Reckless Endangerment: How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Led to Economic Armageddon

Publisher Marketing: A "Washington Post" Notable Nonfiction Book for 2011One of "The Economist s" 2011 Books of the Year The "New York Times's" Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist reveals how the financial meltdown emerged from the toxic interplay of Washington, Wall Street, and corrupt mortgage lenders. In "Reckless Endangerment," Gretchen Morgenson, the star business columnist of The New York Times, exposes how the watchdogs who were supposed to protect the country from financial harm were actually complicit in the actions that finally blew up the American economy. Drawing on previously untapped sources and building on original research from coauthor Joshua Rosner who himself raised early warnings with the public and investors, and kept detailed records Morgenson connects the dots that led to this fiasco. Morgenson and Rosner draw back the curtain on Fannie Mae, the mortgage-finance giant that grew, with the support of the Clinton administration, through the 1990s, becoming a major opponent of government oversight even as it was benefiting from public subsidies. They expose the role played not only by Fannie Mae executives but also by enablers at Countrywide Financial, Goldman Sachs, the Federal Reserve, HUD, Congress, the FDIC, and the biggest players on Wall Street, to show how greed, aggression, and fear led countless officials to ignore warning signs of an imminent disaster. Character-rich and definitive in its analysis, this is the one account of the financial crisis you must hear." Review Citations: New York Times Book Review 07/08/2012 pg. 24 (EAN 9781250008794, Paperback) Wilson Public Library Catalog 01/01/2013 pg. 252 (EAN 9781429965774, Open Ebook) Publishers Weekly 03/21/2011 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Booklist 04/15/2011 pg. 9 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Kirkus Reviews 03/15/2011 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Library Journal Prepub Alert 12/01/2010 pg. 90 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) New York Times Book Review 05/29/2011 pg. 9 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) New York Times Book Review 06/05/2011 pg. 50 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Library Journal 12/01/2010 pg. 90 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Poder Hispanic 08/01/2011 pg. 84 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) New York Review of Books 10/27/2011 pg. 48 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Wilson Public Library Catalog 01/01/2013 pg. 252 (EAN 9780805091205, Hardcover) Contributor Bio:  Morgenson, Gretchen Gretchen Morgenson is a business reporter and writes the Fair Game column in the Sunday Business section of The New York Times, where she also serves as assistant business and financial editor. She was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2002 for her trenchant and incisive coverage of Wall Street. She lives with her husband and son in New York City. Contributor Bio:  Rosner, Joshua Joshua Rosner is a managing director at the independent research consultancy Graham Fisher and Co. and was among the first analysts to identify accounting problems at the government-sponsored-enterprises and to warn of the coming credit crisis. He advises regulators and institutional investors on housing and mortgage-finance-related issues. He lives in New York City.