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Detailed info on corporate and personal taxation system and regulations ... Read more

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Iceland Customs, Trade Regulations and Procedures Handbook ... Read more

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Completely updated and revised for this new edition, our unique electronic book on two CD-ROMs has an amazing collection of the finest federal documents and resources about Iceland, providing encyclopedic coverage of all aspects of the country. This disc set provides a truly fantastic reference source, with over one hundred thousand pages reproduced in Adobe Acrobat format! There is complete coverage of newsworthy material about Iceland, including Reykjavik Reagan-Gorbachev Summit October 1986, Land of Fire and Ice, Earthquakes and Volcanoes, Surtsey, Heimacy Volcano 1973, doing business, NATO, Clinton Presidency, diplomatic list, Leif Ericson Millennium celebration, agriculture, hydrogen fuel energy, naval air station Keflavik, and more.This incredible and comprehensive series on the countries of the world contains material from the State Department, Department of Defense, White House, and cabinet agencies including Agriculture, Energy, and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.There is complete information about geography, people, government, the economy, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues.In addition to the nation-specific material, as a bonus we have included reports about every country on the globe, with 271 nations, dependent areas, and other entities identified by the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA World Factbook is considered an invaluable "world encyclopedia" reference book.This incredible two CD-ROM set is packed with over 100,000 pages reproduced using Adobe Acrobat PDF software - allowing direct viewing on Windows and Macintosh systems. The Acrobat cataloging technology adds enormous value and uncommon functionality to this impressive collection of government documents and material. ... Read more

Product Description
Completely updated and revised for this new edition, our unique electronic book on two CD-ROMs has an amazing collection of the finest federal documents and resources about Iceland, providing encyclopedic coverage of all aspects of the country. This disc set provides a truly fantastic reference source, with over one hundred thousand pages reproduced in Adobe Acrobat format! There is complete coverage of newsworthy material about Iceland, including Reykjavik Reagan-Gorbachev Summit October 1986, Land of Fire and Ice, Earthquakes and Volcanoes, Surtsey, Heimacy Volcano 1973, doing business, NATO, Clinton Presidency, diplomatic list, Leif Ericson Millennium celebration, agriculture, hydrogen fuel energy, naval air station Keflavik, and more.This incredible and comprehensive series on the countries of the world contains material from the State Department, Department of Defense, White House, and cabinet agencies including Agriculture, Energy, and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.There is complete information about geography, people, government, the economy, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues.In addition to the nation-specific material, as a bonus we have included reports about every country on the globe, with 271 nations, dependent areas, and other entities identified by the Central Intelligence Agency. The CIA World Factbook is considered an invaluable "world encyclopedia" reference book.This incredible two CD-ROM set is packed with over 100,000 pages reproduced using Adobe Acrobat PDF software - allowing direct viewing on Windows and Macintosh systems. The Acrobat cataloging technology adds enormous value and uncommon functionality to this impressive collection of government documents and material. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (2)

Amazing
The opening of the book is enough to grab anyone with an interest in how society works.Iceland is unique in that it had no centralized government for hundreds of years and it's tribal society was incredible transitory.The author examines law and order in an essentially anarchist society and how blood feud became another instrument in regulating society.A well written and paced book.Even though it is an academic work, anyone can keep pace.Highly unique and one of the most compelling reads out there.

Opens a Wide New World...
I read this book while a student in Miller's semi-infamous class "Blood Feuds" at the University of Michigan Law School.I went into the class thinking that it would be interesting and fun, but that I wouldn't learn much from it, since I already had such an extensive familiarity with the Icelandic sagas:as an undergraduate I had translated some of them from Old Norse to English, and I had read most of the rest of them several times over in English translation.

Yes, it was interesting and yes, it was fun, but man! were my eyes opened as to how much I had to learn about the sagas and about the culture within which they were written.

There are two main reasons to read this book.First, to learn history.The history of ninth to fourteenth century Iceland is incredible, and the culture fascinating.Theirs was a culture that knew no central or even local government, no law enforcement infrastructure, and no arms control.And yet the Icelanders developed a complex system of law, essentially codifying the blood feud (which tradition still governs dispute resolution in places like Afghanistan and rural Macedonia), according to which civil injustice could be roughly corrected.Their example has much to teach us about human nature unadulterated by the State.

Second, Bloodtaking is an unparalleled gateway into the sagas as literature.Despite my intimate familiarity with every line of, for example, Hrafnkel's saga, until I read Miller's book I had only the most inadequate appreciation for how tightly it is constructed, how elegantly and efficiently it was drafted.The sagas are only vaguely comparable to the very best English-language short stories; the skill that went into them is comparable to that of a Dante or a Shakespeare.

