Name: Gatsby's Dangerous Economics
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Gatsby's Dangerous Economics

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Gatsby's Dangerous Economics

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Book Introduction

Will we be swayed by the measured price of life?
Will we restore the boundless value of life?
Read between the lines of the narrative to understand the nature of capital and desire!

If literature begins with the question, "Why do humans desire?", economics serves as a tool for measuring the utility value of desire.
From Marx in the 19th century to Keynes in the 20th and Piketty in the 21st, whenever human desires became excessively excessive, markets overheated and the world fell into chaos, economists paused from their economic thinking and took a walk in the forest of literature.
Marx reflected on the nature of capital and class in Balzac's "Human Comedy," and Keynes debated the "paradox of thrift" and the role of government in stimulating consumption while reading Dickens in the Bloomsbury Group.
And Piketty's research on polarization and inequality points to a dystopian life for the digitally excluded.

As an economist who has analyzed the economy and policy across academia, business, the National Assembly, and the government for over 30 years, the author surprisingly always has novels in his bag.
Like Marx and Piketty, the author looked at the desires of countless Gatsbys in the novel with the insight of an economist.
In this book, [Gatsby's Dangerous Economics], he begins with the history of financial speculation, and goes through the Dutch 'Tulip Bubble', the British 'South Sea Bubble', and the French 'Mississippi Bubble' that burst in the 17th and 18th centuries, the 19th century Industrial Revolution and the rise of capitalism, the 20th century Great Depression and neoliberalism, the 21st century financial crisis and the war for hegemony entangled with new technologies, and the paradigm shift to the AI era that will unfold in the near future, and he unravels the turning points of economic history through 40 novels.
This is why the nickname 'NOVELNOMICS', a new word meaning 'economics read as a novel', is engraved on the cover of this book.
In this way, the author, with a keen eye, captures the crucial moments of economic history hidden between the lines of the narrative, while delving into the essence of the dilemma we face in an age of uncertainty.

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index

Preface: The Joy of Studying Economics While Reading Novels

Chapter 1.
The World of Bubble Gum Swallowers: 17th-19th Centuries

· The Birth of 'Devil's Urine' and Derivatives
[The Coffee Merchant of Amsterdam] _David Rees
· The meaning of the flower language 'bubble'
[Tulip Fever] _Deborah Mogach
· Credit instead of bank? The cruel history of distrust issued by banks.
[The Great Gamble] _Claude Kueny
· Promises written on paper that disappeared with the bubbles
[Paper Conspiracy] _David Rhys
The Origins of the "Technology War" Surrounding Glassworking
[Murano Glass Worker] _Marina Fiorato
· A tram called the Industrial Revolution trapped in a tunnel of polarization
[North and South] _Elizabeth Gaskell
An Economist's Reading of 19th-Century British Realist Literature
Pride and Prejudice _ Jane Austen
· Crossing isolation to reform? A bridge to imperialism?
[Jacob's Thousand Autumns] _David Mitchell
· How did revolutionary citizens become pension citizens?
[Father Goriot] _ Honoré de Balzac
· Who ate their potatoes?
[Sad Island] _Marita Conlon-McKenna
· The geopolitics of making a fortune overnight
[Sisters Brothers] _Patrick DeWitt
· I denounce the corrupt money and its greedy people.
[Money] _Emile Zola
The Ugly "Current War" and Edison's "Reasonable Losing Streak"
[The Last Days of Night] _Graham Moore
Joseon merchants who dreamed of a central bank
[Bank] _Kim Tak-hwan

