How Shareholder Value Ideology Destroyed the Middle Class - Dr. William Lazonick, UMass - DSPod

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  • Опубліковано 28 гру 2024

КОМЕНТАРІ • 77

  • @DemystifySci_Podcast
    @DemystifySci_Podcast  10 днів тому +7

    Listen on the go at all podcast locations: anchor.fm/demystifysci
    Material solutions to quantum spookiness: www.youtube.com/@MaterialAtomics
    Short films @DemystifySciInvestigates: ua-cam.com/channels/UfzVdgNu2xLThgM2qQZmSQ.html

  • @neilcreamer8207
    @neilcreamer8207 11 днів тому +10

    I never suspected that this would be an interesting topic for me. I was completely mistaken. The conversation was extremely educational and enlightening.

    • @DemystifySci_Podcast
      @DemystifySci_Podcast  11 днів тому +3

      After talking with many economists I was also surprised at having so many revelations here

  • @dameongeppetto
    @dameongeppetto 9 днів тому +6

    Came for a historical lecture, stayed for the Milton Friedman trash talk. Great conversation and good follow up questions from the two of you.

    • @johnwright9372
      @johnwright9372 7 днів тому

      Milton Friedman was a conceited fool. He, his mentor Friedrich Hayek and their gang did so much damage. Trickle down my a..e.

    • @planaria01
      @planaria01 2 дні тому

      inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon... until it isn't

  • @boohoo746
    @boohoo746 14 днів тому +6

    I can listen to this guy forever. He's very well informed.

  • @h4ck3rd4wg
    @h4ck3rd4wg 10 днів тому +8

    Think it's great you guys are addressing WTF happened in 1971. Such an intriguing line of inquiry

  • @eunicesimi3452
    @eunicesimi3452 8 днів тому

    Thank you Emily! Finally, someone who understands. I was doing this for the past 25 years with zero resistance from developers and product managers. The challenge in the tech space today is that product managers are not taught how to think.

  • @alphadog6970
    @alphadog6970 9 днів тому +3

    Great conversation 👍 can't wait for the second episode.

  • @Buf-g6m
    @Buf-g6m 7 днів тому +1

    My two favourite nerds ❤ keep chiming in.

  • @ubiktd4064
    @ubiktd4064 10 днів тому +4

    I love the range of subjects you cover.. very interesting.

  • @jamesconway9277
    @jamesconway9277 14 днів тому +5

    At 2:25 stock buy backs instead of R&D. They get innovation by buying smaller companies with better innovation.

    • @boohoo746
      @boohoo746 14 днів тому +3

      it is also a common practice to buy out and smother the competing innovation

    • @johnwright9372
      @johnwright9372 7 днів тому

      At one time corporations were not allowed to deal in their own shares. Then Pandora's box was opened.

    • @boohoo746
      @boohoo746 7 днів тому

      @@johnwright9372 that's like the US Treasury issuing trillion dollars of debt and the moneyprinting Fed vacuuming up the new issuance from the markets using tons of fake money ...

  • @jamesyearout7639
    @jamesyearout7639 9 днів тому +1

    Wow, great topic...thanks! I feel it is important to review how/why the strong middle class share of wealth in America has evaporated within the time frame of the past 50 years. Time to look at this subject from multiple angles. Thanks!

    • @johnwright9372
      @johnwright9372 7 днів тому

      Not just America. Most countries are having the same problems.

