Buffett

Buffett Plot Summary

Introduction

In the heart of America's Midwest, a financial legend was born who would transform the world of investing through patience, discipline, and uncommon wisdom. Warren Buffett, the unassuming "Oracle of Omaha," rose from selling chewing gum door-to-door as a child to becoming one of the wealthiest individuals on the planet. His journey represents not merely a story of wealth accumulation but a testament to the power of intellectual independence and ethical clarity applied consistently over decades. While Wall Street often chased quick profits through complex financial engineering, Buffett built his fortune through simple principles: buying stakes in understandable businesses with durable competitive advantages, treating stocks as ownership interests rather than ticker symbols, and maintaining emotional equilibrium amid market turbulence. What makes Buffett's story so compelling is the stark contrast between his extraordinary financial success and his remarkably ordinary lifestyle. Despite amassing billions, he continued to live in the same modest Omaha house purchased in 1958, drove his own car, and enjoyed simple pleasures like playing bridge and drinking Cherry Coke. Through his annual letters to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders and his folksy wisdom delivered at the company's famous annual meetings, Buffett democratized investment knowledge, making sophisticated concepts accessible to everyday investors. His life offers profound lessons about the nature of success, the responsible stewardship of wealth, and the importance of aligning one's actions with one's values – insights that transcend investing to touch on fundamental questions of how to live a good and meaningful life.

Chapter 1: Early Years: The Making of an Investor

Warren Edward Buffett was born on August 30, 1930, in Omaha, Nebraska, during the depths of the Great Depression. This economic catastrophe shaped his early understanding of financial risk and opportunity, as he witnessed both devastating poverty and the resilience required to overcome hardship. The son of Howard Buffett, a stockbroker and later a four-term Republican congressman, young Warren displayed an extraordinary affinity for numbers and business concepts that set him apart from his peers. While other children played baseball, six-year-old Warren was already entrepreneurial, purchasing six-packs of Coca-Cola for 25 cents and reselling individual bottles for 5 cents each, pocketing a tidy profit. The Buffett household was intellectually stimulating but emotionally challenging. His mother Leila suffered from unpredictable mood swings that created tension in the family. Warren found refuge in numbers and books, developing a photographic memory that allowed him to recall statistics and business details with astonishing precision. He would meticulously count and record license plate numbers of passing cars, filling notebooks with numerical patterns that fascinated his young mind. This early obsession with mathematics and patterns would become the foundation for his legendary investment career. By age eleven, Buffett made his first stock purchase – three shares of Cities Service Preferred at $38 per share. When the price dropped to $27, he anxiously held on, eventually selling at $40 for a small profit. This early lesson in patience would prove formative – the stock later soared to $200, teaching him the value of long-term thinking. As a teenager, his entrepreneurial ventures expanded. He delivered newspapers, operated pinball machines in local barbershops, and filed his first tax return at age 14, claiming his bicycle as a business expense. By the time he graduated high school, Buffett had accumulated savings equivalent to over $50,000 in today's dollars. After briefly attending the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Buffett transferred to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where he continued his financial education while running various small businesses. His life took a decisive turn when he discovered Benjamin Graham's "The Intelligent Investor," a book that would become his investment bible. Determined to study under Graham, Buffett applied to Columbia Business School where Graham taught. His application to Harvard Business School had been rejected – a fortuitous setback that led him to Columbia and his intellectual mentor. Under Graham's tutelage, Buffett refined his understanding of value investing, learning to identify companies trading below their intrinsic value and to maintain a "margin of safety" in every investment. By his early twenties, Buffett had already accumulated substantial savings and developed core principles that would guide his investment approach: focus on intrinsic value, maintain a margin of safety, and think independently regardless of market sentiment. These formative years established the foundation for what would become one of the most successful investment careers in history. Throughout this early period, Buffett displayed remarkable self-confidence, telling friends he would be a millionaire by age thirty. This wasn't mere bravado but a conviction born of genuine self-awareness and a clear vision of his future path.

