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Listen to New Economics Podcast on Spotify. Award-winning podcast about the economic forces shaping our world, with Ayeisha Thomas-Smith and guests. Brought to you by the New Economics Foundation - the independent think tank and charity campaigning for a fairer, sustainable economy.

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See Her Elected (SHE): 'Economics is for Everyone' 2022, Session 1

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See Her Elected (SHE): 'Economics is for Everyone' 2022, Session 3

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See Her Elected (SHE): 'Economics is for Everyone' 2022, Session 2, Neoliberalism

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Where has all the money gone? STOP tax dodging (Ireland)

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Listen to this episode from The Taxcast on Spotify. In this episode: Ireland only has 0.1% of the world's population, but they became one of the biggest tax havens on the planet. What's that meant for Irish people, and their road ahead? Naomi Fowler speaks with authors of a new book Tax Haven Ireland.

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Rethinking Economics by New Economics Podcast

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Kirsty chats to special guest Yuan Yang, co-founder of Rethinking Economics, an international network of students campaigning for better economics education.

Weekly Economics Podcast on Twitter: www.twitter.com/weeklyeconpod
Yuan Yang on Twitter: www.twitter.com/YuanfenYang
Rethinking Economics on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RethinkEcon
Kirsty Styles on Twitter: www.twitter.com/kirstystyles1

Produced by James Shield. Programme editor for NEF: Huw Jordan.

A special Weekly Economics Podcast shout-out to the Observer's Miranda Sawyer for this lovely review last week: http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/jun/14/radio-review-eddie-mair-robert-peston-julian-barnes-beats1

Brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the independent think tank and charity campaigning for a fairer, sustainable economy. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org.

Like this week's music? Find us on Spotify: www.sptfy.com/4rg

Music by Podington Bear used under Creative Commons BY-NC Licence www.podingtonbear.com

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Ha Joon Chang: 23 things they don't tell you about capitalism

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Ha Joon Chang: 23 things they don't tell you about capitalism

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Supply-Side Economics
Objectives of supply-side
policies
 These policies focus on shifting LRAS to the
right in order to achieve long-term economic
growth
 There are two major types of supply-side
policies that we will discuss today
Market-oriented supply-side
policies
 Based on the neo-classical point of view, economists in
the early 1980s argued that growth in real GDP
depended on the supply-side of the economy as
opposed to the demand-side.
 They argued that increasing potential output should be
the focus of economic policy, not the stabilization of
the business cycle
Any takers? We're in!
The foundation
 As we know, neoclassical economists argue
that in the long-run, macroeconomic
equilibrium always occurs at the full
employment level of GDP, automatically
eliminating inflationary and recessionary gaps.
The possibilities
 Supply-siders argue that an economy pursuing supply-
side policies will be able to achieve rapid growth, price
stability and full employment all at the same time.
 The key is to continuously shift SRAS and LRAS to
the right and watch increases in AD follow accordingly
Stagflation? No problem!
 Supply-siders argue that if a negative supply shock
occurs in the economy, supply-side policies can
effectively shift the SRAS curve back to its original
position, thus dealing with the dual problems of an
increasing price level and falling output......Remember,
demand-side policies can only fix one of those
problems
So how do we put supply-side
policies into effect?
 Market-oriented supply-side policies focus on
introducing legislative, regulatory and institutional
changes in the economy which are intended to increase
efficiency of production, decrease the natural rate of
unemployment, and increase the economy's
production possibilities.
The gospel according to
supply-siders
 Supply-side policies can be classified under four particular
categories. They include:
 Reducing the size of the government sector
 Lowering taxes on businesses
 Making the labour market more competitive
 Liberalizing international trade and capital flows
Smaller government
 Remember me driving my government car, working 3
hours a day, people asleep at their desks, expensive
trips to Puerto Rico? Supply-siders argue that this is
common and changes need to be made. Their
proposals to reduce the size of the government
include.....
Privatization
Privatization
 According to supply-siders, by transferring ownership
of a firm from the public to the private sector,
efficiencies will result due to the more competitive
nature of private industry.
 No more sleeping at your desks!
 No more 3 hour workdays!
Private financing of public
sector projects
 Need a highway or airport built? Supply-siders want
private firms to build, finance and operate public
services, and then allow the government to buy these
services from the private firm.
 The thinking here is that private firms will be more
efficient and the government sector will be reduced
Outsourcing
 Rather than the government employing armies of
accountants, information technology workers and
other professionals, supply-siders want government to
hire private firms to provide these services.
 Increased efficiencies and competition should result
from outsourcing of this work according to supplysiders
Deregulation (2 kinds)
 Economic deregulation involves removing government
controls on price and output in industries such as
airlines, broadcasting, energy, and financial services.
 Again the argument is that with less government
involvement, more competition and inefficiencies will
result.
Deregulation (2 kinds)
 Social deregulation involves removing some of the
protections for consumers in areas such as product safety,
pollution control and injuries in the workplace.
 Supply-siders argue that all these protections for consumers
are unnecessary, cost businesses too much money to comply
with, and result in less output by firms due to the excessive
costs
Restricting Monopoly Power
 Supply-siders want to take away monopoly power from
firms, by breaking them up and ensuring more
competition in the industry.
 They also try to prevent mergers of companies who
could achieve monopoly power if they were permitted
to join together.
Lowering personal income taxes
 Supply siders argue that cuts in personal
income taxes will have an even greater effect
on aggregate supply than on aggregate
demand.
 How does that work you ask?
Lowering personal income taxes
 Supply-siders argue that if the tax rate on individuals is
lowered, people will take home more money and then:
 be motivated to work more hours,
 motivate unemployed people to go back to work,
 delay retirement dates.
 All these can shift LRAS to the right
Lowering taxes on interest
income
 Supply-siders argue that if interest income is not taxed,
people will save more money, therefore increasing the
funds available for businesses to borrow which will
lead to greater capital expenditures and more output.
 The wealthy like this idea 
Lowering business taxes
 Supply-siders argue that cuts in business taxes lead to
increased spending on capital goods and more money
to spend on technology and research and development.
This should also lead to increased output
 Business owners like this idea 
Increasing labour market
flexibility
 Supply side economists argue that making the labour
markets more competitive will lead to increased levels
of aggregate supply.
 They point to several ways this can happen....
No more minimum wage!
 Supply-siders argue that if minimum wage was
eliminated, wage rates would fall to the equilibrium
level, companies would hire more workers at the lower
rate, company profits would increase, which would
then lead to increased investment on capital goods, and
long-term economic growth
 Whaddya think?
Down with Unions!
 Supply-siders argue that unions keep wage rates above
the equilibrium rate, having the same detrimental
effects on the economy as minimum wage. Less union
labour would mean lower wage rates, more workers
employed, greater business profits, and long-term
economic growth
 Whaddya think?
Reducing unemployment
benefits
 Supply-siders argue that unemployment benefits are
too generous and discourage people from looking for
work. If we reduce unemployment benefits, lazy
people will get motivated to work, find jobs, and
increase the level of output in the economy.
 Whaddya think?
Reduce job security
 Supply-siders argue that job security for workers makes
them lazy and unproductive. Put a little fear into a
worker and he/she will work harder, it will be easier to
fire unproductive workers, and economic output will
result
 Whaddya think?
Liberalizing international trade
 Supply-siders argue that increased global trade and
capital flows increase competition and improve
allocation of resources.
 We'll talk more about this later in the course, but it is a
key point of supply-side economic policy
Interventionist supply-side
policies
 Market oriented supply-side policies argue that if
markets are free, efficiencies will result. Supply-siders
also argue for some government intervention to affect
the aspects of the economy that the market itself will
not act upon.
 Such as.....?
Training and Education
 Improvements in training and education lead to more
productive workers. Improving the quality of our
factors of production is one way towards achieving
economic growth, right?
 Hard to argue with that one isn't it?
Improved Health Care
 Healthier workers are more productive workers and
another improvement in our quality of factors of
production.
 Hard to argue with that one isn't it?
Research and Development
 R &amp; D leads to technological innovation and large
potential gains in economic growth. Tax incentives to
businesses in this area, as well as patent protection for
inventions are all supported by supply-sider economists
 Hard to argue with that one too isn't it?
Support for infant industries
 Supply-siders argue for the support of small, growing
firms through tax breaks, grants, subsidies and other
programs.
 Small companies can become giants very quickly, right
Mr. Google?
Infrastructure
 Investments in infrastructure such as roads, airports
and telecommunications can increase efficiencies in
production as costs are lowered.
 Hard to argue with that one isn't it?
Other interventionist policies
 Provision of job information
 Support for adolescent industries
 All of the above interventionist policies are known as
industrial policies because they are designed to support the
industrial sector of the economy and shift LRAS to the
right. These might not be provided by the free market so
government must be involved.
Criticism of interventionist
policies
 Some argue that any government involvement in the market
is likely to do more harm than good.
 Others argue that using government tax money to support
industries could be more wisely used elsewhere, and
requires a higher level of taxation that they would like.
 So what say you, are there any supply-siders in the room?
Me neither!

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Supply-Side Economics Objectives of supply-side policies  These policies focus on shifting LRAS to the right in order to achieve long-term economic growth  There are two major types of supply-side policies that we will discuss today Market-oriented supply-side policies  Based on the neo-classical point of view, economists in the early 1980s argued that growth in real GDP depended on the supply-side of the economy as opposed to the demand-side.

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Milton Friedman's involvement with the brutal Pinochet dictatorship

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Nancy Fraser - neoliberalism ending? Rise of Trump, brexit?

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Nancy Fraser - neoliberalism ending? Rise of Trump, brexit?

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The End of Progressive Neoliberalism - Dissent Magazine

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In a moment of political upheaval, it is up to the left to reject the false choices on offer and seize upon widespread discontent to redefine the terms of debate.

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Theory Buzz Podcast Hosts Wendy Brown: In the Ruins of Neoliberalism

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In her new book Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism's Stealth Revolution, Brown warns that Neoliberalism has created a form of reasoning in which human beings are reduced to their economic value and activity, and in which all fields of human activity are treated as markets and institutions, including the state, are increasingly run as if they were corporations. This logic is even applied to activities with no connection to wealth creation, such as education, dating, or physical exercise, which are increasingly governed according to market rules. People are treated in this schema, as units of human capital who must constantly tend to their own present and future value.

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In her new book Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism's Stealth Revolution , Brown warns that Neoliberalism has created a form of reasoning in which human beings are reduced to their economic value and activity, and in which all fields of human activity are treated as markets and institutions, including the state, are increasingly run as if they were corporations.

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World needs to move away from neoliberal model, says President

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Listen to this episode from Inside Politics on Spotify. Neoliberalism means different things to different people. As a set of economic policies it is mainly associated with reducing state intervention in commerce and society. In the course of its late 20th century heyday, neoliberalism transformed the world - for better or worse.

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There is no place in the world where all residents share the same level of prosperity, or where this prosperity has been achieved in a sustainable or just manner. Therefore, the question is what kind of prosperity is achievable for citizens around the world without destroying the environment and harming the prospects for a decent life of fellow men and future generations?
In this essay I will look for an answer. The doughnut principle proposed by Kate Raworth (on the photo above) is a promising starting-point, hence the title chosen. I will try to avoid the hypocrisy of a well-fed Western man who advocates a reduction in consumption for sustainability, because billions of people are hungry or poor and dream of some wealth. Moreover, they are not the main polluters.

The social origin of greenhouse gasses

The recent Oxfam report Extreme carbon inequality shows that the poorest half of the world population - around 3.5 billion people - is responsible for only 10% of total global emissions from individual consumption. About 50% of the emissions come from the richest 10% of people around the world. They have an average carbon footprint that is 11 times as high as that of the poorest half, and 60 times as high as that the poorest 10%. Even a 50% reduction in consumption by the top 10% and a doubling of consumption by the lower 50% would result in a worldwide decrease of consumption of about 15%.

Also, within all countries, the production of greenhouse gasses varies with income. The graph shows that the concept of rich countries is misleading. A small part of the population of most countries has affluent and still-growing opportunity to consume and to contribute to the production of greenhouse gasses; the majority of the population stays far behind.

Per capita consumption-related emissions in G20 countries

Economic growth remains a political and economic priority in almost all countries. Growth that is measured easily by adding up the total amount of financial resources that is spent from year to year. Mainstream economic thinking assumes that demand will always grow and that, in an effort to meet this demand, firms will deliver an increasing amount of goods and services, resulting in never-ending economic growth. In this vision, growth is the main goals of a successful economy and the measure of success.

