercenaries to fight our wars? Auctioning admission to elite universities? Selling citizenship to immigrants willing to pay? In What Money Can’t Buy, Michael J. Sandel takes on one of the biggest ethical questions of our time: Is there something wrong with a world in which everything is for sale? If so, how can we prevent market values from reaching into spheres of life where they don’t belong? What are the moral limits of markets? In recent decades, market values have crowded out nonmarket norms in almost every aspect of life—medicine, education, government, law, art, sports, even family life and personal relations. Without quite realizing it, Sandel argues, we have drifted from having a market economy to being a market society. Is this where we want to be?
In his New York Times best seller Justice, Sandel showed himself to be a master at illuminating, with clarity and verve, the hard moral questions we confront in our everyday lives. Now, in What Money Can’t Buy, he provokes an essential discussion that we, in our marketdriven age, need to have: What is the proper role of markets in a democratic society—and how can we protect the moral and civic goods that markets don’t honor and that money can’t buy?
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From the shuttered factories of the rust belt to the look-alike strip malls of the sun belt---and almost everywhere in between---America has been transformed by its relentless fixation on low price. This pervasive yet little examined obsession is arguably the most powerful and devastating market force of our time---the engine of globalization, outsourcing, planned obsolescence, and economic instability in an increasingly unsettled world.
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You Get What You Pay For?
- By Roy on 07-26-09
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Kids These Days
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- Narrated by: Will Collyer
- Length: 7 hrs and 29 mins
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Everyone knows "what's wrong with millennials". Glenn Beck says we've been ruined by "participation trophies". Simon Sinek says we have low self-esteem. An Australian millionaire says millennials could all afford homes if we'd just give up avocado toast. Thanks, millionaire. This millennial is here to prove them all wrong.
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A devastating dream of revolution
- By Kevin Tierney Jr on 11-23-17
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A Capitalism for the People
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Born in Italy, University of Chicago economist Luigi Zingales witnessed firsthand the consequences of high inflation and unemployment - paired with rampant nepotism and cronyism - on a country’s economy. This experience profoundly shaped his professional interests, and in 1988 he arrived in the United States, armed with a political passion and the belief that economists should not merely interpret the world, but should change it for the better.
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Enjoyable but a tad predictable.
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Arguing with Idiots
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Idiots can't be identified through voting records, they can be found only by looking for people who hide behind stereotypes, embrace partisanship, and believe that bumper-sticker slogans are a substitute for common sense. If you know someone who fits the bill, then Arguing with Idiots will help you silence them once and for all with the ultimate weapon: the truth.
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Great Book
- By Stacy on 09-22-09
By: Glenn Beck
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Blind Spots
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When confronted with an ethical dilemma, most of us like to think we would stand up for our principles. But we are not as ethical as we think we are. In Blind Spots, leading business ethicists Max Bazerman and Ann Tenbrunsel examine the ways we overestimate our ability to do what is right and how we act unethically without meaning to.
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Great book! Poor narration
- By Susie on 11-20-17
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The Fine Print
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David Cay Johnston has made a name for himself as the defender of the common man, calling out the rich and powerful for cheating the system at the expense of everyone else. Whether he's exposing unjust loopholes in the tax code that help the rich get richer or pointing out how powerful corporations pocket government subsidies at excessive taxpayer expense, Johnston is an eloquent town crier for justice and equality.
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A must listen if you love or hate Trump
- By Rob D on 04-19-17
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The Art of Strategy
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Game theory means rigorous strategic thinking. It’s the art of anticipating your opponent’s next moves, knowing full well that your rival is trying to do the same thing to you. Though parts of game theory involve simple common sense, much is counterintuitive, and it can only be mastered by developing a new way of seeing the world. Using a diverse array of rich case studies - from pop culture, TV, movies, sports, politics, and history - the authors show how nearly every business and personal interaction has a game-theory component to it.
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Completely misleading title
- By Motorjaw on 01-28-15
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Free to Choose
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Milton Friedman and his wife, Rose, teamed up to write this most convincing and readable guide, which illustrates the crucial link between Adam Smith's capitalism and the free society. They show how freedom has been eroded and prosperity undermined through the rapid growth of governmental agencies, laws, and regulations.
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Fantastic
- By Erik on 01-21-08
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This Noble Land
- My Vision For America
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This Noble Land is Michener's most personal statement about America, an examination of the issues that threaten to fragment and undermine the nation - racial conflict, the widening gulf between rich and poor, the decline of education, the inadequacies of our health care system - as well as a thought-provoking prescription for sustaining our "outstanding success". First published shortly before Michener's death, This Noble Land stands as a wake-up call for a troubled era, infused with the wisdom and passion of a lifetime.
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A startling realization
- By Amazon Customer on 08-15-15
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Super Crunchers
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Today, number crunching affects your life in ways you might never imagine. In this lively and groundbreaking new audiobook, economist Ian Ayres shows how today's best and brightest organizations are analyzing massive databases at lightening speed to provide greater insights into human behavior. They are the Super Crunchers.