A modern reader is not culturally prepared to receive the sagas as they would have been by a medieval Icelander.Miller's book provides the small set of cultural factoids that create relevance where otherwise detail might seem pointless or obscure, and reveals the saga-writers' penchant for humorous understatement and emphasis by ellipse.Armed with a relatively small set of cultural facts and with an eye for a small set of saga tropes, the reader has access to a whole new literary world.

Whatever your bent, Bloodtaking makes for fascinating reading. ... Read more

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Iceland declared "perpetual neutrality" in foreign affairs upon gaining sovereignty from Denmark in 1918. Intense nationalism, relatively strong Communist influence and a late modernization long distinguished the country's political and economic development. This brief survey of Icelandic postwar foreign policy covers Iceland's stormy passage from "perpetual neutrality" to an alliance with other western countries. ... Read more

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In a remarkably concise, readable, and accessible format, John Iceland provides a comprehensive picture of poverty in America, He shows how poverty is measured and understood and how it has changed over time, as well as how public policies have grappled with poverty as a political issue and an economic reality. This edition has been updated and includes a new preface. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

An excellent overview
I enjoyed this book quite a bit, depressing as it was.The author did a great job of presenting the relevant information about poverty in this country.It was well-written, so even though it was a required text for a class I didn't mind reading the entire thing.Buy it if you're interested in the subject matter at all.

Hedonistic Consumerism?
John Iceland defines poverty through the use of methods used to measure it. He explains its causes, offers an explanation as to who suffers from it and why, as well as what can be done to reduce or eliminate poverty.

Poverty is economic, or income, deprivation resulting in one's inability to sustain oneself. Poverty has two primary measurements resulting in much controversy as to which is to be used by governmental institutions. Absolute poverty is measured by using a subsistence level of income as a line that when crossed under results in deprivation of the bare necessities to sustain life. Relative poverty is much more difficult to understand in that it is measured subjectively over time but also geographically. This form of poverty uses as it line of income a point at which one is required to meet if one is to be socially acceptable into one's group or community. There is a certain living standard one is expected to uphold depending on one's status group. I would call this "keeping up with the Jones". If one lives in a prominent community in which the norm is to have two BMW automobiles, a vacation home in the Hamptons, as well as hired workers to do the family's housework but one has only one car, a Chevrolet, no vacation home, and does one's own housework, then one would be viewed as economically deprived or poor. This is an extreme example but if one is viewing the community mentioned in the context of a very large community such as what we call the United States of America, then those who are without the many conveniences that the upper class are accustomed to are considered living in poverty. This is the case mainly as a result of consumerism and its extreme marketing campaign to motivate individuals to consume, consume, consume. Iceland makes the point that to effectively measure poverty one must combine these forms of measurement to account for the behavior of those suffering from absolute poverty but continue to use their very limited income to attempt to close this relative gap between the haves and have-nots. The time and money to education the absolute poor to reduce or eliminate this behavior would be better applied to eliminating the actual causes for increases in absolute poverty.


Iceland offers poverty as a common feature of most economic systems and that eradication is most unlikely. The same can be said of unemployment, our economic system will always consist of a certain level of unemployment, even if only short-term. The same applies to poverty; communities are constantly in transition so that one can be employed with high status one day and the next day unemployed and penniless. However, Iceland clearly points out that the primary causes for such high rates of poverty are man made rather than intrinsic to any economic system. These man made causes primarily affect relative poverty through inequality. Inequality is in its very nature a man made phenomenon. These inequalities are born of social stratification in the areas of race, gender, culture, and ethnicity. The primary cause for each of these groups into poverty is a lack of or unequal access to educational and/or economical opportunities Individuals from these groups include African Americans, Hispanics, women, single mothers, children, etc. Discrimination, bias, prejudice, sexual harassment, glass ceilings, etc are the tools of the trade when applying unequal access to these vital opportunities.

Iceland offers that individual choices that one makes will be the optimal way in which to decrease one's chances of falling prey to poverty. However, to understand this fact requires a certain educational attainment. Ultimately he states the one must understand the definition and causes of poverty. One must understand our system of government and economic system. One must understand social stratification and how it is applicable to individual and group dynamics. Finally one must understand that policy does not affect all the same way, that one policy does not fit all. Through an understanding of these one can ultimately come to the conclusion that a fair society with a healthy economy can reduced poverty to its lowest necessary levels according to the economic system it lives within.

