Fat cats and running dogs - Vijay Prashad

Enron - born in Texas in 1986 and the 7th largest corporation in the world only fifteen years later. How did it grow so fast? Why did it collapse so spectacularly? Was it a maverick rogue or trail-blazer for a new kind of American capitalism? Fat Cats and Running Dogs tells the global story of Enron, a company that did not produce, but merely traded.This book tells us about: How new-style US corporations make their money The buying of politicians The revolving door between public office and boardroom membership How the US State Department pressures governments into signing dubious deals Manipulating the market Companies securing themselves from risk by monopoly deals with governments to guarantee prices and markets Omitting to report off-balance sheet losses Hiding profits in tax havens overseas Forging improper relationships with auditing firms.Vijay Prashad takes us into some big questions of our time: the mutual backscratching between politicians and corporate executives; the price paid by us as citizens, taxpayers and employees; and the ways in which US corporations rip off the rest of the world.