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The Value of Everything: Making and Taking in the Global Economy
Modern economies reward activities that extract value rather than create it. This must change to insure a capitalism that works for us all.
In this scathing indictment of our current global financial system, The Value of Everything rigorously scrutinizes the way in which economic value has been determined and reveals how the difference between value creation and value extraction has become increasingly blurry. Mariana Mazzucato argues that this blurriness allowed certain actors in the economy to portray themselves as value creators, while in reality they were just moving existing value around or, even worse, destroying it.
The book uses case studies - from Silicon Valley to the financial sector to big pharma - to show how the foggy notions of value create confusion between rents and profits, a difference that distorts the measurements of growth and GDP.
The lesson here is urgent and sobering: to rescue our economy from the next, inevitable crisis and to foster long-term economic growth, we will need to rethink capitalism, rethink the role of public policy and the importance of the public sector, and redefine how we measure value in our society.
In this scathing indictment of our current global financial system, The Value of Everything rigorously scrutinizes the way in which economic value has been determined and reveals how the difference between value creation and value extraction has become increasingly blurry. Mariana Mazzucato argues that this blurriness allowed certain actors in the economy to portray themselves as value creators, while in reality they were just moving existing value around or, even worse, destroying it.
The book uses case studies - from Silicon Valley to the financial sector to big pharma - to show how the foggy notions of value create confusion between rents and profits, a difference that distorts the measurements of growth and GDP.
The lesson here is urgent and sobering: to rescue our economy from the next, inevitable crisis and to foster long-term economic growth, we will need to rethink capitalism, rethink the role of public policy and the importance of the public sector, and redefine how we measure value in our society.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published September 11, 2018
About the author
Mariana Mazzucato
13 books878 followersMariana Mazzucato (PhD) is Professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London, where she directs the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. Her best selling books include The Entrepreneurial State, The Value of Everything and Mission Economy. Her many prizes include the 2020 John von Neumann Award and the 2018 Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. She is Chair of the World Health Organization’s Council on the Economics of Health for All and a member of the UN High Level Advisory Board for Economic and Social Affairs.
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December 3, 2018
A must-read for finance people and economists. This is an excellent history of bad ideas and theories in economics. Most especially, about how the government got removed and discounted as a creator of value. In fact, government investments create much of the value that the market uses and builds upon. When people think about government investments, they think about Solyndra. Mazzucato asks us to consider Tesla and the smartphone and the internet and all of the foundational modern technologies and companies that began with government grants and investments.
May 23, 2018
Mazzucato's observations and conclusions won't surprise readers who've read more than one or two works of contemporary critical theory. But the fact that she is writing in a different register and for a largely different audience matters a great deal in this case, and I found the book very rewarding (and even rather moving in her concluding call for an "economics of hope").
August 16, 2018
Capitalism has a problem - and that is to confuse price with value. So not only we think a $6 apple must be nicer than a $2 one, we also think that someone earning $100k must be better than one earning $60k etc. Firms are also told to only maximise shareholder returns (a.k.a. ever lower Price/earning ratios), so they dutifully increase revenue (raise price), cut costs (outsource and sack staff). To boost stock price, they also buy back shares to decrease the number of outstanding stocks. Not only that makes workers suffer, increase inequality, but also decreases long term investment. That is because CEOs are rewarded with stock options and their performance is mostly based on stock price. Pharmaceutical companies charge enormous prices for new drugs.
She wrote that historically, economists separate productive vs rent-seeking unproductive activity. According to the author finance is mostly unproductive activity. Corporate raiders buy companies with debt that was saddled on the very companies that were bought, and make quick profits while workers are laid off. Venture capitalists make enormous profits on companies built on government research (like GPS and internet both built by the military).
Mazzucato also attacked the calculation of GDP, that it reflects not value but price. So we can boost our GDP instantly if we just pay each other to cook and clean our house, even if the amount of work done is the same and the net amount of money that changed hands is zero.
Lastly, government has been put down as only the distributors of economic output, not generator of it. So government has been asked to step aside, to just provide some protection and order, and build some roads so that real private wealth generators can do their thing. The IMF and World Bank actually push this agenda to developing countries, asking them to sell almost everything to the private sector, and outsource essential services. This leads to higher cost, worse service and for the government to pick up the tab when private providers go bankrupt.
Mazzucato suggested that we need to look at real Value, and that involves all the stakeholders. She does not have the solution yet but we need to start that conversation. She does have some suggestions:
1. Financial transaction tax to favour long term investment.
2. Grant fewer parents upstream so there is more open access.
3. Limit what pharmaceutical companies can charge
4. Any government support being conditioned on actual investment and not share buy-back.
5. Tax big tech companies more since they benefited from government basic research.
This is a thought-provoking book, with very good ideas. However, finance workers are certainly important: our insurance, pension funds, and sovereign funds all depend on those guys to help us grow our money. The stock market exists to encourage IPOs and thus innovation backed by VCs (since they can then make profits by investing in start ups). It is also very hard to determine the value of something if we cannot rely on its price: who will decide then? A committee? That would be communism... And some government services are really inefficient.
Nonetheless I am very inspired by this book because it really challenges many of my assumptions about the economy.
She wrote that historically, economists separate productive vs rent-seeking unproductive activity. According to the author finance is mostly unproductive activity. Corporate raiders buy companies with debt that was saddled on the very companies that were bought, and make quick profits while workers are laid off. Venture capitalists make enormous profits on companies built on government research (like GPS and internet both built by the military).
Mazzucato also attacked the calculation of GDP, that it reflects not value but price. So we can boost our GDP instantly if we just pay each other to cook and clean our house, even if the amount of work done is the same and the net amount of money that changed hands is zero.
Lastly, government has been put down as only the distributors of economic output, not generator of it. So government has been asked to step aside, to just provide some protection and order, and build some roads so that real private wealth generators can do their thing. The IMF and World Bank actually push this agenda to developing countries, asking them to sell almost everything to the private sector, and outsource essential services. This leads to higher cost, worse service and for the government to pick up the tab when private providers go bankrupt.
Mazzucato suggested that we need to look at real Value, and that involves all the stakeholders. She does not have the solution yet but we need to start that conversation. She does have some suggestions:
1. Financial transaction tax to favour long term investment.
2. Grant fewer parents upstream so there is more open access.
3. Limit what pharmaceutical companies can charge
4. Any government support being conditioned on actual investment and not share buy-back.
5. Tax big tech companies more since they benefited from government basic research.
This is a thought-provoking book, with very good ideas. However, finance workers are certainly important: our insurance, pension funds, and sovereign funds all depend on those guys to help us grow our money. The stock market exists to encourage IPOs and thus innovation backed by VCs (since they can then make profits by investing in start ups). It is also very hard to determine the value of something if we cannot rely on its price: who will decide then? A committee? That would be communism... And some government services are really inefficient.
Nonetheless I am very inspired by this book because it really challenges many of my assumptions about the economy.
September 8, 2019
A very disappointing book. Since it was billed as a refreshing alternative to free market capitalism, I was excited to see an academic take on what sustainable left-leaning policies look like, rather than the typical left-wing media take that relies heavily on moral obligations but fails to offer practical alternatives.
Mazzucato does offer a plausible criticism of modern economics (although I have little experience with economics so am not in much of a position to criticise) - the role of value is underestimated, leading to a universal misinterpretation of the role of government in the economy. As an economics professor, you would expect her economic analysis to be sound, but of course there will be little popular interest in a book about economic technicalities - this is no bad thing, but I sense mazzucato's interest is reaching outside of the economic sphere.
Unfortunately, her grasp of business and finance is much weaker than of economics, and relies heavily on the tropes of left-wing media. Executive pay is offensive, bankers (used in the confused collective sense of anyone working in the financial industry) serve no purpose and earn too much money, the poor government is naively taken advantage of by rapacious entrepreneurs and big pharma lobbyists. Of course there is a certain amount of truth behind each of these perspectives, but to use these as proof of a broken system strikes me as a lazy straw man argument, which is repeated through all the central chapters of the book. The issue is that often these are topics that are regularly debated within the business world, and there are good arguments to be made on each side of the argument. But to present such issues to the public (which ultimately is the point of targeting this book towards a more popular audience) without even mentioning the commonly made counter arguments is remarkably shoddy academic practice.
An example: the author heavily criticises the practice of share buybacks. This is a valid argument to be had, and is discussed within financial circles (for instance, Matt Levine at Bloomberg writes about this regularly). Mazzucato explains that share buybacks are purely a way for executives to boost their pay rather than reinvest in their industry; while this may be a reason for the practice, it is quite ridiculous to suggest that it is the primary motivation. The problem is that if Mazzucato were to expand on the normal reasons for companies to buy back their shares, she would reveal a fundamental contradiction in her arguments - firms have too much power to choose where investment is made, but are then criticised for returning shareholder money to allow the shareholders to choose where further investment should be made. It's not that I don't think she has a point, it's just that you can't make a decent argument if you create a straw man to argue against.
It is a shame that the middle chapters of the book are marred by this kind of rhetoric because it detracts from the whole point of the enterprise. The opening and closing chapters are often great, but Mazzucato reveals either a fundamentally weak understanding of business, or the type of selective disclosure that we expect from partisan newspaper columnists. This begs the question: what is the point of this book? The economics part is interesting but technical and is suited to an academic paper rather than a 'popular' book; the remaining criticisms of capitalism are generic and unoriginal, and fail to provide the academic rigour that the book promises to deliver.
I am generally left-leaning, and I really hoped that this book could offer a plausible economics to counter the inequalities of free market capitalism. However, if the book failed to convince me - actively wanting to be convinced - how can the author expect to enact any actual reform?
Mazzucato does offer a plausible criticism of modern economics (although I have little experience with economics so am not in much of a position to criticise) - the role of value is underestimated, leading to a universal misinterpretation of the role of government in the economy. As an economics professor, you would expect her economic analysis to be sound, but of course there will be little popular interest in a book about economic technicalities - this is no bad thing, but I sense mazzucato's interest is reaching outside of the economic sphere.
Unfortunately, her grasp of business and finance is much weaker than of economics, and relies heavily on the tropes of left-wing media. Executive pay is offensive, bankers (used in the confused collective sense of anyone working in the financial industry) serve no purpose and earn too much money, the poor government is naively taken advantage of by rapacious entrepreneurs and big pharma lobbyists. Of course there is a certain amount of truth behind each of these perspectives, but to use these as proof of a broken system strikes me as a lazy straw man argument, which is repeated through all the central chapters of the book. The issue is that often these are topics that are regularly debated within the business world, and there are good arguments to be made on each side of the argument. But to present such issues to the public (which ultimately is the point of targeting this book towards a more popular audience) without even mentioning the commonly made counter arguments is remarkably shoddy academic practice.
An example: the author heavily criticises the practice of share buybacks. This is a valid argument to be had, and is discussed within financial circles (for instance, Matt Levine at Bloomberg writes about this regularly). Mazzucato explains that share buybacks are purely a way for executives to boost their pay rather than reinvest in their industry; while this may be a reason for the practice, it is quite ridiculous to suggest that it is the primary motivation. The problem is that if Mazzucato were to expand on the normal reasons for companies to buy back their shares, she would reveal a fundamental contradiction in her arguments - firms have too much power to choose where investment is made, but are then criticised for returning shareholder money to allow the shareholders to choose where further investment should be made. It's not that I don't think she has a point, it's just that you can't make a decent argument if you create a straw man to argue against.
It is a shame that the middle chapters of the book are marred by this kind of rhetoric because it detracts from the whole point of the enterprise. The opening and closing chapters are often great, but Mazzucato reveals either a fundamentally weak understanding of business, or the type of selective disclosure that we expect from partisan newspaper columnists. This begs the question: what is the point of this book? The economics part is interesting but technical and is suited to an academic paper rather than a 'popular' book; the remaining criticisms of capitalism are generic and unoriginal, and fail to provide the academic rigour that the book promises to deliver.
I am generally left-leaning, and I really hoped that this book could offer a plausible economics to counter the inequalities of free market capitalism. However, if the book failed to convince me - actively wanting to be convinced - how can the author expect to enact any actual reform?
July 7, 2018
Mariana is a post Keynesian, hence relies on observations of actual economic behaviour rather than doctrine and illogical theoretical assumptions (as did Keynes in his writings) and some of this book follows Keynes' discussions in his General Theory. She debunks the classicists in a comparable fashion. It is refreshingly entertaining writing.
The whole book is readable, and is a logical sequel to her previous 'entrepreneurial state', developing similar themes.
The chapters on theory of value do not actually reach a defined conclusion and she does skirt the issue of how utilitarianism led to neoclassicism a little, but it is still powerful stuff.
Her arguments are compelling - the financial sector is basically parasitic, and the reasoning is solid. 21stC capitalism tends to extract rather than create value. A little more on how externalities - especially environmental damage, carbon emissions and pollution - are written out of the value equation would have been welcome, given that climate change is basically an economic issue.
She is canny in citing Marx and Smith, and extracts residual value from all the classicists after her critiques.
If only my own economics lectures at UCL had been as considered and with an equivalent standard of critical assessment, I might have not abandoned the dismal science (she is an optimist) all those years ago.
The whole book is readable, and is a logical sequel to her previous 'entrepreneurial state', developing similar themes.
The chapters on theory of value do not actually reach a defined conclusion and she does skirt the issue of how utilitarianism led to neoclassicism a little, but it is still powerful stuff.
Her arguments are compelling - the financial sector is basically parasitic, and the reasoning is solid. 21stC capitalism tends to extract rather than create value. A little more on how externalities - especially environmental damage, carbon emissions and pollution - are written out of the value equation would have been welcome, given that climate change is basically an economic issue.
