Some important issued raised in this discussion. Public investment (tax dollars) has historically been used to help companies develop new technologies (a sound way to help increase productivity and future revenues), but thereafter corporations have increasingly been allowed to maximize tax loopholes while funneling profits to shareholders and executives for a time (stock options, buybacks and dividend increases) and socialize the losses in failure (government bailouts). This has resulted in an inefficient and financially self-destructive economy where the rest of us pay more and more with less lasting benefit.
University of Sussex Professor Mariana Mazzucato, author of “Rethinking Capitalism,” explains a different approach to attacking economic issues, and looks at the decline in real wages in the United States and United Kingdom and the investment crisis plaguing global economies. Here is a direct video link.
University of Sussex Professor Mariana Mazzucato, author of “Rethinking Capitalism,” and Gilles Moec, chief European economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, talk about public funding behind corporations, the use of fiscal policy and how governments approach investment and austerity. Here is a direct video link.
Portugal faces a potential failure of its banks as a possible downgrade could create a spiral that takes down the government as well as the banks. Gilles Moec, chief European economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, University of Sussex Professor Mariana Mazzucato, and Bloomberg’s Michael McKee examine the challenges for Portugal, Italy and Europe as a whole. Here is a direct video link.
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