As early as 1968, Robert Kennedy stated in a speech at Kansas University: Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder to sprawl. Fifty years later, the ecological and social effects of the dominant economic model are more visible than ever.
Wellbeing Economy Alliance
In 2017, the governments of Scotland, Costa Rica, Slovenia and New Zealand signed a new alliance, the Wellbeing Economy Alliance. Costa Rica is among the top three countries in the world for the well-being and happiness of their people. The government of New Zealand does no longer accept GNP as the supreme measure of progress: We need to make sure we are looking at people's ability to actually have a meaningful life, an enjoyable life, where their work is enough to survive and support their families, the prime-minister said.

A growing group of people is realizing that the world needs a kind of prosperity that satisfies the needs of the entire world population - now and in the future - and comes about in a socially and environmentally sustainable way.

The big question is what responsible prosperity and a society that is able to foster it look like. But first, we have to understand why this kind of society has never come closer.

The cursed trinity of economic growth, inequality and environmental decay

To start with the latter question, economic growth, the profit of companies and the value for shareholders, not to mention the annual increase in compensation of top managers, are exactly the circumstances that underlie most environmental and social problems in our world.

Wealth on one hand and poverty and environmental decay on the other are strongly connected. This view has been proclaimed by Marxists for years but new - less ideologically inspired - research using census data from 1980 to 2013 provides evidence that economic inequality and regional differences are intertwined. A study by Harvard alumnus Robert Manduca, The Contribution of National Income Inequality to Regional Economic Divergence shows that the growing regional differences within the US are largely a product of national economic inequality, in particular the outsized economic gains that have been captured by the 1% wealthiest people. This elite with its numerous connections with international business and politics is also the main ideological source behind the doctrine of endless growth. Its power has prevented adequate social and environmental policies for more than half a century, including the only measures that could have prevented global warming, namely the internalization of external costs and in particular carbon tax.

P olicy for responsible growth

Below, I summarize a number of insights regarding the conditions of responsible prosperity. Together, these insights enable the formulation of policy guidelines for countries, regions or towns.

In the first place, I mention the Sustainable Development Goals, a rather comprehensive list of targets, followed by the concept of a doughnut economy proposed by UK economic scientist Kate Raworth, to end with the Green New Deal in the US.

I could have included the principles of inclusive growth formulated by the World Economic Forum, the UN Millennial goals, the impressive film Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore, and I could have gone back to the Report of the Club of Rome or Rachel Carson's seminal book Silent Spring.

All of these approaches have in common that mastering environmental problems involves redistributing and redefining of the essence of prosperity.

The Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, all 193 members of the United Nations supported the 17 ambitious Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Each of these goals has been specified in indicators. The number of these indicators has grown to 232 since 2015.

At the same time, the Netherlands has started its own approach, based on the concept of brede welvaart, (broad prosperity), another alternative for gross national product. It has been decided to integrate the policy themes with respect to broad prosperity and the SDGs, which has resulted in a slight adaption of their number and formulation. Just like the SDGs, broad prosperity has many indicators, to do justice to the diversity of its facets.

A unique aspect of measuring broad prosperity - in comparison with the SDGs - is the distinction between prosperity "here and now", the pressure that the current level of prosperity puts on future generations ("later") or on other countries ("elsewhere"). A further distinction is made between absolute size, growth or decline in recent years and the position of the Netherlands in comparison with the EU28-countries.
Prosperity here and now
Regarding the "here and now" indicators, the Netherlands is at the forefront of five development goals: 'No poverty' (SDG 1); 'industry, innovation and infrastructure: knowledge and innovation' (SDG 9); 'reducing inequality: social cohesion and inequality' (SDG 10): 'peace, justice and strong public services: institutions' (SDG 16) and 'partnership to achieve objectives' (SDG 17). In contrast, on four other SDGs, the Netherlands is in the lower regions of the European ranking: 'Affordable and sustainable energy' (SDG 7); 'climate action' (SDG 13); 'life below water' (SDG 14) and 'life on land' (SDG 15).

The trend in the development of broad prosperity "here and now" is positive rather than negative. A positive trend dominates at 'the end of hunger' (SDG 2); 'gender equality' (SDG 5); 'clean water and sanitary' (SDG 6); 'fair work and economic growth: economy and production factors' (SDG 8) and 'industry, innovation and sustainable infrastructure: knowledge and innovation' (SDG 9). A falling trend occurs in 'good health and well-being' (SDG3); 'industry, innovation and infrastructure: mobility' (SDG9); 'reduction of inequality' (SDG 10); 'sustainable cities and communities: living' (SDG 11); and 'life on land' and 'life below water' (SDGs 14 and 15).
Prosperity elsewhere
With regard to the broad prosperity "elsewhere"; there are more negative than positive positions and trends. The total import of fossil energy and biomass in the Netherlands is steadily increasing and the import of metals and minerals has recently increased, with the exception of imports from the poorest countries. This trend is considered negative because of the reduction of the stocks elsewhere in the world.

The Netherlands is at the top when it comes to foreign aid, but in this respect, there is also a downward trend.
Prosperity later
The trend in the development of broad prosperity "later" is predominantly positive, except in the area of ​​natural capital (negative) and human capital (neutral). This falling trend with regard to natural capital reflects the low percentage of renewable energy and a relatively high CO2 emission.
Distribution of broad prosperity
Also interesting is the analysis of the distribution of broad prosperity. The degree of broad prosperity mainly comes with the level of education, not with wealth.

The aforementioned analysis by the Dutch Statistical Office provides a wealth of data concerning the hundreds of indicators. However, many indicators have different interpretations. For example, indicators such as the growth of expenses in health care and the number of hours worked in education do not directly indicate growing prosperity. This depends on whether the increased use of resources is actually bearing fruit. Consequently, the policy relevance of some SDG's is not immediately clear and leaves many political choices open. That is why we are diligently looking for standards with unambiguous implications for sustainable and social action.

The doughnut economy

The model for a doughnut economy has been developed by the British economist Kate Raworth in a report for Oxfam entitled A Safe and Just Space for Humanity. The idea quickly spread throughout the world. The essence is that social and environmental sustainability must be guiding principles for economic policy in the 21th century and together direct economic behavior. There is no triple bottom-line: social and environmental sustainability are in the lead, economy follows.

The idea behind ​​the doughnut model is simple. if you only look at the shape of a doughnut, you see two circles. A small circle in the middle and a large circle on the outside. The smallest circle represents the minimal social objectives (basic-needs) that apply to each country. The large circle represents the self-sustaining capacity of the planet. All societies must develop policies that stay between the two lines. Where economic behavior nowadays has far-reaching consequences that go beyond both lines, future economic policy must aim to make societies thrive between the lines.

The doughnot model

Below you can watch a short video in which Kate Raworth explains the model herself.

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Unlike the SDGs, the model is based on the coherence between economic policy, environmental and social issues. It assumes that our actions are interconnected. In many developed countries, positive outcomes with regards to the social basement are the direct results of the same economic growth that is responsible for overshooting the environmental ceiling. The main objective for each country is to achieve better living conditions between the social basement and the environmental ceiling, without assuming beforehand that economic growth is a necessary condition for this. The tables below show data about the current state regarding the social basement and the ecological ceiling. All targets mentioned have to be reached as quickly as possible. Due to significant differences between countries, in the extent to which each of these goals are achieved, policies can vary by country, region or city.

The social basement

Source: Kate Raworth Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist (appendix)

The nine elements of the ecological ceiling are based on research by a group of earth scientists led by Johan Rockström and Will Steffen and described in their book Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene

The ecological ceiling

Source: Johan Rockström and Will Steffen: Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene

The video below is a short lecture of Will Steffen about the nine elements of the ecological ceiling, threatened by human action.

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In spite of superficial correspondence between the SDG's and the doughnut model, there are differences. The SDG's can be compared with a dashboard with as many red and green lights as there are indicators. It is assumed that each light can separately be influenced by a slide switch. However, the color of the control lights is conditioned by interconnected (economic) processes: For instance, the green color of most social indicators in rich EU28 countries is a direct consequence of their powerful economies, that at the same time result in a dark-red color of environment-related indicators. The main added-value of the doughnut model is enabling a critical evaluation of any city's or country's policy to realize just sustainable prosperity.

What operating between the basement and the ceiling of the doughnut means for inhabitants of different types of countries, is the main topic for the next section. Before, I will introduce the most robust - albeit pragmatic - model, the Green New Deal, that does not need complicated calculations and is therefore easy to understand and ready for implementation.

The Green New Deal

It is already ten years ago, that the United nations called for a 'Global Green New Deal' in which developed countries would invest at least 1% of GDP on reducing carbon dependency, while developing economies should spend 1% of GDP on improving access to clean water and sanitation for the poor as well as strengthening social safety nets. in 2012 and 2016 Green Party candidate Jill Stein ran - in vain - for presidency of the US on a "Green New Deal". In 2018, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, supported by senator Ed Markey, adopted the term during her successful campaign for the House of Representatives.

In recent days, US lawmakers including Senators Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, and Kirsten Gillibrand have voiced support for some form of Green New Deal, and New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo, has sketched out a Green New Deal for his state as part of his budget proposal.

Many candidates for the presidential elections in the US come with plans of their own, voters' support is unexpecting high(see graph) and in several states in the US, for instance New York, California and Minnesota bills are passing that mirror the Green New Deal's principles.

Support for the Green New Deal among registered voters

The Green New Deal's goal is achieving net-zero carbon emissions in the next decade and creating millions of high-paying jobs in order to develop the necessary infrastructure and to reduce the number of poor, work- or homeless people correspondingly. In addition, the Green New Deal includes protection against monopolies, investments in public transport, access to affordable housing and healthy food, and justice for the historically marginalized people in the transition to a new economy.

The Green New Deal pretends to address four systemic national crises: skyrocketing inequality, deepening structural racism, catastrophic climate change, and the takeover of American democracy by the ultra-rich and corporations.
Towards a Global Green New Deal
For more than ten years, C40 has been promoting climate action in more than 65 cities. Recently, this alliance of big cities went one step further - initiated by Anne Hidalgo (mayor of Paris) and Eric Garcetty (mayor of Los Angeles) - and started the Global New Green Deal to connect ecological and social action, where national governments stay behind. It is founded on four principles:

1. Recognition of the global climate change emergency.

2. Commitment to keep global heating below the 1.5°C target by reducing emissions in the sectors that make the largest contribution: transportation, industry, buildings, and waste.

3. Commitment to a fundamental, and irreversible transfer of global resources away from fossil fuels. 4. Intention to cooperate with those who will drive change and whose lives are affected by climate-change, including companies, governments, investors, employees, civil society, citizens, youth, and communities disproportionately impacted by climate change and poverty.

The Green New Deal proposals lacks the theoretical foundation of the donut principle, but both work in the same direction. The New Green Deal could get a boost in the upcoming presidential elections in the US. In the longer term, a more detailed model is needed and the donut principle is better suited for this.

Prosperity within limits

Cities bear a great deal of responsibility as they are focal points of economic activity, provide jobs and produce most that is needed for a decent life of citizens. In their territory most investments will take place that are needed to become socially and environmentally sustainable.

Taking the doughnut principle as a point of depart, economic activities that overshoot the ecological ceiling or do not comply with the social basement need to be redesigned, or new sustainable and just activities have to be developed.

Redesign of economic activities

The actions below mirror the before mentioned lists of policy actions to prevent overshooting the ecological ceiling and to comply with the social basement, albeit adapted to the capabilities of developed countries. The time horizon is 25 years.

Prevention of overshooting the ecological ceiling:

Reduction to zero of greenhouse gas emissions by the combined use of solar, wind and thermal energy. Hydrogen, salt, batteries, and warm water reservoirs are used for storage.

Local plants are clean; toxic or otherwise dangerous emissions are prevented or temporarily sequestered in order to maintain clean air.

Support of local farmers to restructure their operations in order to regenerate soils, increase biodiversity and contribute significantly to the local food supply. The selling of their products is boosted by substantial tax advantages for certificated products.

Reduction of traffic - that is fully electric - by reconstructing cities in order to limit displacements.

Realizing full circularity; the import of raw materials is stalled, with the (temporal) exception of indispensable components of batteries.

The use of nitrogen is limited until an acceptable level of emissions in the air or in the groundwater is reached.

Construction of reservoirs for drinking water and water for agricultural applications to balance water extraction and supply of water.

Complying with the social basement

Rebalancing material rewards and job satisfaction, for instance by substantial reduction of income inequality.

Compulsory education from 2 - 18, in combination with internships in companies and institutions.

Tax benefits for B-certified companies (companies for which societal interests are leading).