She is canny in citing Marx and Smith, and extracts residual value from all the classicists after her critiques.
If only my own economics lectures at UCL had been as considered and with an equivalent standard of critical assessment, I might have not abandoned the dismal science (she is an optimist) all those years ago.
January 6, 2020
I have long known in my gut that usual measures of social wealth, most of all GDP, are fraudulent, in that they falsely identify value where there is none. I have intuited we were all being lied to, and that those who assured us that ever more value was being generated by our society by what appear to be objectively valueless activities were, at best, hiding something. This outstanding book, by left-wing economist Mariana Mazzucato, explains what is being hidden, what hard truths are being avoided, and what she thinks we should do about it. And while I don’t agree with all her prescriptions, or with her rosy view of government competency, the first step on the path to self-improvement is admitting you have a problem.
Others have tried to explain the corruption of the modern economy, such as Rana Foroohar in her dreadful Makers and Takers, but Mazzucato succeeds where they failed. Her core claim is that “much of what is passing for value creation is just value extraction in disguise.” What is value is the heart of this book, along with who creates value. And if value is defined not just as bargained-for exchange, it alters who and what can and should be viewed as productive of value.
Most of all, this book is an attack on the financial industry as extractive and unproductive, something I have also long believed but could not precisely say why, even though I have a lot of direct experience with that industry. Since the financial industry has hoodwinked and bribed much of the world, especially conservatives, into thinking it is a key component of economic growth, and that attacks on it are attacks on the free market and on apple pie, this is a heresy. But a heresy that is also an essential truth.
No surprise, Mazzucato begins by explaining value. “At its heart it is the production of new goods and services.” This is obvious, in a way, but frequently overlooked, ignored, or distorted. In my usual thought experiment, twenty people sitting around on the savanna who do nothing at all except eat and drink what is at hand produce no value. Mazzucato adds the qualifier that not all value, which for her is functionally the same thing as wealth, is net positive, because of externalities. A factory that produces new goods but pollutes creates less net value than if it did not pollute. Similarly, a Gender Studies or Latino Studies professor pollutes society and creates negative net social value, though that’s not an example Mazzucato gives. Conversely, value extraction is “activities focused on moving around existing resources and outputs, and gaining disproportionately from the ensuing trade.”
Thus, determining what is a productive activity is the key to understanding value. In the modern era, since the late eighteenth century, variations on defining the “production boundary” have been used to make this determination. Activities inside the boundary create wealth; activities outside extract it. Today, economic orthodoxy views the production boundary as encompassing all bargained-for exchanges. If a price is paid, value exists. Mazzucato rejects this, holding that some prices paid result in unearned income not representing value creation, a throwback concept, and that some activities currently viewed as creating value actually destroy value.
The first third of the book is a history of economic value. This is a quintessentially modern debate; until the late seventeenth century, economic value was essentially a moral question, revolving around virtuous behavior and contribution to the common good. With the changes wrought by the discovery of the New World, in particular the massive influx of metals, threads of abstract economic thought began to crop up, initially of the mercantilist sort—roughly, the idea that the more metals a country retained, the better. And to measure whether a country was advancing or retreating, the concept of national income was born. William Petty, surveyor to Oliver Cromwell and secretary to Thomas Hobbes, had the insight that viewing each country as a closed system, income and expenditure aggregated the same (ignoring savings), and thus if he could estimate national expenditure, he could estimate national income. He set the production boundary (although he didn’t call it that) to include in national income only production of necessities, such as food and clothing. What is inside and what is outside the production boundary is the core determination for all future calculations of national income—or, as we call it now, more or less, gross domestic product.
The next major thrusts in this area were made by the Physiocrats during the reign of Louis XV, in the mid-eighteenth century. For them, only the primary sector, mostly agriculture but also activities such as mining, was productive. All other activities, including industrial transformations, merchant activities, and of course government, were outside the production boundary. Soon enough, along came the classical economists: Adam Smith and David Ricardo, along with Karl Marx, who are all three here (and not often elsewhere) lumped together, as deriving value, and therefore national income, primarily from labor itself (along with other direct costs of production), not from the focus of the labor. Smith set the production boundary to include any activity involved in production, because it creates value, and to exclude services (lawyers and the like) and government (as well as household production), which do not create value, but live off the surplus created by others. For Smith, using generated wealth to produce more was the key to national growth and success. (This would avoid the example of Spain, which under mercantilist theory should have been in great shape because of the enormous amounts of metals it absorbed, but it did not become more productive, and so sank back into poverty.) Rents, that is transfers of value to those who hold a monopoly on a scarce asset, most obviously land but not at all limited to that, were also unproductive.
Ricardo further developed the theory of rents. As the population grew and assets such as land became relatively scarcer, Ricardo saw rents rising and economic stagnation resulting. Here we see telegraphed Mazzucato’s theme that most of the modern finance industry is not productive, but a seeker of, and gorger upon, rents. For Ricardo, consumption to allow more economic activity, as by industrialists, was good consumption; consumption of frippery was bad consumption. Ricardo, however, included services within the production boundary, as long as they were part of productive processes. Government services were, though, by definition unproductive (true, Ricardo was focused on war spending, and ignored activities such as infrastructure spending).
Marx followed Ricardo in seeing labor as the source of value, but differed in seeing the extraction of surplus value from workers as the key engine of the modern industrial economy (and also the creator of alienation in the workers). Marx included “circulation” within the production boundary—that is, certain activities, including some merchants and some finance, that were needed for productive industry to realize profits. Surplus value that would otherwise be absorbed by production capitalists goes to circulation capitalists—but they also create surplus value, by making activities possible for the production capitalists that would not otherwise be possible. Amazon is an example, as are certain elements of finance—but not lending, “interest-bearing capital.” Thus, anything that created surplus value was within the production boundary. Other aspects, along with government and with household production, were as usual outside the production boundary. Along the same lines, rents were seen as merely redistributing value, not creating it, and were outside the production boundary—they were also merely claims on surplus value created by labor.
In the late nineteenth century, and into the twentieth, the concepts of value developed by classical economics went by the wayside with the rise of the neoclassical economists, such as Alfred Marshall, who developed the marginalist theory of value. They held, and it is nearly universally held today, that people buy goods or services based on their subjective estimation of utility at the margin to the buyer, and therefore the only value of a good or service is whether and what someone is willing to pay for it. Of course, as Mazzucato points out, this means that total value production in a national economy is now purely subjective, and that measures of productivity now fluctuate with prices. Even more perniciously, this theory means that someone who is unemployed is merely choosing leisure over value, by preferring the utility of leisure to whatever work may be available. This also implies that to maximize national value any barriers to trade must be removed, such that everyone can get what he deserves based on his marginal production. Government’s role is only to remove market failures (and that only if it can be proven government will not be a worse cure than the disease, according to James Buchanan’s public choice theory), since by definition the totally free and frictionless market will provide optimal outcomes. Finally, it implies that rents in the old sense, of a monopoly on something such as land or capital, are no longer viewed with distaste; they are merely part of an individual’s utility maximizing, and income from rents is now viewed as inside the production boundary, whether derived from land or capital.
Therefore, nearly every purchase transaction is included within today’s “comprehensive boundary.” Under this new view of things, anything that fetches a price is included in national income, GDP. Mazzucato goes into great detail about the modern calculation of GDP, something that I have long failed to understand, but which she makes accessible, though even with her explanations it’s still mushy and confusing, in its nature, not due to any failure of the author. The accounting calculations are very complex and frequently shifting, done pursuant to something of which you have never heard, the “United Nations’ System of National Accounts,” the SNA. It attempts to calculate GDP as “the amount of value added by production.” National production equals national income equals national expenditure. In theory, at least—but Mazzucato says much of this is ad hoc, such as the switch in 2008 from ignoring research and development to including it in GDP, which magically added 2.5 percent to United States GDP with no actual change in the economy. And anything that does not fetch a price, such as household work, is not part of GDP—but six percent of GDP is rent imputed to homeowners, again with the ad hoc judgment calls. Government spending is included in GDP only for amounts government spends as an actor, excluding transfer payments such as pensions and unemployment benefits (which show up in GDP as part of household spending). Government is ignored in calculations of production, something to which, again, Mazzucato objects, since she views government as very often a value creator.
The explanations here don’t answer some of my questions, though. Where does money borrowed from the Chinese show up? Given the level of foreign debt we incur, national expenditure would seem to grossly exceed national production and national income. Or is the debt transferred to national income and national “production” by government spending? But how can debt be considered production? Or, to take another question that fascinates me, how about California? We are always told how big California’s economy is, how important it is to our country, how it “contributes” so much to national value. We are told if California were independent it would be the world’s fifth-largest economy. We are, of course, told these things to suggest that being run by people on the far left, woker than woke, is totally compatible with economic success, and that “red” states are parasites upon the awesome success of California and New York.
I went exploring, to determine what it is that makes up California’s GDP, through statistics provided by the Bureau of Economic Affairs. The vast majority is things that do not, according to Mazzucato, actually result from the creation of value. Forty-seven percent is FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate), “professional and business services,” or “information.” Twelve percent is manufacturing. Eleven percent is “government and government enterprises.” Ten percent is education and social services. Wholesale and retail trade is eleven percent. And collectively, agriculture, construction, transportation, utilities, and mining are thirteen percent. Thus, what normal people regard colloquially as productive, manufacturing and other forms of real new value creation, is around twenty-five percent of the total. Maybe thirty-five percent, if you optimistically include part of education, “information” and “business services,” though the latter is probably mostly transactions costs such as lawyers imposed by the government and plaintiff’s lawyers engaging in legal extortion. But then, from that maximum of thirty-five percent you have to take away what is really not part of California at all. For example, it appears that any corporation headquartered in California has any capital investments included in California GDP, regardless of where the investment takes place. Along similar lines, presumably “information” includes revenue Google obtains from selling advertising, facilitating transactions that occur mostly totally outside California, and revenue derived from server farms, mostly located outside California. (If calculating GDP by the production method, are all iPhones produced attributed to California’s GDP? I’m not sure.) And so forth, suggesting that much of what appears as value in substantive categories is really not at all attributable to California—it is either fictional, not value at all, or tied to California merely by accounting convention. In other words, as Kurt Schlichter preaches in his “Split” novels, there is no there there, and California would merely collapse like the house in Poltergeist, or Venezuela, if it were severed from the rest of the country, because what passes for value in its GDP is mostly not value at all.
Mazzucato’s history is warmup to her main application of an accurate value framework . . . [Review completes as first comment.]
Others have tried to explain the corruption of the modern economy, such as Rana Foroohar in her dreadful Makers and Takers, but Mazzucato succeeds where they failed. Her core claim is that “much of what is passing for value creation is just value extraction in disguise.” What is value is the heart of this book, along with who creates value. And if value is defined not just as bargained-for exchange, it alters who and what can and should be viewed as productive of value.
Most of all, this book is an attack on the financial industry as extractive and unproductive, something I have also long believed but could not precisely say why, even though I have a lot of direct experience with that industry. Since the financial industry has hoodwinked and bribed much of the world, especially conservatives, into thinking it is a key component of economic growth, and that attacks on it are attacks on the free market and on apple pie, this is a heresy. But a heresy that is also an essential truth.
No surprise, Mazzucato begins by explaining value. “At its heart it is the production of new goods and services.” This is obvious, in a way, but frequently overlooked, ignored, or distorted. In my usual thought experiment, twenty people sitting around on the savanna who do nothing at all except eat and drink what is at hand produce no value. Mazzucato adds the qualifier that not all value, which for her is functionally the same thing as wealth, is net positive, because of externalities. A factory that produces new goods but pollutes creates less net value than if it did not pollute. Similarly, a Gender Studies or Latino Studies professor pollutes society and creates negative net social value, though that’s not an example Mazzucato gives. Conversely, value extraction is “activities focused on moving around existing resources and outputs, and gaining disproportionately from the ensuing trade.”
Thus, determining what is a productive activity is the key to understanding value. In the modern era, since the late eighteenth century, variations on defining the “production boundary” have been used to make this determination. Activities inside the boundary create wealth; activities outside extract it. Today, economic orthodoxy views the production boundary as encompassing all bargained-for exchanges. If a price is paid, value exists. Mazzucato rejects this, holding that some prices paid result in unearned income not representing value creation, a throwback concept, and that some activities currently viewed as creating value actually destroy value.
The first third of the book is a history of economic value. This is a quintessentially modern debate; until the late seventeenth century, economic value was essentially a moral question, revolving around virtuous behavior and contribution to the common good. With the changes wrought by the discovery of the New World, in particular the massive influx of metals, threads of abstract economic thought began to crop up, initially of the mercantilist sort—roughly, the idea that the more metals a country retained, the better. And to measure whether a country was advancing or retreating, the concept of national income was born. William Petty, surveyor to Oliver Cromwell and secretary to Thomas Hobbes, had the insight that viewing each country as a closed system, income and expenditure aggregated the same (ignoring savings), and thus if he could estimate national expenditure, he could estimate national income. He set the production boundary (although he didn’t call it that) to include in national income only production of necessities, such as food and clothing. What is inside and what is outside the production boundary is the core determination for all future calculations of national income—or, as we call it now, more or less, gross domestic product.