  • @jamesriordan5461
    @jamesriordan5461 7 днів тому

    incredible last episode before the holidays

  • @michaelheil-ij5ji
    @michaelheil-ij5ji День тому

    Economics. Always a very challenging discussion. Many would like to deconstruct it into a science, a mathematically analyzable endeavor. However it’s an activity involving human animals, and aligns more often with psychology, as Dr Lazonick points up, than physics.
    Ludwig von Mises clearly understood this idea and presented it in his treatise Human Action, delving into the workings of economics through praxology: humans engaging in conscious actions toward chosen goals.
    This crucial fact often gets lost in economic discussions, and these deliberations are the key to understanding the working of economic activities.
    While this conversation deals primarily with business development through financial institution involvement, the human factor is addressed as a way to describe how and when things have gone wrong: The nefarious wrongdoers presented as a problematic result of an equally problematic system.
    Though the conversation stayed at a very high level, not descending into the right or wrong of capitalism and free market approaches to human advancement, the larger unasked question seems to always be: “Is capitalism moral?”
    And also: “Does a socialist system operate under a higher moral principle.”
    As I have mentioned in other comments, the thought that capitalism is a “system” is just wrong. Capitalism developed as an approach to human interaction once the autocratic, church and state institutions stepped aside or were removed during the enlightenment. It was a release from top/down structuring, allowing for free exchange of ideas and objects.
    To me, nothing could be more moral.
    Does this automatically create a situation where human nature becomes something it is not? Does the concept of the choice between good or bad actions disappear?
    Of course not.
    Will bad folks show up. Yes, indeed.
    But it seems that a volitional choice for good, post enlightenment, is at least allowed for without the threat of higher power punishment. Capitalism gives a choice for individual action toward a moral high ground, but of course does not guarantee this.
    We are humans. The nefarious will always be with us. But the reason for the vast expansion of human betterment with coming of the enlightenment and capitalism, and technological advancement as one of its products, was/is the cause.
    The attempt to acquire a higher moral systematic approach through the forceful imposition of Marxist philosophy on a society has always failed and will always fail because human nature is frail and psychologically indeterminate.
    Putting in the words “scientific dialectic materialism” does not make it scientifically grounded. And the religious phrase “ from each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs” does not make it moral.
    Too long. My bad.
    Thanks guys for another wonderful discussion.

  • @sebastian2zen
    @sebastian2zen 9 днів тому +3

    53:20 I bing watch interviews in UA-cam, a lot of political and economics commentators. I haven't seen no one verbalizing the nature of finantial capitalism in such a simple form: FINANTIAL MARKETS ARE VALUE EXTRACTION TOOLS, they are exits for early investors. This becomes so evident in the age of crypto, there is no real product, they underlying technology is costly and unproductive, most of the assets devaluate over time, it's value emerges out of consensus rather than actual usefulness. It works due to a multipolar world and high volatility, it is casino that profits on social capital and the ability to form communities: It is extractive indeed, it profits over our human instincts, it is capital monetizing humanity itself.

  • @LUKEQUARTO
    @LUKEQUARTO 7 днів тому

    1. The Point (Form Meeting Formless)
    2. The Moment (Attention Meeting Awareness)
    3. History (Overlapping Timelines)
    🌊

  • @WazZawh
    @WazZawh 6 днів тому

    thanks guys

  • @ZippyLeroux
    @ZippyLeroux 10 днів тому +5

    Wow, never thought of it as an ideology before. Just good ol' fashioned greed. But it makes sense now, how in this way, it would consume those with access to it....

    • @dameongeppetto
      @dameongeppetto 9 днів тому +2

      You are not wrong. It is an ideology concocted to justify bottomless greed.

  • @Kian.
    @Kian. 13 днів тому +12

    I think this episode should have been called "How Shareholder Value Is Killing the Middle Class"

    • @DemystifySci_Podcast
      @DemystifySci_Podcast  13 днів тому +5

      noted and applied - lets see how it plays when it goes live. Had to modify slightly to fit the character limits

    • @neilcreamer8207
      @neilcreamer8207 11 днів тому +2

      @@Kian. Having now listened to the whole episode, I think you hit the nail squarely on the head.

    • @jamesmorton7881
      @jamesmorton7881 8 днів тому

      The Chinese FAILED to drink the neoliberal kool aide. Financialization of the US economy. The 2008 mess was NEVER addressed. Debt kills Empires.

