Economics and the Left
Economics and the Left

Author: C.J. Polychroniou

Publisher: Verso Books

Published: 2021-09-07

Total Pages: 433

ISBN-13: 1839763795

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Twenty-four economists discuss how they promote egalitarianism, democracy and ecological sanity through research, activism, and policy engagement Economics and the Left presents interviews with twenty-four leading progressive economists. All of these practitioners of the “dismal science” are dedicated to both interpreting the world and changing it for the better. The result is a combustible brew of ideas and reflections on major historical events, including the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact on the global economy. Interviewed are: Michael Ash, Nelson Henrique Barbosa Filho, James K. Boyce, Ha-Joon Chang, Jane D’Arista, Diane Elson, Gerald Epstein, Nancy Folbre, James K. Galbraith, Teresa Ghilarducci, Jayati Ghosh, Ilene Grabel, Costas Lapavitsas, Zhongjin Li, William Milberg, Léonce Ndikumana, Ozlem Onaran, Robert Pollin, Malcolm Sawyer, Juliet Schor, Anwar Shaikh, William Spriggs, Fiona Tregenna and Thomas Weisskopf.

The Economics of Belonging
The Economics of Belonging

Author: Martin Sandbu

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2020-06-16

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 0691204527

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"This is a proposal for a short book (of around 50,000 words) that speaks directly to the state we are in. The populist insurgency on both sides of the Atlantic and in Europe has deep roots in decades of mismanagement of economic and cultural change and as a result there are large groups of people who feel they no longer belong to the societies they live in, the disinfranchised, the left behind. The appeal of the anti-liberal populists who have emerged is that they convince those who feel left behind that national leaders are no longer working in their interests hence the rhetoric of 'putting America first' and 'making America great again' or the Brexiteers claining that they are 'taking back control.' In undemocractic regimes elsewhere populists play on people's feelings of insecurity in an unpredictable and fast changing world, promising security and order in exchange for democratic freedom. Liberal openness has been put on the defensive so it is up to us, electorates, politicians and policy makers, to show how an open and liberal economic system can once again belong to everyone. In the second part of the book Martin Sandbu outlines four key areas of economic policy that he believes will address not just the symptoms but the underlying causes of the current inequality which has led to so many people, especially the young and the most vulnerable being left behind. These include productivity, regional development, improved access to business finance for SMEs, and increaed representation for workers. He makes a number of other recommendaitons regarding housing, education for all, universal basic income and taxation. He concludes by saying that while these proposals add up to a radical package in total they are necessary reforms to ensure a sense of belonging and without them we could be opening the door to a radicalism which is both illiberal and undemocratic"--

The American Political Economy
The American Political Economy

Author: Jacob S. Hacker

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2021-11-11

Total Pages: 487

ISBN-13: 1316516369

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Drawing together leading scholars, the book provides a revealing new map of the US political economy in cross-national perspective.

Where Economics Went Wrong
Where Economics Went Wrong

Author: David Colander

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2018-11-27

Total Pages: 284

ISBN-13: 0691179204

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

How modern economics abandoned classical liberalism and lost its way Milton Friedman once predicted that advances in scientific economics would resolve debates about whether raising the minimum wage is good policy. Decades later, Friedman’s prediction has not come true. In Where Economics Went Wrong, David Colander and Craig Freedman argue that it never will. Why? Because economic policy, when done correctly, is an art and a craft. It is not, and cannot be, a science. The authors explain why classical liberal economists understood this essential difference, why modern economists abandoned it, and why now is the time for the profession to return to its classical liberal roots. Carefully distinguishing policy from science and theory, classical liberal economists emphasized values and context, treating economic policy analysis as a moral science where a dialogue of sensibilities and judgments allowed for the same scientific basis to arrive at a variety of policy recommendations. Using the University of Chicago—one of the last bastions of classical liberal economics—as a case study, Colander and Freedman examine how both the MIT and Chicago variants of modern economics eschewed classical liberalism in their attempt to make economic policy analysis a science. By examining the way in which the discipline managed to lose its bearings, the authors delve into such issues as the development of welfare economics in relation to economic science, alternative voices within the Chicago School, and exactly how Friedman got it wrong. Contending that the division between science and prescription needs to be restored, Where Economics Went Wrong makes the case for a more nuanced and self-aware policy analysis by economists.

Liberalism at Large
Liberalism at Large

Author: Alexander Zevin

Publisher: Verso Books

Published: 2021-03-23

Total Pages: 545

ISBN-13: 1788739620

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The path-breaking history of modern liberalism told through the pages of one of its most zealous supporters In this landmark book, Alexander Zevin looks at the development of modern liberalism by examining the long history of the Economist newspaper, which, since 1843, has been the most tireless—and internationally influential—champion of the liberal cause anywhere in the world. But what exactly is liberalism, and how has its message evolved? Liberalism at Large examines a political ideology on the move as it confronts the challenges that classical doctrine left unresolved: the rise of democracy, the expansion of empire, the ascendancy of high finance. Contact with such momentous forces was never going to leave the proponents of liberal values unchanged. Zevin holds a mirror to the politics—and personalities—of Economist editors past and present, from Victorian banker-essayists James Wilson and Walter Bagehot to latter-day eminences Bill Emmott and Zanny Minton Beddoes. Today, neither economic crisis at home nor permanent warfare abroad has dimmed the Economist’s belief in unfettered markets, limited government, and a free hand for the West. Confidante to the powerful, emissary for the financial sector, portal onto international affairs, the bestselling newsweekly shapes the world its readers—as well as everyone else—inhabit. This is the first critical biography of one of the architects of a liberal world order now under increasing strain.