The next major thrusts in this area were made by the Physiocrats during the reign of Louis XV, in the mid-eighteenth century. For them, only the primary sector, mostly agriculture but also activities such as mining, was productive. All other activities, including industrial transformations, merchant activities, and of course government, were outside the production boundary. Soon enough, along came the classical economists: Adam Smith and David Ricardo, along with Karl Marx, who are all three here (and not often elsewhere) lumped together, as deriving value, and therefore national income, primarily from labor itself (along with other direct costs of production), not from the focus of the labor. Smith set the production boundary to include any activity involved in production, because it creates value, and to exclude services (lawyers and the like) and government (as well as household production), which do not create value, but live off the surplus created by others. For Smith, using generated wealth to produce more was the key to national growth and success. (This would avoid the example of Spain, which under mercantilist theory should have been in great shape because of the enormous amounts of metals it absorbed, but it did not become more productive, and so sank back into poverty.) Rents, that is transfers of value to those who hold a monopoly on a scarce asset, most obviously land but not at all limited to that, were also unproductive.
Ricardo further developed the theory of rents. As the population grew and assets such as land became relatively scarcer, Ricardo saw rents rising and economic stagnation resulting. Here we see telegraphed Mazzucato’s theme that most of the modern finance industry is not productive, but a seeker of, and gorger upon, rents. For Ricardo, consumption to allow more economic activity, as by industrialists, was good consumption; consumption of frippery was bad consumption. Ricardo, however, included services within the production boundary, as long as they were part of productive processes. Government services were, though, by definition unproductive (true, Ricardo was focused on war spending, and ignored activities such as infrastructure spending).
Marx followed Ricardo in seeing labor as the source of value, but differed in seeing the extraction of surplus value from workers as the key engine of the modern industrial economy (and also the creator of alienation in the workers). Marx included “circulation” within the production boundary—that is, certain activities, including some merchants and some finance, that were needed for productive industry to realize profits. Surplus value that would otherwise be absorbed by production capitalists goes to circulation capitalists—but they also create surplus value, by making activities possible for the production capitalists that would not otherwise be possible. Amazon is an example, as are certain elements of finance—but not lending, “interest-bearing capital.” Thus, anything that created surplus value was within the production boundary. Other aspects, along with government and with household production, were as usual outside the production boundary. Along the same lines, rents were seen as merely redistributing value, not creating it, and were outside the production boundary—they were also merely claims on surplus value created by labor.
In the late nineteenth century, and into the twentieth, the concepts of value developed by classical economics went by the wayside with the rise of the neoclassical economists, such as Alfred Marshall, who developed the marginalist theory of value. They held, and it is nearly universally held today, that people buy goods or services based on their subjective estimation of utility at the margin to the buyer, and therefore the only value of a good or service is whether and what someone is willing to pay for it. Of course, as Mazzucato points out, this means that total value production in a national economy is now purely subjective, and that measures of productivity now fluctuate with prices. Even more perniciously, this theory means that someone who is unemployed is merely choosing leisure over value, by preferring the utility of leisure to whatever work may be available. This also implies that to maximize national value any barriers to trade must be removed, such that everyone can get what he deserves based on his marginal production. Government’s role is only to remove market failures (and that only if it can be proven government will not be a worse cure than the disease, according to James Buchanan’s public choice theory), since by definition the totally free and frictionless market will provide optimal outcomes. Finally, it implies that rents in the old sense, of a monopoly on something such as land or capital, are no longer viewed with distaste; they are merely part of an individual’s utility maximizing, and income from rents is now viewed as inside the production boundary, whether derived from land or capital.
Therefore, nearly every purchase transaction is included within today’s “comprehensive boundary.” Under this new view of things, anything that fetches a price is included in national income, GDP. Mazzucato goes into great detail about the modern calculation of GDP, something that I have long failed to understand, but which she makes accessible, though even with her explanations it’s still mushy and confusing, in its nature, not due to any failure of the author. The accounting calculations are very complex and frequently shifting, done pursuant to something of which you have never heard, the “United Nations’ System of National Accounts,” the SNA. It attempts to calculate GDP as “the amount of value added by production.” National production equals national income equals national expenditure. In theory, at least—but Mazzucato says much of this is ad hoc, such as the switch in 2008 from ignoring research and development to including it in GDP, which magically added 2.5 percent to United States GDP with no actual change in the economy. And anything that does not fetch a price, such as household work, is not part of GDP—but six percent of GDP is rent imputed to homeowners, again with the ad hoc judgment calls. Government spending is included in GDP only for amounts government spends as an actor, excluding transfer payments such as pensions and unemployment benefits (which show up in GDP as part of household spending). Government is ignored in calculations of production, something to which, again, Mazzucato objects, since she views government as very often a value creator.
The explanations here don’t answer some of my questions, though. Where does money borrowed from the Chinese show up? Given the level of foreign debt we incur, national expenditure would seem to grossly exceed national production and national income. Or is the debt transferred to national income and national “production” by government spending? But how can debt be considered production? Or, to take another question that fascinates me, how about California? We are always told how big California’s economy is, how important it is to our country, how it “contributes” so much to national value. We are told if California were independent it would be the world’s fifth-largest economy. We are, of course, told these things to suggest that being run by people on the far left, woker than woke, is totally compatible with economic success, and that “red” states are parasites upon the awesome success of California and New York.
I went exploring, to determine what it is that makes up California’s GDP, through statistics provided by the Bureau of Economic Affairs. The vast majority is things that do not, according to Mazzucato, actually result from the creation of value. Forty-seven percent is FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate), “professional and business services,” or “information.” Twelve percent is manufacturing. Eleven percent is “government and government enterprises.” Ten percent is education and social services. Wholesale and retail trade is eleven percent. And collectively, agriculture, construction, transportation, utilities, and mining are thirteen percent. Thus, what normal people regard colloquially as productive, manufacturing and other forms of real new value creation, is around twenty-five percent of the total. Maybe thirty-five percent, if you optimistically include part of education, “information” and “business services,” though the latter is probably mostly transactions costs such as lawyers imposed by the government and plaintiff’s lawyers engaging in legal extortion. But then, from that maximum of thirty-five percent you have to take away what is really not part of California at all. For example, it appears that any corporation headquartered in California has any capital investments included in California GDP, regardless of where the investment takes place. Along similar lines, presumably “information” includes revenue Google obtains from selling advertising, facilitating transactions that occur mostly totally outside California, and revenue derived from server farms, mostly located outside California. (If calculating GDP by the production method, are all iPhones produced attributed to California’s GDP? I’m not sure.) And so forth, suggesting that much of what appears as value in substantive categories is really not at all attributable to California—it is either fictional, not value at all, or tied to California merely by accounting convention. In other words, as Kurt Schlichter preaches in his “Split” novels, there is no there there, and California would merely collapse like the house in Poltergeist, or Venezuela, if it were severed from the rest of the country, because what passes for value in its GDP is mostly not value at all.
Mazzucato’s history is warmup to her main application of an accurate value framework . . . [Review completes as first comment.]
May 8, 2023
I wanted to like this book. I thought that Mazzucato had her heart in the right place. I kept hoping that she was going to deliver a new theory of value that was going take us into value's Copernican universe so that both the old discredited labor theory of value and the Neoclassical idea that value is a function of demand would look like the Ptolemaic epicycles of value theory. But she didn't. She seems to be saying that value is a function of overall social utility. Fair enough. But then she doesn't tell us how to measure or maximize value. Maybe that's because this is a popular book that can't have formulas or math, but I suspect that it is because her theory is not fully formed, because all we get from her is a pile of anecdotes where others claim to create or measure value but clearly fail to do so.
Her main attack on Neoclassical value theory seems to be that price does not reflect value. But when I was taught Neoclassical economics in college, nobody ever claimed that prices are true reflections of value. There are too many market distorting forces at play for that to ever be true except in a few simple cases. Value is a function of demand. Most products for which there is demand have a price. The price is driven at least in part by demand, but price and demand are not the same thing, though you wouldn't know that from reading this book or some of the other reviews.
I strongly agree with her criticism of the finance business as being largely parasitic and not the value and wealth creator that it claims to be. I am afraid that my own business of law is also often parasitic and too often only extracts value without contributing to it. But that doesn't mean that finance or law are without value, only that that are not the value creators that they claim to be and that in a fairer more perfect world financiers and lawyers would get smaller rewards that would compensate only for the value that they actually add.
I also agree with her concept that corporations should be refocused away from the concept of maximizing shareholder value to a broader concept of enhancing value for all stakeholders. The rewards for society as a whole in the long run would far exceed what the present system delivers.
So Mazzucato is doing God's work in the results that she aims for. I just wish that she could have delivered a stronger theoretical underpinning.
Her main attack on Neoclassical value theory seems to be that price does not reflect value. But when I was taught Neoclassical economics in college, nobody ever claimed that prices are true reflections of value. There are too many market distorting forces at play for that to ever be true except in a few simple cases. Value is a function of demand. Most products for which there is demand have a price. The price is driven at least in part by demand, but price and demand are not the same thing, though you wouldn't know that from reading this book or some of the other reviews.
I strongly agree with her criticism of the finance business as being largely parasitic and not the value and wealth creator that it claims to be. I am afraid that my own business of law is also often parasitic and too often only extracts value without contributing to it. But that doesn't mean that finance or law are without value, only that that are not the value creators that they claim to be and that in a fairer more perfect world financiers and lawyers would get smaller rewards that would compensate only for the value that they actually add.
I also agree with her concept that corporations should be refocused away from the concept of maximizing shareholder value to a broader concept of enhancing value for all stakeholders. The rewards for society as a whole in the long run would far exceed what the present system delivers.
So Mazzucato is doing God's work in the results that she aims for. I just wish that she could have delivered a stronger theoretical underpinning.
January 8, 2024
One of the best economics books I’ve ever read.
I’ve read a mountain of economics books, at least over 50, and this is easily top ten. In The Value of Everything, the author takes you from the history of economics of how value was defined and how it has become deranged today into an enormous financialized rent seeking behemoth that siphons off wealth. This is also a balanced book, mostly apolitical, written by a PHD in economics. It’s not a polemic, it’s a well-thought, well-researched critique about the current economic system.
The author gives us a nice overlay of the transformation of “value” and how its definition has changed over time with enormous impact. The TLDR version is that value has been redefined from things that produce into things that don’t produce as long as they are private entities. Meaning, the broad financialization that has occurred since the 1980s has suddenly been deemed to add “value” except that it only increases shareholder value and that anything the government does does not produce value even though the government provides tremendous value to its citizens. It’s this broad redefining of value that has created an enormous rent seeking apparatus that results in wage stagnation and wealth concentration.
The author starts at the beginning with classical economics and does a good job with an overview of Adam Smith , Ricardo and Marx and their contributions to what is considered to be valuable or not. Adam Smith helped develop a lot of labor value theory. He believed growth depended on increasing the share of manufacturing and wage laborers and free trade was essential to bring this about. Enemies of growth, accordion and Smith were the protectionist policies of mercantilism as well as guilds protecting artisan privilege and the nobility who squandered its money on consumption and unproductive labor. Smith believed that hoarding cash prevents nations from spreading wealth. Smith’s theories were basically against mercantilism and for more free trade without tariffs and rent seeking. Smith’s free trade principles traced value to labor and not to gold. Ricardo was all about how the distribution of wealth was created from labor and he was also opposed to rent seeking constructions. Marx understood the labor power is what allowed surplus to even happen to begin with which is then exploited by the capitalists. He understood the ingenuity of capitalists who organize workers to create surplus value and he foresaw the deleterious effects of mechanization and financialization and how it undermines workers. There are four types of capitalists: production bearing, commercial bearing, interest bearing and land owners.
And then the neoclassical economists overturned the labor value theory. A new theory was developed that dictated that a price is set by the value the buyer gives it and NOT derived from the labor that was created. THIS IS KEY. Flash forward to today and this is the exact same rational greedy drug makers will use when talking about why their medication costs tens of thousands of dollars. They argue the price is high because of the value it brings. The value IS the price even though the costs and labor to produce are way smaller than the price. This is all called marginal utility and it’s part of neoclassical economics. The idea of scarcity also became a very important part of economic theory at this time. Marginal value theory assumes that there is no monopoly of companies to set prices. Marginal value theory creates hyper individualistic economic theory and hyper charges the consumer. It was this shift from classical thinking that saw rent seeking as parasitic, into neoclassical view that saw rent seeking as something that added value to the economy. Now in the modern economy, we count financial products and rent seeking as part of the GDP and consider it to be of productive value. The difference between profits and rent is obscured and it's all taken as productive.
Finance made a huge shift in the 1980s into being as a value adding entity but all it did was extract wealth and inflict wage stagnation. From leveraged buyout, stock buybacks, junk bonds, shadow banking, to transaction costs: the majority of Wall Street is an enormous rent seeking apparatus. It’s been the transition from stakeholder to shareholder that has created this paradigm shift. There are only short term profits. That’s it.
After the author explains all of this in great detail she then goes on to expound on all the ways the government adds value either by Keynesian economic policies or just straight up direct investment and production of key technologies. The government helped fund or directly created many technologies we use today and that private companies have exploited: semiconductors, touch screens, the internet, GPS, nuclear technology, fracking, battery energy and so many others. 2 ⁄ 3 of pharmaceuticals were developed and funded by the NIH. Let’s be clear: the government directly and indirectly creates value. Now, when I say something like this some people think I’m picking an ideological fight and smell blood in the water and go off on what the government’s role is supposed to be. But these are merely the facts: the government has and does create value. It’s not an ideological turf war, it’s literally the facts.