    • @dcorgard
      @dcorgard 8 днів тому +2

      Though I get your point, I agree that it has ALREADY happened - IMO either way using the past tense would be more accurate.
      It truly took off 15th August 1971, with Nixon's executive order creating the petrodollar, and it accelerated beyond that. The curve of wages vs. production starts diverging at that exact date.

    • @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885
      @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885 8 днів тому

      @@dcorgard yes and the corporate firm has been tied to the military ever since the Civil War when the Union north first created standardized parts production and engineering for massive social control. The genocide of IndoChina killing millions so that "firms" could maintain neocolonial control of slave wage factories, mining and oil, etc. is what led to the PetroDollar deal with the Saudis. This then led to the NeoFascist Trilateral Commission to prop up the regimes of Japan/Korea/Taiwan and Germany with "firm" subsidies as massive state policies. And this "globalization" then enabled Reagan to just wipe out the unions in the U.S. that were 36% in the 1950s and now are less than 6%.

  • @Achrononmaster
    @Achrononmaster 9 днів тому +4

    Don't get confused about gold, the USA came off gold in 1935. Bretton Woods was just fixed exchange rates, with the USD as a numeraire, and was a flawed system even then (fixed exchange rate maintenance, or a commodity peg, reduces the government fiscal space with which to alleviate poverty and run full employment). The mid 1960's began the neoliberal era, and it was all policy choice and Neolib think tanks created by the Mont Pelerin Society and their satellites. None of this was natural market economics. Read the Powell Manifesto. And talk to Bill Mitchell at UNSW. He is multilingual and reads all the EU documents and stuff, he has more insight into neoliberalism than anyone else on the planet I would guess.

    • @jaydenwilson9522
      @jaydenwilson9522 8 днів тому

      Thanks for sharing!
      I just googled the manifesto and it looks like some of my questions will be answered!

  • @donaldrshaffer
    @donaldrshaffer 10 днів тому +5

    Michael Hudson's "Super Imperialism the economic strategy of American empire"

    • @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885
      @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885 8 днів тому

      also check out the Program on Law, Corporations and Democracy. The late 19th century corrupt judicial system ruled that corporations are "legal persons" protected by the Bill of Rights. Previously corporate charters were revoked by the attorney general and state legislatures - it can still be done today but it's very rare. Also corporations now rely on the secret private government of the World Trade Organization, an offshoot of Bretton Woods institutions (IMF, World Bank/GATT). So these "institutions" are enforced by the fascist CIA special forces using lists of people to assassinate in massacres and drug smuggling for hard cash to prop up secret wars - the best researcher on this is Douglas Valentine. See his "CIA as Organized Crime" for his best overview book on the topic.

    • @tom_rob
      @tom_rob 10 годин тому

      @@voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885 - found it - Wikipedia : The Program on Corporations, Law, and Democracy (POCLAD) is an activist collective of 11 members (with three leaving, making 14.), who research the history of corporations in the United States. They are some of the main circulators of the notion that corporate personhood-which gives corporations some of the same legal rights as real human beings-is at the center of the problems regarding corporations. They also publish a newsletter three times a year called By What Authority (ISSN 1524-1106) English for quo warranto, a legal phrase that questions illegitimate exercise of privilege and power, which they claim reflects an unabashed assertion of the right of the sovereign people to govern themselves.

  • @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885
    @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885 8 днів тому

    the proprietary system he's referring to is also what led to World War II - there has been excellent research on the U.S. Steel partnership with I.G. Farben. Germany was dominant in global control of patents for industrial production at the time - so that was used to leverage the financing of the Nashzis.

  • @shareclipsave
    @shareclipsave 7 днів тому

    Buying your own stock or buying any stock at the most basic is seen as a positive signal (bullish) for price. Selling any stock can be seen as negative signal for price. If there are more buyers than sellers, price go up. If there are more sellers than buyers, price go down. As market participants see the price going up, fear of missing out causes some people to buy in which drives the price up even more. As market participants see the price going down, they get spooked and sell before the price goes even lower which drives the price down.