Chapter 2.
The Age of Dangerous Gatsbys: The 20th Century

A fable about the controversial life of a great economist.
[Keynes's Revolution] _E.J.
Barnes
· The illusion of a green utopia created by dreamers
[The Great Gatsby] _F.
Scott Fitzgerald
· A multi-layered observer's perspective on the nature of capital
[Trust] _Hernan Diaz
· 100 years ago, rice was traded as a futures contract in Korea.
[Play] _Lee Kwang-soo
· A journey of three thousand miles in search of gold, written in the style of 'Daylight and Night Work'
[Gold's Passion] _Chae Man-sik
· An economist who short-sold stocks out of barbaric impulse
[Harvard Economics Professor] John Kenneth Galbraith
· Misreaders of the Invisible Hand, Blasphemers of Adam Smith
[Who Framed Mr. Smith] _Jonathan B.
White
· How did people with long wallets buy apartments in Gangnam?
Children of Paradise _ Park Wan-seo
· An ugly self-portrait of Japan, lost for 30 years
[Financial Corruption Island] _Ryo Takasugi
Eagles hunting prey in the skies above Japan's bubble economy
[Hagetaka] _Mayama Jin
· Finding the black money hidden in the Alps
[Account under another person's name] _Christopher Reich

Chapter 3.
Utopia or Dystopia: The 21st Century and the Future

The mirage of Boston's financial empire built on moral hazard
[Union Atlantic] _Adam Hazlitt
· At that time, people only talked about houses [1]
[Capital] _John Lanchester
· The sorrow of Kairos, who made a deal with the devil
[Devils] _Guido Maria Brera
· The conspirators of a 21st-century Greek tragedy
[Organized Gang] _Flor Vasher
· The algorithm you created is attacking you.
[The Physicist's Flight] _Robert Harris
The world is wide and there is nothing to do.
[A Hologram for a King] _Dave Eggers
· At that time, people only talked about houses [2]
[Seo Young-dong's Story] _ Jo Nam-joo
· People who use their children as collateral to spend money in Gangnam
[People of Jamsil-dong] _Jeong Ah-eun
· Seongsu desires Apgujeong, Apgujeong is jealous of Seongsu
[His Great Light] _Sim Yun-kyung
· Can mother and daughter truly unite?
[A Very Brief Interest in Ownership] _Elena Medel
· Great America Again?, Great Depression Again!
[The Mandibles] _Lionel Schreiber
How UK Education Drives Income Inequality
[Meritocracy] _Michael Young
· The American Nightmare Driven by Political Extremism
[Wonderful Land] _ Douglas Kennedy
Economics powerless against inequality, literature becoming a refuge from poverty
Folding City _ Hao Jingfang
· If humanoids realize the dignity of existence
[The Employee] _Olga Ravn

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Into the book

Mihuel's prediction, which recognized the commercial value of coffee, was not wrong.
Soon after Mihuel launched his massive coffee trading operation, demand for coffee (indeed) swept Europe.
Numerous coffee houses opened in major European cities, the most prosperous being London.
Records show that around 1700, there were over 2,000 coffee houses operating in London alone.
What's interesting is that a coffee house in an alley behind the Royal Exchange in London is the birthplace of the London Stock Exchange.
In 1696, when the Royal Exchange restricted the entry of stockbrokers on the grounds that they were spreading all kinds of false information and confusing the market, brokers began to gather in coffee houses around the exchange.
A broker named John Casting created a sensation by writing stock and commodity prices on a blackboard at a place called Jonathan's Coffee House, which became the first stock price bulletin board.
The brokers even signed a contract for exclusive use of Jonathan's Coffee House.
As time passed and redevelopment took place in London, a building was built on the site of the demolished Jonathan Coffee House and was named the London Stock Exchange.