Why do people give a pass to corporate failures but not for government failures? The government invested in both the failed Solyndra and Tesla but you don’t hear about how successful the government was in the EV revolution in Tesla. All you hear about is the failure of Solyndra. The government fails and succeeds just like any other investor. The success of venture capitalists has to do with nothing more or less than happenstance and timing. National accounting doesn’t account for value, employment and profits that the government is responsible for so it makes the government appear unproductive and tons of private companies then capture and claim that value when all they’re doing is rent seeking and concentrating wealth to shareholders.
There is so much to this book and it’s explained so incredibly well. I highly recommend everyone read it.
I’ve read a mountain of economics books, at least over 50, and this is easily top ten. In The Value of Everything, the author takes you from the history of economics of how value was defined and how it has become deranged today into an enormous financialized rent seeking behemoth that siphons off wealth. This is also a balanced book, mostly apolitical, written by a PHD in economics. It’s not a polemic, it’s a well-thought, well-researched critique about the current economic system.
The author gives us a nice overlay of the transformation of “value” and how its definition has changed over time with enormous impact. The TLDR version is that value has been redefined from things that produce into things that don’t produce as long as they are private entities. Meaning, the broad financialization that has occurred since the 1980s has suddenly been deemed to add “value” except that it only increases shareholder value and that anything the government does does not produce value even though the government provides tremendous value to its citizens. It’s this broad redefining of value that has created an enormous rent seeking apparatus that results in wage stagnation and wealth concentration.
The author starts at the beginning with classical economics and does a good job with an overview of Adam Smith , Ricardo and Marx and their contributions to what is considered to be valuable or not. Adam Smith helped develop a lot of labor value theory. He believed growth depended on increasing the share of manufacturing and wage laborers and free trade was essential to bring this about. Enemies of growth, accordion and Smith were the protectionist policies of mercantilism as well as guilds protecting artisan privilege and the nobility who squandered its money on consumption and unproductive labor. Smith believed that hoarding cash prevents nations from spreading wealth. Smith’s theories were basically against mercantilism and for more free trade without tariffs and rent seeking. Smith’s free trade principles traced value to labor and not to gold. Ricardo was all about how the distribution of wealth was created from labor and he was also opposed to rent seeking constructions. Marx understood the labor power is what allowed surplus to even happen to begin with which is then exploited by the capitalists. He understood the ingenuity of capitalists who organize workers to create surplus value and he foresaw the deleterious effects of mechanization and financialization and how it undermines workers. There are four types of capitalists: production bearing, commercial bearing, interest bearing and land owners.
And then the neoclassical economists overturned the labor value theory. A new theory was developed that dictated that a price is set by the value the buyer gives it and NOT derived from the labor that was created. THIS IS KEY. Flash forward to today and this is the exact same rational greedy drug makers will use when talking about why their medication costs tens of thousands of dollars. They argue the price is high because of the value it brings. The value IS the price even though the costs and labor to produce are way smaller than the price. This is all called marginal utility and it’s part of neoclassical economics. The idea of scarcity also became a very important part of economic theory at this time. Marginal value theory assumes that there is no monopoly of companies to set prices. Marginal value theory creates hyper individualistic economic theory and hyper charges the consumer. It was this shift from classical thinking that saw rent seeking as parasitic, into neoclassical view that saw rent seeking as something that added value to the economy. Now in the modern economy, we count financial products and rent seeking as part of the GDP and consider it to be of productive value. The difference between profits and rent is obscured and it's all taken as productive.
Finance made a huge shift in the 1980s into being as a value adding entity but all it did was extract wealth and inflict wage stagnation. From leveraged buyout, stock buybacks, junk bonds, shadow banking, to transaction costs: the majority of Wall Street is an enormous rent seeking apparatus. It’s been the transition from stakeholder to shareholder that has created this paradigm shift. There are only short term profits. That’s it.
After the author explains all of this in great detail she then goes on to expound on all the ways the government adds value either by Keynesian economic policies or just straight up direct investment and production of key technologies. The government helped fund or directly created many technologies we use today and that private companies have exploited: semiconductors, touch screens, the internet, GPS, nuclear technology, fracking, battery energy and so many others. 2 ⁄ 3 of pharmaceuticals were developed and funded by the NIH. Let’s be clear: the government directly and indirectly creates value. Now, when I say something like this some people think I’m picking an ideological fight and smell blood in the water and go off on what the government’s role is supposed to be. But these are merely the facts: the government has and does create value. It’s not an ideological turf war, it’s literally the facts.
Why do people give a pass to corporate failures but not for government failures? The government invested in both the failed Solyndra and Tesla but you don’t hear about how successful the government was in the EV revolution in Tesla. All you hear about is the failure of Solyndra. The government fails and succeeds just like any other investor. The success of venture capitalists has to do with nothing more or less than happenstance and timing. National accounting doesn’t account for value, employment and profits that the government is responsible for so it makes the government appear unproductive and tons of private companies then capture and claim that value when all they’re doing is rent seeking and concentrating wealth to shareholders.
There is so much to this book and it’s explained so incredibly well. I highly recommend everyone read it.
January 15, 2019
I heard an interview with the author on the Brian Lehrer show. Her perspective on "value" leans a little more socialist than mine, but it's healthy to read opinions different from your own.
Certainly, her opinions are different than mine, though I can hear echoes of her opinions in comments made by President Obama, Secretary Hillary Clinton, and Senator Bernie Sanders.
The book strikes me as a little too idealistic, imagining government and society as a Disney movie, where all the critters chirp and scuttle about happily with Snow White (labor and the government) while the evil queen (capitalism, entrepreneurs, etc.) plots to put
Snow White to sleep and rape the forest's timber for her mill.
The chapters set up a series of straw man arguments plucked mostly from recent press villains as examples of capitalism gone wrong. Each successful business profiting at the expense of the government and its citizens in a zero-sum game where consumers and workers aren't free to make their own choices.
She seems conflicted about the relationship between price and value. It's immoral when some actors price for value (drug companies), but moral when others do it (government). The book complains that technologies like the internet, microwaves, and GPS were all funded by the government with public dollars, but the companies that make profits with consumer products using those technologies are "extracting" their profits from public dollars, not adding value.
The book's economics are very zero-sum. No one can make money or create value.
I would have gotten more out of the book had the author spent more time arguing her points rather than just criticizing capitalism. For instance, the chapter discussing the "Keynesian multiplier" just mentioned there were critics of the idea, but didn't explore the criticisms. In this specific case, Bastiat's Broken Window Fallacy was screaming at me while the chapter talked about the importance of deficit spending. My suspicion is the book could have been more persuasive had it argued its points rather than, well, not arguing them.
Certainly, her opinions are different than mine, though I can hear echoes of her opinions in comments made by President Obama, Secretary Hillary Clinton, and Senator Bernie Sanders.
The book strikes me as a little too idealistic, imagining government and society as a Disney movie, where all the critters chirp and scuttle about happily with Snow White (labor and the government) while the evil queen (capitalism, entrepreneurs, etc.) plots to put
Snow White to sleep and rape the forest's timber for her mill.
The chapters set up a series of straw man arguments plucked mostly from recent press villains as examples of capitalism gone wrong. Each successful business profiting at the expense of the government and its citizens in a zero-sum game where consumers and workers aren't free to make their own choices.
She seems conflicted about the relationship between price and value. It's immoral when some actors price for value (drug companies), but moral when others do it (government). The book complains that technologies like the internet, microwaves, and GPS were all funded by the government with public dollars, but the companies that make profits with consumer products using those technologies are "extracting" their profits from public dollars, not adding value.
The book's economics are very zero-sum. No one can make money or create value.
I would have gotten more out of the book had the author spent more time arguing her points rather than just criticizing capitalism. For instance, the chapter discussing the "Keynesian multiplier" just mentioned there were critics of the idea, but didn't explore the criticisms. In this specific case, Bastiat's Broken Window Fallacy was screaming at me while the chapter talked about the importance of deficit spending. My suspicion is the book could have been more persuasive had it argued its points rather than, well, not arguing them.
October 18, 2022
Con economistas como Mariana hay esperanza.
"El valor de las cosas" es un libro que presenta una tesis concreta, bastante simple (en su presentación básica) y con un impacto significativo en la sociedad: a la economía contemporáneas, tanto a la teoría pero en especial a la práctica, les falta una verdadera definición de qué es el valor; el valor de las cosas, el valor del trabajo, el valor del futuro.
No soy economista pero me sorprendió mucho descubrir, a través de las páginas del libro, que el concepto que para mí debería estar en el centro de las ciencias económicas, es precisamente el concepto más esquivo, el peor definido de todos. Para ofrecer un comparativo traído de mi área, es como si los físicos no supiéramos exactamente qué es la energía o no la hubiéramos definido rigurosamente. Para ponerlo aún más cerca a la vida diaria, es como si los bomberos todavía se debatieran en acalorados debates para definir que es el fuego.
Pero es aún peor: de la definición de qué es el valor dependen las políticas económicas que nos afectan a todos y que, tal y como demuestra ampliamente la profesora Mazzucato, podrían estar en el corazón de algunos de los problemas sociales (pe. desigualdad y pobreza) y ambientales (pe. depredación de la Naturales y residuos) mas graves del presente.
La exhaustiva demostración de la tesis de profesora la Mazzucato de que no existe una definición apropiada del valor de las "cosas" en la economía, se divide en cuatro grandes apartes (esta es mi división) : una introducción histórica (capítulos 1 y 2); una descripción y análisis detallado de la manera como se mide actualmente la riqueza de las naciones a través del denominado PIB (capítulo 3); una pormenorizada relación de la historia del sector financiero y de cómo paso de ser un simple intermediario en las economías del mundo a una fuerza supuestamente productiva internacional, pero peor aún, de cómo está conduciendo a la financiarización de la verdadera economía productiva (capítulos 4, 5 y 6); un juicioso análisis de la denominada economía de la innovación y de la teoría del valor en su contexto (capítulo 7); y finalmente, pero no menos importante, un análisis del infravalorado sector público (capítulo 8).
La parte histórica para mi fue todo un descubrimiento. Después de haber leído referencias tangenciales a los grandes personajes de la economía y a algunas de sus ideas en libros de historia más generalistas, ver por fin organizado en un texto agradable de leer y escrito por una autoridad en la materia, algunos de los hitos más importantes en el desarrollo de la economía, desde su origen como una ciencia social en los 1600, hasta su ascenso como una supuesta ciencia exacta en el presente, fue bastante ilustrativo.
Naturalmente el texto no se vendo a sí mismo como una breve historia de la economía. En su exposición la profesora Mazzucato se concentra específicamente en la evolución del concepto de valor; por supuesto la economía es mucho más que esto. Pero su descripción de las ideas más importantes de personajes como Adam Smith, Karl Marx o John Maynard Keynes (quién no conoce esos nombres) es excelente y muy ilustrativa para quiénes no somos economistas.
Los capítulos dedicados a las finanzas son, para decirlo de forma que quede bien clara y evitar que me maldiga quién se anime a leer el libro por mi culpa cuando este pasando por esas páginas son prácticamente incomprensibles para el profano.
Tuve que hacer un gran esfuerzo de concentración y llenarme de mucha paciencia para terminar de leerlos (estamos hablando de 110 páginas, poco menos del 30% del libro). En realidad en más de una ocasión pensé abandonar el libro en medio de algunas incomprensibles explicaciones sobre el funcionamiento del sector financiero. Tal vez personas más ilustradas puedan encontrar sencillos los conceptos que allí se presentan, pero para mí eran casi completamente nuevos.
¿Se podría leer el libro sin pasar por esos pesados capítulos dedicados a las finanzas?. Tal vez, pero no lo recomiendo.
A pesar de lo difícil que pueda parecer entender el rol que el sector financiero tiene toda la problemática del valor y en general en el estado de cosas de la sociedad actual es muy importante para apreciar en su integridad la tesis de la profesora Mazzucato. Quién lea estos capítulos y no termine odiando (aún más) al sector financiero, es porque trabaja en él o se beneficia de su grosera actividad extractivista (quiero aclarar que la profesora Mazzucato nunca usa adjetivos inapropiados como estos, pero su análisis del sector es contundente, claro y sin pelos en la lengua).
Los capítulos dedicados a la innovación y el sector público son sin lugar a dudas los más brillantes de todo el libro. Tal vez mi juicio superlativo de estos apartes se vea sesgado por mi trabajo, soy científico y trabajo en una universidad pública, pero a juzgar por la influencia que las ideas de la profesora Mazzucato vienen teniendo en la sociedad, especialmente en los sectores progresistas (yo personalmente leí el libro después de oír que Gustavo Petro, presidente electo de Colombia cuando escribo está reseña, hablaba de ella) diría que en esos capítulos, los de la innovación y el sector público, está precisamente el quid de la tesis de Mazzucato.
Para resumirlo en dos frases (la profesora Mazzucato invierte 120 páginas): 1) innovación sí pero no así y 2) el Gobierno es productivo pero nadie lo reconoce.
La innovación produce mucho valor pero lo hace en red: no se puede identificar a un solo agente como el responsable de la creación de ese valor. El mejor ejemplo es el de las telecomunicaciones que dan forma al mundo en el que vivimos.
El surgimiento, por ejemplo, del teléfono inteligente fue una innovación maravillosa que hizo inmensamente ricos a unos cuantas personas (beneficios derivados del valor), pero en realidad se basó en la existencia de valor previamente producido, especialmente por el mayor inversor de riesgo que existe: los gobiernos. Fue precisamente gracias a esos cuáles que se desarrollaron tecnologías como los microprocesadores, el GPS o las pantallas táctiles. Lamentablemente los beneficios derivados de esa innovación no han llegado todavía a los Gobiernos (y de allí a todos nosotros), ni siquiera a los trabajadores de los sectores en los que se producen esas innovaciones. Esto es una clara demostración de que la economía no entiende todavía muy bien el significado del "valor".