  • @TheMemesofDestruction
    @TheMemesofDestruction 10 днів тому +3

    Let's go UML! ^.^

  • @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885
    @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885 8 днів тому

    He's not mentioning that military funding was the main subsidy for microelectronics - as Noam Chomsky points out - and he saw this from the inside at M.I.T. Read Professor David F. Noble's book "America By Design" for detail on the private corporate foundations controlling public research at universities - Noble was a history professor at M.I.T. but they didn't like that book. So he didn't get tenure, he filed a lawsuit but he went back to Canada.

  • @jaydenwilson9522
    @jaydenwilson9522 9 днів тому

    1:35:15
    MHMMMMMMM!
    People power is far more important than mythomagcial power.
    2:07:30
    INTERESTING! I love that he isn't scared to go there.
    .......
    The Milton Friedman article of Sept 1970 was The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits, yeah?
    And Michael C. Jensen doesn't look trustworthy at all!
    2:29:10
    Increase the demand by artificially limiting the supply. Its how the diamond market works!
    2:31:30
    YES! HE MENTIONED APPLE! They are so artificially PROPPED UP and I didn't know how they did it!
    Thank-you for answering this nagging question Dr. William Lazonick!!!!
    2:36:00
    -.-

  • @jaik195701
    @jaik195701 9 днів тому +1

    international mobility of capital and international mobility of labor. Trade liberalization has basically destroyed the middle-class in the United States.

    • @johnwright9372
      @johnwright9372 7 днів тому

      And everywhere else. Welcome to the new age of the Robber Barons.

  • @jamesmorton7881
    @jamesmorton7881 8 днів тому

    5%. ROI. While we got 2% wage increases. Share holders over employees. ❤❤

  • @dcorgard
    @dcorgard 8 днів тому

    Any chance of recording and releasing the gathering in Portugal in the long run and make it available to Patrons? Or are your mertings already doing something like this?

  • @jaysphilosophy1951
    @jaysphilosophy1951 10 днів тому +2

    It seems like the higher the stock market goes, the lower the value of the dollar becomes....

  • @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885
    @voidisyinyangvoidisyinyang885 8 днів тому

    It's definitely a Ponzi Scheme - Doug Henwood's book "Wall Street" was an instant classic around 1998 - providing a structural critique that predicted the great crash of 2008. Greed is pure demand.

  • @koltoncrane3099
    @koltoncrane3099 9 днів тому +1

    I’d argue abandoning the use of money and using fiat currency is what has destroyed the middle class leading to massive wealth inequality. Fractional reservebanking some argue is bad but what’s really bad is a private centrwlbankw because it’s paying a 6%dividennd and can always bailout wallstreet maintaining massive wealth inequality rather than promoting capitalism and bankruptcy and the redistribution of resources and assets and better allocation of capital.

    • @sebastian2zen
      @sebastian2zen 9 днів тому

      That is because the institutions are not into economics but politics instead, a minority imposes their preferences over the larger population by geeting to a consensus of minorities. In this case the political, burocratic and banking classes get to pass legislation that affects the rest of population, the they will favor each other in payment for their positions. Milton Friedman addresses this topic in his lectures: "How to make politically profitable for the wrong person to do the right thing?"

  • @SeiroosFardipour-sy3sh
    @SeiroosFardipour-sy3sh 9 днів тому

    I loved to be there in June 2025 for for conference but I have to pay the ticket and I can't effort that.

  • @janedrew3050
    @janedrew3050 9 днів тому +1

    Ooh, I hope he brings up the Phoebus Cartel!

  • @SeiroosFardipour-sy3sh
    @SeiroosFardipour-sy3sh 9 днів тому

    They did it first in India ,later they delocalized in U.S.A

  • @timharbert7145
    @timharbert7145 10 днів тому +3

    Ayn f'ing Rand

  • @TheWillmo65
    @TheWillmo65 9 днів тому

    A reading recommendation: "The Reminiscents of a Stock Operator". Jesse Livermore provides an insider's experience in the formulative stages of the trading market that is required reading for insight into the stock market as a mechanism. And its a fun read.