Local government, companies and institutions work together to offer all adults engaging and challenging jobs with salaries that enable a decent and independent life.

All salaries are negotiated by work councils or in collective labor agreements. Differences in salary levels are motivated; gender specific differences are prohibited.

Prices of (imported) products that damage health or the environment (or both) are listed and substantially taxed.

Prison sentence is aimed at returning to society. However, the duration of imprisonment depends on the time needed to eliminate the risk of recidivism, allowing citizens to live without fear.

The cost of health care and assurance depends on obtaining certificates for a healthy life and preventing lifestyle related illnesses such as being overweight.

Citizens can vote directly in matters related to their immediate living environment.

Decent housing for all adults, and adequate housing for students, situated in an attractive and safe living environment.

The presence of opportunities and support for commoning and place-making.

A new global oriented-mindset

A future of responsible prosperity requires a new mindset, including the meaning of the concept of prosperity itself. To give a few examples: zero greenhouse gas emissions does not only require replacing carbon energy sources with wind, sun and earth, but also new consumption patterns. Meat becomes a delicacy, to be consumed accordingly. Circular production requires a more efficient use of goods, higher prices, superior quality, the repair of broken devises instead of their replacement, and a less fashion-dependent design. With respect to the traditional yardstick of prosperity, a stable GDP, rather than a growing one is probably the highest conceivable goal, if it should be a goal at all. Wages below modal will rise considerably, wages above modal will decrease, the highest 10% in particular.

If we consider the world as a whole, the policy implications are even more dramatic. A considerable part of the world population still lives below the social basement. The population of these countries is growing fast and is concentrated in cities characterized by heavy pollution, traffic jams, dirty industries, poor housing, sanitation and water supply and increasing insecurity and inequality.

In these countries, growth of GDP, the production of goods and services, and the domestic markets as well are necessary for at least one decade. In combination with policies to control population growth and pollution, to use renewable resources and to improve the infrastructure; public transportation, water supply, housing and sanitation in the first place.

The transition to circularity is virtually impossible in the short term, as the volume of raw materials required will exceed the availability of reusable materials for years.

Where (city) governments in developed countries can focus on a transition from traditional growth towards sustainable prosperity immediately, (city) government in developing countries must simultaneously manage a decade of 'traditional' economic growth and a transition to sustainable prosperity.

How to become a doughnut city?

Below I sketch a couple of ideas for actions, initiated by city governments to encourage the process of becoming a doughnut city.

Amsterdam and the doughnut-economy

The above example represents a first step. Determining the critical values ​​to comply with the social basement and to prevent overshooting the ecological ceiling, like I proposed above, is an essential next step to be followed by measuring actual values ​​and bridging a possible gap with the targets. ​

The power of city governments is limited and therefore all stakeholders together - citizens, companies, institutions and national government - must take the road to a donut city as the Amsterdam case emphasizes. Cooperation can start with a charter to disclose the shared principles and subsequent actions by all parties.

The government must put pressure on companies to reconsider their relationship with society. The company's incentive structure - maximizing profit and shareholder value and continuous growth - is not compatible with the donut principle. A growing group of social enterprises (benefit companies) has already taken this step and focuses on social goals and considers financial goals as instruments to ensure continuity.
We Mean Business
We mean Business is a global coalition of the world's most influential businesses to act on climate change. 87 major companies - with a combined market capitalization of over US$2.3 trillion and annual direct emissions equivalent to 73 coal-fired power plants - intend to align their businesses with what scientists say is needed to limit the worst impacts of climate change. Of the 87 companies, the following already have verified a 1.5°C reduction target with respect to greenhouse gas emissions from their operations: AstraZeneca, BT, Burberry Limited, Deutsche Telekom AG, Dexus, Elopak, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Intuit, Levi Strauss & Co., SAP, Schneider Electric, Signify, Sodexo, The Co-operative Group and Unilever and recently Royal DSM.

The impact of the transition to environmental and social sustainability is illustrated in a series of articles in Fast Company Compass. Apparel and fashion, for instance, have to change considerably to align with the doughnut principle. In the first place because the low prices for clothing are connected with low wages and dangerous and dirty working conditions elsewhere in the world. In the second place because dyeing of cotton is a major burden on the environment. The movie 'The True Cost', available on Netflix shows this in a penetrating way. The official trailer can be seen below:

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Still, a new report Managing the Impacts of Climate Change 2019, published by Zurich Insurance Group concludes that the business sector as a whole appears to be lacking in ambition as far as climate change is concerned.

Ecovillages

Responsible prosperity and the humane city

One of the lessons of this essay is that becoming a humane city does not depend on the value (red light - green light) of individual indicators apart, but is a result of their interaction.

This essay therefore elaborated on the interaction between characteristics of ecosystem and society, such as the availability of food, drinking water, housing and material welfare.

The doughnut principle emphasized that these values are interchangeable only to a certain extent, and that freedom of choice is limited by the necessity to comply with both the ecological ceiling and a social basement. This means that the effects of the production and consumption of goods and services must remain between these lines.

Another insight from this essay is that operating between the lines is contextual. Temporary overshooting the ecological ceiling seems inevitable in developing countries in favor of economic growth to correct serious social deficiencies.

In the introduction of the series on the development of humane cities of which this essay is a part, I have positioned each the articles in three groups of competing principles: sustainability, social justice and quality of life. I wrote choices must be made within each of these principles and the three principles as a whole must be in balance. In other words, there are more doughnuts to deal with in search for the humane city and each of the articles will look for its own one. Ultimately, the picture will be fairly complete. The value of the doughnut principle is in evoking discussion about conflicting principles - from the search for optimal choices to the definition of upper and lower limits that should not be exceeded. But also, that there is room to make choices: the dough of the doughnut. Below, I summarize how the desire to become a humane city and the principle of a responsibly prospering city (briefly referred to as the doughnut city) can reinforce eachother.

Actions to align the principle of responsible prosperity and the development of humane cities

1. Becoming a humane city means looking for a balance between sustainability, social justice and quality of life. These principles are versatile and parts of them are at odds with eachother. Before an optimum is determined, the lower and upper limits must be established. Good health, for example, cannot compensate for global warming.

2. Responsible prosperity is a useful concept to describe differences between countries, regions and cities. In its most simplified form, it is about dividing an agreed value for 'good things' (income, care, education et cetera) by a value for 'bad things' (income inequality, insecurity, pollution, extinction of species, global heating etcetera).

3. Full application of the doughnut-principle requires the establishment of an ecological ceiling and a social basement at global, national and regional level. Establishing national and regional values is urgent given the necessity to differentiate between developing, emerging and developed countries.

4. It is a widespread misconception to view economic growth as the goal of economic action. This concept had better disappear from our language. Instead, the purpose of economic action is to make nations, regions, and cities thrive in a responsible manner.

5. As money has become a value in itself, the intrinsic value of work was suppressed by extrinsic motivation, namely making money. An unemployed income therefore is a bad idea and must be replaced by creating sufficient opportunities for meaningful and sufficiently paid work for everyone.

6. The definition of standards related to the ecological ceiling ('sustainability') is mainly based on current scientific research. The definition of the social basement (standards regarding social justice and quality of life) are scientifically informed human choices.

7. Setting specific goals for different parts of the world with regard to the ecological ceiling and the social basement is an act of governance.

This article was brought to you by Professor Herman van den Bosch, Professor at Open University of The Netherlands.

Photo at top: Kate Raworth explains the doughnut-principle - Photo: Amsterdam municipality.

There is no place in the world where all residents share the same level of prosperity, or where this prosperity has been achieved in a sustainable or just manner. Therefore, the question is what kind of prosperity is achievable for citizens around the world without destroying the environment and harming the prospects for a decent life of fellow men and future generations?
In this essay I will look for an answer. The doughnut principle proposed by Kate Raworth (on the photo above) is a promising starting-point, hence the title chosen. I will try to avoid the hypocrisy of a well-fed Western man who advocates a reduction in consumption for sustainability, because billions of people are hungry or poor and dream of some wealth. Moreover, they are not the main polluters.

The social origin of greenhouse gasses

The recent Oxfam report Extreme carbon inequality shows that the poorest half of the world population - around 3.5 billion people - is responsible for only 10% of total global emissions from individual consumption. About 50% of the emissions come from the richest 10% of people around the world. They have an average carbon footprint that is 11 times as high as that of the poorest half, and 60 times as high as that the poorest 10%. Even a 50% reduction in consumption by the top 10% and a doubling of consumption by the lower 50% would result in a worldwide decrease of consumption of about 15%.

Doughnut cities is the seventh edition in a series of essays on how cities can become more humane. That means finding a balance between sustainability, social justice and quality of life. This requires far-reaching choices. Once these choices have been made, it goes without saying that we use smart technologies to realize them.

The essays that have already been published can be found here.

Also, within all countries, the production of greenhouse gasses varies with income. The graph shows that the concept of rich countries is misleading. A small part of the population of most countries has affluent and still-growing opportunity to consume and to contribute to the production of greenhouse gasses; the majority of the population stays far behind.

Per capita consumption-related emissions in G20 countries

Economic growth remains a political and economic priority in almost all countries. Growth that is measured easily by adding up the total amount of financial resources that is spent from year to year. Mainstream economic thinking assumes that demand will always grow and that, in an effort to meet this demand, firms will deliver an increasing amount of goods and services, resulting in never-ending economic growth. In this vision, growth is the main goals of a successful economy and the measure of success.

As early as 1968, Robert Kennedy stated in a speech at Kansas University: Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder to sprawl. Fifty years later, the ecological and social effects of the dominant economic model are more visible than ever.
Wellbeing Economy Alliance
In 2017, the governments of Scotland, Costa Rica, Slovenia and New Zealand signed a new alliance, the Wellbeing Economy Alliance. Costa Rica is among the top three countries in the world for the well-being and happiness of their people. The government of New Zealand does no longer accept GNP as the supreme measure of progress: We need to make sure we are looking at people's ability to actually have a meaningful life, an enjoyable life, where their work is enough to survive and support their families, the prime-minister said.

A growing group of people is realizing that the world needs a kind of prosperity that satisfies the needs of the entire world population - now and in the future - and comes about in a socially and environmentally sustainable way.

The big question is what responsible prosperity and a society that is able to foster it look like. But first, we have to understand why this kind of society has never come closer.

The cursed trinity of economic growth, inequality and environmental decay

To start with the latter question, economic growth, the profit of companies and the value for shareholders, not to mention the annual increase in compensation of top managers, are exactly the circumstances that underlie most environmental and social problems in our world.

Wealth on one hand and poverty and environmental decay on the other are strongly connected. This view has been proclaimed by Marxists for years but new - less ideologically inspired - research using census data from 1980 to 2013 provides evidence that economic inequality and regional differences are intertwined. A study by Harvard alumnus Robert Manduca, The Contribution of National Income Inequality to Regional Economic Divergence shows that the growing regional differences within the US are largely a product of national economic inequality, in particular the outsized economic gains that have been captured by the 1% wealthiest people. This elite with its numerous connections with international business and politics is also the main ideological source behind the doctrine of endless growth. Its power has prevented adequate social and environmental policies for more than half a century, including the only measures that could have prevented global warming, namely the internalization of external costs and in particular carbon tax.

P olicy for responsible growth

Below, I summarize a number of insights regarding the conditions of responsible prosperity. Together, these insights enable the formulation of policy guidelines for countries, regions or towns.

In the first place, I mention the Sustainable Development Goals, a rather comprehensive list of targets, followed by the concept of a doughnut economy proposed by UK economic scientist Kate Raworth, to end with the Green New Deal in the US.

I could have included the principles of inclusive growth formulated by the World Economic Forum, the UN Millennial goals, the impressive film Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore, and I could have gone back to the Report of the Club of Rome or Rachel Carson's seminal book Silent Spring.

All of these approaches have in common that mastering environmental problems involves redistributing and redefining of the essence of prosperity.

The Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, all 193 members of the United Nations supported the 17 ambitious Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Each of these goals has been specified in indicators. The number of these indicators has grown to 232 since 2015.

At the same time, the Netherlands has started its own approach, based on the concept of brede welvaart, (broad prosperity), another alternative for gross national product. It has been decided to integrate the policy themes with respect to broad prosperity and the SDGs, which has resulted in a slight adaption of their number and formulation. Just like the SDGs, broad prosperity has many indicators, to do justice to the diversity of its facets.

