Can We Build a Common Good Economy? (with Mariana Mazzucato)

Goldie, today we get to talk to our old friend, economist Mariana Mazzucato, who has a new book out called The Common Good Economy: How to Make Capitalism Work for Us All.

Mariana's been on the podcast before.

She's written a, a, a ton of really interesting books, but this one in particular I think is super well timed and argues that we've kind of gotten how we think about the difference between markets and states backwards, that markets are this sort of state of nature that-

It's an act of God.

Yeah.

Yes.

The market capitalism emerged fully formed from Zeus's head.

Yes, exactly.

Right.

Exactly.

It's this thing that i...

this object that exists out there that obeys natural laws.

It's like physics.

Yes.

And then, uh, all you government bureaucrats come in and mess everything up.

That's, uh, th-there you go.

You no longer have to take Econ 101.

I just explained it all for you.

[chuckles]

You know what? I think that's...

You said it so well.

[laughs]

Uh, and she argues that you, that, that that's exactly backwards, that markets are always human constructs.

They're shaped by laws, institutions, public investment, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and that the only way to get on top of our problems, and, you know, of course, this is, uh, completely aligned with market humanism, is by organizing the economy to solve the problems you wanna solve and, and try to limit its ability to create the problems that you want to avoid.

A- as opposed to just fixing all those-