Economics & Beyond with Rob Johnson

The Unfathomable Willingness to Destroy the World

Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg continues the conversation about his book, The Doomsday Machine, talking about the changes in military strategy that allowed the targeting of civilians and how the arms industry pushed military expansion, which he goes on to relate to climate change.

A History of the Nuclear Danger that the Military Industrial Complex Engineered

Famous whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg discusses his book, The Doomsday Machine, which chronicles the tremendous threat to humanity that US nuclear war planners deliberately considered and whose plans he was going to leak instead of the Pentagon Papers, had it not been for the Vietnam War.

Challenging the Conventional Development Wisdom of Both the Left and the Right

Christopher Cramer and John Sender, authors of the book, African Economic Development: Evidence, Theory, and Policy, discuss their book (co-written with Arkebe Oqubay) and how economic policy needs to be rooted in flexibly responding to changing circumstances and consequences, instead of dogma. 

Link to a PDF version of the book:  http://fdslive.oup.com/www.oup.com/academic/pdf/openaccess/9780198832331.pdf

How Local Projects Can Change People's Notion of What Is Possible

Hilary Doe, the founder and president of the Michigan-based organization Scout, talks about the ways in which successful local projects can have profound effects on people's consciousness about what is politically possible

Matt Morrison: Rising Insecurity and Focus on Identity Politics Helped Propel Trump

Executive Director of Working America, Matt Morrison, talks about the political and economic factors that originally helped Trump succeed and how Democrats can build on their 2020 victory

Protecting People Against COVID-19 Protects the Economy

Phillip Alvelda, Thomas Ferguson, and John C. Mallery discuss their latest research into how the pandemic is related to the economy and how protecting against the virus also protects societies from economic disaster.

 

Read their article: https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/blog/to-save-the-economy-save-people-first

Jacqueline Novogratz: Why We Need a Moral Revolution

Social entrepreneur Jacqueline Novogratz discusses her book Manifesto for a Moral Revolution and the crisis facing a pandemic-riddled world.

Richard Kozul-Wright and Orsola Costantini Discusses UNCTAD’s Trade and Development Report 2020

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development’s Richard Kozul-Wright and Orsola Costantini say we can continue misguided policy choices or collectively chart a new path that leads from recovery to a more resilient, more equal and more environmentally sustainable world.

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Sarah Chayes: How Corrupt Elites Extract Wealth From Ordinary Americans

National security expert Sarah Chayes discusses her new book, On Corruption in America: and What Is at Stake. Chayes explores how corruption in U.S. state and society furthers and deepens inequality.

Abigail Disney: We Need to Tell a Better Story of What America Could Be

Abigail Disney, filmmaker, founder of Peace, So Loud, and podcast host of All Ears, discusses how changes among the country's elite, towards the "Greed is Good" ethic and a blind faith in markets have made inequality more extreme than ever and why we need a new discourse, even among progressives, that recognizes and respects the contributions of society's poorest.