Chapter 2: The Graham Influence and Investment Philosophy

When Warren Buffett entered Columbia Business School in 1950, he was already a dedicated investor with clear ideas about the market. However, his encounter with Benjamin Graham would transform his approach entirely. Graham, the father of value investing, taught that stocks represented not mere ticker symbols but ownership interests in actual businesses. In Graham's classroom, Buffett found intellectual validation for his natural inclination toward careful analysis and rational decision-making. Though the youngest student in the class, he dominated discussions, raising his hand constantly and answering questions with remarkable insight. Graham's investment philosophy centered on the concept of "margin of safety" – buying securities at prices sufficiently below their intrinsic value to provide a cushion against error. This approach contrasted sharply with the prevailing Wall Street wisdom that emphasized market timing and technical analysis. Graham advocated treating the market as a voting machine in the short term but a weighing machine in the long run, meaning that while prices might fluctuate based on popularity, they eventually reflect fundamental value. Buffett absorbed these lessons with remarkable intensity, earning an A+ in Graham's class – the only such grade Graham had awarded in twenty-two years of teaching. After graduation, Buffett eagerly sought employment with Graham's investment firm, Graham-Newman Corporation. Initially rejected, he returned to Omaha and worked at his father's brokerage firm while continuing to study Graham's methods. His persistence paid off in 1954 when Graham finally offered him a position. During his two years at Graham-Newman, Buffett refined his analytical skills, learning to identify "cigar butt" investments – companies trading so cheaply that they offered one last "puff" of value even if their long-term prospects were limited. This approach focused on statistical bargains – companies trading below their net working capital, essentially getting their fixed assets for free. When Graham retired in 1956, Buffett returned to Omaha with newfound confidence and a clear investment methodology. At just 25 years old, he started his own investment partnership with $105,000 from family and friends. His approach was straightforward but revolutionary: he charged no management fee, took 25% of profits above a 6% hurdle rate, and invested a significant portion of his own limited capital alongside his partners. This alignment of interests would become a hallmark of Buffett's business dealings throughout his career. While Buffett began as a strict disciple of Graham's quantitative approach, he gradually evolved beyond his mentor's teachings. This evolution was accelerated by his friendship with Charlie Munger, a brilliant lawyer and investor whom Buffett met in 1959. Munger encouraged Buffett to pay up for quality businesses rather than just buying cheap stocks. "Charlie shoved me in the direction of not just buying bargains, but buying better businesses," Buffett would later explain. This shift was crystallized in Buffett's famous adaptation: "It's far better to buy a wonderful company at a fair price than a fair company at a wonderful price." This intellectual journey beyond Graham's teachings, while maintaining fidelity to his fundamental principles, would define Buffett's mature investment philosophy and lead to his extraordinary success in the decades to come.

Chapter 3: Building Berkshire Hathaway's Empire

In 1962, Buffett began purchasing shares in a struggling New England textile manufacturer called Berkshire Hathaway. Initially attracted by its low price relative to assets, Buffett increased his stake until he gained control of the company in 1965. The acquisition itself was somewhat accidental – Buffett had reached a verbal agreement with Berkshire's president, Seabury Stanton, to sell back his shares at $11.50. When the formal offer came in at $11.375, Buffett felt insulted by what he perceived as an attempt to chisel him. Rather than selling, he decided to buy more shares and take control of the company, eventually forcing Stanton's resignation. The textile business itself was mediocre at best, facing intense competition from southern mills and overseas manufacturers with lower labor costs. In what Buffett would later call his biggest investment mistake, he poured money into the failing textile operations for years before finally accepting their inevitable decline. However, this apparent misstep became the foundation for one of history's greatest investment vehicles. Buffett began using Berkshire's cash flow to acquire businesses in more promising industries. His first significant acquisition outside textiles came in 1967 when he purchased National Indemnity, an Omaha-based insurance company, for $8.6 million. This insurance acquisition proved transformative. Insurance companies collect premiums upfront but pay claims later, creating a "float" that can be invested in the interim. Buffett recognized this structural advantage and deployed the growing float with remarkable skill. Throughout the 1970s, as the broader market struggled through bear markets and stagflation, Buffett methodically expanded Berkshire's holdings. He acquired See's Candies in 1972 for $25 million, a purchase that revealed his evolving investment philosophy. Unlike the "cigar butt" companies Graham favored, See's commanded premium pricing power and required minimal capital investment to grow. By the early 1980s, Berkshire had evolved from a struggling textile manufacturer into a diversified holding company with significant interests in insurance, media, and consumer products. Buffett finally shut down the textile operations in 1985, acknowledging that capital could be better deployed elsewhere. That same year, Berkshire made another transformative acquisition, purchasing a major stake in Capital Cities/ABC in a $517 million deal that represented Buffett's largest investment to date. The construction of Berkshire continued through the 1980s with the acquisition of Nebraska Furniture Mart, a massive retail operation run by the remarkable Rose Blumkin, who had built the business from nothing after immigrating from Russia with no formal education. What distinguished Berkshire from other conglomerates was Buffett's unique approach to acquired businesses. Rather than imposing corporate systems or replacing management, he gave his company leaders extraordinary autonomy. When he acquired Nebraska Furniture Mart from Rose Blumkin in 1983, the purchase agreement was a single page, and Buffett allowed "Mrs. B" to continue running the business exactly as she had before. This hands-off approach extended to Berkshire's corporate structure, which remained remarkably decentralized. Buffett maintained a tiny headquarters staff in Omaha – fewer than two dozen employees – and had no corporate strategic planning department, human resources function, or public relations office. By the late 1980s, Berkshire Hathaway had transformed from a failing textile mill into Warren Buffett's "canvas" – a vehicle through which he could allocate capital across a diverse range of businesses and investments. The company's unique structure allowed Buffett to focus on what he did best – identifying undervalued assets and exceptional businesses – while letting talented managers run the operations. This approach attracted entrepreneurs who wanted to sell their life's work without seeing it dismantled or absorbed into a corporate bureaucracy. Berkshire became known as a permanent home for great businesses, a reputation that gave Buffett access to acquisition opportunities unavailable to other buyers.