A unique aspect of measuring broad prosperity - in comparison with the SDGs - is the distinction between prosperity "here and now", the pressure that the current level of prosperity puts on future generations ("later") or on other countries ("elsewhere"). A further distinction is made between absolute size, growth or decline in recent years and the position of the Netherlands in comparison with the EU28-countries.
Prosperity here and now
Regarding the "here and now" indicators, the Netherlands is at the forefront of five development goals: 'No poverty' (SDG 1); 'industry, innovation and infrastructure: knowledge and innovation' (SDG 9); 'reducing inequality: social cohesion and inequality' (SDG 10): 'peace, justice and strong public services: institutions' (SDG 16) and 'partnership to achieve objectives' (SDG 17). In contrast, on four other SDGs, the Netherlands is in the lower regions of the European ranking: 'Affordable and sustainable energy' (SDG 7); 'climate action' (SDG 13); 'life below water' (SDG 14) and 'life on land' (SDG 15).

The trend in the development of broad prosperity "here and now" is positive rather than negative. A positive trend dominates at 'the end of hunger' (SDG 2); 'gender equality' (SDG 5); 'clean water and sanitary' (SDG 6); 'fair work and economic growth: economy and production factors' (SDG 8) and 'industry, innovation and sustainable infrastructure: knowledge and innovation' (SDG 9). A falling trend occurs in 'good health and well-being' (SDG3); 'industry, innovation and infrastructure: mobility' (SDG9); 'reduction of inequality' (SDG 10); 'sustainable cities and communities: living' (SDG 11); and 'life on land' and 'life below water' (SDGs 14 and 15).
Prosperity elsewhere
With regard to the broad prosperity "elsewhere"; there are more negative than positive positions and trends. The total import of fossil energy and biomass in the Netherlands is steadily increasing and the import of metals and minerals has recently increased, with the exception of imports from the poorest countries. This trend is considered negative because of the reduction of the stocks elsewhere in the world.

The Netherlands is at the top when it comes to foreign aid, but in this respect, there is also a downward trend.
Prosperity later
The trend in the development of broad prosperity "later" is predominantly positive, except in the area of ​​natural capital (negative) and human capital (neutral). This falling trend with regard to natural capital reflects the low percentage of renewable energy and a relatively high CO2 emission.
Distribution of broad prosperity
Also interesting is the analysis of the distribution of broad prosperity. The degree of broad prosperity mainly comes with the level of education, not with wealth.

The aforementioned analysis by the Dutch Statistical Office provides a wealth of data concerning the hundreds of indicators. However, many indicators have different interpretations. For example, indicators such as the growth of expenses in health care and the number of hours worked in education do not directly indicate growing prosperity. This depends on whether the increased use of resources is actually bearing fruit. Consequently, the policy relevance of some SDG's is not immediately clear and leaves many political choices open. That is why we are diligently looking for standards with unambiguous implications for sustainable and social action.

The doughnut economy

The model for a doughnut economy has been developed by the British economist Kate Raworth in a report for Oxfam entitled A Safe and Just Space for Humanity. The idea quickly spread throughout the world. The essence is that social and environmental sustainability must be guiding principles for economic policy in the 21th century and together direct economic behavior. There is no triple bottom-line: social and environmental sustainability are in the lead, economy follows.

The idea behind ​​the doughnut model is simple. if you only look at the shape of a doughnut, you see two circles. A small circle in the middle and a large circle on the outside. The smallest circle represents the minimal social objectives (basic-needs) that apply to each country. The large circle represents the self-sustaining capacity of the planet. All societies must develop policies that stay between the two lines. Where economic behavior nowadays has far-reaching consequences that go beyond both lines, future economic policy must aim to make societies thrive between the lines.

The doughnot model

Below you can watch a short video in which Kate Raworth explains the model herself.

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Unlike the SDGs, the model is based on the coherence between economic policy, environmental and social issues. It assumes that our actions are interconnected. In many developed countries, positive outcomes with regards to the social basement are the direct results of the same economic growth that is responsible for overshooting the environmental ceiling. The main objective for each country is to achieve better living conditions between the social basement and the environmental ceiling, without assuming beforehand that economic growth is a necessary condition for this. The tables below show data about the current state regarding the social basement and the ecological ceiling. All targets mentioned have to be reached as quickly as possible. Due to significant differences between countries, in the extent to which each of these goals are achieved, policies can vary by country, region or city.

The social basement

Source: Kate Raworth Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist (appendix)

The nine elements of the ecological ceiling are based on research by a group of earth scientists led by Johan Rockström and Will Steffen and described in their book Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene

The ecological ceiling

Source: Johan Rockström and Will Steffen: Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene

The video below is a short lecture of Will Steffen about the nine elements of the ecological ceiling, threatened by human action.

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In spite of superficial correspondence between the SDG's and the doughnut model, there are differences. The SDG's can be compared with a dashboard with as many red and green lights as there are indicators. It is assumed that each light can separately be influenced by a slide switch. However, the color of the control lights is conditioned by interconnected (economic) processes: For instance, the green color of most social indicators in rich EU28 countries is a direct consequence of their powerful economies, that at the same time result in a dark-red color of environment-related indicators. The main added-value of the doughnut model is enabling a critical evaluation of any city's or country's policy to realize just sustainable prosperity.

What operating between the basement and the ceiling of the doughnut means for inhabitants of different types of countries, is the main topic for the next section. Before, I will introduce the most robust - albeit pragmatic - model, the Green New Deal, that does not need complicated calculations and is therefore easy to understand and ready for implementation.

The Green New Deal

It is already ten years ago, that the United nations called for a 'Global Green New Deal' in which developed countries would invest at least 1% of GDP on reducing carbon dependency, while developing economies should spend 1% of GDP on improving access to clean water and sanitation for the poor as well as strengthening social safety nets. in 2012 and 2016 Green Party candidate Jill Stein ran - in vain - for presidency of the US on a "Green New Deal". In 2018, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, supported by senator Ed Markey, adopted the term during her successful campaign for the House of Representatives.

In recent days, US lawmakers including Senators Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, and Kirsten Gillibrand have voiced support for some form of Green New Deal, and New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo, has sketched out a Green New Deal for his state as part of his budget proposal.

Many candidates for the presidential elections in the US come with plans of their own, voters' support is unexpecting high(see graph) and in several states in the US, for instance New York, California and Minnesota bills are passing that mirror the Green New Deal's principles.

Support for the Green New Deal among registered voters

The Green New Deal's goal is achieving net-zero carbon emissions in the next decade and creating millions of high-paying jobs in order to develop the necessary infrastructure and to reduce the number of poor, work- or homeless people correspondingly. In addition, the Green New Deal includes protection against monopolies, investments in public transport, access to affordable housing and healthy food, and justice for the historically marginalized people in the transition to a new economy.

The Green New Deal pretends to address four systemic national crises: skyrocketing inequality, deepening structural racism, catastrophic climate change, and the takeover of American democracy by the ultra-rich and corporations.
Towards a Global Green New Deal
For more than ten years, C40 has been promoting climate action in more than 65 cities. Recently, this alliance of big cities went one step further - initiated by Anne Hidalgo (mayor of Paris) and Eric Garcetty (mayor of Los Angeles) - and started the Global New Green Deal to connect ecological and social action, where national governments stay behind. It is founded on four principles:

1. Recognition of the global climate change emergency.

2. Commitment to keep global heating below the 1.5°C target by reducing emissions in the sectors that make the largest contribution: transportation, industry, buildings, and waste.

3. Commitment to a fundamental, and irreversible transfer of global resources away from fossil fuels. 4. Intention to cooperate with those who will drive change and whose lives are affected by climate-change, including companies, governments, investors, employees, civil society, citizens, youth, and communities disproportionately impacted by climate change and poverty.

The Green New Deal proposals lacks the theoretical foundation of the donut principle, but both work in the same direction. The New Green Deal could get a boost in the upcoming presidential elections in the US. In the longer term, a more detailed model is needed and the donut principle is better suited for this.

Prosperity within limits

Cities bear a great deal of responsibility as they are focal points of economic activity, provide jobs and produce most that is needed for a decent life of citizens. In their territory most investments will take place that are needed to become socially and environmentally sustainable.

Taking the doughnut principle as a point of depart, economic activities that overshoot the ecological ceiling or do not comply with the social basement need to be redesigned, or new sustainable and just activities have to be developed.

Redesign of economic activities

The actions below mirror the before mentioned lists of policy actions to prevent overshooting the ecological ceiling and to comply with the social basement, albeit adapted to the capabilities of developed countries. The time horizon is 25 years.

Prevention of overshooting the ecological ceiling:

Reduction to zero of greenhouse gas emissions by the combined use of solar, wind and thermal energy. Hydrogen, salt, batteries, and warm water reservoirs are used for storage.

Local plants are clean; toxic or otherwise dangerous emissions are prevented or temporarily sequestered in order to maintain clean air.

Support of local farmers to restructure their operations in order to regenerate soils, increase biodiversity and contribute significantly to the local food supply. The selling of their products is boosted by substantial tax advantages for certificated products.

Reduction of traffic - that is fully electric - by reconstructing cities in order to limit displacements.

Realizing full circularity; the import of raw materials is stalled, with the (temporal) exception of indispensable components of batteries.

The use of nitrogen is limited until an acceptable level of emissions in the air or in the groundwater is reached.

Construction of reservoirs for drinking water and water for agricultural applications to balance water extraction and supply of water.

Complying with the social basement

Rebalancing material rewards and job satisfaction, for instance by substantial reduction of income inequality.

Compulsory education from 2 - 18, in combination with internships in companies and institutions.

Tax benefits for B-certified companies (companies for which societal interests are leading).

Local government, companies and institutions work together to offer all adults engaging and challenging jobs with salaries that enable a decent and independent life.

All salaries are negotiated by work councils or in collective labor agreements. Differences in salary levels are motivated; gender specific differences are prohibited.

Prices of (imported) products that damage health or the environment (or both) are listed and substantially taxed.

Prison sentence is aimed at returning to society. However, the duration of imprisonment depends on the time needed to eliminate the risk of recidivism, allowing citizens to live without fear.

The cost of health care and assurance depends on obtaining certificates for a healthy life and preventing lifestyle related illnesses such as being overweight.

Citizens can vote directly in matters related to their immediate living environment.

Decent housing for all adults, and adequate housing for students, situated in an attractive and safe living environment.

The presence of opportunities and support for commoning and place-making.

A new global oriented-mindset

A future of responsible prosperity requires a new mindset, including the meaning of the concept of prosperity itself. To give a few examples: zero greenhouse gas emissions does not only require replacing carbon energy sources with wind, sun and earth, but also new consumption patterns. Meat becomes a delicacy, to be consumed accordingly. Circular production requires a more efficient use of goods, higher prices, superior quality, the repair of broken devises instead of their replacement, and a less fashion-dependent design. With respect to the traditional yardstick of prosperity, a stable GDP, rather than a growing one is probably the highest conceivable goal, if it should be a goal at all. Wages below modal will rise considerably, wages above modal will decrease, the highest 10% in particular.

If we consider the world as a whole, the policy implications are even more dramatic. A considerable part of the world population still lives below the social basement. The population of these countries is growing fast and is concentrated in cities characterized by heavy pollution, traffic jams, dirty industries, poor housing, sanitation and water supply and increasing insecurity and inequality.

In these countries, growth of GDP, the production of goods and services, and the domestic markets as well are necessary for at least one decade. In combination with policies to control population growth and pollution, to use renewable resources and to improve the infrastructure; public transportation, water supply, housing and sanitation in the first place.

The transition to circularity is virtually impossible in the short term, as the volume of raw materials required will exceed the availability of reusable materials for years.

Where (city) governments in developed countries can focus on a transition from traditional growth towards sustainable prosperity immediately, (city) government in developing countries must simultaneously manage a decade of 'traditional' economic growth and a transition to sustainable prosperity.

How to become a doughnut city?

Below I sketch a couple of ideas for actions, initiated by city governments to encourage the process of becoming a doughnut city.

Amsterdam and the doughnut-economy
The city of Amsterdam works together with Kate Raworth to develop a doughnut model for the city. Moreover, she was recently appointed as a professor in the Amsterdam University of Applied Science.

The doughnut model was used as a powerful tool to create a strategy for Circular Amsterdam. More than 50 officials from the city and region, together with more than 100 representatives from the construction, biomass and food and consumer goods sectors, jointly developed building blocks for policy to comply with the social basement and prevent overshooting the ecological ceiling in the donut model.

In four workshops, participants compared the current goals of the city with the donut model and outlined a coherent circular vision for the value chains mentioned. The outcome was a set of seventeen building blocks towards a holistic strategy for the city of Amsterdam, each of which has been elaborated thoroughly in the report Building blocks for the new strategy Amsterdam circular 2020-2025; directions for a thriving city within the planetary boundaries.

