The New Economy

The world today is shaped by economic disruptors: automation, climate change, populism, digitization, and protectionism that is maneuvering the economies we live in today into totally different forms from what it was one decade ago, starting from the period of the 2008 financial crisis. Moreover, a report by Tom Orlik, Scott Johnson and Alex Tanzi called, “The New Economy Drivers and Disruptores”, which will be painstakingly discussed in The 2020 Bloomberg New Economy Forum, underlines the limited path to development and the upending of winners and losers in the global economy which they correlate to the influences driven by the economic disruptors. Furthermore, my attention was caught by two challenging statements quoted by Joseph Stiglitz, an economist professor at the University of Columbia, and I quote, “The only way to save our planet and our civilization, is a rebirth of history”, and that, “neoliberalism will literally bring an end to our civilization”. In this article I will drive my curiosity to reason the statement by Mr. Stiglitz with two economic disruptors, chosen solely upon my interest; climate change and populism.

One of the greatest economic disruptors countries are facing today is the drastic changes in climate, especially after Margret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan took control implementing neoliberalist policies that have since been dominating business decisions. Even though the gravity of climate change is highlighted each day in and day out the severity of this is still being underestimated by companies whose main income is dependent on nonrenewable energy sources. Under the realms of neoliberalism, competition has been purported as efficiency, and the definition of an individual is merely limited to only being a consumer under the market. The market, thus, is defined to perform perfectly without a planned route. These definitions of neoliberalism gave great incentives to firms to pursue the greatest of their interest without worrying about any negative externalities such as polluting the environment. However, this is not going unnoticed the vociferous and apprehensive generation z is going on climate strikes demanding governments to stop laundering money from the backs of massive corporations and that they start regulating these corporations transparently.

Secondly, neoliberalist populist economic policies are controlling the global financial markets in the context of historical capitalism defining our prosperity as an upshot of such policies. On and on, it is further convinced that our prosperity is dependent on the incessant growth of the financial markets. It is no amazement that Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve during the 2008 mortgage crisis had to create $700 million, which is argued by some to be the speculated amount, out of thin air to save the big banks in order to keep the cogwheel spinning. Today, the accumulated challenging statements towards populist liberalist policies are reflected in the furious protestors seen around the world raging their skepticism in the streets of Hong Kong to the streets in Beirut and Santiago. It is evident that populist neoliberalist policies are on-life support that has been devising their strategies more orthodoxly since the 2008 financial crisis.

From populism to climate change I believe we are in the process of the rebirth of history backlashing neoliberalist policies, by transmogrifying our economies into sharing economies and keeping moral benefit above materialistic benefit in accordance with policies that see the individual unique and production for use-value only. I am excited to read the outcomes of The Bloomberg New Economy Forum this year from the 20th of November to the 22nd of November that will be hosted in Beijing, China bringing economists, financiers, and business leaders from around the world to discuss questions posed in the report by Tom Orlik, Scott Johnson and Alex Tanzi of what is to become of the economies we live in in the future, albeit, I am skeptical and curious about whether the resolutions could answer the concerns of the people from around the world.

References

Bloomberg L.P. (n.d.). Retrieved November 22, 2019, from https://www.neweconomyforum.com/.

Stiglitz, J. E. (2019, November 4). The End of Neoliberalism and the Rebirth of History by Joseph E. Stiglitz. Retrieved November 22, 2019, from https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/end-of-neoliberalism-unfettered-markets-fail-by-joseph-e-stiglitz-2019-11.