El problema del Gobierno o del Estado: ¡qué problema!
¿Debe intervenir ampliamente en los mercados o hacerse a un lado? ¿debe crecer o contraerse? ¿debe reclamar los beneficios que le corresponden? ¿cuáles serían las consecuencias de recibir esos beneficios? ¿cuáles son los números mágicos que definen la salud o enfermedad de la economía nacional?. En "El valor de las cosas" encontré respuestas a, o más bien sugerencias de cómo podrían responderse en el futuro esas preguntas. El resultado es sencillamente maravilloso y se ajusta de forma exquisita a algunos proyectos políticos que están surgiendo actualmente, especialmente en Latinoamérica incluyendo a Colombia.
Espero que en un futuro cuando vuelva a leer esta reseña no me arrepienta de lo que escribí, pero, si Mariana Mazzucato tiene razón, si podemos concebir un funcionamiento de la economía más justo, uno en el que el Gobierno sea reconocido como un agente productivo, uno que nos de esperanza, el cambio político que vemos en países como Chile, Colombia y posiblemente Brasil, va en la dirección correcta.
Espero no equivocarme y si lo hago, ojalá no sea después muy tarde para corregir otra vez el rumbo.
"El valor de las cosas" es un libro que presenta una tesis concreta, bastante simple (en su presentación básica) y con un impacto significativo en la sociedad: a la economía contemporáneas, tanto a la teoría pero en especial a la práctica, les falta una verdadera definición de qué es el valor; el valor de las cosas, el valor del trabajo, el valor del futuro.
No soy economista pero me sorprendió mucho descubrir, a través de las páginas del libro, que el concepto que para mí debería estar en el centro de las ciencias económicas, es precisamente el concepto más esquivo, el peor definido de todos. Para ofrecer un comparativo traído de mi área, es como si los físicos no supiéramos exactamente qué es la energía o no la hubiéramos definido rigurosamente. Para ponerlo aún más cerca a la vida diaria, es como si los bomberos todavía se debatieran en acalorados debates para definir que es el fuego.
Pero es aún peor: de la definición de qué es el valor dependen las políticas económicas que nos afectan a todos y que, tal y como demuestra ampliamente la profesora Mazzucato, podrían estar en el corazón de algunos de los problemas sociales (pe. desigualdad y pobreza) y ambientales (pe. depredación de la Naturales y residuos) mas graves del presente.
La exhaustiva demostración de la tesis de profesora la Mazzucato de que no existe una definición apropiada del valor de las "cosas" en la economía, se divide en cuatro grandes apartes (esta es mi división) : una introducción histórica (capítulos 1 y 2); una descripción y análisis detallado de la manera como se mide actualmente la riqueza de las naciones a través del denominado PIB (capítulo 3); una pormenorizada relación de la historia del sector financiero y de cómo paso de ser un simple intermediario en las economías del mundo a una fuerza supuestamente productiva internacional, pero peor aún, de cómo está conduciendo a la financiarización de la verdadera economía productiva (capítulos 4, 5 y 6); un juicioso análisis de la denominada economía de la innovación y de la teoría del valor en su contexto (capítulo 7); y finalmente, pero no menos importante, un análisis del infravalorado sector público (capítulo 8).
La parte histórica para mi fue todo un descubrimiento. Después de haber leído referencias tangenciales a los grandes personajes de la economía y a algunas de sus ideas en libros de historia más generalistas, ver por fin organizado en un texto agradable de leer y escrito por una autoridad en la materia, algunos de los hitos más importantes en el desarrollo de la economía, desde su origen como una ciencia social en los 1600, hasta su ascenso como una supuesta ciencia exacta en el presente, fue bastante ilustrativo.
Naturalmente el texto no se vendo a sí mismo como una breve historia de la economía. En su exposición la profesora Mazzucato se concentra específicamente en la evolución del concepto de valor; por supuesto la economía es mucho más que esto. Pero su descripción de las ideas más importantes de personajes como Adam Smith, Karl Marx o John Maynard Keynes (quién no conoce esos nombres) es excelente y muy ilustrativa para quiénes no somos economistas.
Los capítulos dedicados a las finanzas son, para decirlo de forma que quede bien clara y evitar que me maldiga quién se anime a leer el libro por mi culpa cuando este pasando por esas páginas son prácticamente incomprensibles para el profano.
Tuve que hacer un gran esfuerzo de concentración y llenarme de mucha paciencia para terminar de leerlos (estamos hablando de 110 páginas, poco menos del 30% del libro). En realidad en más de una ocasión pensé abandonar el libro en medio de algunas incomprensibles explicaciones sobre el funcionamiento del sector financiero. Tal vez personas más ilustradas puedan encontrar sencillos los conceptos que allí se presentan, pero para mí eran casi completamente nuevos.
¿Se podría leer el libro sin pasar por esos pesados capítulos dedicados a las finanzas?. Tal vez, pero no lo recomiendo.
A pesar de lo difícil que pueda parecer entender el rol que el sector financiero tiene toda la problemática del valor y en general en el estado de cosas de la sociedad actual es muy importante para apreciar en su integridad la tesis de la profesora Mazzucato. Quién lea estos capítulos y no termine odiando (aún más) al sector financiero, es porque trabaja en él o se beneficia de su grosera actividad extractivista (quiero aclarar que la profesora Mazzucato nunca usa adjetivos inapropiados como estos, pero su análisis del sector es contundente, claro y sin pelos en la lengua).
Los capítulos dedicados a la innovación y el sector público son sin lugar a dudas los más brillantes de todo el libro. Tal vez mi juicio superlativo de estos apartes se vea sesgado por mi trabajo, soy científico y trabajo en una universidad pública, pero a juzgar por la influencia que las ideas de la profesora Mazzucato vienen teniendo en la sociedad, especialmente en los sectores progresistas (yo personalmente leí el libro después de oír que Gustavo Petro, presidente electo de Colombia cuando escribo está reseña, hablaba de ella) diría que en esos capítulos, los de la innovación y el sector público, está precisamente el quid de la tesis de Mazzucato.
Para resumirlo en dos frases (la profesora Mazzucato invierte 120 páginas): 1) innovación sí pero no así y 2) el Gobierno es productivo pero nadie lo reconoce.
La innovación produce mucho valor pero lo hace en red: no se puede identificar a un solo agente como el responsable de la creación de ese valor. El mejor ejemplo es el de las telecomunicaciones que dan forma al mundo en el que vivimos.
El surgimiento, por ejemplo, del teléfono inteligente fue una innovación maravillosa que hizo inmensamente ricos a unos cuantas personas (beneficios derivados del valor), pero en realidad se basó en la existencia de valor previamente producido, especialmente por el mayor inversor de riesgo que existe: los gobiernos. Fue precisamente gracias a esos cuáles que se desarrollaron tecnologías como los microprocesadores, el GPS o las pantallas táctiles. Lamentablemente los beneficios derivados de esa innovación no han llegado todavía a los Gobiernos (y de allí a todos nosotros), ni siquiera a los trabajadores de los sectores en los que se producen esas innovaciones. Esto es una clara demostración de que la economía no entiende todavía muy bien el significado del "valor".
El problema del Gobierno o del Estado: ¡qué problema!
¿Debe intervenir ampliamente en los mercados o hacerse a un lado? ¿debe crecer o contraerse? ¿debe reclamar los beneficios que le corresponden? ¿cuáles serían las consecuencias de recibir esos beneficios? ¿cuáles son los números mágicos que definen la salud o enfermedad de la economía nacional?. En "El valor de las cosas" encontré respuestas a, o más bien sugerencias de cómo podrían responderse en el futuro esas preguntas. El resultado es sencillamente maravilloso y se ajusta de forma exquisita a algunos proyectos políticos que están surgiendo actualmente, especialmente en Latinoamérica incluyendo a Colombia.
Espero que en un futuro cuando vuelva a leer esta reseña no me arrepienta de lo que escribí, pero, si Mariana Mazzucato tiene razón, si podemos concebir un funcionamiento de la economía más justo, uno en el que el Gobierno sea reconocido como un agente productivo, uno que nos de esperanza, el cambio político que vemos en países como Chile, Colombia y posiblemente Brasil, va en la dirección correcta.
Espero no equivocarme y si lo hago, ojalá no sea después muy tarde para corregir otra vez el rumbo.
June 6, 2022
Io non ne posso più di Enel Energia.
Mi chiamano in tutti i momenti: quando sono in moto, al lavoro, in bagno; e tutte le volte rispondo, nel dubbio che si tratti di uno dei miei anziani. Solo oggi, 4 volte; si vede che vogliono chiudere in bellezza prima del divieto (speriamo che stavolta funzioni davvero).
A volte nemmeno si degnano di farmi chiamare da una persona, meglio così, posso insultare meglio, con i poveracci non mi riesce.
Oggi però mi sono stufato, voglio vedere chi sono i vertici, scorro i nomi del Consiglio di Amministrazione.
Leggo: Mariana Mazzucato... questo nome non mi è nuovo.
Cerco su Goodreads e... NON CI POSSO CREDERE!!!
Questa dà pure lezioni sull'etica del capitalismo, propugna un sistema più inclusivo, etc...
Incredibile: nemmeno il buon gusto di godersi in silenzio gli emolumenti di amministratore.
Senza pietà: minimo dei voti senza neppure averlo letto.
Mi chiamano in tutti i momenti: quando sono in moto, al lavoro, in bagno; e tutte le volte rispondo, nel dubbio che si tratti di uno dei miei anziani. Solo oggi, 4 volte; si vede che vogliono chiudere in bellezza prima del divieto (speriamo che stavolta funzioni davvero).
A volte nemmeno si degnano di farmi chiamare da una persona, meglio così, posso insultare meglio, con i poveracci non mi riesce.
Oggi però mi sono stufato, voglio vedere chi sono i vertici, scorro i nomi del Consiglio di Amministrazione.
Leggo: Mariana Mazzucato... questo nome non mi è nuovo.
Cerco su Goodreads e... NON CI POSSO CREDERE!!!
Questa dà pure lezioni sull'etica del capitalismo, propugna un sistema più inclusivo, etc...
Incredibile: nemmeno il buon gusto di godersi in silenzio gli emolumenti di amministratore.
Senza pietà: minimo dei voti senza neppure averlo letto.
June 14, 2020
I heard about this author in a recent piece in the NYT where she was recommended as one of a group of five especially important women economists. She is a professor at University College London and appears to hang out with a sharp group of colleagues. This is a book on public policy and political economy. It reads more like a trade book than one intended specifically for economists. In this book she is taking on a whole host of current interrelated economic crises not unlike those of interest to PIketty and others — inequality, innovation, governance, growth, etc. In light of the past two decades, these issues are all well known and I was curious to see what particular perspective she would adopt in telling her tales.
By the way, if one follows these public policy perspectives, we are just at the spot when some new perspectives trying to draw together our current public crisis trifecta of pandemic, nascent depression, and racial unrest in a new treatment of what is going on. Apart from a few stray working papers on the economy moving forward, it still seems to be a bit early. This author, however, will be involved once the next wave of analysis begins.
Back to the book. The perspective that Professor Mazzucato adopts is that current economic and policy approaches towards inequality and related issues are fundamental hamstrung due to the lack of a developed theory of value that permits the formulation of a meaningful progressive response to contemporary crises. As it currently stands, price theory has come to determine our view of value and as a result value has come to mean whatever economic actors say it means. This lack of a theory of value completely muddies the waters concerning what is value creation and how it differs from rent seeking or value extraction. This has enabled those in power to pursue their own interests at the expense of society - or of anyone else. The huge expansion of CEO pay is fine, the success of the top .01 % in appropriating more of the gains of economic activity is reasonable, and the growth of super-rich internet monopolies on the basis of publicly funded R&D is just peachy. The punchline is that the impoverishment of the economic theory of value (which is a relatively recent phenomenon) has emplowered those in power and impaired the ability of government or observers to object.
This is an argument that the economic theory that becomes accepted and ensconced in government regulations and procedures makes a big difference in the way the resulting world operates. Economic life is not a natural phenomenon but a social one that we get to construct and thinking hard about it, paying attention to data, and having the courage to act on our conclusions.
This is not the usual story and it is very well told. There is much to like about it. She might be criticized by some for throwing too much history in the mix, but that did not bother me. Overall, I followed the story and generally agreed. She is also a fine writer. Between a plausible story and a well written book, what is not to like here?
If I had to raise any issues, the principal one would be that arguing for a different theory of value is certainly a good start. A nice follow-up would be to suggest one or a few that she might recommend. As is, she is perhaps too open-minded about different theories of value. If I followed her up through the last chapter, an final one on candidate value perspectives would have been eagerly read. I guess I will wait for the next installment. Given the current abundance of crises, I hope the wait is not long!
By the way, if one follows these public policy perspectives, we are just at the spot when some new perspectives trying to draw together our current public crisis trifecta of pandemic, nascent depression, and racial unrest in a new treatment of what is going on. Apart from a few stray working papers on the economy moving forward, it still seems to be a bit early. This author, however, will be involved once the next wave of analysis begins.
Back to the book. The perspective that Professor Mazzucato adopts is that current economic and policy approaches towards inequality and related issues are fundamental hamstrung due to the lack of a developed theory of value that permits the formulation of a meaningful progressive response to contemporary crises. As it currently stands, price theory has come to determine our view of value and as a result value has come to mean whatever economic actors say it means. This lack of a theory of value completely muddies the waters concerning what is value creation and how it differs from rent seeking or value extraction. This has enabled those in power to pursue their own interests at the expense of society - or of anyone else. The huge expansion of CEO pay is fine, the success of the top .01 % in appropriating more of the gains of economic activity is reasonable, and the growth of super-rich internet monopolies on the basis of publicly funded R&D is just peachy. The punchline is that the impoverishment of the economic theory of value (which is a relatively recent phenomenon) has emplowered those in power and impaired the ability of government or observers to object.
