Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer

Latest Episodes:

Will bad economics kill the Green New Deal? (with Naomi Klein and J.W. Mason) Oct 22, 2019

Show notes

The only thing holding us back from big, bold, progressive change is ourselves. When critics wonder if we can afford to pay for the Green New Deal, they couch their concerns in the language of neoliberal economics: they say that investing in the middle class, raising wages, and doing too much too quickly will ruin the economy. This week, Naomi Klein and J.W. Mason join us to explain why the economic status quo is the greatest barrier to the Green New Deal becoming a reality, and how we actually can afford to change our economy so drastically.

Naomi Klein is an award-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author. She is Senior Correspondent for The Intercept, a Puffin Writing Fellow at Type Media Center, and the inaugural Gloria Steinem Chair in Media, Culture and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University. Her most recent book, ‘On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal’, published worldwide in September, was an instant New York Times bestseller and a #1 Canadian bestseller.

Twitter: @NoamiAKlein

J.W. Mason is a Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, where he works on the Financialization Project, and an assistant professor of economics at John Jay College, CUNY. His current research focuses on the history and political economy of credit, including the evolution of household debt and changing role of financial markets in business investment. He also works on the history of economic thought, particularly the development of macroeconomics over the twentieth century.

Twitter: @JWMason1

Further reading and resources:

On Fire: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781982129910

Can We Afford a Green New Deal? http://jwmason.org/slackwire/can-we-afford-a-green-new-deal/

Decarbonizing the US Economy: Pathways Toward a Green New Deal: https://rooseveltinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Roosevelt-Institute_Green-New-Deal_Digital-Final.pdf

A Message from the Future with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9uTH0iprVQ

With a Green New Deal, Here’s What the World Could Look Like for the Next Generation: https://theintercept.com/2018/12/05/green-new-deal-proposal-impacts/

Paul’s Book Review: Kochland Oct 18, 2019

Show notes

Be still, our hearts—it’s another book review, straight from the glittering literary mind of Paul Constant. This week, Paul recommends the New York Times Bestseller ‘Kochland’ by Christopher Leonard, a deeply reported investigation of Koch Industries’ secretive corporate power, smarmy public influence, and weird libertarian agenda. Plus: literal back-stabbing!

Kochland: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781476775388

Twitter: @paulconstant

Paul’s website, The Seattle Review of Books: https://seattlereviewofbooks.com/

The trade-offs of global trade (with Dean Baker and Port Commissioner Ryan Calkins) Oct 15, 2019

Show notes

In the 1990s and early 2000s, free trade was considered an unalloyed good. But now, policymakers and economists agree that global trade creates winners and losers—and they acknowledge that we've never really tried to fairly compensate the losers. Economist Dean Baker and Seattle Port Commissioner Ryan Calkins help us try to imagine a more equitable way forward on international trade.

Dean Baker is a senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, an organization he co-founded in 1999. His areas of research include housing, consumer prices, intellectual property, trade, employment, Social Security, and Medicare. He is the author of several books, including ‘Rigged: How Globalization and the Rules of the Modern Economy Were Structured to Make the Rich Richer,’ and his blog, ‘Beat the Press,’ provides commentary on economic reporting. He is currently a visiting professor at the University of Utah.

Twitter: DeanBaker13

Ryan Calkins is a Port of Seattle Commissioner specializing in sustainable economic development, ensuring that our region's prosperity is shared among all of our communities. Commissioner Calkins also works as a nonprofit professional at Ventures, a charitable organization that supports low income entrepreneurs who are starting and growing businesses in the Puget Sound Area.

Twitter: @ryancalkinsSEA

How neoliberalism happened (with George Monbiot and Binyamin Appelbaum) Oct 08, 2019

Show notes

It’s trendy to mock the malicious pervasiveness of neoliberalism now, but have you ever wondered what its origins are? This week, George Monbiot and Binyamin Appelbaum join the show to uncover just where the dominant economic theory of our time came from and how it took hold.

George Monbiot writes a weekly column for The Guardian and is the author of a number of books, most recently ‘Out of the Wreckage: A New Politics for an Age of Crisis’. As an investigative journalist and self-described “professional troublemaker,” George uncovers the complicated truths behind the world’s most persistent problems.

Twitter: @GeorgeMonbiot

Binyamin Appelbaum writes about economics and business for the editorial page of The New York Times. From 2010 to 2019, he was a Washington correspondent for the Times, covering economic policy in the aftermath of the 2008 crisis. His new book, ‘The Economists’ Hour: False Prophets, Free Markets, and the Fracture of Society’ is a Wall Street Journal Business Bestseller.

