Branko Milanovic — First reflections on the French ““événements de décembre”

This raises a more general issue which I discussed in my polemic with Jason Hickel and Kate Raworth. Proponents of degrowth and those who argue that we need to do something dramatic regarding climate change are singularly coy and shy when it comes to pointing out who is going to bear the costs of these changes. As I mentioned in this discussion with Jason and Kate, if they were serious they should go out and tell Western audiences that their real incomes should be cut in half and also explain them how that should be accomplished. Degrowers obviously know that such a plan is a political suicide, so they prefer to keep things vague and to cover up the issues under a “false communitarian” discourse that we are all affected and that somehow the economy will thrive if we all just took full conscience of the problem--without ever telling us what specific taxes they would like to raise or how they plan to reduce people’s incomes.

Now the French revolt brings this issue into the open. Many western middle classes, buffeted already by the winds of globalization, seem unwilling to pay a climate change tax. The degrowers should, I hope, now come up with concrete plans....

Global Inequality
First reflections on the French ““événements de décembre”
Branko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and formerly lead economist in the World Bank's research department and senior associate at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Branko Milanovic — On growth and people: my reply to Kate Raworth's reply

If you are following this debate.

Let me focus on two most important issues on which Kate Raworth and I differ.

(My original review of Kate Raworth's very good and challengingDoughnut Economics can be found here; Kate’s response is given here.)

Global Inequality
On growth and people: my reply to Kate Raworth's replyBranko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and formerly lead economist in the World Bank's research department and senior associate at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

See also

Evonomics
What Is the Role of Morality in a Capitalist Economy?
Peter Turchin | Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Connecticut, Research Associate in the School of Anthropology, University of Oxford, and Vice-President of the Evolution Institute

Common Creams
As Interest in Democratic Socialism Surges, Ocasio-Cortez Explains to Colbert What a 'Moral' Economy Would Look Like
Jake Johnson, staff writer

Lars P. Syll — Economics for the 21st century

Kate Raworth's seven ways.

Lars P. Syll’s Blog
Economics for the 21st century

Lars P. Syll | Professor, Malmo University

Branko Milanovic — Inevitability of the need for economic growth—the nth time.

Today, I got into a bit of a Twitter spat with Kate Raworth who suggested in a talk to OECD top brass that their statement of objectives (defined, I guess, in the 1950s or 1960s) which emphasizes the achievement of high growth rates should be modified to create “redistributive and regenerative economies..whether or not they grow”. I have to confess not to have read Kate’s very successful “Doughnut economics” yet but hope to make up for that very soon. But I have read some reviews and my reaction to the suggested change in the OECD mission statement was thoroughly negative. De-emphasizing growth is not desirable, and perhaps more importantly, is utterly unrealizable in societies like our modern societies. Because I am convinced of the latter, perhaps I should refrain from criticizing her position—since I believe that nothing will ever come of it.
But let me still explain under several headings why I think so. (Surely, the OECD statement may be changed for PR reasons, but this is immaterial.)

Depends on the meaning of "growth.

Obviously, a growing population requires maintaining growth to offset and innovation can produce higher growth levels thorough increased productivity that obviates or reduced increased need for scarce resources and does so sustainably.

This is an important debate to have and the issues are coming to the fore in political economy as it relates to globalization.

In my view, the neoliberal concept of growth (growth for the sake of growth) needs to be revisited and overhauled on the core assumption (value statement) that economies serve societies rather than vice versa.

This is essentially a debate about values, and the kind of world that we want to create and living in, not only ourselves but future generations. Discussion of means follows this.

Milanovic observes that the fundamental problematic is that of capitalism. Everyone wants the benefits but then complains about the tradeoffs that are systemically necessary but undesirable. Standard of living includes more than can be measured in terms of increased material benefits, which not only do not yield abiding happiness but the inordinate pursuit of which individually and socially may become a detriment to fulfillment.

Global Inequality
Inevitability of the need for economic growth—the nth time.
Branko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and formerly lead economist in the World Bank's research department and senior associate at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Brad Voracek — Doughnut Economics – Grab a pencil, draw a doughnut!

Many of us know we need to rethink economics, but Kate Raworth actually did it.|Envisioning the economy as a doughnut, two boundaries become clear. If we fall into the doughnut’s middle hole, human needs fail to be met. If we drop off of the outer edge, life is unsustainable.

You should always be weary of people who seek to get the “first lick” on a young impressionable brain. Paul Samuelson knew that by writing a successful economics textbook, he could influence how students frame the economy, and thus the world. From the 50’s to the 70’s, his textbook was the most widely used in introductory economics courses.

Today, that role has been given to Gregory Mankiw’s “Macroeconomics” (see the Open Syllabus Project). Both view the economy in the same narrow way, with the same simple pictures that don’t seem useful today. Raworth’s Doughnut Economics breaches the pattern and envisions a new economics, for a new generation with clearly defined challenges and scant tools to solve them....

The Minskys
Doughnut Economics – Grab a pencil, draw a doughnut!
Brad Voracek

See also

Evonomics
Seven Ways to Transform 21st-Century Economics — and Economists

Kate Raworth | senior visiting research associate at Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute and a senior associate of the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership

The Next System

A New Cooperative Economy
By Guy Dauncey