The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy

Wages of Destruction analyzes the rise and fall of Nazism from an economic perspective. Some of the seemingly nonsensical behaviors of the Nazi Germany do start to make a little more sense when looked at that one. Germany was suffering after World War 2. Even with some clever management, reparations took a toll on the economy. There was a significant portion of the country still working in agriculture, yet the country had trouble feeding itself. There was a shortage of available labor.

The National Socialists wanted to build up the economy and the military. They also had strong ideological beliefs about their racial superiority. (Somewhat ironically, Hitler viewed the British has being closer to Germans, yet chose to align with the "inferior" Russians.) Americans were viewed to be controlled by the Jews.

The Blitzkrieg attack on France was done in a "lean" fashion. The war would have been over if there were not a quick success. Germany did not have much left in reserve. The success was somewhat lucky. It helped inspire Hitler to engage in future actions.

Hitler knew he must fight the British. He viewed America as an enemy also as they were supplying the British. Germany was fairly resource constrained. More oil, iron and food were needed. Russia, a supposed ally had an abundance of natural resources. The invasion of Russia was hoped to be a quick action (like in France). It would provide Germany with resources that were needed to continue the war effort against the English speaking countries. When the Russians put up a greater fight than expected, Germany was toast.

The extermination of Jews and other undesirable also had its roots in the intersection of ideology and economics. There was not enough food to feed everybody. It would be more productive to feed one person sufficient food than to feed two partial rations. Exterminating undesirables would free up more food for other workers. (When more food was available, these worked could be worked as slave labor.)

There were also other interesting points. Germany had a higher female labor force participation than the UK. Hitler really wanted people to have cars. Many people put down deposits for Volkswagons, only to not get them due to the war and other things.

The Deluge: The Great War, America and the Remaking of the Global Order, 1916-1931

Deluge describes how the events of World War I ushered in a massive change in the world order and a dominance of the United States. Some of the early sections offer a strong condemnation of US policy towards "minor" players in the war effort. Some small policy shifts in American policy may have led to massively different outcomes in Russia and China which would have impacted events in World War 2 and the cold war.
The book is fairly harsh on president Wilson. He seemed to be too idealistic, yet patronizing. It seems a lot of the issues of the time rose from people thinking they new what was best for other people. Many of the various revolutions revolved around charismatic elite claiming they spoke for the peasants. It seems to be a similar problem we have today. Leaders get the "masses" to side with them, but their solutions are just crafted to "look good" to the masses. Often they benefit the "elite" who know their way around the restrictions.
The interwar period was also significantly impacted by debt payment. It seemed that even back then, the bankers were able to extract the needed concessions from the countries involved. Reparations were only a small part of the system of transfer of payments, with payments to allies often being more significant. There was also little attention given to those outside of western Europe. How would things be different today if a few small changes were made in the late 1910s?

Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World

in Crashed, Adam Tooze explores the interrelated economic meltdowns of the past decade and the resultant political actions. The approach is perhaps too detailed. However, in some ways it needs the details to bring out the relationships between activities in many different companies and countries. He openly admits a left-of-center viewpoint with that calls in to question some of the decisions made. (The investment bankers that really triggered the mess were the ones to quickly recover their full bonuses. The average Joe, however, often suffered through demands of austerity.) Governments often have a "built in" stimulus that triggers increased benefits (such as unemployment) when the economy takes a turn for the worse. Cutting government spending for these can further extend the pain of the recession.
The economic malaise also triggered social and political issues, thus contributing to the refugee crisis. These factors contributed to a call for nativism in many developed countries. People wanted were upset with free trade and the largess of the investment bankers, and instead wanted politicians that would focus on the home. In Europe, this led to the rise of many far-left and far-right parties and Brexit. In the US, with the entrenched 2 party system, this led to a takover of the Republican Party by the Tea Party and then Trump. The "Liberal Technocrats" consider this to just be a blip, disregarding the desires of a great portion of the populace. The end result, however, it Republicans often pushing many of the same things that they had fought against when Democrats were in power (such as "stimulus")
The book does a good job of explaining why it is so challenging for democracies to run a global economic scheme.