Twitter: @BCAppelbaum

Further reading:

Out of the Wreckage: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781786632890

The Economists’ Hour: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780316512329

Neoliberalism - the ideology at the root of all our problems: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot

Games Economists Play: http://bostonreview.net/class-inequality/marshall-steinbaum-games-economists-play

BONUS: Rewriting the rules for an inclusive economy (with Darrick Hamilton) Oct 04, 2019

Show notes

As we reimagine the rules of our political and economic institutions, it is essential that racial justice be centered in the conversation. Darrick Hamilton explains how neoliberalism exploits existing structures of racism and power in America, and shares his optimism for a course-correction that will promote broadly shared prosperity.

Darrick Hamilton is the Executive Director of the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at The Ohio State University, and a fellow at the Roosevelt Institute. As a stratification economist, his research focuses on the causes, consequences, and remedies of racial and ethnic inequality in economic and health outcomes, which includes an examination of the intersections of identity, racism, colorism, and socioeconomic outcomes.

Twitter: @DarrickHamilton

Further reading:

New Rules for the 21st Century: Corporate Power, Public Power, and the Future of the American Economy:

https://rooseveltinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Roosevelt-Institute_2021-Report_Digital-copy.pdf

Why philanthropy can’t undo this mess (with Anand Giridharadas) Oct 01, 2019

Show notes

Few books have shaken the philanthropy world more than ‘Winners Take All’, Anand Giridharadas’s blistering critique of wealthy do-gooders. Global elites who ostentatiously give away hundreds of millions of dollars, he argues, are actually just preserving the status quo that grants them power in the first place. This week, Anand joins Nick and Goldy to explain how do-gooding perpetuates inequality.

Anand Giridharadas is a writer. His most recent book, ‘Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World,’ is a national bestseller. He is an editor-at-large for TIME, an on-air political analyst for MSNBC, and a visiting scholar at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University.

Twitter: @AnandWrites

Further reading:

Winners Take All: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/539747/winners-take-all-by-anand-giridharadas/9780451493248

Beware Rich People Who Say They Want to Change the World: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/24/opinion/sunday/wealth-philanthropy-fake-change.html

BONUS: Saru Jayaraman - Unedited Conversation Sep 27, 2019

Show notes

Food labor expert Saru Jayaraman joined us earlier this month to expose the lie of marginal productivity, and to reveal how it’s used to take advantage of workers. For the sake of time, we cut a fascinating tangent on the minimum wage and the restaurant industry from that episode, but it’s so insightful we just had to share it with you. Catch it here, with Saru and Goldy’s full conversation.

Saru Jayaraman is the Co-Founder and President of the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC United) and Director of the Food Labor Research Center at the University of California, Berkeley. Saru authored ‘Behind the Kitchen Door’, a national bestseller, and her most recent book is ‘Forked: A New Standard for American Dining.’

Twitter: @SaruJayaraman

Saru Jayaraman: How Restaurant Workers Are Inheriting a Legacy of Slavery in the U.S.: https://bioneers.org/saru-jayaraman-restaurant-workers-inheriting-legacy-slavery-u-s-ztvz1712/

Author Interview: Chris Arnade Sep 24, 2019

Show notes

In an effort to rethink the conversation around poverty, author Chris Arnade’s new book, ‘Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America’, pushes aside decades of academic detachment, instead encouraging those who have been left out of prosperity to describe their own experiences. This week, Chris joins Goldy for a wide-ranging conversation about poverty, addiction, and inequality.

Chris Arnade is a writer and photographer covering addiction and poverty in America. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Guardian, and the Washington Post, among many others.

Twitter: @Chris_arnade

Further reading:

Our forgotten towns: struggle, resilience, love and respect in ‘back-row America’: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/05/america-dignity-chris-arnade-book-extract-poverty

Dignity on IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9780525534730

Paul’s Book Review #2: Janesville, An American Story Sep 20, 2019

Show notes

Everyone’s favorite human library, Paul Constant, is back with a review of ‘Janesville, An American Story’ by Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist Amy Goldstein. Pair with a Wisconsin-brewed beer.

Buy Janesville on IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781501102233

Behind the scenes of Nick’s new TED Talk: The dirty secret of capitalism—and a new way forward Sep 17, 2019

Show notes

In July, Nick took the stage at TEDSummit in Edinburgh, Scotland to make the case for a new economics that recognizes people, not capital, as the driver of economic growth. The talk, released by TED last week, explains why unchecked greed will inevitably lead to the collapse of society. In this episode, Nick takes us behind the scenes of the making of the speech and shares his hopes for its impact, and TED Business Curator Corey Hajim gives us insight into the making of a TED conference. To hear Nick's full speech, visit the links below.

Video of Nick’s TED Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/nick_hanauer_the_dirty_secret_of_capitalism_and_a_new_way_forward

Audio of Nick’s talk on the TED Talks Daily podcast: https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5mZWVkYnVybmVyLmNvbS9URURUYWxrc19hdWRpbw&episode=ZW4uYXVkaW8udGFsay50ZWQuY29tOjQ4NTQ1&hl=en&ep=6&at=1568658932671

Twitter: @NickHanauer

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