---From "The Devil's Urine and the Birth of Derivatives: [The Coffee Merchant of Amsterdam] David Rees"

As tulip values soared to unimaginable heights, merchants began naming luxury varieties after historical figures, such as Alexander the Great.
The bulb that recorded the highest price at the time was called 'Semper Augustus'.
The name Augustus, the first emperor of the Roman Empire, is combined with the Latin word Sempre, meaning 'always', to give it the meaning of 'eternal emperor'.
This variety once sold for a single bulb worth 12 acres of land (roughly the size of seven football fields), but the bubble burst quickly, rendering the term "Sempre" meaningless.
---From "The Meaning of the Flower Language of 'Bubble': [Tulip Fever] Deborah Mogach"

French economist Thomas Piketty, in his book Capital in the Twenty-First Century, mentions the importance of income and wealth distribution and inheritance as described by Balzac.
At that time, the average annual income of a French adult was 400 to 500 francs.
But in those times of extreme inequality, to live comfortably, elegantly, and with a servant, one needed 10,000 to 20,000 francs, 20 to 30 times the average income.
This was not a level that could be earned through work.
---「How the Revolutionary Citizen Became a Pensioner: [Old Goriot] Honoré de Balzac」

Between 1792 and 1847, the total amount of gold produced in the United States was 37 tons, but in 1849 alone, the amount of gold mined in California far exceeded this amount.
During this period, the monetary systems of each country were based on precious metals such as gold and silver, so the gold rushes in California and Australia that followed caused a general rise in prices around the world.
It is said that prices rose by about 30 percentage points between 1850 and 1855.
Of course, the cost of living in California, the center of the gold rush, was much higher than this.
---From "The Economics of Getting Rich Quickly: [Sisters Brothers] Patrick DeWitt"

How could investors capitalize on falling stock prices during this period? Interestingly, the Paris Stock Exchange's futures market was more developed than its spot market.
In the spot market, stocks and cash are exchanged and settlement is completed immediately after the transaction is concluded, but in the futures market, settlement is made on a specific date (twice a month, on the 15th and last day) after the transaction.
Investors who predict a stock price decline can sell stocks in advance at a certain price in the futures market, and when the stock price falls on the settlement date, they can purchase the stocks at a lower price in the spot market and sell them at a higher price agreed upon in the futures market to make a profit.
Of course, if the stock price rises contrary to expectations, you will incur a loss.
---「I Accuse Corrupt Money and Its Greedies: [Money] by Emile Zola」

It was not long after the Unyo Incident, in which Japan invaded Yeongjongjin in Incheon, annihilated the Joseon navy, captured weapons, and set fire to the castle.
The three merchants lament that a wave is coming that will swallow Joseon, and that they will only feel resentful if they properly fight the foreign merchants.
First, the merchants of Hanyang, Gaeseong, and Incheon decided to join forces and create an organization to pool and operate money together.
No one called it a 'bank' (they didn't even know the word), but what they dreamed of was a bank.
---From "Joseon's Merchants Who Dreamed of a Central Bank: [Bank] Kim Tak-hwan"

In a speech, President Obama confessed that “in America, people from poor backgrounds are significantly less likely to catch up with people from rich backgrounds than in other developed countries.”
Professor Alan Kruger, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, formalized this as the “Great Gatsby Curve.”
When we examine the current inequality and intergenerational mobility in major advanced countries, we can see that the more severe the inequality, the lower the intergenerational mobility.
Many American media outlets cited this curve and lamented, “The American Dream is achieved in Denmark, not in the United States.”
---「The illusion of a green utopia created by dreamers: [The Great Gatsby] F.
Scott Fitzgerald"

The novel contains a passage in which Smith debates left-wing scholars who criticize the free market competitive order.
This does not mean, however, that Smith's views are consistent with neoliberalism.
For example, those who criticize government regulation of financial markets are wrong in their claim that they seek the basis for their criticism in Smith's "invisible hand."
Smith never applied his metaphor of the "invisible hand" to financial markets.
Rather, in [The Wealth of Nations], he stated the state's responsibilities and argued that the state has a duty to protect the market from financial fraud and speculation.
---「Misreaders of the Invisible Hand, Blasphemers of Adam Smith: [Who Framed Mr. Smith?] Jonathan B.
Among "White"

