Budget Books

I found this book to most helpful when I was putting together my budget proposal for the Media Center. I think that if you are a media coordinator, media specialist, or librarian you need this book!

This is a true lap-breaker, but one worth the risk of back injury to pick up. (9" x 12" nearly 500 pages)

When other books don't have the historical RR information I need, this will often have at least enough to get me started. It truly covers the entire world of RR, not just Britain and North America: India, Africa, South America, Asia, Australia. On top of this, every page is graced with period artwork or photos, in color as often as possible.

It's a compendium of articles by specialist authors. "History" subdivides by area. Then there's separate ones on Passenger Travel, Locomotive Development, & Civil Engineering. We especially enjoyed the section on the great name trains, from the 20th C Ltd to the Shinkansen Hikari. Other sections are Railway Operation, Freight Transport, Industrial RR, Rapid Transit, Mountain RR, Architecture, Preservation, RR in the Cinema, RR At War, biographies of notable figures, "The Artist's View," Records, Disasters, Chronology, Facts & Figures, and a glossary for the newcomer. All this, and huge beast is indexed, too.

As specific reference on this or that line, no, of course not. You couldn't do all of them in less than a room of books. As a general reference to lots of them, great.

I found this book to be very well written. It is both interesting and informative. I plan to apply the information I learned in my energy consulting work. While energy savings reduces our carbon footprint, it must also be financially appealing to gain universal acceptance. The principals taught in this book should help management better understand the financial benefits of energy conservation.

This is an important book for anyone wishing to gain a better understanding of energy in all its forms and in all environments. Perhaps I can best express my thoughts at this early stage of reading the book by quoting from an email I sent the author, Vaclav Smil, earlier today.

"Today I received your latest book, Energy in Nature and Society, in paperback. After initially looking through it, I've now read the preface and the first eight pages and, after reading only that little, just placed an order for a hardcover copy - even though I can barely afford such extravagance. In this volume you have published a remarkable piece of work, and I hope it will be widely read by those who truly wish to gain a better understanding of energy in its totality."

This truly is a book for those who wish to gain a deeper understanding of energy and is the best writing to date on the subject.

This book contains Eric Sloane's "American Barns & Covered Bridges," "Our Vanishing Landscape," and "American Yesterday," which are all reviewed elsewhere. These are classic Eric Sloane books accompanied by his illustrations. The larger hardcover format means the illustrations are slightly larger than in the paperback editions.

This is the only book needed when travelling around Europe.

The book is great at explaining, in layman's terms, the confusing and difficult-to-understand language used in the world of accounting.

Pros:
-Explains entire chapters (of a basic classroom accounting book) in one or two pages
-Very clear/plain English
-Small, lightweight, convenient

Cons:
-It's missing a lot of other important accounting topics that were very important
-It has very very poor examples
-It puts you down and states a lot of useless/pointless information. I can't remember exactly where in the book I got insulted, but I did. She didn't have to put that stuff down, don't waste my time

Overall: Buy it, it's good. But you'll definitely need another book to supplement and make more full your knowledge of accounting, because this book only has the very minimum.

Ever want to know where your tax dollars go, well this book explains it all! Interesting and informative, I couldn't put this book down. Wow!

I really appreciate this book because it does exactly what the title says. Without speaking down to you, the author tells you in plain language where the government gets all the money for the budget and where they spend it. You also get to see how the money has been spent over the past 40 years, which shows you where our priorities have been as a country. The author is careful not to cast judgment on anything, but just tells you what has been happening with our money. Also, I think the book is very empowering to individuals. The author basically tells you that "Knowledge is Power" and you CAN understand this stuff. Once you understand it, you can take action in your state. Very well done, and I'd recommend it to anyone.

Dr. Schick's book is outstanding. If you use this book in the classroom or teach the congressional or federal budget process, you should also look at the Congressional Operations Poster.

One side of the poster covers the federal budget process, with a flowchart that is very useful when teaching about the federal or congressional budget process. (But don't take my word that the poster is useful - I have seen it hanging in federal agency offices in Washington, DC.) The publisher, TheCapitol.Net, has more information about the poster, and many useful links, on their web site: congressposter.com

Best bet is to buy Dr. Shick's book and the Congressional Operations Poster.