Chapter 4: Investment Strategies and Market Wisdom

Warren Buffett's investment strategy evolved significantly over his career, yet remained anchored to certain fundamental principles. Chief among these was his insistence on investing within his "circle of competence" – focusing only on businesses he could understand and evaluate with confidence. This approach led him to avoid technology stocks during the dot-com boom of the late 1990s, a decision that drew criticism until the subsequent market crash vindicated his caution. "I don't try to jump over seven-foot bars," Buffett explained. "I look around for one-foot bars that I can step over." Perhaps Buffett's most distinctive quality as an investor was his patience. While Wall Street increasingly focused on quarterly results, Buffett maintained that his favorite holding period was "forever." This long-term perspective allowed him to ignore market fluctuations and focus on business fundamentals. During the 1987 market crash, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 22.6% in a single day, Buffett remained calm. Rather than panicking, he increased his investments in companies like Coca-Cola and The Washington Post, whose intrinsic values remained unchanged despite their suddenly lower stock prices. "The stock market is a device for transferring money from the impatient to the patient," he observed. Buffett's approach to risk differed markedly from academic theories. While modern portfolio theory defined risk as price volatility, Buffett defined it as the possibility of permanent capital loss. He dismissed the notion that a stock became riskier simply because its price had fallen, famously quipping, "I've never been able to figure out why it's riskier to buy $400 million worth of properties for $40 million than for $80 million." This fundamental disagreement with academic finance led to his rejection of concepts like beta (a measure of volatility) and efficient market theory. Instead, Buffett focused on the underlying economics of businesses and their competitive positions. Central to Buffett's philosophy was the concept of "economic moats" – sustainable competitive advantages that protected businesses from competition. He particularly favored companies with strong consumer brands, predictable earnings, high returns on equity, and minimal capital requirements. His 1988 purchase of Coca-Cola shares exemplified this approach. By then, Coca-Cola was hardly an undiscovered gem – it was one of the world's most recognized brands. Yet Buffett saw what others missed: the company's extraordinary international growth potential and pricing power. He invested $1.02 billion, acquiring 7% of the company. Within three years, this stake had grown to $3.75 billion. Buffett also distinguished himself through what he didn't do. He avoided debt, complex financial instruments, and businesses he couldn't understand. During the leveraged buyout boom of the 1980s, when corporate raiders used junk bonds to finance hostile takeovers, Buffett criticized the practice as financial engineering that created little real value. Similarly, during the 2008 financial crisis, Berkshire remained solvent and cash-rich while many highly leveraged institutions collapsed. This financial conservatism, while sometimes limiting growth during bull markets, provided crucial stability during downturns and allowed Buffett to capitalize on opportunities when others were forced to sell. Perhaps most remarkably, Buffett achieved his extraordinary returns without relying on specialized knowledge or insider information. His investment in The Washington Post came after reading publicly available financial statements. His purchase of GEICO shares followed his own consumer experience with the company. As he often noted, successful investing required "a sound intellectual framework for making decisions and the ability to keep emotions from corroding that framework." Buffett's greatest advantage was not access to better information, but the discipline to act rationally while others succumbed to fear or greed – a temperamental advantage that he cultivated throughout his career.

