'30 years ago, thinking 'like an economist' would have been taken as good adivice. Today, not so much.'

"When it comes to crafting economic policy, cost-effectiveness, efficiency, choice, and competition have reigned supreme among policymakers for decades. Sociologist Elizabeth Popp Berman says that this style of economic reasoning—prioritizing efficiency above all else—makes good ideas seem like bad policy. She walks us through how that short-sighted style of thinking took hold in DC and explains when policymakers are right to lean on purely economic thinking—and when they should reject it in favor of prioritizing more fundamental values." - Pitchfork Economics

For big corporations, The Inflation Reduction Act “definitively changes the narrative from risk mitigation to opportunity capture.”

"Late in September, analysts at the investment bank Credit Suisse published a research note about America’s new climate law that went nearly unnoticed."

Blockchains give us the power to organize around something other than just maximizing returns for shareholders.

"Governments, corporations, and non-profit organizations just can’t seem to crack society’s biggest challenges.

'99% of humanity' is worse off due to Covid-19 while the world's 10 richest men have doubled their fortunes during the pandemic.

"In a new report titled 'Pandemic of Greed,' Oxfam offers a grave assessment of the current state of the public health emergency in an effort to bury the notion that the coronavirus is on its way out and normality is on the horizon—a rosy and potentially dangerous sentiment voiced in recent days by the leaders of rich nations and the executives of powerful pharmaceutical companies." - Jake Johnson

'The goal is people over profit, community over consumption, and resilience over recklessness.'

We live under the illusion of progress: as long as GDP is going up and prices stay low, we accept poverty and pollution as unfortunate but inevitable byproducts of a successful economy. In fact, the infallibility of the free market and the necessity of endless growth are so ingrained in the public consciousness that they seem like scientific fact.

Wealthy countries can create prosperity while using less materials and energy if they abandon economic growth as an objective.

Many industrialized countries are now struggling to grow their economies, given economic convulsions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, resource scarcities and stagnating productivity improvements. Governments face a difficult situation. Their attempts to stimulate growth clash with objectives to improve human well-being and reduce environmental damage.

Transitioning businesses to employee ownership has the potential to significantly reduce the overall wealth gap as well as the racial equity gap.

For many years now, conventional solutions to income and wealth inequality—minimum wage, unions, progressive taxation, or guaranteed income—have failed to gain enough momentum to reverse the trend of greater and greater accumulation among the already well-off.

How to turn fashion waste into healthy ecosystems

"Beauty, function and non-toxic decomposition coexist in this simple flax flower. We challenge the fashion and textile industries to match that performance."

What if we used the principles outlined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to define U.S. industrial policy?

President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal—which included the construction of the Bonneville Lock and Dam to improve navigation on Columbia River and provide hydropower to the Pacific Northwest—is an example of past U.S. industrial policy.

Arun Gupta leads food tours around New York City. He's often asked why the same dish might be three of four times as expensive in one restaurant than another restaurant a block or two away.

"The reason for this divergence in price and quality comes to down to how migration, labor and immigration laws, supply chains, and culture all interrelate." - Arun Gupta

'We are in the midst of the most creative period of economic innovation since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution.'

“This is a book about deep change. It’s about hope. It’s about the real possibility that a fundamentally new kind of economy can be built, that this work is further along than we suppose, and that it does deeper than we would dare to dream."

Small is Beautiful

Coming of age in the early 70s I was influenced by a small but influential group of thinkers who channeled the promise of a new age into realistic practicums. EF Schumacher was on the foundational reading list. This week my friend and colleague, John Abrams, wrote a good appreciation of a book from which we are still learning.