Abundance

Why did Trump win again? Why are the swing states in the United States becoming more red than blue? Why do policies and plans established by term presidents fail? What happened to all the promises and plans of the Democrats? This book offers answers to some of these questions and many more.

When you want society to change or adapt and accept newer ways, and propose that the change is good for them, they actually want to see the fast results of those promises.

Take climate change issues, for example — they have been discussed for several decades, and governments have taken actions, which seem insufficient for activists and exaggerated for capitalists who see it as an obstacle to fast money-making.

But it’s not easy, and the book discusses the roadblocks and challenges that hinder policies and progressive changes, often because too many causes are combined into a single effort.

Over the years, governments have learned the hard way that policies and institutions need to be tailored individually to each country’s culture and history. What works for one doesn’t work for another. Also, looking into projects that will bring benefits in the future is a hard sell to the average public. It is the insurance dilemma — where you think you don’t need to invest in it because it’s not going to happen to you, until it really does… that’s when you realize you needed to do something about it all along.

The world we live in today and the comforts from technological progress are the outcomes of efforts put in many years ago. For example, let’s take Generative AI. To help you understand the gist of long pages of text today, several decades of work were invested. Many radical ideas are swept under the rug, with huge focus placed on new trends and what is hot now and making money. Often forgotten is that these innovations are the outcomes of radical ideas proposed by individuals who did not believe in the norm but dedicated themselves to risky or unventured ideas. Hence, governments and institutions should support more of these individuals.

It was an interesting read, and many of the arguments made sense.

© 2025 Sindhuja Cheema Enzinger. All Rights Reserved.