This is an argument that the economic theory that becomes accepted and ensconced in government regulations and procedures makes a big difference in the way the resulting world operates. Economic life is not a natural phenomenon but a social one that we get to construct and thinking hard about it, paying attention to data, and having the courage to act on our conclusions.
This is not the usual story and it is very well told. There is much to like about it. She might be criticized by some for throwing too much history in the mix, but that did not bother me. Overall, I followed the story and generally agreed. She is also a fine writer. Between a plausible story and a well written book, what is not to like here?
If I had to raise any issues, the principal one would be that arguing for a different theory of value is certainly a good start. A nice follow-up would be to suggest one or a few that she might recommend. As is, she is perhaps too open-minded about different theories of value. If I followed her up through the last chapter, an final one on candidate value perspectives would have been eagerly read. I guess I will wait for the next installment. Given the current abundance of crises, I hope the wait is not long!
February 19, 2020
Um livro bem interessante onde a Mariana Mazzucato discute como os conceitos de valor e de produtividade estão ultrapassados. Como preço era um indicativo de valor em um produto que tem um custo associado, como o insumo para produzir um pão ditando o custo final dele, mas isso não se aplica à produção intelectual e os bens de hoje em dia. O que faz com que preço não seja mais um indicativo do valor de mercado ou do valor econômico de um bem. Um dos exemplos que ela dá é o de fármacos multiplicando de preço por uma empresa que controla toda a produção, como nos EUA; por que o preço aumentou 6x em um ano, isso não quer dizer que o valor que esse fármaco traz para o mercado americano ou para a produtividade do país tenha aumentado tanto.
Ainda dentro da comparação que ela faz, uma farmacêutica que dobrou o lucro porque dobrou o preço dos remédios não contribuiu o mesmo que uma que aumentou o lucro em 10-20% porque lançou novos medicamentos inéditos. A curto prazo, a primeira parece mais produtiva, a longo prazo, nada de novo foi criado. Enquanto a segunda parece ter lucrado menos, mas o que produziu de novo tem repercussão por bem mais tempo e em mais setores da economia. O grosso do argumento no fim acaba sendo que o que se mede não é necessariamente o que acontece.
Ela extrapola essa avaliação para o mercado financeiro para argumentar que, apesar de movimentar muito dinheiro, a real contribuição do mercado financeiro para a produtividade de um país não corresponde a isso. Que avaliar um setor como esse pelo valor que movimenta, ignorando os gastos desnecessários ou os riscos que o setor traz, faz com que as prioridades econômicas fiquem bem enviesadas. E faz com que os setores que deveriam receber mais investimento, como produção de propriedade intelectual, recebam menos valor. O GPS, o sistema de posicionamento global por satélite, deu prejuízo no papel. Foi um gasto enorme do governo americano, de bilhões de dólares, por algo que milhões de pessoas no mundo usam e não pagam um centavo. Por outro lado, com certeza é um sistema que contribui para aumentar a produtividade do mundo, que aumenta o PIB da maioria dos países.
Acaba sendo uma ótima discussão sobre a importância de aprendermos a diferenciar entre extração de valor e produção de valor quando avaliamos o dinheiro movimentado. Bem pertinente para o momento atual.
Ainda dentro da comparação que ela faz, uma farmacêutica que dobrou o lucro porque dobrou o preço dos remédios não contribuiu o mesmo que uma que aumentou o lucro em 10-20% porque lançou novos medicamentos inéditos. A curto prazo, a primeira parece mais produtiva, a longo prazo, nada de novo foi criado. Enquanto a segunda parece ter lucrado menos, mas o que produziu de novo tem repercussão por bem mais tempo e em mais setores da economia. O grosso do argumento no fim acaba sendo que o que se mede não é necessariamente o que acontece.
Ela extrapola essa avaliação para o mercado financeiro para argumentar que, apesar de movimentar muito dinheiro, a real contribuição do mercado financeiro para a produtividade de um país não corresponde a isso. Que avaliar um setor como esse pelo valor que movimenta, ignorando os gastos desnecessários ou os riscos que o setor traz, faz com que as prioridades econômicas fiquem bem enviesadas. E faz com que os setores que deveriam receber mais investimento, como produção de propriedade intelectual, recebam menos valor. O GPS, o sistema de posicionamento global por satélite, deu prejuízo no papel. Foi um gasto enorme do governo americano, de bilhões de dólares, por algo que milhões de pessoas no mundo usam e não pagam um centavo. Por outro lado, com certeza é um sistema que contribui para aumentar a produtividade do mundo, que aumenta o PIB da maioria dos países.
Acaba sendo uma ótima discussão sobre a importância de aprendermos a diferenciar entre extração de valor e produção de valor quando avaliamos o dinheiro movimentado. Bem pertinente para o momento atual.
April 10, 2021
I first encountered Mariana Mazzucato's ideas as a paper in a course on Innovation and Technology Management at my university. If I recall correctly, the paper had been buried in the further readings, meaning that I only read it after wrapping up for the year and having written an essay on funding gaps in biotechnology. I really only started reading it on a whim, but I am very glad that I did.
Mariana dazzled me by citing the obscure readings like Pisano 2006 as case studies of the overarching theory challenging invidulistic entrepreneurship in favour of socio-systemic outcomes. But it wasn't just her awareness and expertise in various different sectors that impressed me - it was how she wielded the information to make her case, and her ability to synthesize various theories to create a meaningful critique of how our current economics works that decidedly won me over.
Having read the book, I am concluding that there is something wickedly wrong with how economics is taught, even at ostensibly prestigious institutions like the one I attend. And unfortunately, behavioural economics, a popularly prescribed fix, is merely a band-aid that will do little to help us get out of this mess.
Fortunately, Mariana is not only good at critiquing but also at formulating solutions. These are exciting times for economics, and in no small part have they been reinvigorated by this little book.
Mariana dazzled me by citing the obscure readings like Pisano 2006 as case studies of the overarching theory challenging invidulistic entrepreneurship in favour of socio-systemic outcomes. But it wasn't just her awareness and expertise in various different sectors that impressed me - it was how she wielded the information to make her case, and her ability to synthesize various theories to create a meaningful critique of how our current economics works that decidedly won me over.
Having read the book, I am concluding that there is something wickedly wrong with how economics is taught, even at ostensibly prestigious institutions like the one I attend. And unfortunately, behavioural economics, a popularly prescribed fix, is merely a band-aid that will do little to help us get out of this mess.
Fortunately, Mariana is not only good at critiquing but also at formulating solutions. These are exciting times for economics, and in no small part have they been reinvigorated by this little book.
Read
January 22, 2023L'he acabattttttt, per fiiiiiiiii. Mazzucato socialdemòcrata de merda (està bastant bé en realitat)
April 6, 2019
The value of everything by Mariana Mazzucato is about value creation and value extraction, making versus taking, which is a subtitle of the book. We currently have corporate governance structures which are very much not just aimed at short-termism but actually very much centred around extracting value. The book talks about particular practices of value extraction, for example, the increasing practice of just buying back your own shares to boost your share price or options and, unsurprisingly, executive pay.
The book also opens polemics with narratives and lazy assumptions that are used all the time that wealth is created in business and then, at best, what government can do is facilitate it and redistribute that value through taxation. Mariana, on the other hand, argues that the value creation process is a collective creation and of course labour creates value, different types of state entities create value, businesses create value, and of course, civil society creates value. We would not have weekends and we would not have an eight-hour workday without trade unions. In this concept of different actors comes together to co-create value and, undoubtedly, have conflict in the process. This should be at the heart of any progressive agenda. She also argues that the financial sector and the Silicon Valley seen as great wealth creators are often just shuffling around existing value, or even worse, destroying it.
Anyway, the book provides a good storyline of where does value come from in different ages and gives a great analysis of how these concepts interlink. Mariana explains a change in the understanding of the value and how it affects the way we see things. In the 1600s we had Mercantilists who created value by trade, focusing on the terms of trade, on exchange rates and taxation. They thought it was trade itself that created value and that’s why they put so much emphasis on that. Then in 1700s Physiocrats opted for farming. It was still before the industrial revolution in an agricultural society so at the heart of their theory of value was, in fact, farm labour. In the next century Classicals like Adam Smith and Karl Marks were starting to put emphasis on value as embodied in the industrial environment in the working process. They tried to understand... (if you like to read my full review please visit my blog https://leadersarereaders.blog/the-va...)
The book also opens polemics with narratives and lazy assumptions that are used all the time that wealth is created in business and then, at best, what government can do is facilitate it and redistribute that value through taxation. Mariana, on the other hand, argues that the value creation process is a collective creation and of course labour creates value, different types of state entities create value, businesses create value, and of course, civil society creates value. We would not have weekends and we would not have an eight-hour workday without trade unions. In this concept of different actors comes together to co-create value and, undoubtedly, have conflict in the process. This should be at the heart of any progressive agenda. She also argues that the financial sector and the Silicon Valley seen as great wealth creators are often just shuffling around existing value, or even worse, destroying it.
Anyway, the book provides a good storyline of where does value come from in different ages and gives a great analysis of how these concepts interlink. Mariana explains a change in the understanding of the value and how it affects the way we see things. In the 1600s we had Mercantilists who created value by trade, focusing on the terms of trade, on exchange rates and taxation. They thought it was trade itself that created value and that’s why they put so much emphasis on that. Then in 1700s Physiocrats opted for farming. It was still before the industrial revolution in an agricultural society so at the heart of their theory of value was, in fact, farm labour. In the next century Classicals like Adam Smith and Karl Marks were starting to put emphasis on value as embodied in the industrial environment in the working process. They tried to understand... (if you like to read my full review please visit my blog https://leadersarereaders.blog/the-va...)
August 11, 2018
Mazzucato is one of the most interesting economists working today. I say this because her project in the last two books focus on a ground-up redetermination of what is important in the economy. To someone like me, who is interested in the social generation and distribution of resources but who think that policy makers went the wrong way in recent years (especially before 2008, see Bernanke to Friedman: “Let me end my talk by abusing slightly my status as an official representative of the Federal Reserve. I would like to say to Milton and Anna: Regarding the Great Depression. You're right, we did it. We're very sorry. But thanks to you, we won't do it again. “) this book is just catnip. So much catnip that I stayed up too late a couple of nights in a row reading it.
Mazzucato, in this book, looks at where value was theoretically derived historically from the physiocrats to Smith through Marx and into the marginal revolution. She focuses the critique on the marginalists and the composition of current GDP about how it focus to much on the market – how what has a price has value and nothing else. For Mazzucato, this sidelines non-market institutions like the government which are long-term value creators but left out of market considerations because what they do doesn’t have a price. It is a compelling argument to look at how we analyze “the economy” in a different light.
Mazzucato, in this book, looks at where value was theoretically derived historically from the physiocrats to Smith through Marx and into the marginal revolution. She focuses the critique on the marginalists and the composition of current GDP about how it focus to much on the market – how what has a price has value and nothing else. For Mazzucato, this sidelines non-market institutions like the government which are long-term value creators but left out of market considerations because what they do doesn’t have a price. It is a compelling argument to look at how we analyze “the economy” in a different light.
July 15, 2019
An excellent argument for the relativity of 'value,' made from the perspective of an economist rather than a critical theorist. How do we calculate economic growth? In short, we include things made by private businesses, and exclude the work--'economic' or otherwise--of those who are not being employed by private businesses. Once you've done that, it's pretty easy to claim that tax cuts for the rich are the only ways to increase growth. Of course, once you recognize this, you should recognize that our understanding of 'value' itself needs to be altered.
May 29, 2018
I fear that confirmation bias makes me a poor judge; the author articulates and explains what I have been feeling for years.
She's a respected economist and writes accessibly. If you feel that something may be wrong with our rulers' views on the nature of value, read this book .
She's a respected economist and writes accessibly. If you feel that something may be wrong with our rulers' views on the nature of value, read this book .
October 1, 2019
Most delusional economic book I ever read. The book is heavily biased providing only one sided view. There no real solution offered all suggestions are utopian and have no relation to real life.
March 2, 2019
The author attempts to find exactly which players in the economy are productive and which are unproductive “rent collectors.” Specifically, she takes a hard look at the role of banks. Are banks providing a vital service by making capital easier to obtain or are they merely rent collectors that extract an unproductive toll for basic access to markets?
The first part of this book is what I enjoyed most. Mazzucato did a great job of clearly laying out the most important concepts of the classic economic theorists: Hume, Marx, etc. She showed how their venerable ideas have shaped the current economy.
What I didn’t like about this book was the author’s utopian expectations that the harsh realities of today’s economic problems can be solved through good intentions. Mazzucato spends a lot of time casting stones at the world’s economic troubles, but she provides few practical solutions. Too many of her solutions simply disregard the greed and selfishness inherent in free markets.
It would be great if misbehaving capitalist didn’t run much of the world economy. I’d love it if we had universal healthcare, fair elections and sustainable wages. We don’t. Those with the economic power will fight hard to keep it. So let’s be realistic and seek solutions that soberly and pragmatically acknowledge the current economy’s Machiavellian proclivities.
Mazzucato provides some fascinating insights into the “all government is bad” narrative started during the Reagan years. She shows how this message has transformed the world economy by transferring economic power to the business titans. We are returning to the economic model of the late 19th century.
