Historian of American Capitalism
My
Story
I am an award-winning historian of American capitalism and an Associate Professor of History. My first book, The Pricing of Progress: Economic Indicators and the Capitalization of American Life, was published by Harvard University Press in 2017 and explores how Americans came to measure nearly every aspect of life in monetary terms. The book received the Society for U.S. Intellectual History’s Best Book Award as well as the Morris D. Forkosch Best Book Prize from the Journal of the History of Ideas.
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I received my PhD from Harvard University in 2013. My work has appeared in The Atlantic, Time, Jacobin, Raritan, The Chicago Tribune, American Prospect, and Dissent. In addition to my academic work, I regularly write for and appear in public media to analyze and comment on American politics, the economy, and elections.
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I am currently completing my second book on the history of choice menus and the rise of platform capitalism, titled Choose Your Own Captivity: Choice Architects and the Analog Origins of Digital Capitalism. It will be published by Crown Publishing (Penguin Random House) in February 2027.
Money Talks: The Rise of Willingness to Pay Without Apology Cook, E., Dec 2025, In: History of Political Economy. 57, S1, p. 141-174 34 p.
Efficiently Unequal: The Global Rise of Kaldor-Hicks Neoliberalism Cook, E., 2024, In: Global Intellectual History. 9, 1-2, p. 247-269 23 p.
Rearing Children of the Market in the "You" Decade: Choose Your Own Adventure Books and the Ascent of Free Choice in 1980s America Cook, E., May 2021, In: Journal of American Studies. 55, 2, p. 418-445 28 p.
Naturalizing Inequality: The Problem of Economic Fatalism in the Age of Piketty Cook, E., 1 Mar 2020, In: Capitalism. 1, 2, p. 338-378 41 p.
Lifting the Veil of Money: What Economic Indicators Hide Cook, E., 2019, Capitalism's Hidden Worlds. Lipartito, K. & Jacobson, L. (eds.). University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 25-43 19
Slavery, Freedom and Contract: Blurred Lines and Historical Resistance Cook, E. & Rosenberg, A., 1 Jan 2019, In: Law and Social Inquiry. 44, 2, p. 526-533 8 p.
The Great Marginalization: Why Twentieth Century Economists Neglected Inequality Cook, E., 2018, In: Real World Economics Review. 83, p. 20-34
Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Books Cook, E., 2017, History of Consumer Culture Conference Proceedings. p. 143-149
The Neoclassical Club: Irving Fisher and the Progressive Origins of Neoliberalism Cook, E., 1 Jul 2016, In: Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. 15, 3, p. 246-262 17 p.
Henry Goldman: Outsider as Empire-Builder Cook, E., 2015, Immigrant Entrepreneurship: German-American Business Biographies. Hoyt, G. (ed.). Washington DC: German Historical Institute, Vol. 3. 25 p.
The progress and poverty of Thomas Piketty Cook, E., 1 Sep 2015, In: Raritan. 35, 2, p. 1-19 19 p.
Can david graeber become the marx of the debtor class? Cook, E., Sep 2013, In: Raritan. 33, 2, p. 83-100 18 p.
The pricing of everyday life Cook, E., Dec 2013, In: Raritan. 32, 3, p. 109-121 13 p.
