Opinion (Dani Rodrik, Professor of International Political Economy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government): “There was a time when we economists steered clear of politics. We viewed our job as describing how market economies work, when they fail, and how well-designed policies can enhance efficiency. We analyzed trade-offs between competing objectives (say, equity versus efficiency), and prescribed policies to meet desired economic outcomes, including redistribution. …

“Frustrated by the reality that much of our advice went unheeded (so many free-market solutions still waiting to be taken up!), we turned our analytical toolkit on the behavior of politicians and bureaucrats themselves. We began to examine political behavior using the same conceptual framework that we use for consumer and producer decisions in a market economy. Politicians became income-maximizing suppliers of policy favors; citizens became rent-seeking lobbies and special interests; and political systems became marketplaces in which votes and political influence are traded for economic benefits. …

“Why are so many industries closed off to real competition? Because politicians are in the pockets of the incumbents who reap the rents. Why do governments erect barriers to international trade? Because the beneficiaries of trade protection are concentrated and politically influential, while consumers are diffuse and disorganized. Why do political elites block reforms that would spur economic growth and development? Because growth and development would undermine their hold on political power. Why are there financial crises? Because banks capture the policymaking process so that they can take excessive risks at the expense of the general public. …

“If politicians’ behavior is determined by the vested interests to which they are beholden, economists’ advocacy of policy reforms is bound to fall on deaf ears.”

My Comment: Fortunately, nothing will be left of the past egoistic economy in the age of its collapse; so, there is no point in trying to identify all the secrets of clans of the elite and how to work with them. The crisis will clean everything! What will be left of people and the world will take a new form: the necessary fulfillment of the material things and infinite fulfillment in the revelation of the meaning of life. This state can be reached through education, that is, changing a person. In an effort to soften the landing of the world to the new conditions, we have to consider integral education, proposed by Kabbalah.
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 Related Material:
“2012 Debt Tipping Point Results”
A Progress Trap
The Pyramid Economy

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