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I was tempted by both sides of the philosophical arguments presented in the book. This read couldn't have happened at a better time in my life. Atlas Shrugged was a useful tool to help me focus my mind to explain the past and, in turn, look towards an enlightened future. Before diving into this novel, I was, perhaps, a cross between the two extremes presented in the book. In many ways, this maleable, soft, moderate, milquetoast cross between Johnny Galt and Jimmy Taggart contributed to the business failings with which I am now dealing. It helped me realize that I have nobody else to blame for my past mistakes and that nobody else is responsible for my future but me. I certainly got my money's worth out of this book.
This could really have been divided into 3 separate novels and been just as enjoyable. I was sucked into this story from the first page onward. What I had anticipated as a tome containing dry comparisons between the 'producers' of society and its 'looters' was really a fantastic story that intertwined the motivations of each of the characters into an enjoyable plotline. The one aspect I wish she would have covered in the story would be the potential policies that would have allowed the characters to be successful at the end. We're left to assume that there is a happy ending, but no real discussion is given of its results.It definitely provides a thought provoking set of ideas that can be used for further discussion among rational and pragmatic adults.
Her philosophy should be tought at school and before getting the right to vote any citizen should learn about the vertues that make a valuable human being in a society. . The economic genius Milton Friedman said that the most important duty of any business is to be profitable. the world would be a better place.This is a book for people inpired by socialistic ideas thinking that they are philantrophic: Vampirizing the productive part of a society in order to "help" the needing part without getting anything in return dooms any society.I loved this book and the brilliant philosophy of Ayn Rand. She is one of the most important authors on this globe and Altas Shrugged her masterpiece. He would turn around in his grave seeing what is happening today in the so called civilized countries: They do not only "democratically" steal enormeous amounts of money of the producing part of the society but also of the futur generations of producers to give it away for the sake of human equalization which is an impossible aim. Well if you do not agree you desperately need this book to understand.
What's sad is that so many people think this book mirrors real life. Dear readers, do you think that Ayn Rand would classify any of you as a Hank Rearden or a Dagny Taggart, or even less, as an Ayn Rand. I frankly found the book hard to read with her pessimistic and whining tone. I wonder what made her so angry.
I read this book 50 years ago, but I had missed the great depression and was young, so I didn't fully appreciate it. Wisdom pours from nearly every page. I read again last month and it made so much more sense. I will read it again every year for as long as I live, and learn from it every time. Many of the scenes portrayed are now in the daily news. Scary.
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