Chapter 5: The Art of Identifying Undervalued Companies

Warren Buffett's approach to identifying undervalued companies evolved significantly over his career, but always centered on a few fundamental principles. At its core was his insistence on understanding a business thoroughly before investing – staying within what he called his "circle of competence." Unlike many investors who chase the latest trends, Buffett focused on businesses with predictable economics that he could analyze with confidence. "Never invest in a business you cannot understand," he advised, a principle that kept him away from technology stocks for decades despite their explosive growth. His evaluation process began with quantitative measures but extended far beyond the numbers. He scrutinized financial statements looking for companies with consistent earnings, high returns on equity, little debt, and strong free cash flow. But equally important were qualitative factors: the durability of a company's competitive advantage (its "economic moat"), the quality and integrity of management, and the simplicity of the business model. Buffett sought businesses that could be run by "idiots" because eventually, he warned only half-jokingly, they would be. This focus on business quality rather than mere statistical cheapness distinguished Buffett from many value investors who followed Benjamin Graham's original approach. Buffett's investment in American Express during the "salad oil scandal" of 1963 perfectly illustrates his approach. When a subsidiary of American Express was implicated in a massive fraud involving nonexistent vegetable oil inventory, the company's stock plunged from 60 to 35. While Wall Street analysts were forecasting doom, Buffett conducted his own research. He visited restaurants and observed that customers were still using their American Express cards; he checked with banks and found that travelers' checks were selling as briskly as ever. Recognizing that the company's brand and customer loyalty remained intact despite the scandal, Buffett invested nearly a quarter of his partnership's assets in American Express. Within two years, the stock had doubled, vindicating his analysis. Another hallmark of Buffett's approach was his patience. He was willing to wait years for the right opportunity, keeping substantial cash reserves ready for when truly compelling investments appeared. As he put it, "The stock market is a no-called-strike game. You don't have to swing at everything – you can wait for your pitch." This discipline allowed him to avoid the speculative frenzies that periodically sweep markets. During the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s, Buffett was criticized for missing out on technology stocks. When the bubble burst, however, his restraint was vindicated. Similarly, during the housing bubble of the mid-2000s, Buffett avoided the complex mortgage-backed securities that later devastated many financial institutions. Buffett also recognized the importance of psychological factors in investing. He understood that most investors' worst enemy is themselves – their tendency to follow the crowd, to act on emotion rather than reason, and to confuse activity with achievement. His famous advice to "be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful" encapsulated his contrarian mindset. This perspective allowed him to make some of his most successful investments during periods of market panic, such as his purchases of Goldman Sachs and General Electric during the 2008 financial crisis. Perhaps most distinctive was Buffett's long-term perspective. While most professional investors focused on quarterly performance, Buffett evaluated investments based on their prospects over decades. This approach allowed him to benefit from the compounding of value in great businesses over time. His investments in companies like Coca-Cola, American Express, and The Washington Post were held for decades, generating returns far beyond what short-term trading could have achieved. This long-term orientation also made Buffett an attractive investor for companies seeking stable shareholders, giving him access to opportunities unavailable to more transient investors. By focusing on business quality, maintaining emotional discipline, and taking a truly long-term view, Buffett developed an approach to identifying undervalued companies that produced one of the greatest investment records in history.

