The Mystery of Capital

The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else by Hernando de Soto

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I just read The Mystery of Capital and loved it. I think you would too. Hernando De Soto talks about why capitalism has worked for the Western world but not for the third-world. After closing the last page I agreed with him: The big difference is the legal system, specifically that the third-world lacks the systems of showing that a persons has property. De Soto argues that it's actual real estate that begins to push and grow an economy. Without property one cannot borrow wealth to grow wealth (property is used as collateral).



The developing world has many assets, but they are dead assets, because there is no legal system to back it up. De Soto also mentions that third-world countries are currently in much of the same situation the US was in 200 hundred years ago... the US was full of land squatters, with hundreds of regulations and laws, with Elites doing their best to keep the poor (which was the majority of the nation) from gaining wealth as well as power... it's quite interesting. I agree with De Soto at this point, but I would really like to read another professionals point of view... any suggestions?




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