Episode · The Ezra Klein Show · 2026-08-28
Books mentioned on Trump vs. the Bond Market
A lot of things are on track to get more expensive. The U.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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Barbarians at the Gate
Barbarians at the Gate by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar is a classic business narrative chronicling the 1989 leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco by the private equity firm KKR.
Recommended“I think the obvious first place, the first book is is Barbarians at the Gate. I I genuinely think it's kind of the gold standard of of narrative business journalism today, but really it's kind of like um a history of American business over the past century told through the prism of this private equity deal and all the crazy”
Where to get it
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The Prize
The Prize by Daniel Yergin is a classic, comprehensive historical work that examines the central, defining role that energy, particularly oil, has played in global power dynamics and geopolitics over the past century.
Recommended“my second book, Daniel Jurgens's the prize. It's a history of the oil market. It's kind of the model for a lot of similar books that came first, but Jurgen's kind of the OG. It's I I love those histories that kind of tell a history of the world. This is almost a history of the 20th century, but through”
Where to get it
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Lords of Finance
Recommended“I think I'm going to go with Leak Ahmed's Lords of Finance. Uh, it's just a fabulous book about this kind of tumultuous interwar period, in the run-up to the Great Depression.”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (1) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
Own book A Fabulous Debt
“He's co-host of their podcast, A Story of Money, and author of the forthcoming book, A Fabulous Debt: The Epic Story of How Bonds Built the Modern World.”