Our financial system is crumbling this week.

[Joe Shlabotnik]

Very good stuff. Thanks for posting it.

[AdmiralKird]

We have to return to our origins and talk about the soul of the economy.

I for one am not crawling the back in the womb to have a philosophical discussion.

[Hungary Jack]

We have to return to our origins and talk about the soul of the economy.

I for one am not crawling the back in the womb to have a philosophical discussion.

The soul of the economy is self-interest. It's not that complicated.

[docellis]

We have to return to our origins and talk about the soul of the economy.

I for one am not crawling the back in the womb to have a philosophical discussion.

The soul of the economy is self-interest. It's not that complicated.

You don't like Bob Dylan, do you?

[Joe Shlabotnik]

We have to return to our origins and talk about the soul of the economy.

I for one am not crawling the back in the womb to have a philosophical discussion.

The soul of the economy is self-interest. It's not that complicated.

ENLIGHTENED self-interest.

At some point, unhindered self-interest of the powerful is a detriment to the common good. Enlightened individuals with power understand this and regulate themselves. Counting on this self regulation though is naive. There will always be those who will not consider the wider good in their dealings with others. Extreme examples of these types of people are usually called 'criminals' when they pass beyond the bounds of social norms and laws.

There must be a balance between self-interest and the common good. Too much of the one leads to tyranny of the individual - dictators, war lords, etc. Too much of the other leads to a disincentivized and languishing society with very little progress and innovation.

[Freed Roger]

We have to return to our origins and talk about the soul of the economy.

I for one am not crawling the back in the womb to have a philosophical discussion.

The soul of the economy is self-interest. It's not that complicated.

ENLIGHTENED self-interest.

At some point, unhindered self-interest of the powerful is a detriment to the common good. Enlightened individuals with power understand this and regulate themselves. Counting on this self regulation though is naive. There will always be those who will not consider the wider good in their dealings with others. Extreme examples of these types of people are usually called 'criminals' when they pass beyond the bounds of social norms and laws.

There must be a balance between self-interest and the common good. Too much of the one leads to tyranny of the individual - dictators, war lords, etc. Too much of the other leads to a disincentivized and languishing society with very little progress and innovation.

Well said Rad.
Yeah, the laws of nature apply with the self-centered/interest. However, the larger quest for a common good is what separates us humans from the animals.

For a long time, both republicans and democrats recognized what you said as true and the balancing act worked. Sad for a lot of young in this country, pre-Reagan- they never saw how this concept works.

.

[G. Keenan]

We have to return to our origins and talk about the soul of the economy.

I for one am not crawling the back in the womb to have a philosophical discussion.

The soul of the economy is self-interest. It's not that complicated.

You are a brilliant economist. You should publish some books expanding on that banality.

[Hungary Jack]

IMO, self-interest does not carry the connotation that you are forbidden to act for the common good, or have to screw somebody else to maximize your own utilization. A lot of people maximize their self-interest by doing things that accrue lots of public benefit.

There are many accounts of "wild" animals cooperating for mutual benefit--dolphins, orcas, wolves, etc. all cooperate during hunts, other species adopt orphaned animals, etc.

Not to say that there aren't bad actors. And thus laws are certainly needed. But individuals pursuing their own interests are the foundation of any productive economy.

I will try to think of some more banal stuff to add later.

[Arthur Dent]

There is some serious food for thought in this interview:

That reads like a bunch of fairly banal observations dressed up with literary references followed by a downright awful concrete proposal. What am I missing?

As his own references suggest, it's not exactly revolutionary to question the mindless pursuit of growth and consumption. Concerns of that sort have been present throughout human history and are alive and well today. And I agree that it's easy both individually and socially to get caught up in this pursuit. But that's a fairly lame criticism of these things as such. Sure, the overall level of happiness is not necessarily raised by fulfilling particular material desires as we tend to simply replace those with new ones, but that hardly makes human striving less worthwhile. There are, of course, huge practical gains of growth including the ability to treat disease, the ability the travel the world, the ability to feed an ever growing population, etc. etc., but beyond That, the desire to expand our reach, understanding, and abilities are just part of what makes us human.

As for the bit about prioritizing the elimination of debt, I don't agree at all, especially with his proposal on government debt. It sure sound like this is just the old, deeply wrongheaded, moralistic interpretation. Any decent criticism should at least recognize that debt is a social relationship within societies and that statements about the overall level of debt that talk about how much debt "we" are in are totally misleading. The boring technical literature and current debate in mainstream economics, though in many ways awful, is really a much more useful guide.

I don't understand why would want to limit growth either, this apparently a straight application of the idea that growth itself is somehow soul crushing. Many of the places in the world with high growth are quite poor and growth there contributes greatly to happiness and human development. In the developed world, growth itself is not a bad thing either. In the US, what matters a lot more than growth to me would be the building of a less brutal society than the one we have today which operates on the principle that we are fundamentally fallen and weak creatures that must be prodded and beaten to do anything worthwhile. If creating such a society with greater support and security came at the expense of some growth, that would be fine by me, but I actually don't think that this is the case. International comparisons are useful here. Sweden is doing very well. Implying that we must give up growth for happiness is really an endorsement of this pessimistic and damaging view of human society.

[Hungary Jack]

Well put AD.