John Lanchester, author of [Capital], is often compared to the Victorian writer Charles Dickens.
Walter Bageott, a British financial journalist who lived in the same era, once commented that “Dickens described London as if he were a correspondent for posterity.”
Likewise, through Lanchester, we can get a more vivid picture of Britain before and after the financial crisis and Brexit than through reportage.
Dickens and Lanchester were both journalists and novelists.
---From "People in those days only talked about houses: [Capital] John Lanchester"

Maria and Carmen, and Carmen and Alicia are mother and daughter, but they do not bond with each other.
The common denominator of economic poverty divided them.
The daughter was tired of inheriting poverty, and the mother was tormented by a sense of debt to her daughter.
The scene where Maria (not knowing that she is her granddaughter) reaches out to Alicia, who is fainting from dizziness at the 'International Women's Day' rally, is not a moment of restoration of a relationship, but a moment of confirming the harsh reality.

---From "Can Mother and Daughter Really Be Solidar with One Another: [A Short Interest in Possession] Elena Medel"

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Publisher's Review

How Bubble Gum Swallowers Wrecked the Market

This book is organized by era, focusing on important events that became turning points in economic history, in 40 novels.
Beginning with the story of the world's first commodity exchange in the 17th century, the novel explores the massive financial bubble that burst in the 17th and 18th centuries, the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, the Great Depression and neoliberalism of the 20th century, the financial crisis and economic hegemony war of the 21st century, and the present and near future, which are on the verge of a paradigm shift toward AI.

The first chapter, as the title 'The World of Bubble Gum Swallowers' suggests, begins with novels that highlight the three major financial bubbles of early capitalism: the 'Tulip Bubble', the 'South Sea Bubble', and the 'Mississippi Bubble'.
The bubble was so absurd that a single tulip bulb, seemingly unrelated to the economy, was being sold for the equivalent of seven football fields, but it did happen (p. 26).
Among the bubble's architects was a famous figure like John Law, a mathematically gifted economist and gambler who even wrote a book called [Money and Trade] to support the establishment of a bank (p. 34).
The practice of raising investment funds by using gold mining projects in the New World as bait and then printing money at banks to provide seed money has been rampant throughout history.
We cannot overlook the fact that banks took a leading role in colluding in the bubble (p. 44).
The anecdote about a bank that lost trust due to the bubble and decided to change its name from Bank to Credit is very suggestive.

It is also impressive that Elizabeth Gaskell, a representative female writer of 19th-century Britain, addressed the issues of labor exploitation and environmental pollution, the real face of the Industrial Revolution, in her novel [North and South].
Gaskell directly rejected the distorted view of contemporary critics that “no matter how hard they try, women cannot understand labor-management issues” through his novel (p. 62).

If French economist Piketty cited Balzac's Le Père Goriot in his Capital in the Twenty-First Century to historically illuminate hereditary capitalism, the author points out the background of how Parisians, once called "revolutionary citizens," have fallen to the status of "pension citizens."
The pensions featured in the novel have the character of ‘national bonds,’ and the author delves into the reasons why the French government at the time had no choice but to increase the issuance of national bonds (p. 86).

While Britain and France were paying the high price of their great revolution, the gold rush was in full swing across the Atlantic in America.
The author takes us to the scene of the 1848 California Gold Rush through Canadian author Patrick DeWitt's novel, Sisters Brothers.
And it explores the phenomenon that the gold mining boom at the time raised global prices by 30%p and became a precursor to the gold standard (p. 102).

There was a gold rush in our country too.
In the 1930s, Joseon was swept up in a gold investment craze, so much so that it was called the gold rush era.
The author introduces a passage from Chae Man-sik's novel [Passion of Gold] that satirizes the 'Golden Age' as the 'Golden Madness Age', and denounces the fact that Japan was obsessed with gold exploitation in Korea in order to secure the massive military funds needed for the Manchurian Incident in 1931 and the Sino-Japanese War in 1937 (p. 168).

