Rush

Why We Thrive in the Rat Race

Paperback
$17.00 US
On sale Jul 31, 2012 | 304 Pages | 978-0-452-29795-1
Relaxation makes us stupid.

You think that downtime will make you happy. You may even dream about getting out of the rat race for good. But Todd Buchholz—a former White House director of economic policy, award-winning teacher at Harvard, hedge fund director, and co-producer of a Tony Award-winning Broadway hit show—wants you to know that you’re wrong. It’s the race that delivers the rush. So forget about retirement, zen retreats, and making everyone feel like a winner; human beings are hard-wired to compete. Interweaving entertaining stories and cutting-edge research from neuroeconomics to evolutionary biology to Renaissance art to General Motors, Buchholz draws the counterintuitive—yet wholly convincing—conclusion that competition has not only made us taller and smarter, it’s what we love and need.
Todd G. Buchholz is an internationally acclaimed economist who advises ABC News as well as some of the world's leading investment funds. He has served as a director of economic policy at the White House and is a contributing editor for Worth magazine. Buchholz holds advanced degrees from Cambridge University and Harvard Law School and was awarded the Allyn Young Teaching Prize by Harvard University's Department of Economics. View titles by Todd G. Buchholz

About

Relaxation makes us stupid.

You think that downtime will make you happy. You may even dream about getting out of the rat race for good. But Todd Buchholz—a former White House director of economic policy, award-winning teacher at Harvard, hedge fund director, and co-producer of a Tony Award-winning Broadway hit show—wants you to know that you’re wrong. It’s the race that delivers the rush. So forget about retirement, zen retreats, and making everyone feel like a winner; human beings are hard-wired to compete. Interweaving entertaining stories and cutting-edge research from neuroeconomics to evolutionary biology to Renaissance art to General Motors, Buchholz draws the counterintuitive—yet wholly convincing—conclusion that competition has not only made us taller and smarter, it’s what we love and need.

Author

Todd G. Buchholz is an internationally acclaimed economist who advises ABC News as well as some of the world's leading investment funds. He has served as a director of economic policy at the White House and is a contributing editor for Worth magazine. Buchholz holds advanced degrees from Cambridge University and Harvard Law School and was awarded the Allyn Young Teaching Prize by Harvard University's Department of Economics. View titles by Todd G. Buchholz