The above example represents a first step. Determining the critical values ​​to comply with the social basement and to prevent overshooting the ecological ceiling, like I proposed above, is an essential next step to be followed by measuring actual values ​​and bridging a possible gap with the targets. ​

The power of city governments is limited and therefore all stakeholders together - citizens, companies, institutions and national government - must take the road to a donut city as the Amsterdam case emphasizes. Cooperation can start with a charter to disclose the shared principles and subsequent actions by all parties.

The government must put pressure on companies to reconsider their relationship with society. The company's incentive structure - maximizing profit and shareholder value and continuous growth - is not compatible with the donut principle. A growing group of social enterprises (benefit companies) has already taken this step and focuses on social goals and considers financial goals as instruments to ensure continuity.
We Mean Business
We mean Business is a global coalition of the world's most influential businesses to act on climate change. 87 major companies - with a combined market capitalization of over US$2.3 trillion and annual direct emissions equivalent to 73 coal-fired power plants - intend to align their businesses with what scientists say is needed to limit the worst impacts of climate change. Of the 87 companies, the following already have verified a 1.5°C reduction target with respect to greenhouse gas emissions from their operations: AstraZeneca, BT, Burberry Limited, Deutsche Telekom AG, Dexus, Elopak, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Intuit, Levi Strauss & Co., SAP, Schneider Electric, Signify, Sodexo, The Co-operative Group and Unilever and recently Royal DSM.

The impact of the transition to environmental and social sustainability is illustrated in a series of articles in Fast Company Compass. Apparel and fashion, for instance, have to change considerably to align with the doughnut principle. In the first place because the low prices for clothing are connected with low wages and dangerous and dirty working conditions elsewhere in the world. In the second place because dyeing of cotton is a major burden on the environment. The movie 'The True Cost', available on Netflix shows this in a penetrating way. The official trailer can be seen below:

Content not available.
Please allow cookies by clicking Accept on the banner

Still, a new report Managing the Impacts of Climate Change 2019, published by Zurich Insurance Group concludes that the business sector as a whole appears to be lacking in ambition as far as climate change is concerned.

Ecovillages
The Global Ecovillage Network wants to move towards a world where citizens play a central role on the road to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The aim of Senegal is to create 14.000 ecovillages that are deliberately designed through locally owned, participatory processes to strengthen their economic, social and cultural identity. They must become a model for governments that want to adapt an effective approach to climate change, rural exodus and deforestation. Ecovillages are based on five principles of sustainability, that reflect the doughnut principle.
Picture: Participants in a Democratic Republic of Congo ecovillage design course - Photo: Global Ecovillage Network

Responsible prosperity and the humane city

One of the lessons of this essay is that becoming a humane city does not depend on the value (red light - green light) of individual indicators apart, but is a result of their interaction.

This essay therefore elaborated on the interaction between characteristics of ecosystem and society, such as the availability of food, drinking water, housing and material welfare.

The doughnut principle emphasized that these values are interchangeable only to a certain extent, and that freedom of choice is limited by the necessity to comply with both the ecological ceiling and a social basement. This means that the effects of the production and consumption of goods and services must remain between these lines.

Another insight from this essay is that operating between the lines is contextual. Temporary overshooting the ecological ceiling seems inevitable in developing countries in favor of economic growth to correct serious social deficiencies.

In the introduction of the series on the development of humane cities of which this essay is a part, I have positioned each the articles in three groups of competing principles: sustainability, social justice and quality of life. I wrote choices must be made within each of these principles and the three principles as a whole must be in balance. In other words, there are more doughnuts to deal with in search for the humane city and each of the articles will look for its own one. Ultimately, the picture will be fairly complete. The value of the doughnut principle is in evoking discussion about conflicting principles - from the search for optimal choices to the definition of upper and lower limits that should not be exceeded. But also, that there is room to make choices: the dough of the doughnut. Below, I summarize how the desire to become a humane city and the principle of a responsibly prospering city (briefly referred to as the doughnut city) can reinforce eachother.

Actions to align the principle of responsible prosperity and the development of humane cities

1. Becoming a humane city means looking for a balance between sustainability, social justice and quality of life. These principles are versatile and parts of them are at odds with eachother. Before an optimum is determined, the lower and upper limits must be established. Good health, for example, cannot compensate for global warming.

2. Responsible prosperity is a useful concept to describe differences between countries, regions and cities. In its most simplified form, it is about dividing an agreed value for 'good things' (income, care, education et cetera) by a value for 'bad things' (income inequality, insecurity, pollution, extinction of species, global heating etcetera).

3. Full application of the doughnut-principle requires the establishment of an ecological ceiling and a social basement at global, national and regional level. Establishing national and regional values is urgent given the necessity to differentiate between developing, emerging and developed countries.

4. It is a widespread misconception to view economic growth as the goal of economic action. This concept had better disappear from our language. Instead, the purpose of economic action is to make nations, regions, and cities thrive in a responsible manner.

5. As money has become a value in itself, the intrinsic value of work was suppressed by extrinsic motivation, namely making money. An unemployed income therefore is a bad idea and must be replaced by creating sufficient opportunities for meaningful and sufficiently paid work for everyone.

6. The definition of standards related to the ecological ceiling ('sustainability') is mainly based on current scientific research. The definition of the social basement (standards regarding social justice and quality of life) are scientifically informed human choices.

7. Setting specific goals for different parts of the world with regard to the ecological ceiling and the social basement is an act of governance.

This article was brought to you by Professor Herman van den Bosch, Professor at Open University of The Netherlands.

Photo at top: Kate Raworth explains the doughnut-principle - Photo: Amsterdam municipality.

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There is no place in the world where all residents share the same level of prosperity, or where this prosperity has been achieved in a sustainable or just manner. Therefore, the question is what kind of prosperity is achievable for citizens around the world without destroying the environment and harming the prospects for a decent life of fellow men and future generations?

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This is historical. For the first time since its original report in 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has talked about degrowth. The term is mentioned 15 times (plus 12 mentions in the bibliography) in the 3,675-page report of the second working group " Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability," which was released on February 28 th, 2022.

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What is the 'Beyond GDP' The Beyond GDP initiative is about developing indicators that are as clear and appealing as GDP, but more inclusive of environmental and social aspects of progress.This website updates on recent developments and ongoing work.

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What is the 'Beyond GDP' The Beyond GDP initiative is about developing indicators that are as clear and appealing as GDP, but more inclusive of environmental and social aspects of progress.This website updates on recent developments and ongoing work.

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The year is 1937 and National Bureau of Economic Research economist, Simon Kuznets, has just presented his report to the U.S. Congress, "National Income, 1929-35." The report contains his formulation for Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the idea of a single measure to capture all economic production from individuals, companies and government within the US. The calculation method described in the report is viewed as a giant leap forward especially in the context of The Great Depression - a time where the nation was at the mercy of economic forces that it understood poorly.

The invention of GDP was seen as yet another triumph by man over the chaos and complexity of the natural world. Its invention came within the same generation as two other equations now listed among the 17 Equations That Changed The Course Of History  - Einstein's equation describing relativity as well as the most important equation in quantum mechanics, Schrödinger's equation.

There was great optimism that the lessons and methods of physics and mathematics could be directly and easily applied to the social sciences. The result was a stunningly simple and elegant equation that many thought was all one needs to describe economic life: Y=C+I+G+(X-M). The equation still taught to undergrad economics students today.

Acceptance and efficacy
Seven short years after its introduction, GDP was made the global standard at the Bretton Woods Conference in New Hampshire.

Given the state of economic knowledge at the time and the resources he had to work with, we can rightfully conclude that Kuznets' GDP formulation was indeed a step in the right direction. When put to the test GDP does a decent job at predicting things we care about such as happiness or life expectancy - certainly better than the other tools Kuznets would've had access to in 1937. Looking at the graph below we can easily eyeball a strong correlation between self reported life satisfaction and per capita GDP by nation at a point in time.

But when you zoom in the evidence gets murky. For instance, it has been shown that US income per capita during the period 1974-2004 almost doubled yet the average level of happiness showed no appreciable upward trend. This puzzling finding is called the Easterlin Paradox and has been confirmed in similar studies in Europe.

One explanation which seeks to reconcile the Easterlin Paradox with data from the graph above states that the positive relationship between happiness and GDP per capita vanishes beyond a certain level of GDP per capita. Recent studies suggest countries with GDP per capita over $20,000 see a much less obvious link between GDP and happiness. To the extent that this theory is true it's easy to understand how GDP was so quickly accepted in the hand-to-mouth first half of the 20th century. It's also easy to understand how that now many nations are past the $20,000 per capita GDP level that there's such a groundswell of support to think beyond GDP.
Where it went wrong
The problem wasn't the introduction of an imperfect indicator (that is quite understandable) but rather the full throated support and unquestioned acceptance it received. Perhaps if world economic leaders would have heeded Kuznets' own warning about the measure he created we could have prevented what Joseph Stiglitz has referred to as the "fetishization of GDP." Even before Kuznets' testimony before the US Congress he was quoted as saying "The welfare of a nation can scarcely be inferred from a measurement of national income." Some 30 years later Kuznets said "Distinctions must be kept in mind between quantity and quality of growth, between its costs and return, and between the short and the long term. Goals for more growth should specify more growth of what and for what."

His sounding of the alarm fell on deaf ears, for it was around the same time that President Kennedy's advisor, Arthur Okun coined "Okuns Law" which further enshrined the "Gospel According To GDP." By the late 70's GDP was being calculated for over 100 countries. Each successive "law" built on top of GDP communicated a false scientific confidence which shut down the appetite for an inquiry into the efficacy of GDP as "the one and only" national economic account.

Had the economists of the era had more of a reverence for the scientific method rather than an unrepentant envy of physicists and mathematicians they could have incrementally built upon the pros of GDP while minimizing its cons. They could've realized that the positive relationship between per capita GDP and happiness breaks above a certain level and can even become negative. Economists could've factored in relatively easy to measure things such as crime statistics, income distribution and air quality to paint a fuller picture of national quality of life. This would have required us to make our elegant equation messy or maybe even make multiple equations... Oh, the horror!
A measure entrenched
The problem is not that we measure GDP, it's that it has become the de facto stand in for national well being and fails to consider other relevant factors. GDP has been positioned as a "1 of 1" when it's really "1 of many" factors that matter.

When China began calculating a new "green GDP" measure, which accounted for negative impacts of economic growth on the environment, they found that it would have lowered their 2004 GDP by 3 percentage points  - from 10% to 7%.

What would the equivalent adjustment look like for the US?

A better question would be what would the equivalent adjustment look like for China today? We don't know because the "green GDP" project was dropped by the Chinese government after pressure from regional and local proponents of economic growth. This blind adherence is what Joseph Stiglitz means when he refers to the "fetishization of GDP" and its exactly what Simon Kuznets was hoping to avoid when he introduced GDP as a national accounting method.
The point
It's understandable that an imperfect measure was introduced and became widespread. What's not acceptable is that this remains the case. Now that we fully understand the limitations of GDP we must not continue to hold it as the primary indicator of economic progress. If economists are to emulate and envy physicists we ought to strive to be more empirical and account for all factors. Practicing full cost accounting is inconvenient but it is what is required. Measures such as Genuine Progress Indicator and Gross National Happiness aren't perfect - they only approximate the full cost accounting that we seek, but like GDP in 1937 they are a giant leap over the status quo.

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The Case Against GDP, Made By Its Own Creator - Gross National Happiness USA

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The year is 1937 and National Bureau of Economic Research economist, Simon Kuznets, has just presented his report to the U.S. Congress, "National Income, 1929-35." The report contains his formulation for Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the idea of a single measure to capture all economic production from individuals, companies and government within the US.

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Ireland - ‘Moving from GDP to Wellbeing’ in National Budget - Wellbeing Economy Alliance

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Resource June 22, 2021 Case Study Case Study Wellbeing Policy Design 13631

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Doughnut Economics Action Lab - become a member

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Doughnut Economics Action Lab - become a member

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Turning the ideas of #DoughnutEconomics into action.

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This is by John Barry, Professor of Green Political Economy in Queens University Belfast

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‘Economics is for everyone’, argues legendary economist Ha-Joon Chang in our latest mind-blowing RSA Animate. This is the video economists don’t want you to see! Chang explains why every single person can and SHOULD get their head around basic economics. He pulls back the curtain on the often mystifying language of derivatives and quantitative easing, and explains how easily economic myths and assumptions become gospel. Arm yourself with some facts, and get involved in discussions about the fundamentals that underpin our day-to-day lives.

