Defense spending was never really a story of military issues. It’s really more of an economic story.
To mark Economic Update’s 10th anniversary year, Professor Wolff is revisiting relevant moments from 10 years ago to explore how capitalism, its defenders, and its critics have all changed.
For the month of April, Prof Wolff takes a look at defense spending, which was at its height in 2011, accounting for 4.5% of the total US GDP. 10 years later, the Biden Administration has announced the final withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, ending the 20 year war without the defeat of the Taliban. But there was a winner: the defense industry.
Today’s episode features an analysis (part 1) of how, why capitalism – especially in US – failed to prepare for or cope with a virus thereby enabling it to trigger another crash of capitalism (third this century: dot.com in 2000, sub-prime mortgage in 2008). In part 2, Prof. Wolff provides an analysis of how to respond to crash better than the US govt by emphasizing re-employment in millions of new jobs rather than unemployment, emphasizing worker-coops, etc.
In this video clip, Dr. Richard Wolff shares information on the world’s billionaires.
This clip is occurred during a talk at the Revolutionary Workers Group, Revolutionary University, October 2, 2016
Richard D. Wolff is Professor of Economics Emeritus, University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is currently a Visiting Professor in the Graduate Program in International Affairs of the New School University in New York. Wolff has also taught economics at Yale University, City University of New York, and the University of Paris I (Sorbonne).
Speak Out Now/Revolutionary Workers Group is a revolutionary group. They believe that a socialist world is possible and can be brought into being by the active struggles of the majority of the people of the world. They believe the international working class is the social force that can transform society and create a new world. But to do so, revolutionary organizations must be built in the working class. For this reason their group aims its activity primarily at large workplaces. Their newsletters are distributed at several workplaces every two weeks. http://revolutionaryworkersgroup.org/
Economist Dr. Richard Wolff, Capitalism’s Crisis Deepens Essays on the Global Economic Meltdown/Democracy At Work(For tickets/info on Dr. Wolff’s speaking events, click Democracy At Work.) There is a bright line from Carter and Reagan deregulating the airlines to what happened United Airlines Flight 3411 and the PR disaster that’s followed.
On tonight’s Big Picture, Thom discusses Trump’s economic and trade policies with economist and professor Dr. Richard Wolff. If Trump cuts taxes and ramps up defense spending, the U.S. could be looking at a shift back to Reagan-era economics.
Always Question Authority 