In the past, government’s economic supremacy was guaranteed by the regionality of commerce. Those governments could easily control corporations in their region because moving goods and services to other regions was cost prohibitive.
But now the poorer nations of the world hunger for a piece of the international economic pie. It has forced them into a deal with the devil, offering tax breaks and lax regulations that turn corporate tax collecting into a shell game.
The author points out we are now in a transition period. If Apple doesn’t like the rules in America, it moves its profits to Ireland or any country that gives it the best deal. The G20 is a powerful start at creating equitable economic rules that might curtail the excesses of selfish capitalism, but it has a long way to go.
The everyday people who are excluded from the benefits of the world economy will continue to lose until all countries agree to a set of baseline economic rules that reign in selfish capitalism. Let’s all agree not to exploit child labor, pay workers a sustainable wage and provide basic safety conditions in the workplace.
Until we can guarantee a minimal set of standards where everyone in the world plays by the same rules, it is going to be a race to the bottom. Businesses will be free to flock to countries that give them a freehand to pay the lowest wages, pollute at will and do whatever they please.
The first part of this book is what I enjoyed most. Mazzucato did a great job of clearly laying out the most important concepts of the classic economic theorists: Hume, Marx, etc. She showed how their venerable ideas have shaped the current economy.
What I didn’t like about this book was the author’s utopian expectations that the harsh realities of today’s economic problems can be solved through good intentions. Mazzucato spends a lot of time casting stones at the world’s economic troubles, but she provides few practical solutions. Too many of her solutions simply disregard the greed and selfishness inherent in free markets.
It would be great if misbehaving capitalist didn’t run much of the world economy. I’d love it if we had universal healthcare, fair elections and sustainable wages. We don’t. Those with the economic power will fight hard to keep it. So let’s be realistic and seek solutions that soberly and pragmatically acknowledge the current economy’s Machiavellian proclivities.
Mazzucato provides some fascinating insights into the “all government is bad” narrative started during the Reagan years. She shows how this message has transformed the world economy by transferring economic power to the business titans. We are returning to the economic model of the late 19th century.
In the past, government’s economic supremacy was guaranteed by the regionality of commerce. Those governments could easily control corporations in their region because moving goods and services to other regions was cost prohibitive.
But now the poorer nations of the world hunger for a piece of the international economic pie. It has forced them into a deal with the devil, offering tax breaks and lax regulations that turn corporate tax collecting into a shell game.
The author points out we are now in a transition period. If Apple doesn’t like the rules in America, it moves its profits to Ireland or any country that gives it the best deal. The G20 is a powerful start at creating equitable economic rules that might curtail the excesses of selfish capitalism, but it has a long way to go.
The everyday people who are excluded from the benefits of the world economy will continue to lose until all countries agree to a set of baseline economic rules that reign in selfish capitalism. Let’s all agree not to exploit child labor, pay workers a sustainable wage and provide basic safety conditions in the workplace.
Until we can guarantee a minimal set of standards where everyone in the world plays by the same rules, it is going to be a race to the bottom. Businesses will be free to flock to countries that give them a freehand to pay the lowest wages, pollute at will and do whatever they please.
June 23, 2018
This is a follow-up to the Entrepreneurial State and is a consideration of how the public sector should be shown to be adding economic value rather than being seen as a drain on the economy.
This is done via an analysis of rent seekers in the 21st C like banks that have taken over from land owners in their rent-seeking capacity.
It then reviews the concepts of the previous book - how government adds value to research and risk-taking to enable companies in the private sector to stand on their shoulders and reap the financial benefits.
It also assesses why education, roads and other core government provisions add real value that is not shown in GDP statistics.
It also provides a good analysis on how the new monopolies in the virtual world like Facebook add no real value, should be charged by the consumer for the information provided and earns its money through advertising, which is non-valued adding. Its real value add is via the information provision.
Overall, there is no question that government adds value and should reap some reward for it via royalties, profit shares etc. In my old industry of defence and aerospace, the US government did take a royalty on international sales where they had paid for R&D - this was a norm. But, governments seem to have lost the thread in their desire to placate private industry.
Can this change before it is too late? We are already in a GDP overkill period where natural resources are in grave danger. We are close to robots taking many millions of jobs and where the consumer has seen wages held very low and is moving into low paid work.
Not sure that MM has a method for evaluating all the new threads of economics within the focus on value but it is an important work that refocuses the economic mind so that government and private industry are seen not as competitors but, somehow, symbiotic.
This is done via an analysis of rent seekers in the 21st C like banks that have taken over from land owners in their rent-seeking capacity.
It then reviews the concepts of the previous book - how government adds value to research and risk-taking to enable companies in the private sector to stand on their shoulders and reap the financial benefits.
It also assesses why education, roads and other core government provisions add real value that is not shown in GDP statistics.
It also provides a good analysis on how the new monopolies in the virtual world like Facebook add no real value, should be charged by the consumer for the information provided and earns its money through advertising, which is non-valued adding. Its real value add is via the information provision.
Overall, there is no question that government adds value and should reap some reward for it via royalties, profit shares etc. In my old industry of defence and aerospace, the US government did take a royalty on international sales where they had paid for R&D - this was a norm. But, governments seem to have lost the thread in their desire to placate private industry.
Can this change before it is too late? We are already in a GDP overkill period where natural resources are in grave danger. We are close to robots taking many millions of jobs and where the consumer has seen wages held very low and is moving into low paid work.
Not sure that MM has a method for evaluating all the new threads of economics within the focus on value but it is an important work that refocuses the economic mind so that government and private industry are seen not as competitors but, somehow, symbiotic.
September 19, 2018
The author does a good job of drawing attention to the evils of rent seeking behaviour. Parasites!
Although I agree there is a role for government in encouraging innovation, the author overstates government's contribution. This claim is stated repeatedly, but never treated in any depth.
The government invented the Internet? It would have been interesting to discuss the great man theory of invention.
In asserting government should get a larger share of the spoils, she ignores its take via tax. In this way it gets a large share, and it certainly doesn't always share in the losses of failures.
When one thinks of government, one thinks of inefficiency. Acknowledging and addressing this somehow would strengthen the argument that despite this, government can do things of value.
I would have liked her to be more forceful in her recommendations regarding patents. As in, get rid of them!
It would have been interesting to cover the value of open source.
As an aside, there are parallels with the role of pricing in monopolies thinking which she might have drawn out.
Overall, a bit repetitive and lacking in depth. But worth reading.
Although I agree there is a role for government in encouraging innovation, the author overstates government's contribution. This claim is stated repeatedly, but never treated in any depth.
The government invented the Internet? It would have been interesting to discuss the great man theory of invention.
In asserting government should get a larger share of the spoils, she ignores its take via tax. In this way it gets a large share, and it certainly doesn't always share in the losses of failures.
When one thinks of government, one thinks of inefficiency. Acknowledging and addressing this somehow would strengthen the argument that despite this, government can do things of value.
I would have liked her to be more forceful in her recommendations regarding patents. As in, get rid of them!
It would have been interesting to cover the value of open source.
As an aside, there are parallels with the role of pricing in monopolies thinking which she might have drawn out.
Overall, a bit repetitive and lacking in depth. But worth reading.
May 30, 2018
A must read!
"While wealth is created through a collective effort, the massive imbalance in the distribution of the gains from economic growth has often been more the result of wealth extraction, whose potential scale globalization has greatly magnified...
I will argue that the way the word ‘value’ is used in modern economics has made it easier for value-extracting activities to masquerade as value-creating activities. And in the process rents (unearned income) get confused with profits (earned income); inequality rises, and investment in the real economy falls. What’s more, if we cannot differentiate value creation from value extraction, it becomes nearly impossible to reward the former over the latter. If the goal is to produce growth that is more innovation-led (smart growth), more inclusive and more sustainable, we need a better understanding of value to steer us."
"While wealth is created through a collective effort, the massive imbalance in the distribution of the gains from economic growth has often been more the result of wealth extraction, whose potential scale globalization has greatly magnified...
I will argue that the way the word ‘value’ is used in modern economics has made it easier for value-extracting activities to masquerade as value-creating activities. And in the process rents (unearned income) get confused with profits (earned income); inequality rises, and investment in the real economy falls. What’s more, if we cannot differentiate value creation from value extraction, it becomes nearly impossible to reward the former over the latter. If the goal is to produce growth that is more innovation-led (smart growth), more inclusive and more sustainable, we need a better understanding of value to steer us."
February 11, 2020
I am punching above my intellectual bag with this read as i find it rather academic and theoretical. First half recapitulation of history and theories of economic thinkers was rather dry but it gets really good on the second half. This book confronts the future viability of capitalism and author is being very bold in inviting the paradigm shift of mindset in the definition of value and wealth creation. Tech Companies, Financial traders, rapacious lenders, and property flippers are being bashed ruthlessly as wealth extractors, and they do make sense. I hope lawmakers in my country read this.
January 16, 2019
من ينتجون ومن يأخذون في الاقتصاد
شهد عام 2015 زيادات قوية في دخول قيادات البنوك الخاصة في مصر وصلت إلى 13 في المائة في بعضها، بينما أوقف تحديد الحد الأقصى للأجر (قبل إلغائه لاحقاً) نمو دخول قيادات البنوك العامة لتتوقف عند 42 ألف جنيه شهرياً. وبلغ متوسط دخول العشرين مديراً الأعلى في بنك فيصل الإسلامي (الأعلى بحسب المسح الذي أجرته جريدة المال)، حوالي 165 ألف جنيه شهرياً، والمتوسط هنا قد يعني وجود مديرين يتقاضون أعلى من هذا الرقم من بينهم ووجود من يتقاضون أقل. في عام 2015 ذاته، كان إنفاق 1600 جنيه شهرياً يقفز بالمواطن المصري إلى مصاف العشرة في المائة الأعلى دخلاً في البلاد، بينما كان حوالي 9 ملايين مصري ينفقون 300 جنيهاً فأقل شهرياً، بحسب أرقام مسح الدخل والإنفاق الصادرة عن الجهاز المركزي للتعبئة والإحصاء.
هذا التفاوت الجبار لا يقتصر على مصر وعادة ما يتم تبريره بالأرباح التي يحققها القطاع، والتي تزيد في مصر وفي العالم كله، ومعها تزيد رواتب ودخول العاملين به، بالذات لمن يقبعون على قمته. في مصر مثلاً، حققت البنوك العاملة في البلاد أرباحاً تقدر بحوالي 48.5 مليار جنيه في التسع شهور من يناير حتى سبتمبر 2018، بلغ نصيب العاملين فيها منها حوالي 4.85 مليار جنيه. بالطبع، يرجح أن أنصبة القيادات العليا منها فاق بشدة أنصبة الموظفين الصغار.
يبدو الأمر منطقياً للغاية: مؤسسات ناجحة تتحمل المخاطر وتحقق أرباحاً، ومديرون منتجون يقودونها لذلك فيأخذون مكافأتهم "العادلة" على حسن أدائهم. تتساءل الاقتصادية الإيطالية ماريانا مازوكاتو في أحدث كتبها الصادر في 2018، والذي ترشح للقائمة القصيرة لجريدة الفاينانشيال تايمز، "لكن ماذا لو أن هذه التوصيفات ببساطة قصص فحسب؟ خطاب يتم صياغته من أجل تبرير التفاوتات في الدخل والثروة، رواية تكافئ بشكل هائل القلة القادرة على إقناع الحكومات والمجتمع بأنها تستحق هذه المكافآت الكبيرة بينما على بقيتنا أن يقتاتوا بالبقايا؟".
في عالم تتصاعد فيه اللامساواة في الدخل والثروة، وتزيد فيه أهمية الأنشطة المالية على حساب الاقتصاد الحقيقي في الصناعة والزراعة، تعيد مازوكاتو في كتابها الاعتبار لسؤال القيمة في الاقتصاد.. من يخلقها وكيف تتوزع، من يدورها ويحركها من قطاع لآخر ومن يعيشون بشكل طفيلي على عمل الآخرين (كأصحاب الأراضي من الأرستقراطية وقتها)، وهي الأسئلة المركزية التي ركز عليها الاقتصاديون الرواد كآدم سميث وديفيد ريكاردو وكارل ماركس. تشتبك الأكاديمية، التي تُدَرِّس اقتصاديات الابتكار والقيمة العاملة في لندن، مع هذا السؤال في عالمنا المعاصر: من ينتج ومن يحصد؟ وعواقب ذلك. مازوكاتو الحائزة على جوائز عدة من ضمنها جائزة ليونتيف لتوسيعها آفاق الفكر الاقتصادي، والمستشارة حاليا لعدد من الحكومات، كانت قد أثارت ضجة كبيرة قبل أعوام بعد إصدارها كتابها السابق عن الدور الريادي للدولة في الابتكار، والذي تكشف فيه مساهمة المال العام الكبيرة في الابتكارات التكنولوجية، التي تسمح لشركات مثل أبل بتحقيق مليارات الدولارات من الأرباح.
