The Best Books I Read In 2024
1/ Same as Ever: A Guide to What Never Changes by Morgan Housel. Really cool sort of social sciences book about timeless principles in life and finance that remain the same over time.
2/ World on the Brink: How America Can Beat China in the Race for the Twenty-First Century by Dmitri Alperovitch. Just a tremendous overview of the tensions between the US and China and what might come next. This book really helped me clarify how to think about foreign affairs. You have the western hemisphere and the eastern hemisphere. The US is the clear leader of the West. The East doesn’t have a clear leader, and that’s very much in the US’s interests. The East has ~70% of the world’s population. If China were to become dominant, many of our allies would be forced to tip toward China and away from the US (South Korea, Australia, Japan, etc.). The primary objective of US foreign policy is to avoid that outcome.
3/ Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry's Road to Bankruptcy and Bailout and Beyond by Paul Ingrassia. An excellent overview of the twists and turns of the US auto industry since its inception. An incredibly interesting story.
4/ Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things by Adam Grant. Sort of a Moneyball-like book. It talks about identifying hidden talent, which is an invaluable skill when building a startup.
5/ The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor by Howard S. Marks. Great insights from Howard Marks on managing risk and your patience as an investor.
6/ How To Get Rich: (without getting lucky) by Naval Ravikant. Brilliant framework for creating wealth using long-term thinking, entrepreneurship, and leveraging technology. I’d make this mandatory reading for high school students.
“The purpose of wealth is freedom. It’s nothing more than that. It’s not to buy fur coats, or drive Ferraris, or sail yachts, or jet around the world in your Gulfstream. That stuff gets really boring and really stupid, really fast. It’s really so that you are your own sovereign individual.”
7/ Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering by Malcolm Gladwell. I’m a sucker for Gladwell’s books. A really fun read on social change and how key people can make a major impact.
8/ Scarcity Brain: Fix Your Craving Mindset and Rewire Your Habits to Thrive with Enough by Michael Easter. Really good book on how to crave less. Sort of the opposite of Atomic Habits in some ways.
9/ Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science by Charles Wheelan. Another book that should be required reading for high school students. An extremely easy read and really strong overview of fundamental economic concepts that everyone should understand.
10/ How to Invest: Masters on the Craft by David Rubenstein. A series of interviews with some of the world’s most successful investors that lay out their strategies and advice on successful investing.