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Great book on
- By Jon on 01-31-08
By: Ian Ayres
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What listeners say about What Money Can't Buy
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- ER
- 01-01-21
From 2012 - But More Relevant Than Ever
Eye-opening book, even though it's from 2012 it's messages are more important and relevant than ever.
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- Mark hoyle
- 12-07-22
really good book about ethics and markets/money
I was surprised. great ethical lessons regarding money and where it shouldn't have a place in society.
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- DC Denizen
- 12-11-12
Thought-Provoking and Timely
The author teaches an extremely popular undergraduate ethics course at Harvard called "Justice" [the course is available for free download at iTunes University]. I've watched many of the Justice segments and enjoyed them, so I was very interested when I read a review of What Money Can't Buy in the NYTimes earlier this year.
Even if you lean toward [or embrace] free-market economics, Sandel's book will provide ample food for reflection. His basic argument is that the two decades leading up to the 2008 financial meltdown were an era of "market triumphalism" -- one in which markets and market values crept into spheres of life where they didn't belong. Sandel wants us to think about the role that markets and market values should play in society, and whether there are some things that money should not buy.
I found that I didn't agree with some of Sandel's views, but I nonetheless found them thoughtful and well reasoned. Sandel reads the book himself, and I found his narration perfectly matched the content. Although Sandel's topic is weighty, he manages to be low-key, engaging, and even humorous. He clearly has a point of view, but he's never didactic.
How much did I like the audiobook? I enjoyed it so much, that I later downloaded the Kindle version so I could spent more time thinking about the content. That's my equivalent of "two thumbs up."
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9 people found this helpful
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- Jennifer
- 09-17-14
Enjoyable
This book turned me into one of those people who can't get my friends to read what I'm reading and so tells them in too much detail about it. It can get a bit preachy in places, and the major premise of the book- that markets aren't morally neutral and we need to jettison that lie so we can begin to discuss the morality of certain transactions- is fairly apparent to anyone who's given it any thought, but the book was interestingly written and full of exciting examples. I became a factoid dispensing machine, outraged at the things money can, in fact, actually buy. It was good to know and easy to get through.
The narration wasn't spectacular, but it didn't detract for me. It happens sometimes when authors narrate their own books. Not exciting enough for a long road trip, but good for a morning commute.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Mark
- 05-25-12
interesting analysis but no real solutions
Would you consider the audio edition of What Money Can't Buy to be better than the print version?
One advantage of the audio version is it is read by the author who is a very popular and distinguished Harvard professor, so it is as though you are in his class.
What did you like best about this story?
Makes you consider where we should draw the line of what should and should not be bought.
Any additional comments?
The author says repeatedly that we have had no public discourse about this issue and we should start a national dialogue about it, etc, but it is unclear what exactly that means. Should we start writing editorials, talk about it on TV news stations, or what? Where would the solution to this problem lie?
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- Cam
- 04-13-19
Amazing book, less than stellar recording.
Firstly, this is an excellent book. Michael J Sandel is a wonderful economist with a sense of wit and humility not often found in that profession. The remainder of my review is about the audio recording—which is the only part of this book experience that I have issue with.
While I always appreciate hearing a person’s words from that same person’s mouth, that does not necessarily mean that I want that person to read their audiobook. Sandel has a nasally voice that, combined with the low quality of the recording, made the listening experience unpleasant at times. This could have been easily resolved by hiring a professional to record the audio for the book. I can’t help but wonder if Sandel as an economist chose to record his own audio in order to limit the market’s effect on his audiobook.
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- Amazon Customer
- 05-24-12
Excellent Book by a brilliant moral philosopher.
If you could sum up What Money Can't Buy in three words, what would they be?
Thoughtful, nonpartisan, and beneficial.
Who was your favorite character and why?
NA
What does Michael J. Sandel bring to the story that you wouldn???t experience if you just read the book?
Having both read the book and then listened to it afterward, listening to Sandel personally describe the issues in his own voice and tone was extremely disarming. He is genuinely concerned about these issues and seems to sincerely want the American public to live happy and meaningful lives. In short, he is both a great philosopher and a truly good man.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
At one point he makes the point that going to professional sporting events were in the past an event where everyone, both the rich and the poor, the elites and common people would come together and cheer for their favorite team. They were joined by common excitement in the public square. But now, with the advent of "box seating" those with the means can pay extremely high prices to set themselves apart from everyone else.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Michael R Johnson
- 06-27-20
So So
Really just gave you two sides of a coin, no mind blowing or even thought provoking info.
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- Horacio Carman
- 03-03-24
An actual call to action
Full of examples, masterfully well documented, this is inevitably a call to action. Hope everyone heeds the call!
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- Cliff Oh
- 03-09-24
Thinking once more
Reminding what need for modern society and a nation. Easy to understand and consent. Recommend for MZ generation.
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