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This will really help to frame your thinking before we begin!

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Economic Man vs Humanity: a Puppet Rap Battle (from Doughnut Economics)

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Economic Man vs Humanity: a Puppet Rap Battle (from Doughnut Economics)

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It looks childish; it's anything but!

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Economic Man vs Humanity: a Puppet Rap Battle

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Upstream Podcast | Unlearn Everything you knew about Economics

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Upstream Podcast | Unlearn Everything you knew about Economics

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Upstream is a bold new podcast that Challenges traditional assumptions and makes conventional economists a little uneasy.

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‎The David McWilliams Podcast on Apple Podcasts

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The aim of this weekly podcast is to make economics easy, uncomplicated and accessible. With the world at a political, technological and financial tipping point, economics has never been so important to all of us and yet, it's made inaccessible and complicated by so many.I've always thought what is...

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In this episode we bring you the story of a pensioner robbed of his dream retirement and his fight for justice in multiple jurisidctions. Tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions don't just hurt us because they're places of impunity for the rich and for criminals. Quite ordinary people can get caught up in them too. And when things go bad, you may not get the help from regulators and law enforcement that you hope for. It is imperative that you are absolutely sure your Independent Financial Advisor is a fit and proper person.

Plus, we share the news of a great loss to Malawi and to the world of tax official Mr Alinafe Bonongwe, who was taken from us for doing his job bravely and in the public interest. You can read more about him here. May he rest in peace.

The Taxcast transcript is available here. (Some is automated and may not be 100% accurate)

Featuring:

Pensioner (un-named)

Rachel Etter-Phoya of the Tax Justice Network

Produced and hosted by Naomi Fowler of the Tax Justice Network

Taxcast special feature summary:

We know that so-called 'blue collar crime' tends to get all the attention. But white collar crime is seen as somehow more acceptable, less serious - they're men in suits after all (- well, they're usually men!) In this Taxcast episode, we hear the experiences of one pensioner's fight for justice, in multiple jurisdictions. Since there are various legal proceedings in process, and still to take place, we're going to call him our pensioner. Here's some of that story which he shares with us on the Taxcast:

Pensioner: "I was in the fortunate position of being able to retire relatively early and it had always been a long term ambition of ours to try and live permanently in the sunshine somewhere. We had always put in motion the process of emigrating to the States, we'd already bought a plot in Southwest Florida. So that was where it all started, and then talked to my UK accountant and said you know, what do I do now about pensions? And they said, well, you know, there are such things as these QROPS."

(QROPS is a special pension arrangement. It stands for Qualifying Recognised Overseas Pension Scheme.)

Pensioner: "Basically it's available to any overseas citizens who have worked and lived and have earned a pension in the UK, who then when they go back to their motherland, can transfer their UK pension into one of these QROPS. So, one of the things that came to light in the early stages when we were going through the process with an American lawyer to get our green card sorted, was we needed to be careful that we didn't get caught in the trap of being taxed in two separate jurisdictions. They were specialist immigration lawyers, he said, I do know that there are other Brits who have taken out QROPS because there's a double taxation treaty between the UK and the US with Malta. So he said, we've got quite a few of our green card holders who have got pensions based in Malta because of this double taxation treaty and he said you know, it seems to work fairly well."

Naomi: "If you're getting a sinking feeling at this point, as our pensioner says, hindsight is a great thing."

Pensioner: "So on the back of that, I did some Google research and this was in the early days of Malta having been granted status by HMRC"

Naomi: "HMRC is Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, the British tax authorities."

Pensioner: "and I think I'm right in saying that my pension provider was one of the first, or if not, the very first to be granted a licence by the MFSA to operate or administer a QROPS."

Naomi: "The MFSA is the Malta Financial Services Authority. Remember that, it'll come up later. Did you know at the time when you started this whole business, did you know much about Malta as a jurisdiction?" Pensioner: "No. Well, no. I mean, the, the ironic part is that when the subsidiary company was granted the MFSA licence, the MD of the parent company said, 'anybody that decides to come with us can rest assured that as Malta is a full member of the EU, they will be fully protected by EU law and consumer protection, and I thought, yeah, you know, safe as houses, aren't we?!" Naomi: "Very reassuring!"

Pensioner: "Yes! Because this was a new venture in Malta, they had set up a contract with the Maltese shell companies to have all the administration of the Maltese pension provider supplied by one of their subsidiary companies in the UK. They were a UK FCA-regulated company, so that bit you know, stacked up,except that, of course, when it all started to go belly up, it transpired that this service administrative company was not FCA-regulated at all. It was registered in the UK, but was un-regulated."

Naomi: "The FCA is the UK Financial Conduct Authority, the regulator for financial services. So, we've got two jurisdictions so far - Malta and the UK. Now enter Stage Right - the Independent Financial Advisor, the IFA:"

Pensioner: "I then obviously looked to see, try and find a pension advisor who was specialised in QROPS. Um, this name came up, did my research on that. He'd said at the outset that he was CII-qualified and he was FCA regulated, He claimed that had G60 advanced pension transfer qualifications, and the MD of the parent company in the UK, he'd been on various pension advisory boards, his CV you know, gold-plated in theory, as were the people involved in his Maltese company, you've got a former ambassador, who was a lawyer and specialised in financial services, so I, like the hundreds of others who eventually got sucked in, thought, well, this is the way to go. So anyway, the money got transferred and we moved to the States and so a policy was opened by my trustee company in Malta with one of the big insurers in the Isle of Man, all of whom assured me that they had done due diligence on my advisor. On paper, everything looked hunkydory."

Naomi: "So, now we've got Malta, the UK and the British Crown Dependency of the Isle of Man. And of course, the IFA, the Independent Financial Advisor:"

Pensioner: "My IFA assured me that the list of investments that he was going to put in my portfolio were all low risk, which I said, well, you know, I worked really hard to accumulate it, so I don't want to be speculating, so low risk is absolutely fine. He said, no, no, I assure you that everything will be low risk and this, that and the other."

Naomi: "So, our pensioner retires, and he starts living the dream in Florida. But only a year later the first 'low risk' investment in which his pension was invested went belly-up - that's now subject to legal proceedings involving the UK's Serious Fraud Office. That was soon followed by more of these supposedly 'low risk' investments going bad."

Pensioner: "Then there was another one and then another one and another one, and I started to ask my highly qualified IFA, you know, what was going on? And he said ah, don't worry about it. He said, all these are sound, it's just they've got cashflow problems - all sounded plausible, you know. And he said, you know, some of the funds are regulated by the Isle of Man FSA and so I said, okay. Anyway, I, I just had a gut feeling then that all was not as it should be and I started to ask pointed questions of my IFA and he was being ever more devious in the replies I was getting. Out of the blue he said, I am resigning as your IFA and I wish you luck, but I will not now enter into any further correspondence with you. And at this stage, you know, I was relying on him for information as to what was going on with the suspended funds. Well, I obviously went back to my QROPS provider in Malta and said, you know, what is going on? And I also, at the same time sent an email to the admin provider in the UK because at that stage they were still contracted to provide all the administration for the QROPS in Malta. So they both acknowledged and said, 'oh, you know, we're sorry to hear this, leave it with us.' And I did leave it with them and they're still dealing with it!"

Naomi: "Our pensioner turned detective. He discovered that his IFA - Independent Financial Advisor had been suspended by the Chartered Insurance Institute for quite some time."

Pensioner: "And the FCA meantime had also confirmed that the IFA had never been regulated by them either as an individual, the various companies which he had set up in various jurisdictions, none of which were regulated anywhere, some of which weren't even registered, he'd just made up a company name and given an address in Italy, and it then transpired much further down the line that all these addresses that he'd given were just accommodation addresses. Um, but anyway, hindsight's a wonderful gift, isn't it?!"

Naomi: "It is indeed. Scammers do use accommodation addresses, they open letterbox companies in the UK, they trade on Britain's supposed respectability and trustworthiness! We've reported before on the Taxcast about the kind of 'wild west' of Scottish and English limited partnerships. And then Companies House, the UK companies registry is an open joke."

Pensioner: "So, I mean, this guy's been operating for a long, long time and has scammed millions and millions and millions in fees and conditions and god knows what, facilitated and enabled by the insurers and indeed by HMRC because, you know, I've been backwards and forwards with HMRC for goodness knows how long saying, how can you allow these registered companies to still be operating when the UK Treasury last summer put Malta on its red list as being a jurisdiction which needs treating with great care? 'Nothing to do with us!'"

Naomi: "Our pensioner didn't take all this sitting down:"

Pensioner: "So I then contacted a law firm in the UK because that stage all the administration was still being carried out by the unregulated company in the UK. They, in fairness, were very, very diligent, which is how so much of this information I think I've already shared with you came to light about the use of 14 different addresses, the fact that he was never, ever regulated in the UK. He denied that he'd lived in the UK, but in fact, he was on the electoral register. Um, they used trace agents, you know, the whole nine yards. And of course, as each day went by, it became more and more obvious that I was a victim of a huge scam."

Naomi: "Just as it looked like he was getting somewhere, possibly the worst news of all came from our pensioner's lawyers:"

Pensioner: "My UK lawyer said, 'look, although this contract between the QROPS in Malta and the administrative company in the UK says that the contract had been drawn up in accordance with English law, the reality is that - and they took advice from a barrister - because the trustees were based in Malta, the jurisdiction lay in Malta. So it was at that stage that I then appointed the lawyer in Malta to represent me, who has been an absolute star, I have to say, and then he submitted judicial papers as they call it in Malta to the courts to start a litigation case against the QROPS provider in Malta. And he said, I'll tell you now, this will drag on for years, it will end up eventually in the European courts, because he said, everybody here is a friend of a friend of a friend, they have got their friends in all the places where they need them to be, to ensure that what happens in Malta, stays in Malta."

Naomi: "That is exactly the situation in other small island jurisdictions that we've come across where the conflicts of interest are ridiculous, it's the same thing that you've experienced, so it's really interesting."

Pensioner: "Yeah, and it's the same in the Isle of Man. Because the insurers are based in the Isle of Man I've submitted complaints to the Isle of Man constabulary, the Isle of Man FSA, the Isle of Man financial ombudsman service. And it's the same with the FCA. They all say, well, no, no, I hear what you're saying, but the jurisdiction is in Malta, so they know what's going on, but they just don't want it to stick with them do they? It's the classic 'we'll pass the parcel until the music stops, and hope it doesn't stop with us!'"

Naomi: "So, I mean, you've got a lot of evidence which you've collected. There's a lot of litigation and a lot of processes that you've gone through. You've tried to pursue justice with HRMC, Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, the Financial Action Task Force, Malta's Financial Services Authority, the Financial Conduct Authority, you've been to your Member of Parliament, you've been to the police, how would you describe the process of trying to get some kind of justice or some kind of accountability?

Pensioner: "Um, character building!"

Naomi: "And then, our pensioner unexpectedly discovered he wasn't alone."

Pensioner: "We had an email from the QROPS provider in Malta, where inadvertently, they had put 30-plus people in copy rather than putting us all in blind copy, which was an update from the liquidators of one of the Isle of Man failed funds basically telling us, you know, good luck with this, you're gonna get, you know, half or nothing! I assumed I was no longer the only one who'd been caught up in this, but the provider obviously was desperate not to let it out that there were between 60 and 70 members of just this one QROPS provider who had been advised by this now absconded IFA."

Naomi: "So you, you got in touch with each other because you realised there were other victims in the, the email chain?"

Pensioner: "Yes, once this infamous email was shared amongst us, myself, and one other sort of have started basically an action group, for want of a better term. And I got in touch with them and said look, I've, you know, had lawyers in the UK on it since 2017, a lawyer in Malta on it. We're just part of an absolute huge scam in many, many different jurisdictions. And we've been sharing..." Naomi: "Horror stories?" Pensioner: "Oh, yeah, horror stories is the right way to describe it!"

Naomi: "Can I ask you, I mean, you don't have to answer this at all, but can you give an idea of what you've lost personally?" Pensioner: "Personally, well, over a million, well, over a million. I hope to goodness, in one respect, you know, I am one of the biggest losers. Fortunately it hasn't brought us to our knees. I mean, we've had to move back to the UK, but I mean, I haven't lost everything."

Naomi: "Do you know, I mean, you've been in touch with some of the people that were involved in the same scam that you were, do you know any of their stories?"