The dangerous game of desire of the 20th century's Gatsbys is still going on in the 21st century!

The second chapter, which deals with the 20th century, is titled 'The Age of Dangerous Gatsbys.'
It is a twist on Fitzgerald's novel [The Great Gatsby], and the author analyzes human greed that has repeatedly created huge bubbles from an economic perspective through various characters in the novel, including Gatsby.

In classical economics, desire was viewed as a natural human nature, and satisfying desires through the market was considered a rational economic phenomenon.
However, behavioral economics has noted that human desires are not necessarily rational.
The moment desires become excessively inflated and explode into greed, the market loses its ability to self-correct and the world falls into chaos.
Many novelists created narratives that captured the spirit of the times, shaped by the wild impulses of humankind at that very moment.

Economist Alan Kruger converted the illusion of the American Dream that Gatsby in the novel believed to have achieved into an inequality index using intergenerational income elasticity and the Gini coefficient, and gave it the nickname "The Great Gatsby Curve."
Citing the “Great Gatsby Curve,” experts criticized the tilted playing field in American society, making comments such as, “The American Dream is achieved in Denmark, not in the United States” (p. 144).

Through his novels, the author details the phenomenon of inequality widening as desires become more inflated.
For example, in the expression “incestuous genealogy of money, in which capital begets capital, and capital begets capital” in Hernán Díaz’s Pulitzer Prize-winning [Trust], he notes how the continuity of desire increases the possibility of intergenerational transfer of wealth (p. 152).
In the process, the author points out the peculiar aspect of financial capitalism, where the word “trust” is read as both “trust” and “monopoly.”

Moreover, the author unfilteredly reveals how the so-called 'popularization of desire' culminates in real estate speculation.
Through Park Wan-seo's short story "Children of Paradise," we look back at the identity of a housewife in the Gangnam development site in the 1970s (p. 192), and through Jo Nam-joo's novel "Seoyoung-dong Story" (p. 274) and Jeong Ah-eun's novel "People of Jamsil-dong" (p. 282), we examine how the blatant nature (or snobbery) toward wealth is expressed in Korean society.
And, through John Lanchester's novel [Capital], he recalls the Northern Rock bank run in the UK due to the subprime mortgage shock, and reveals that real estate speculation is not a phenomenon unique to Korean society (p. 234).
The author's statement that the so-called middle class in Korea, England, and the United States at that time "talked only about houses" does not seem to be an exaggeration.

Insights missed by world-class economists
Novelnomics captured by novelists

After reading this book, you will realize where the future choice of 'utopia or dystopia' raised in the third chapter will lead.
In the 21st century, people have experienced financial and fiscal crises, and countless lives have been lost to bizarre epidemics, yet the world remains in turmoil.
As the world is awash with news of geopolitical crisis and war, the economy is gloomy and markets are turbulent.
It is a pity to see a bleak future in this book.

Nevertheless, the virtues this book offers its readers are surprisingly wonderful.
Novelists have predicted things we are currently facing or are likely to face in the future, such as ‘Trump-style MAGA gospel,’ ‘extremism,’ ‘digital polarization,’ and ‘AI innovation or invasion,’ from as far back as 60 years ago (Michael Young’s [The Rise of the Meritocracy]) to as recently as 10 years ago (Lionel Shriver’s [The Mandibles: A Record of 2029–2047]).

As the year ends and the new year begins, bookstores are flooded with economic outlook books, but it's not easy to find one that provides satisfactory insights.
On the other hand, it is astonishing that novelists have been able to capture insights that the world's most capable economists have missed.
This is why the author, who has been involved in economic policy for over 30 years, working in corporations, the National Assembly, and the government, never neglects reading novels.

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GOODS SPECIFICS

- Date of issue: July 10, 2025

- Page count, weight, size: 352 pages | 602g | 150*210*20mm

- ISBN13: 9791192229645

- ISBN10: 1192229649