这是一本物理学家撰写得跨经济学、社会、物理学等多学科的专著。在伊达尔戈之前，从来没有人以这样的方式研究经济增长。 什么是经济增长？为什么它只发生在历史长河的一些节点上？传统意义上的解释都强调了体制、地理、金融和心理因素。而塞萨尔?伊达尔戈告诉我们，想了解经济增长的本质，还需要走出社会科学的研究，在信息、关系网和复杂性这样的自然科学中寻求答案。为了认识经济发展，塞萨尔?伊达尔戈认为我们首先需要理解秩序的增长。 为什么有的国家富裕，有的国家贫穷？在1975年，阿根廷的收入是韩国的3倍，是一个富裕国家。但当时阿根廷的国家发展能力并不见得比韩国强。这个例子说明，发展能力要比财富更加重要，那为什么一些国家的国家发展能力要强于其他国家？ 在《增长的本质》这本书中，伊达尔戈结合经济增长以及物理学这两个看似分离的领域，提出了经济增长的新理论。复杂产品（从企业到机器人，应用程序到汽车）是经济知识的物理升华，是一个对其教育、基础设施和能力的可衡量体现。 这是一本对全球经济进行全新诠释，并颠覆经济发展和财富起源传统假设的书。

EDITORIAL REVIEW: The #1 New York Times bestseller: a brilliant account—character-rich and darkly humorous—of how the U.S. economy was driven over the cliff. When the crash of the U. S. stock market became public knowledge in the fall of 2008, it was already old news. The real crash, the silent crash, had taken place over the previous year, in bizarre feeder markets where the sun doesn’t shine, and the SEC doesn’t dare, or bother, to tread: the bond and real estate derivative markets where geeks invent impenetrable securities to profit from the misery of lower- and middle-class Americans who can’t pay their debts. The smart people who understood what was or might be happening were paralyzed by hope and fear; in any case, they weren’t talking. The crucial question is this: Who understood the risk inherent in the assumption of ever-rising real estate prices, a risk compounded daily by the creation of those arcane, artificial securities loosely based on piles of doubtful mortgages? Michael Lewis turns the inquiry on its head to create a fresh, character-driven narrative brimming with indignation and dark humor, a fitting sequel to his #1 best-selling Liar’s Poker. Who got it right? he asks. Who saw the real estate market for the black hole it would become, and eventually made billions of dollars from that perception? And what qualities of character made those few persist when their peers and colleagues dismissed them as Chicken Littles? Out of this handful of unlikely—really unlikely—heroes, Lewis fashions a story as compelling and unusual as any of his earlier bestsellers, proving yet again that he is the finest and funniest chronicler of our times.

SUMMARY: 本书分为五篇,“论劳动生产力逐步提高的原因及产品在不同阶层之间自然分配的顺序”;“论资产的性质、积累和使用”;“论各国财富增长的不同途径”;“论政治经济学体系”;“论君主或国家的收入”。