Pensioner: "Oh, heartbreaking. I, I, I mean, there's one lady who was a nurse and is still working as a nurse in the States and she said 'I can't afford to envisage taking out legal action against them because of the legal fees involved.' And I mean, that is heartbreaking. There is somebody who died destitute in Spain because he had been scammed out of everything, his house had been repossessed and he died just days before the bank was gonna take the keys from him. I've shared that with the MFSA and with the police and everybody in Malta saying, you know, how can you allow this to happen and not take action? And the reality is because so many of those people involved are high up in government circles, have been former MPs, are former ambassadors and so on, and they're all just looking after themselves. Truly scandalous."

Naomi: "So in terms of, I mean, in one sense you could look at this as a story about Malta being a really bad and unsafe jurisdiction to do business. However, you could also say, this is also a story about lack of enforcement in many jurisdictions, so you're talking about the Isle of Man, you're talking about the UK where the company was registered there and actually, that wasn't safe either. So this is not just a story about 'don't put your money in Malta'!"

Pensioner: "No, oh no, no! And it's basically stick it under your mattress and look after yourself, because all these people that are meant to be batting for you aren't interested, or are incapable, or dare I even suggest it, perhaps facilitating because of the benefits they receive. I mean, certainly that's the case in Malta, and I'm increasingly convinced the same as in the Isle of Man, because you've got exactly the same scenario - small island, heavily reliant on financial services, they all know each other, all the auditors will know each other, all the insurers will know each other. And when I've got literally thousands and thousands and thousands of pages of documents, how any of them can sleep straight in bed at night, I have no idea." Naomi: "I don't know either, and here's a question for you - how would you sum up - what is the Malta Financial Services Authority for?" Pensioner: "Um, to cover the tracks of the criminals who are operating there!" Naomi: "I thought you might say something like that! And the conflicts of interest run beyond a small island culture where everyone knows everyone - in the Isle of Man for quite some time the insurance industry regulator also had a remit to promote the industry! That would cast some doubt on the proper assessment of new applicants wanting to do business there. Now, I know there are good people who work hard for regulators and they try to do the best they can - but we see time and time again that regulators are understaffed, underinvested in, and they often have no teeth. So far, neither the regulators nor law enforcement in the Isle of Man, in Malta or in the UK have dealt effectively with the criminality involved in our pensioner's case:"

Pensioner: "I've identified 50+ breaches in law - one of which clearly states that where, um, you can show that the regulated body has wilfully neglected to protect your interests they are obliged to reimburse you for the losses you have incurred. You know, it's there in black and white. All the MFSA has done so far, they've concentrated on the regulatory breaches. They've ignored all the criminal breaches because of course, if they actually go that way then of course it opens up a huge, huge can of worms. And one of the other big things that's been relevant to our scheme is that they have refused to confirm whether they have indemnity insurance, and the MFSA have not confirmed whether they have or haven't. And I fear the fact that nobody is saying so is that perhaps they have, but the insurers are saying well, you know, we're not gonna pay out on this because you've been naughty boys, haven't you?!" Naomi: "Yeah. Yeah. That's very likely!" Pensioner: "Well, I would think it's very, very, very likely!"

Naomi: "Our pensioner had early hopes that the Maltese Police might investigate the criminal aspects of his case. After a long wait, his lawyer had a go:"

Pensioner: "They said that they've been investigating, you know, and they clearly hadn't. He said, well, you know, it's up to you because if you don't fulfill on the report that you said you were going to make, then I'm gonna just take it to the European court of law because my client's human rights to justice are being denied. Within an hour, he had an email back from the Assistant Commissioner who is in charge of financial crime saying you will hear shortly from superintendent so-and-so, on progress that we are making. We are still waiting. I think this will be the end of Malta as a jurisdiction for pensioners because none of the insurers will now touch it with a barge pole, they won't be able to get insurance for their indemnity liabilities."

Naomi: "What would you say to anybody, you know, to, I don't know, to yourself back then, when you were looking at pension options?"

Pensioner: "If I knew then what I know now, I would've just left my pension with the company. Um, the, the, yeah."

Naomi: "What do you think has happened to your money, and to the money of the other people who have been involved in this scam?"

Pensioner: "Somebody somewhere is living off it very, very nicely, one of whom, no doubt is my now absconded fraudster IFA and his family."

Naomi: "They're probably living in Florida!"

Pensioner: "Well, they quite probably are, you know, they may even have bought the house that we had to sell! You know, the IFA, his company, or his final company was registered in Panama, so he was having his fees paid into a Barclay's account in the Isle of Man, who no doubt have been sending the money to, you know, Panama or Cayman islands or whatever. And the Isle of Man have said, well, there's no reason for us to investigate because there's no evidence of criminal activity. And I said, well, excuse me, I think there is because you know, that money has been paid by Isle of Man-registered and regulated insurer's, money taken from our portfolios and you've been paying fees and commissions. And I mean, my fees for transferring into the policy initially were over 43,000 pounds. And then he's had commissions from all these high risk bonds and God knows what, it's staggering." Naomi: "It is staggering."

Pensioner: "I've gone back to the head of the economic crime unit in the Isle of Man, I said, you've got to review this now because you can't now say this is just a regulatory matter. This is a criminal matter. I've spent more than £70,000 on legal fees so far, on top of the money I've lost. And this is why I'm doing so much myself, because if I'd been trying to pay lawyers to do it, you know, I'd want millions to gather the information and the evidence that I've got. But anyway, I'm not giving up!"

That's part of our pensioner's story, for which we thank him for sharing with us on the Taxcast. We wish his group of pensioners good luck in their ongoing battles for justice. We've seen so many times that on the surface so many jurisdictions look good. They've got coats of arms, official bodies with crests above their names, shiny office blocks, oak panelled meeting rooms, and glossy brochures. But when things go wrong, you really can't be sure they'll help you...

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The Taxcast - A podcast by The Tax Justice Network

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In this episode we bring you the story of a pensioner robbed of his dream retirement and his fight for justice in multiple jurisidctions. Tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions don't just hurt us because they're places of impunity for the rich and for criminals. Quite ordinary people can get caught up in them too.

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Ha Joon Chang: Economics, The User's Guide

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Ha Joon Chang: Economics, The User's Guide

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Podcast: We set up an offshore company in a tax haven (Classic) - 31 minutes

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Podcast: We set up an offshore company in a tax haven (Classic) - 31 minutes

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We set up an offshore company in a tax haven (Classic)

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Listen to this episode from Planet Money on Spotify. The Pandora Papers released this week reveal how many world leaders allegedly hold wealth through the use of shell companies. We listen back to when we set up our very own Planet Money shell companies.

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Neoliberalism - the ideology at the root of all our problems (George Monbiot)

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Imagine if the people of the Soviet Union had never heard of communism. The ideology that dominates our lives has, for most of us, no name. Mention it in conversation and you'll be rewarded with a shrug. Even if your listeners have heard the term before, they will struggle to define it. Neoliberalism: do you know what it is?

Its anonymity is both a symptom and cause of its power. It has played a major role in a remarkable variety of crises: the financial meltdown of 2007‑8, the offshoring of wealth and power, of which the Panama Papers offer us merely a glimpse, the slow collapse of public health and education, resurgent child poverty, the epidemic of loneliness, the collapse of ecosystems, the rise of Donald Trump. But we respond to these crises as if they emerge in isolation, apparently unaware that they have all been either catalysed or exacerbated by the same coherent philosophy; a philosophy that has - or had - a name. What greater power can there be than to operate namelessly?

Inequality is recast as virtuous. The market ensures that everyone gets what they deserve.

So pervasive has neoliberalism become that we seldom even recognise it as an ideology. We appear to accept the proposition that this utopian, millenarian faith describes a neutral force; a kind of biological law, like Darwin's theory of evolution. But the philosophy arose as a conscious attempt to reshape human life and shift the locus of power.

Neoliberalism sees competition as the defining characteristic of human relations. It redefines citizens as consumers, whose democratic choices are best exercised by buying and selling, a process that rewards merit and punishes inefficiency. It maintains that "the market" delivers benefits that could never be achieved by planning.

Attempts to limit competition are treated as inimical to liberty. Tax and regulation should be minimised, public services should be privatised. The organisation of labour and collective bargaining by trade unions are portrayed as market distortions that impede the formation of a natural hierarchy of winners and losers. Inequality is recast as virtuous: a reward for utility and a generator of wealth, which trickles down to enrich everyone. Efforts to create a more equal society are both counterproductive and morally corrosive. The market ensures that everyone gets what they deserve.

We internalise and reproduce its creeds. The rich persuade themselves that they acquired their wealth through merit, ignoring the advantages - such as education, inheritance and class - that may have helped to secure it. The poor begin to blame themselves for their failures, even when they can do little to change their circumstances.

Never mind structural unemployment: if you don't have a job it's because you are unenterprising. Never mind the impossible costs of housing: if your credit card is maxed out, you're feckless and improvident. Never mind that your children no longer have a school playing field: if they get fat, it's your fault. In a world governed by competition, those who fall behind become defined and self-defined as losers.

Among the results, as Paul Verhaeghe documents in his book What About Me? are epidemics of self-harm, eating disorders, depression, loneliness, performance anxiety and social phobia. Perhaps it's unsurprising that Britain, in which neoliberal ideology has been most rigorously applied, is the loneliness capital of Europe. We are all neoliberals now.

The term neoliberalism was coined at a meeting in Paris in 1938. Among the delegates were two men who came to define the ideology, Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek. Both exiles from Austria, they saw social democracy, exemplified by Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and the gradual development of Britain's welfare state, as manifestations of a collectivism that occupied the same spectrum as nazism and communism.

In The Road to Serfdom, published in 1944, Hayek argued that government planning, by crushing individualism, would lead inexorably to totalitarian control. Like Mises's book Bureaucracy, The Road to Serfdom was widely read. It came to the attention of some very wealthy people, who saw in the philosophy an opportunity to free themselves from regulation and tax. When, in 1947, Hayek founded the first organisation that would spread the doctrine of neoliberalism - the Mont Pelerin Society - it was supported financially by millionaires and their foundations.

With their help, he began to create what Daniel Stedman Jones describes in Masters of the Universe as "a kind of neoliberal international": a transatlantic network of academics, businessmen, journalists and activists. The movement's rich backers funded a series of thinktanks which would refine and promote the ideology. Among them were the American Enterprise Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Institute of Economic Affairs, the Centre for Policy Studies and the Adam Smith Institute. They also financed academic positions and departments, particularly at the universities of Chicago and Virginia.

As it evolved, neoliberalism became more strident. Hayek's view that governments should regulate competition to prevent monopolies from forming gave way - among American apostles such as Milton Friedman - to the belief that monopoly power could be seen as a reward for efficiency.

Something else happened during this transition: the movement lost its name. In 1951, Friedman was happy to describe himself as a neoliberal. But soon after that, the term began to disappear. Stranger still, even as the ideology became crisper and the movement more coherent, the lost name was not replaced by any common alternative.

At first, despite its lavish funding, neoliberalism remained at the margins. The postwar consensus was almost universal: John Maynard Keynes 's economic prescriptions were widely applied, full employment and the relief of poverty were common goals in the US and much of western Europe, top rates of tax were high and governments sought social outcomes without embarrassment, developing new public services and safety nets.

But in the 1970s, when Keynesian policies began to fall apart and economic crises struck on both sides of the Atlantic, neoliberal ideas began to enter the mainstream. As Friedman remarked, "when the time came that you had to change ... there was an alternative ready there to be picked up". With the help of sympathetic journalists and political advisers, elements of neoliberalism, especially its prescriptions for monetary policy, were adopted by Jimmy Carter's administration in the US and Jim Callaghan's government in Britain.

It may seem strange that a doctrine promising choice should have been promoted with the slogan 'there is no alternative'

After Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan took power, the rest of the package soon followed: massive tax cuts for the rich, the crushing of trade unions, deregulation, privatisation, outsourcing and competition in public services. Through the IMF, the World Bank, the Maastricht treaty and the World Trade Organisation, neoliberal policies were imposed - often without democratic consent - on much of the world. Most remarkable was its adoption among parties that once belonged to the left: Labour and the Democrats, for example. As Stedman Jones notes, "it is hard to think of another utopia to have been as fully realised."

It may seem strange that a doctrine promising choice and freedom should have been promoted with the slogan "there is no alternative". But, as Hayek remarked on a visit to Pinochet's Chile - one of the first nations in which the programme was comprehensively applied - "my personal preference leans toward a liberal dictatorship rather than toward a democratic government devoid of liberalism". The freedom that neoliberalism offers, which sounds so beguiling when expressed in general terms, turns out to mean freedom for the pike, not for the minnows.