Chapter 6: Personal Values and Modest Living

Despite amassing one of the world's largest fortunes, Warren Buffett maintained remarkably modest personal habits that stood in stark contrast to the typical lifestyle of the super-wealthy. He continued to live in the same Omaha house he purchased in 1958 for $31,500, drove his own car rather than employing a chauffeur, and enjoyed simple pleasures like playing bridge and drinking Cherry Coke. This deliberate simplicity reflected his belief that happiness comes not from consumption but from doing work one loves and being surrounded by people one admires. "I'm doing what I would most like to be doing in the world," he often said, "and I've been doing it since I was 20." Buffett's frugality was not born of miserliness but of genuine indifference to luxury. When asked about his modest lifestyle, he explained, "I can have anything I want that money will buy. But I always could." This remarkable perspective revealed a man whose relationship with money was fundamentally different from most people's – he valued it as a scorecard for his investment skill rather than as a means to acquire possessions. He once observed that for him, the pleasure of accumulating money was "watching your net worth increase, not spending it." This attitude allowed him to accumulate enormous wealth without becoming attached to the trappings of affluence that often accompany it. The Buffett household was characterized by informality and an egalitarian spirit that belied the family's growing wealth. Friends of the Buffett children were often unaware of their father's financial status. The family ate simple meals, and the children attended public schools. Buffett encouraged them to pursue careers they found meaningful rather than lucrative. His daughter Susie became a philanthropist, son Howard a farmer and conservationist, and son Peter a musician and composer. Though proud of their accomplishments, Buffett maintained an emotional distance that his children sometimes found challenging. His intense focus on business often came at the expense of family time, a trade-off he later acknowledged with regret. At the center of Buffett's personal life was his relationship with his wife Susan, whom he married in 1952. Their partnership was complex and unconventional. Susan was outgoing, empathetic, and socially conscious – in many ways Warren's opposite. She was deeply involved in civil rights causes and worked to broaden her husband's social awareness. As Warren once said, "Susie put me together, and Charlie Munger has kept me together." When Susan left Omaha in 1977 to pursue her own interests in San Francisco, their marriage continued, though they lived apart. With Susan's blessing, Astrid Menks became Warren's companion in Omaha, creating an unusual but harmonious arrangement that lasted until Susan's death in 2004, after which Warren married Astrid. Throughout his career, Buffett demonstrated a remarkable consistency of character. The same qualities that made him successful as an investor – rationality, patience, independent thinking, and integrity – shaped his personal life. He approached ethical questions with the same analytical rigor he applied to investments. When asked about a questionable business practice, he suggested a simple test: "Would you be willing to have any contemplated act appear on the front page of your local paper tomorrow, to be read by your spouse, children, and friends?" This "newspaper test" became a cornerstone of Berkshire's ethical culture. Buffett's life exemplified his belief that reputation is an invaluable asset. "It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it," he told his son. "If you think about that, you'll do things differently." This principle guided his business dealings and personal conduct alike. In an era when corporate scandals have become commonplace, Buffett maintained an unblemished record of ethical behavior, earning him a level of trust that few business leaders achieve. His modest lifestyle, ethical clarity, and focus on what truly matters rather than superficial status symbols offer a powerful counterexample to the excesses often associated with great wealth.