Keynes Against Capitalism
Keynes Against Capitalism

Author: James Crotty

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-04-29

Total Pages: 595

ISBN-13: 0429877056

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Keynes is one of the most important and influential economists who ever lived. It is almost universally believed that Keynes wrote his magnum opus, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, to save capitalism from the socialist, communist, and fascist forces that were rising up during the Great Depression era. This book argues that this was not the case with respect to socialism. Tracing the evolution of Keynes’s views on policy from WWI until his death in 1946, Crotty argues that virtually all post-WWII "Keynesian" economists misinterpreted crucial parts of Keynes’s economic theory, misunderstood many of his policy views, and failed to realize that his overarching political objective was not to save British capitalism, but rather to replace it with Liberal Socialism. This book shows how Keynes’s Liberal Socialism began to take shape in his mind in the mid-1920s, evolved into a more concrete institutional form over the next decade or so, and was laid out in detail in his work on postwar economic planning at Britain’s Treasury during WWII. Finally, it explains how The General Theory provided the rigorous economic theoretical foundation needed to support his case against capitalism in support of Liberal Socialism. Offering an original and highly informative exposition of Keynes’s work, this book should be of great interest to teachers and students of economics. It should also appeal to a general audience interested in the role the most important economist of the 20th century played in developing the case against capitalism and in support of Liberal Socialism. Keynes Against Capitalism is especially relevant in the context of today’s global economic and political crises.

Markets in the Name of Socialism
Markets in the Name of Socialism

Author: Johanna Bockman

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2011-07-26

Total Pages: 556

ISBN-13: 0804778965

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The worldwide spread of neoliberalism has transformed economies, polities, and societies everywhere. In conventional accounts, American and Western European economists, such as Milton Friedman and Friedrich von Hayek, sold neoliberalism by popularizing their free-market ideas and radical criticisms of the state. Rather than focusing on the agency of a few prominent, conservative economists, Markets in the Name of Socialism reveals a dialogue among many economists on both sides of the Iron Curtain about democracy, socialism, and markets. These discussions led to the transformations of 1989 and, unintentionally, the rise of neoliberalism. This book takes a truly transnational look at economists' professional outlook over 100 years across the capitalist West and the socialist East. Clearly translating complicated economic ideas and neoliberal theories, it presents a significant reinterpretation of Cold War history, the fall of communism, and the rise of today's dominant economic ideology.

The Left Case Against the EU
The Left Case Against the EU

Author: Costas Lapavitsas

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2018-12-05

Total Pages: 160

ISBN-13: 1509531084

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Many on the Left see the European Union as a fundamentally benign project with the potential to underpin ever greater cooperation and progress. If it has drifted rightward, the answer is to fight for reform from within. In this iconoclastic polemic, economist Costas Lapavitsas demolishes this view. He contends that the EU’s response to the Eurozone crisis represents the ultimate transformation of the union into a neoliberal citadel that institutionally embeds austerity, privatization, and wage cuts. Concurrently, the rise of German hegemony has divided the EU into an unstable core and dependent peripheries. These related developments make the EU impervious to meaningful reform. The solution is therefore a direct challenge to the EU project that stresses popular and national sovereignty as preconditions for true internationalist socialism. Lapavitsas’s powerful manifesto for a left opposition to the EU upends the wishful thinking that often characterizes the debate and will be a challenging read for all on the Left interested in the future of Europe.

Cognitive Capitalism
Cognitive Capitalism

Author: Yann Moulier-Boutang

Publisher: Polity

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 258

ISBN-13: 0745647324

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book argues that we are undergoing a transition from industrial capitalism to a new form of capitalism - what the author calls & lsquo; cognitive capitalism & rsquo;

Economics for Everyone
Economics for Everyone

Author: Jim Stanford

Publisher:

Published: 2015

Total Pages: 350

ISBN-13: 9781783713271

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"Economics is too important to be left to the economists. This concise and readable book provides non-specialist readers with all the information they need to understand how capitalism works (and how it doesn't). Economics for Everyone, now published in second edition, is an antidote to the abstract and ideological way that economics is normally taught and reported. Key concepts such as finance, competition and wages are explored, and their importance to everyday life is revealed. Stanford answers questions such as 'Do workers need capitalists?', 'Why does capitalism harm the environment?', and 'What really happens on the stock market?' The book will appeal to those working for a fairer world, and students of social sciences who need to engage with economics. It is illustrated with humorous and educational cartoons by Tony Biddle, and is supported with a comprehensive set of web-based course materials for popular economics courses."--Publisher's description.