Freedom from trade unions and collective bargaining means the freedom to suppress wages. Freedom from regulation means the freedom to poison rivers, endanger workers, charge iniquitous rates of interest and design exotic financial instruments. Freedom from tax means freedom from the distribution of wealth that lifts people out of poverty.

Naomi Klein documented that neoliberals advocated the use of crises to impose unpopular policies while people were distracted. Photograph: Anya Chibis/The Guardian

As Naomi Klein documents in The Shock Doctrine, neoliberal theorists advocated the use of crises to impose unpopular policies while people were distracted: for example, in the aftermath of Pinochet's coup, the Iraq war and Hurricane Katrina, which Friedman described as "an opportunity to radically reform the educational system" in New Orleans.

Where neoliberal policies cannot be imposed domestically, they are imposed internationally, through trade treaties incorporating " investor-state dispute settlement": offshore tribunals in which corporations can press for the removal of social and environmental protections. When parliaments have voted to restrict sales of cigarettes, protect water supplies from mining companies, freeze energy bills or prevent pharmaceutical firms from ripping off the state, corporations have sued, often successfully. Democracy is reduced to theatre.

Neoliberalism was not conceived as a self-serving racket, but it rapidly became one

Another paradox of neoliberalism is that universal competition relies upon universal quantification and comparison. The result is that workers, job-seekers and public services of every kind are subject to a pettifogging, stifling regime of assessment and monitoring, designed to identify the winners and punish the losers. The doctrine that Von Mises proposed would free us from the bureaucratic nightmare of central planning has instead created one.

Neoliberalism was not conceived as a self-serving racket, but it rapidly became one. Economic growth has been markedly slower in the neoliberal era (since 1980 in Britain and the US) than it was in the preceding decades; but not for the very rich. Inequality in the distribution of both income and wealth, after 60 years of decline, rose rapidly in this era, due to the smashing of trade unions, tax reductions, rising rents, privatisation and deregulation.

The privatisation or marketisation of public services such as energy, water, trains, health, education, roads and prisons has enabled corporations to set up tollbooths in front of essential assets and charge rent, either to citizens or to government, for their use. Rent is another term for unearned income. When you pay an inflated price for a train ticket, only part of the fare compensates the operators for the money they spend on fuel, wages, rolling stock and other outlays. The rest reflects the fact that they have you over a barrel.

In Mexico, Carlos Slim was granted control of almost all phone services and soon became the world's richest man. Photograph: Henry Romero/Reuters

Those who own and run the UK's privatised or semi-privatised services make stupendous fortunes by investing little and charging much. In Russia and India, oligarchs acquired state assets through firesales. In Mexico, Carlos Slim was granted control of almost all landline and mobile phone services and soon became the world's richest man.

Financialisation, as Andrew Sayer notes in Why We Can't Afford the Rich, has had a similar impact. "Like rent," he argues, "interest is ... unearned income that accrues without any effort". As the poor become poorer and the rich become richer, the rich acquire increasing control over another crucial asset: money. Interest payments, overwhelmingly, are a transfer of money from the poor to the rich. As property prices and the withdrawal of state funding load people with debt (think of the switch from student grants to student loans), the banks and their executives clean up.

Sayer argues that the past four decades have been characterised by a transfer of wealth not only from the poor to the rich, but within the ranks of the wealthy: from those who make their money by producing new goods or services to those who make their money by controlling existing assets and harvesting rent, interest or capital gains. Earned income has been supplanted by unearned income.

Neoliberal policies are everywhere beset by market failures. Not only are the banks too big to fail, but so are the corporations now charged with delivering public services. As Tony Judt pointed out in Ill Fares the Land, Hayek forgot that vital national services cannot be allowed to collapse, which means that competition cannot run its course. Business takes the profits, the state keeps the risk.

The greater the failure, the more extreme the ideology becomes. Governments use neoliberal crises as both excuse and opportunity to cut taxes, privatise remaining public services, rip holes in the social safety net, deregulate corporations and re-regulate citizens. The self-hating state now sinks its teeth into every organ of the public sector.

Perhaps the most dangerous impact of neoliberalism is not the economic crises it has caused, but the political crisis. As the domain of the state is reduced, our ability to change the course of our lives through voting also contracts. Instead, neoliberal theory asserts, people can exercise choice through spending. But some have more to spend than others: in the great consumer or shareholder democracy, votes are not equally distributed. The result is a disempowerment of the poor and middle. As parties of the right and former left adopt similar neoliberal policies, disempowerment turns to disenfranchisement. Large numbers of people have been shed from politics.

Slogans, symbols and sensation ... Donald Trump. Photograph: Aaron Josefczyk/Reuters

Chris Hedges remarks that "fascist movements build their base not from the politically active but the politically inactive, the 'losers' who feel, often correctly, they have no voice or role to play in the political establishment". When political debate no longer speaks to us, people become responsive instead to slogans, symbols and sensation. To the admirers of Trump, for example, facts and arguments appear irrelevant.

Judt explained that when the thick mesh of interactions between people and the state has been reduced to nothing but authority and obedience, the only remaining force that binds us is state power. The totalitarianism Hayek feared is more likely to emerge when governments, having lost the moral authority that arises from the delivery of public services, are reduced to "cajoling, threatening and ultimately coercing people to obey them".

Like communism, neoliberalism is the God that failed. But the zombie doctrine staggers on, and one of the reasons is its anonymity. Or rather, a cluster of anonymities.

The invisible doctrine of the invisible hand is promoted by invisible backers. Slowly, very slowly, we have begun to discover the names of a few of them. We find that the Institute of Economic Affairs, which has argued forcefully in the media against the further regulation of the tobacco industry, has been secretly funded by British American Tobacco since 1963. We discover that Charles and David Koch, two of the richest men in the world, founded the institute that set up the Tea Party movement. We find that Charles Koch, in establishing one of his thinktanks, noted that "in order to avoid undesirable criticism, how the organisation is controlled and directed should not be widely advertised".

The nouveau riche were once disparaged by those who had inherited their money. Today, the relationship has been reversed

The words used by neoliberalism often conceal more than they elucidate. "The market" sounds like a natural system that might bear upon us equally, like gravity or atmospheric pressure. But it is fraught with power relations. What "the market wants" tends to mean what corporations and their bosses want. "Investment", as Sayer notes, means two quite different things. One is the funding of productive and socially useful activities, the other is the purchase of existing assets to milk them for rent, interest, dividends and capital gains. Using the same word for different activities "camouflages the sources of wealth", leading us to confuse wealth extraction with wealth creation.

A century ago, the nouveau riche were disparaged by those who had inherited their money. Entrepreneurs sought social acceptance by passing themselves off as rentiers. Today, the relationship has been reversed: the rentiers and inheritors style themselves entre preneurs. They claim to have earned their unearned income.

These anonymities and confusions mesh with the namelessness and placelessness of modern capitalism: the franchise model which ensures that workers do not know for whom they toil; the companies registered through a network of offshore secrecy regimes so complex that even the police cannot discover the beneficial owners; the tax arrangements that bamboozle governments; the financial products no one understands.

The anonymity of neoliberalism is fiercely guarded. Those who are influenced by Hayek, Mises and Friedman tend to reject the term, maintaining - with some justice - that it is used today only pejoratively. But they offer us no substitute. Some describe themselves as classical liberals or libertarians, but these descriptions are both misleading and curiously self-effacing, as they suggest that there is nothing novel about The Road to Serfdom, Bureaucracy or Friedman's classic work, Capitalism and Freedom.

For all that, there is something admirable about the neoliberal project, at least in its early stages. It was a distinctive, innovative philosophy promoted by a coherent network of thinkers and activists with a clear plan of action. It was patient and persistent. The Road to Serfdom became the path to power.

Neoliberalism's triumph also reflects the failure of the left. When laissez-faire economics led to catastrophe in 1929, Keynes devised a comprehensive economic theory to replace it. When Keynesian demand management hit the buffers in the 70s, there was an alternative ready. But when neoliberalism fell apart in 2008 there was ... nothing. This is why the zombie walks. The left and centre have produced no new general framework of economic thought for 80 years.

Every invocation of Lord Keynes is an admission of failure. To propose Keynesian solutions to the crises of the 21st century is to ignore three obvious problems. It is hard to mobilise people around old ideas; the flaws exposed in the 70s have not gone away; and, most importantly, they have nothing to say about our gravest predicament: the environmental crisis. Keynesianism works by stimulating consumer demand to promote economic growth. Consumer demand and economic growth are the motors of environmental destruction.

What the history of both Keynesianism and neoliberalism show is that it's not enough to oppose a broken system. A coherent alternative has to be proposed. For Labour, the Democrats and the wider left, the central task should be to develop an economic Apollo programme, a conscious attempt to design a new system, tailored to the demands of the 21st century.

George Monbiot's How Did We Get into This Mess? is published this month by Verso. To order a copy for £12.99 (RRP £16.99) ) go to bookshop.theguardian.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £10, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99.

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Neoliberalism - the ideology at the root of all our problems

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Financial meltdown, environmental disaster and even the rise of Donald Trump - neoliberalism has played its part in them all. Why has the left failed to come up with an alternative?

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Neoliberalism on Trial (David Harvey chapter)

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Neoliberalism on Trial (David Harvey chapter)

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Harvey a brief history of neoliberalism chapter 6

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A People's Guide to Capitalism with Hadas Thier (In Conversation) - 1 hour

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A People's Guide to Capitalism with Hadas Thier (In Conversation) - 1 hour

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A People's Guide to Capitalism with Hadas Thier (In Conversation)

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Listen to this episode from Upstream on Spotify. Why do so many of us often feel like shit when we leave work? Where does that ambient feeling of alienation come from? That nagging sense that we've somehow been taken advantage of?

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WEEKLY ECONOMICS PODCAST: A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO NEOLIBERALISM (approx 1 hour)

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WEEKLY ECONOMICS PODCAST: A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO NEOLIBERALISM (approx 1 hour)

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Please listen to episodes 1, 2, 3 and 6. This is also on Spotify.

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Latest episode of our award winning podcast - subscribe on iTunes!

For the next six weeks, we're doing something a bit different. We're telling the story of neoliberalism, from the beginning. We call it A Beginner's Guide to Neoliberalism.

We first ran the series back in 2015, but it's as relevant as ever. It's presented by the journalist Kirsty Styles alongside James Meadway, who at the time was chief economist at the New Economics Foundation.

Part 1 - The basics

In part 1, James and Kirsty start with a history of our economic system, the difference between capitalism and neoliberalism, and examine how neoliberalism came to dominate modern day economics.

Part 2 - The House That Hayek Built

Economist James Meadway and journalist Kirsty Styles continue their 6‑part miniseries about neoliberalism. In part 2, they tell the story of how the once obscure ideas of theorist Friedrich Hayek moved from the fringe to the mainstream, ushering in the age of neoliberalism.

Part 3 - World Domination

James Meadway and Kirsty Styles explain how neoliberalism came to dominate economies around the globe.

Part 4 - Acceptable in the 80s

James Meadway and Kirsty Styles explain how neoliberalism took hold in the UK in the 1980s.

Part 5 - The End of History?

James Meadway and Kirsty Styles discuss how neoliberalism lives on today.

This episode was recorded back in August 2015 and a lot has changed since then. The good news is James and Kirsty will be back for a brand new episode in a couple of weeks' time, telling the story of the backlash against neoliberalism over the past few years.

Part 6 - The Alternatives

Kirsty Styles and James Meadway talk about the alternatives to neoliberalism.

This episode was recorded back in August 2015, which feels like a million years ago. We still think it's worth listening to, but a lot has changed since then. James and Kirsty will be back for a brand new update episode next week, bringing us bang up to date on the alternatives.

It's been 4 years since Kirsty Styles and James Meadway told the story of neoliberalism, from Hayek to Thatcher to the end of history. But we got the band back together, alongside NEF chief executive Miatta Fahnbulleh for a brand new up to date episode which you can listen to here.

Listen on Google podcasts
Listen on Apple podcasts
Banner image: Randi Hausken 2.0 Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0)

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Weekly Economics Podcast: A Beginner's Guide to Neoliberalism

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Latest episode of our award winning podcast - subscribe on iTunes! For the next six weeks, we're doing something a bit different. We're telling the story of neoliberalism, from the beginning. We call it A Beginner's Guide to Neoliberalism. We first ran the series back in 2015, but it's as relevant as ever.

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David Harvey: A Brief history of Neoliberalism, Chapter 1 - approx 1 hour

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David Harvey: A Brief history of Neoliberalism, Chapter 1 - approx 1 hour

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Harvey a Brief History of Neoliberalism Chapter 1