Chapter 7: Philanthropy and Legacy

Warren Buffett's approach to philanthropy evolved dramatically over his lifetime, culminating in one of history's most significant charitable commitments. For decades, Buffett maintained that he would defer major giving until after his death, arguing that he could create more social benefit by compounding his investment returns and giving away a larger sum later. This stance drew criticism, even from friends like Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham, who urged him to be more generous during his lifetime. Buffett's initial philanthropic interests focused narrowly on population control and nuclear disarmament, causes he viewed as addressing fundamental threats to humanity's future. A profound shift in Buffett's philanthropic approach came in 2006 when, at age 75, he announced plans to donate 85% of his Berkshire shares, then worth about $37 billion, to five foundations. The largest portion went to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with smaller amounts to foundations established by his children and late wife. This decision, which represented the largest charitable gift in history, reflected Buffett's pragmatic approach to giving. Rather than creating his own foundation empire, he entrusted his wealth to organizations he believed could deploy it effectively, particularly in addressing global health challenges. "I know what I want to do, and it makes sense to get going," he explained, reversing his longtime position on deferring philanthropy. Buffett's thinking about wealth transfer was equally unorthodox. He famously stated that he wanted to give his children "enough money so that they would feel they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing." While most billionaires established dynastic trusts, Buffett planned to leave his children only modest inheritances, believing that massive inherited wealth was as harmful to recipients as it was to society. "The idea that you get a lifetime supply of food stamps based on coming out of the right womb strikes at my idea of fairness," he explained. Instead, he established foundations for each of his children, providing them with resources to pursue their own philanthropic interests while avoiding the burden of excessive personal wealth. This philanthropic commitment aligned with Buffett's longtime advocacy for higher taxes on the wealthy. Unlike many billionaires who used their charitable giving as justification for lower tax rates, Buffett consistently argued that the tax system favored the rich, famously noting that he paid a lower tax rate than his secretary. His 2011 New York Times op-ed, "Stop Coddling the Super-Rich," called for increased taxes on investment income and became a rallying point in debates about economic inequality. This stance earned him both admiration and criticism, but reflected his longstanding belief that capitalism, while creating enormous wealth, required guardrails to ensure its benefits were widely shared. Beyond his financial legacy, Buffett's impact on investing and business culture has been profound. Through his annual letters to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders, written in clear, jargon-free language and laced with homespun wisdom, Buffett created what amounts to a master class in investing principles accessible to professionals and amateurs alike. His annual meetings in Omaha grew from small gatherings to events attracting over 40,000 attendees from around the world, dubbed the "Woodstock for Capitalists." These forums democratized investment knowledge, making sophisticated concepts accessible to everyday investors. As a business leader, Buffett demonstrated that exceptional returns could be achieved without resorting to financial engineering, excessive leverage, or aggressive accounting. His emphasis on honest reporting, rational capital allocation, and long-term thinking provided a counterweight to the quarterly earnings focus that dominated corporate America. At Berkshire Hathaway, he created a unique corporate culture that attracted exceptional managers and allowed acquired businesses to maintain their identities and operational independence. This approach demonstrated that decentralization could work effectively when built on a foundation of shared values and mutual trust. Perhaps Buffett's most enduring legacy will be his example of a life guided by clear principles consistently applied. In an era of increasing complexity and moral relativism, he maintained a straightforward ethical framework centered on integrity, rationality, and fairness. His combination of extraordinary financial success with personal modesty and ethical clarity offers a template for responsible wealth creation and stewardship that will influence generations to come.

Summary

Warren Buffett's journey from a numbers-obsessed Omaha teenager to one of history's most successful investors represents more than a story of wealth accumulation. It demonstrates the extraordinary power of intellectual independence, unwavering discipline, and ethical clarity applied consistently over decades. Buffett's genius lay not in complex financial engineering or privileged information, but in his ability to see through market noise to underlying business realities, and in his remarkable emotional equilibrium that allowed him to be "fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful." His life offers a profound lesson that sustainable success comes not from following trends or maximizing short-term gains, but from adhering to timeless principles: focus on what you understand, invest in quality, think independently, and maintain an unwavering commitment to your values regardless of what others are doing. The Oracle of Omaha's legacy transcends his investment returns. He showed that capitalism, practiced with integrity and a long-term perspective, can create enormous value while avoiding the excesses that periodically threaten the system. His approach to wealth – viewing himself as a steward rather than an owner, living modestly despite vast riches, and ultimately committing his fortune to addressing global challenges – offers a template for responsible affluence in an age of growing inequality. For investors seeking to apply Buffett's wisdom, the path begins with self-knowledge – understanding your circle of competence and emotional temperament – and continues with the patience to wait for truly compelling opportunities rather than forcing action. Perhaps most importantly, Buffett reminds us that the ultimate measure of success is not wealth itself, but the character with which it is earned and the purpose to which it is directed.

About Author

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Roger Lowenstein

Roger Lowenstein is an American financial journalist and writer. He graduated from Cornell University and reported for The Wall Street Journal for more than a decade, including two years writing its Heard on the Street column, 1989 to 1991. Born in 1954, he is the son of Helen and Louis Lowenstein of Larchmont, New York. Lowenstein is married to Judith Slovin.He is also a director of Sequoia Fund. In 2016, he joined the board of trustees of Lesley University. His father, the late Louis Lowenstein, was an attorney and Columbia University law professor who wrote books and articles critical of the American financial industry.Roger Lowenstein's latest book, Ways and Means: Lincoln and His Cabinet and the Financing of the Civil War, was released on March 8, 2022, and won the 2022 Harold Holzer Lincoln Forum Book Prize.

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