Iceland did a terrific job of explaining poverty. I have a very through understanding between subsistence and socially relative poverty. I do think that one must have not only the bare necessities to survive such as water, food, and shelter but must also have what one needs to "fit in". Without fitting in, one will be an outcast but society should also realize what it deems recommended so as to "fit in". Iceland discusses educational opportunities for the poor to elevate them above poverty. I additionally recommend the education of those not in poverty so as to understand poverty. Iceland states that approximately half of the U.S. feels that those suffering from poverty are deserving of it for they have individual characteristic flaws while the other half feel those in poverty are there at no fault to themselves, they are lacking in opportunity. This word "opportunity" is the most important word or concept that I discovered in this study into poverty.

Nothing wrong with an academic approach
Today in our nation's Capitol at least between 5,000 and 10,000 poor are living, dying, and going hungry in the streets each day. This is appalling for supposedly the richest and most powerful nation on earth.

Obviously some people believe it is all the fault of the poor that they are poor in America. This is only true if a person is mentally and bodily able to work.Poverty in America has many causes and I believe John Iceland begins to address the problems.Sad that someone may find this book too academic.What do they want, a Christian fundamentalist emotional approach to the subject?Fine. But if you want a more objective approach, this is where to start.

Iceland advances several arguments through the course of this book. "First, views of poverty vary over time and place. What it meant to be poor in the early twentieth century is not the same today. Nor is the standard of what constitutes poverty in the United States the same as that in the developing world. Second, the persistence of poverty in the United States reflects more than just an aggregation of individual failings. Structural factors, such as the way we understand and define poverty, the inherent features of our economic system that produce income inequality, social inequities, and our policy responses to these problems shape current trends. Third, contrary to conventional wisdom, shifts in family structure have not been the most important factor explaining trends in American poverty rates in recent decades, though they were related to increasing child poverty rates in the 1970s and 1980s. Economic changes--such as economic growth and income inequality--have had the strongest association with trends in overall rates, regardless of how we measure poverty. Fourth, anti-poverty policies constitute a relatively small part of the federal budget and have only a moderate impact on poverty. The effect of policy on poverty is limited by the role of government in society the public supports. Public sentiment is in turn affected by trust in government, the development of communal institutions, and a belief in a common good. Racial conflict, confusion about the causes of poverty, and parochial concerns all stand in the way of efforts to reduce poverty and inequality."

Also:

"As far back as 1776, Adam Smith noted the importance of social perceptions in determining what constitutes economic hardship. In the Wealth of Nations, he defined the lack of "necessaries" as the experience of being unable to consume "not only the commodities which are indispensably necessary for the support of life, but whatever the custom of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even of the lowest order, to be without." More recently, Peter Townsend observed that people are social beings who assume many roles in a community--worker, citizen, parent, friend, and so on. He maintained that poverty should be defined as the lack of sufficient income for people to "play the roles, participate in the relationships, and follow the customary behavior which is expected of them by virtue of their membership of society."

Academic affair depicting poverty in charts and graphs
John Iceland has taken a devout stab at analyzing poverty in the United States from an academic standpoint.In fact, this book is obviously a publishable doctoral dissertation clocking in at a scant 152 pages of readable text with the rest covering footnotes and references.Sure looks like a dissertation to me.

Its not that this book is bad, it's just fails to put a face on poverty.One can read the book and gather big picture analysis of the trend in American poverty and discover fodder for debating the policy issue, but one through reading the book doesn't come to know the poverty-stricken people any better.To do that through reading would require picking up a copy of "The Working Poor," by David Shipler or "Getting nickled and dimed in America," by Barbara Ehrenreich.Iceland's work reaches out to academics and policy-makers and helps them to understand poverty measures, characteristics of the poverty population (through statistics albeit), causes of poverty, and effect of poverty policy.Though, it's readable I would think it only reaches those who are students of poverty and not to the hearts and minds of the average American.

Go elsewhere for engaging books to help you understand the challenges of those living in poverty.But by all means pick up Iceland's "Poverty in America," if you have a term paper to write, are looking for data to back-up policy positions, or need to mine the issue and work in a service field to those in poverty.Iceland points out that relative poverty thrives in the United States today due to low wages and lack of wise public support programs.Though we are the land of plenty, many people still suffer, not gaining any benefit of living in a wealthy nation.It gives cause for thought.
--MMW ... Read more

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In this text, elements of a theory of the optimum size of states are developed to obtain an overall view of small states in the global system. Political status and the value of independence in international relations is evaluated with the aid of the independence/dependence continiuum. Analysis of the foreign trade of small states is undertaken to verify theoretically expected characteristics of small states, and the theoretical status of small states in international trade is explained with the help of Heckscher-Ohlin theory of trade and the theory of intra-industry trade. Economic growth, monetary stability and regional problems of small states is also examined. Finally, regional integration as a possible escape from smallness is examined in the light of political status, trade characteristics, and centre-peripheral relations of small states, the main conclusion being, that small states are not suboptimal units in the global system. ... Read more

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