Hobsbawm and Foucault great choices.

But I'd choose the elder Hobsbawm's The Age of Extremes which has a quote for the ages: "capitalism saws off the tree branch upon which it sits."

Add these with the premise that it's impossible to be educated without at least some understanding of history, evolution, cosmology and physics, economics, finance and the psychology of money:

The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins, you have it backwards about genes and organisms, and which is a means for which.

Why Nations Fail, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson--who's rich, who's poor and why.

Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond, who conquered whom and why.

1491: New Revelations About the Americas Before Columbus, Charles Mann, everything you thought you knew, from New England to the Mississippi to the Amazon, was wrong.

The Human Universe, Brian Cox, you are where the universe's meaning resides.

The Black Swan, Nassem Taleb, why resilience matters.

Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman--the cognitive biases at the heart of the long history of bubbles, crashes and other human financial stupidity.

Sartre, not Sarte.