  • @anautonomousagent
    @anautonomousagent 10 днів тому +1

    I wonder what percentage of voting stock is locked away in managed funds? like all the voting power has been handed over to a small set of organizations and people, no? Now imagine if there was a way to ensure the people who held shares could more easily participate. More direct ownership, none of this depository and custodial nonsense.

  • @boohoo746
    @boohoo746 14 днів тому +2

    What prevents mistakes from being corrected? A lack of a grounding mechanism for value and truth in the system, a role that has historically been played by "show me" / "produce on demand" physical gold holdings. You can't blame a runaway system on a lack of regulation when you remove the regulator. Sure, corporations and firms did this and did that, but who shut off the traffic lights and suppressed the market signals that indicate that the system is out of touch with reality and customer preferences? You need to understand both sides of the equation to arrive at the truth.

    • @DemystifySci_Podcast
      @DemystifySci_Podcast  13 днів тому +3

      I mean I'm constantly struck by the fact that ancient repositories of gold coins are still worth something while paper IOUs are meaningless, but I'm also preoccupied with the fact that the financial needs of the country outstrip gold supplies.
      If you need gold for everything, then aren't you obligated to eternal war?

    • @boohoo746
      @boohoo746 12 днів тому

      @@DemystifySci_Podcast you can't have it all at the same time. leaders of countries should learn to prioritize and live within their means to avoid deviating from the mechanisms which ground the economy in truth and which reflect true consumer preferences (indirectly consumer values). Politicians can bloviate and deviate from honest accounting, but it comes at a cost. The cost is eventually paid by the (unwilling/never consulted/ignored) citizenry. This is commonly referred to as privatizing the profits and socializing the losses, but this is wrong - the profits are kept by the fascist private/public partnerships and the losses are inflicted upon the least powerful. Another point you are missing is that prices are real numbers - they go up and down. In an era of great prosperity, high production leads to lower prices and higher savings/capital is available for investment.

    • @antonyjh1234
      @antonyjh1234 4 дні тому

      @@DemystifySci_Podcast I like to say ancient pharaohs told people the flesh of Ra was what gold was and if they collected it they would get rewarded, and still people think gold has value.
      Not sure if you have done one, any chance of a program explaining to people that all money is debt, that it doesn't build up and all value of property assets etc is an assumed value, that all money being loans then that it must all be paid back? No-one I know realises money is banker debt or that is all the debts were paid back that there would be no money left. People seem to think taxes pay for govt spending instead of making money disappear, they don't understand all money being debt then it has an interest rate and that is one part of inflation. When it costs 4 cents per hundred dollars to create and we pay it back full value it seems as though it should be something we understand.

  • @SeiroosFardipour-sy3sh
    @SeiroosFardipour-sy3sh 9 днів тому

    Industrial revolution was the consequences inevitable of feudalism with the help of science and new continents

  • @timdunbar-e4c
    @timdunbar-e4c 9 днів тому

    is the dude levitating??

  • @johnwright9372
    @johnwright9372 7 днів тому

    This could be called The Parasites Kill The Host.

  • @antonyjh1234
    @antonyjh1234 4 дні тому

    @ 35 minutes talking about people are figuring out where to invest money etc, I think it is more people are realising money is just bank debt.

  • @tomconrad7091
    @tomconrad7091 6 днів тому

    Please wake up! This video is just wrong. We no longer live in an industrial economy. If you want to understand the economy today, study 1920 Germany. The problem is not right vs left or capitalism vs socialism, but society forgets humanity. Germany elected a social democrat to address inequality and inflation. His name was Adolph.

  • @jaysphilosophy1951
    @jaysphilosophy1951 9 днів тому

    You guys don't have business degrees. How dare you......