Videos Unit 5

Videos to Watch

  1. Joseph Stiglitz: Make Markets Be Markets
  2. Simon Johnson: The Doom Cycle

StiglitZ: Make Markets BE MARKETS

Joseph Stiglitz is a Nobel-prize winning economist. He is also a former Chief Economist of the World Bank. He resigned / was forced out in 2000 because of his criticism of IMF and US Treasury policies in forcing “free-market fundamentalism” onto developing and emerging market countries in the 1990’s. He has been a sharp critic throughout his career of the free-markets-are-always-right view that has often characterized the “Chicago boys”. Indeed, the theoretical work for which he was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize demonstrates how markets will not achieve desirably outcomes without some forms of government regulations and institutional restrictions.

Johnson: The doom cycle

Simon Johnson is a professor of economics and entrepreneurship at MIT. He was also the Chief Economist at the IMF from 2007-2008. Johnson has been highly critical of the international financial and banking industry, particularly Wall Street. He has written and commented numerous times that we are seeing the emergence of “a financial oligarchy” that functions above and beyond the control or regulation of any particular government.

Simon Johnson writes a blog at The Baseline Scenario.

 

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