Powerful ideas from top nonfiction
Try Blinkist to get the key ideas from 7,000+ bestselling nonfiction titles and podcasts. Listen or read in just 15 minutes.
Start your free trial
Blink 3 of 8 - The 5 AM Club
by Robin Sharma
Listen to the Intro
This Could Be Our Future summary
Yancey Strickler
A Manifesto for a More Generous World
27 mins
Brief summary
This Could Be Our Future by Yancey Strickler argues for a world beyond financial maximization, one where we prioritize our collective well-being, values, and meaning over profit. He offers a path towards a society centered on purpose and flourishing.
Table of Contents
This Could Be Our Future
Summary of 8 key ideas
Audio & text in the Blinkist app
Key idea 1 of 8
Our lives are governed by invisible ideas, and financial maximization is the biggest one of them.
When Perry Chen, Charles Adler, and the author, Yancey Strickler, first started telling people about their idea, Kickstarter, in 2005, most of the people they told assumed they were crazy. A platform where people give other people money to make art? “That’s not how the world works!” people would say.
And they were sort of right. Back then, the term “crowdfunding” didn’t even exist. But, in 2009, Kickstarter launched anyway. And now, some ten years later, the platform is responsible for bringing to life more than 100,000 new creative ideas – among them Oscar-winning documentaries like Jehane Noujaim’s The Square, and the wildly popular card game Cards Against Humanity.
The key message here is: Our lives are governed by invisible ideas, and financial maximization is the biggest one of them.
Kickstarter proved something about human thought: most of our ideas about how the world works don’t reflect some immutable truth – they are just concepts we’ve invented. But many of these ideas are so deeply embedded in daily life that we cease to recognize them as the made-up concepts they truly are.
The notion that money is the be-all and end-all of human existence is one of these invisible ideas. The author calls this notion “financial maximization.” It’s the idea that, as a business, but also as an individual, nothing but money-making should guide your actions.
In the 1970s, star economist Milton Friedman became the first public figure to argue that businesses have no responsibility to society other than turning a profit. And companies truly took this to heart.
Today, the only standard most businesses hold themselves to is how much profit they can make for their shareholders. From mass firings to tax evasion to diminishing service quality, no strategy is off limits – if it’ll generate profit.
Indeed, for those at the top, all areas of human activity – our movies, our health care, our education, our communities – are nothing but different kinds of investment opportunities. And if it will make them more money, they will buy, sell, and trade those investments with no concern for the people affected.
Worst of all, we have come to expect this behavior. We emulate it in our private lives without questioning its wider utility. Of course people should do what makes them the most money. That’s just how things work. Or at least so the thinking goes. But that begs the question of whether things really are working.
Want to see all full key ideas from This Could Be Our Future?
Key ideas in This Could Be Our Future
More knowledge in less time
Read or listen
Get the key ideas from nonfiction bestsellers in minutes, not hours.
Find your next read
Get book lists curated by experts and personalized recommendations.
Shortcasts New
We’ve teamed up with podcast creators to bring you key insights from podcasts.
What is This Could Be Our Future about?
This Could Be Our Future (2019) is a manifesto for a better tomorrow – a future world that isn’t ruled solely by money, but by all forms of value that humanity produces. Former Kickstarter CEO Yancey Strickler explains how our modern obsession with “financial maximization” has led society astray – bankrupting institutions, stifling innovation, and starving creativity – and what we can do to adjust our course.
Best quote from This Could Be Our Future
Value is what something is worth. Values are whats worth something to somebody.
—Yancey Strickler
Who should read This Could Be Our Future?
- Critical capitalists and suspicious socialists
- Entrepreneurs and business owners ready to make a difference
- Anyone who suspects that there is more to life than money
Categories with This Could Be Our Future
Book summaries like This Could Be Our Future
People ❤️ Blinkist
Sven O.
It's highly addictive to get core insights on personally relevant topics without repetition or triviality. Added to that the apps ability to suggest kindred interests opens up a foundation of knowledge.
Thi Viet Quynh N.
Great app. Good selection of book summaries you can read or listen to while commuting. Instead of scrolling through your social media news feed, this is a much better way to spend your spare time in my opinion.
Jonathan A.
Life changing. The concept of being able to grasp a book's main point in such a short time truly opens multiple opportunities to grow every area of your life at a faster rate.
Renee D.
Great app. Addicting. Perfect for wait times, morning coffee, evening before bed. Extremely well written, thorough, easy to use.
People also liked these summaries
4.7 Stars
Average ratings on iOS and Google Play
29 Million
Downloads on all platforms
10+ years
Experience igniting personal growth