في 2009، بعد عام واحد من مساهمة مؤسسات كمؤسسته في اندلاع الأزمة المالية، قال لويد بلانكفاين رئيس بنك جولدمان ساكس إن موظفيه هم من بين الأكثر إنتاجية في العالم. (كانت الحكومة قد اضطرت للتدخل بضخ مليارات الدولارات لدعم جولدمان ساكس وغيره من أموال دافعي الضرائب، بينما تخلصت الشركة من 3 آلاف موظف خلال عامين). تتحدى مازوكاتو فكرة الإنتاجية المرتفعة التي يتحدث عنها رئيس جولدمان ساكس، الذي ارتفعت مكافآته هو ونظرائه برغم كل شيء. وهي فكرة لا تقتصر على القطاع المالي. "يسمونها خلق القيمة لكنها في الحقيقة العكس، محض استخلاص للقيمة". يشير الكتاب هنا إلى أن القطاع المالي لم يكن يعد قطاعاً منتجاً في الاقتصاد في الحسابات القومية والناتج المحلي الإجمالي حتى عام 1970، بل كانت أهميته تنبع فحسب من تسهيله لعملية تراكم رأس المال ونقل الثروة الموجودة بالفعل، لا خلق ثروة جديدة. ثم تسلل القطاع المالي لحساب الناتج المحلي كناتج وسيط، أولاً كخدمة تساهم في تشغيل الصناعات الأخرى، الخالقة حقاً للقيمة، ثم تغير الوضع محاسبياً بالتزامن مع تغير السياسات بتقليص القيود على أنشطته والكم الذي يستطيع إقراضه والنقود التي يخلقها.. إلخ. "هذه التعديلات غيرت جذرياً كيف يتصرف القطاع وزادت من نفوذه على الاقتصاد الحقيقي".
تجول مازوكاتو في كتابها بين قطاعات الأدوية والمال والتكنولوجيا وفي نظريات الاقتصاد المختلفة المتعلقة بالقيمة تاريخياً كي تثبت مقولتها الرئيسية بأن هذه القطاعات تستخلص القيمة في الاقتصاد وتتلقى عوائد مبالغ فيها بشدة عوضاً عن خلق القيمة.
يضرب الكتاب مثلاً بشركة جلياد للأدوية التي سَعَّرَت دواء هارفوني لفيروس سي في 2014 بحوالي 95 ألف دولار لكورس علاجي مدته 3 شهور. كان تبرير الشركة وقتها أن تقاضي هذا الثمن يوازي القيمة التي يتسبب الدواء في تجنبها من تكاليف المرض لو لم يتم علاجه، وهو ما تسميه صناعة الأدوية "التسعير المبني على القيمة". ترد مازوكاتو على ذلك بعديد من الدراسات التي تؤكد عدم وجود أي علاقة بين سعر أدوية السرطان وغيرها وبين المنافع التي توفرها، التي هي أقل بما لا يقاس من السعر حتى بمنطق تكاليف المرض. "في الحقيقة فإن نسبة كبيرة من تكاليف الرعاية الصحية في العالم الغربي لا علاقة لها بالرعاية الصحية: ببساطة هي قيمة استخلاص القيمة التي تقوم به صناعة الأدوية".
لكن الأمر لا يتوقف عند زيف رواية الكفاءة والإنتاجية كمبرر لكل هذه العوائد الهائلة. فالطريقة التي تشتغل بها قطاعات استخلاص القيمة، عبر الاستثمار في الأوراق المالية والمشتقات وإعادة شراء الأسهم، وهي أنشطة ريعية، ينطبق عليها وصف الاقتصادي الأشهر جون ماينارد كينز للمستثمرين فيه: "مستثمر عاطل يعتمد على ملكيته لرأس المال مستغلاً قيمة ندرته". في المقابل، بينما شهد الاقتصاد الأمريكي، مثلاً، زيادة في الإنتاجية بين 1975 و2015 بأكثر من ستين في المائة، تجمدت الأجور الحقيقية لمعظم الأمريكيين أو حتى انخفضت في الفترة ذاتها.
مازوكاتو تقول إن سيطرة منطق التمويل وروايته الكاذبة عن خلق القيمة لا يتعلق فقط بحجم القطاع المالي وكيف فاق نموه الاقتصاد غير الم��لي، وباللامساواة في الدخل والثروة، وإنما أيضاً بآثاره على سلوك باقي الاقتصاد، الذي تم أمولة وتوريق أجزاء كبيرة منه. تركز النشاط في القطاعات التي تحرك القيمة وتستخلصها على حساب القطاعات التي تخلقها.
"بينما يتم خلق الثروة عبر جهد جماعي، فإن عدم التوازن الهائل في توزيع ثمار النمو الاقتصادي عادة ما كان نتيجة لاستخلاص القيمة الذي وسعت العولمة بشدة من نطاقه". تقول مازوكاتو إن هذا وضع يقود الرأسمالية العالمية لأزمة وراء أزمة، وإن إعادة الاعتبار للقطاعات التي تخلق القيمة ومواجهة الاحتكارات وتدخل الدولة لدعم الأنشطة المنتجة والتنازل عن سياسات التقشف هي شروط ضرورية لاستعادة "رأسمالية تعمل من أجل الجميع". إلا أن الكتاب لا يشرح كيف يمكن للدولة، وهي الآن ساحة لسيطرة هذه القطاعات المالية والاحتكارية عبر لوبيهات المصالح، خاصة وأنها تمثل أكبر مقرضيها عبر أذون وسندات الخزانة، أن تتحدى مصالحها وتواجهها، ناهينا عن أن يتبرع هؤلاء المستفيدون بالتنازل عن حصة من عوائدهم.
"من يروي الحكاية يحكم العالم"، تستشهد مازوكاتو بمقولة الفيلسوف الإغريقي أفلاطون في الإشارة للرواية التي تبرر للطفيليين من صائدي الريع جوائزهم على حساب الناس. وكتابها
يتحدى هذه الرواية ويكشف تهافتها.
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شهد عام 2015 زيادات قوية في دخول قيادات البنوك الخاصة في مصر وصلت إلى 13 في المائة في بعضها، بينما أوقف تحديد الحد الأقصى للأجر (قبل إلغائه لاحقاً) نمو دخول قيادات البنوك العامة لتتوقف عند 42 ألف جنيه شهرياً. وبلغ متوسط دخول العشرين مديراً الأعلى في بنك فيصل الإسلامي (الأعلى بحسب المسح الذي أجرته جريدة المال)، حوالي 165 ألف جنيه شهرياً، والمتوسط هنا قد يعني وجود مديرين يتقاضون أعلى من هذا الرقم من بينهم ووجود من يتقاضون أقل. في عام 2015 ذاته، كان إنفاق 1600 جنيه شهرياً يقفز بالمواطن المصري إلى مصاف العشرة في المائة الأعلى دخلاً في البلاد، بينما كان حوالي 9 ملايين مصري ينفقون 300 جنيهاً فأقل شهرياً، بحسب أرقام مسح الدخل والإنفاق الصادرة عن الجهاز المركزي للتعبئة والإحصاء.
هذا التفاوت الجبار لا يقتصر على مصر وعادة ما يتم تبريره بالأرباح التي يحققها القطاع، والتي تزيد في مصر وفي العالم كله، ومعها تزيد رواتب ودخول العاملين به، بالذات لمن يقبعون على قمته. في مصر مثلاً، حققت البنوك العاملة في البلاد أرباحاً تقدر بحوالي 48.5 مليار جنيه في التسع شهور من يناير حتى سبتمبر 2018، بلغ نصيب العاملين فيها منها حوالي 4.85 مليار جنيه. بالطبع، يرجح أن أنصبة القيادات العليا منها فاق بشدة أنصبة الموظفين الصغار.
يبدو الأمر منطقياً للغاية: مؤسسات ناجحة تتحمل المخاطر وتحقق أرباحاً، ومديرون منتجون يقودونها لذلك فيأخذون مكافأتهم "العادلة" على حسن أدائهم. تتساءل الاقتصادية الإيطالية ماريانا مازوكاتو في أحدث كتبها الصادر في 2018، والذي ترشح للقائمة القصيرة لجريدة الفاينانشيال تايمز، "لكن ماذا لو أن هذه التوصيفات ببساطة قصص فحسب؟ خطاب يتم صياغته من أجل تبرير التفاوتات في الدخل والثروة، رواية تكافئ بشكل هائل القلة القادرة على إقناع الحكومات والمجتمع بأنها تستحق هذه المكافآت الكبيرة بينما على بقيتنا أن يقتاتوا بالبقايا؟".
في عالم تتصاعد فيه اللامساواة في الدخل والثروة، وتزيد فيه أهمية الأنشطة المالية على حساب الاقتصاد الحقيقي في الصناعة والزراعة، تعيد مازوكاتو في كتابها الاعتبار لسؤال القيمة في الاقتصاد.. من يخلقها وكيف تتوزع، من يدورها ويحركها من قطاع لآخر ومن يعيشون بشكل طفيلي على عمل الآخرين (كأصحاب الأراضي من الأرستقراطية وقتها)، وهي الأسئلة المركزية التي ركز عليها الاقتصاديون الرواد كآدم سميث وديفيد ريكاردو وكارل ماركس. تشتبك الأكاديمية، التي تُدَرِّس اقتصاديات الابتكار والقيمة العاملة في لندن، مع هذا السؤال في عالمنا المعاصر: من ينتج ومن يحصد؟ وعواقب ذلك. مازوكاتو الحائزة على جوائز عدة من ضمنها جائزة ليونتيف لتوسيعها آفاق الفكر الاقتصادي، والمستشارة حاليا لعدد من الحكومات، كانت قد أثارت ضجة كبيرة قبل أعوام بعد إصدارها كتابها السابق عن الدور الريادي للدولة في الابتكار، والذي تكشف فيه مساهمة المال العام الكبيرة في الابتكارات التكنولوجية، التي تسمح لشركات مثل أبل بتحقيق مليارات الدولارات من الأرباح.
في 2009، بعد عام واحد من مساهمة مؤسسات كمؤسسته في اندلاع الأزمة المالية، قال لويد بلانكفاين رئيس بنك جولدمان ساكس إن موظفيه هم من بين الأكثر إنتاجية في العالم. (كانت الحكومة قد اضطرت للتدخل بضخ مليارات الدولارات لدعم جولدمان ساكس وغيره من أموال دافعي الضرائب، بينما تخلصت الشركة من 3 آلاف موظف خلال عامين). تتحدى مازوكاتو فكرة الإنتاجية المرتفعة التي يتحدث عنها رئيس جولدمان ساكس، الذي ارتفعت مكافآته هو ونظرائه برغم كل شيء. وهي فكرة لا تقتصر على القطاع المالي. "يسمونها خلق القيمة لكنها في الحقيقة العكس، محض استخلاص للقيمة". يشير الكتاب هنا إلى أن القطاع المالي لم يكن يعد قطاعاً منتجاً في الاقتصاد في الحسابات القومية والناتج المحلي الإجمالي حتى عام 1970، بل كانت أهميته تنبع فحسب من تسهيله لعملية تراكم رأس المال ونقل الثروة الموجودة بالفعل، لا خلق ثروة جديدة. ثم تسلل القطاع المالي لحساب الناتج المحلي كناتج وسيط، أولاً كخدمة تساهم في تشغيل الصناعات الأخرى، الخالقة حقاً للقيمة، ثم تغير الوضع محاسبياً بالتزامن مع تغير السياسات بتقليص القيود على أنشطته والكم الذي يستطيع إقراضه والنقود التي يخلقها.. إلخ. "هذه التعديلات غيرت جذرياً كيف يتصرف القطاع وزادت من نفوذه على الاقتصاد الحقيقي".
تجول مازوكاتو في كتابها بين قطاعات الأدوية والمال والتكنولوجيا وفي نظريات الاقتصاد المختلفة المتعلقة بالقيمة تاريخياً كي تثبت مقولتها الرئيسية بأن هذه القطاعات تستخلص القيمة في الاقتصاد وتتلقى عوائد مبالغ فيها بشدة عوضاً عن خلق القيمة.
يضرب الكتاب مثلاً بشركة جلياد للأدوية التي سَعَّرَت دواء هارفوني لفيروس سي في 2014 بحوالي 95 ألف دولار لكورس علاجي مدته 3 شهور. كان تبرير الشركة وقتها أن تقاضي هذا الثمن يوازي القيمة التي يتسبب الدواء في تجنبها من تكاليف المرض لو لم يتم علاجه، وهو ما تسميه صناعة الأدوية "التسعير المبني على القيمة". ترد مازوكاتو على ذلك بعديد من الدراسات التي تؤكد عدم وجود أي علاقة بين سعر أدوية السرطان وغيرها وبين المنافع التي توفرها، التي هي أقل بما لا يقاس من السعر حتى بمنطق تكاليف المرض. "في الحقيقة فإن نسبة كبيرة من تكاليف الرعاية الصحية في العالم الغربي لا علاقة لها بالرعاية الصحية: ببساطة هي قيمة استخلاص القيمة التي تقوم به صناعة الأدوية".
لكن الأمر لا يتوقف عند زيف رواية الكفاءة والإنتاجية كمبرر لكل هذه العوائد الهائلة. فالطريقة التي تشتغل بها قطاعات استخلاص القيمة، عبر الاستثمار في الأوراق المالية والمشتقات وإعادة شراء الأسهم، وهي أنشطة ريعية، ينطبق عليها وصف الاقتصادي الأشهر جون ماينارد كينز للمستثمرين فيه: "مستثمر عاطل يعتمد على ملكيته لرأس المال مستغلاً قيمة ندرته". في المقابل، بينما شهد الاقتصاد الأمريكي، مثلاً، زيادة في الإنتاجية بين 1975 و2015 بأكثر من ستين في المائة، تجمدت الأجور الحقيقية لمعظم الأمريكيين أو حتى انخفضت في الفترة ذاتها.
مازوكاتو تقول إن سيطرة منطق التمويل وروايته الكاذبة عن خلق القيمة لا يتعلق فقط بحجم القطاع المالي وكيف فاق نموه الاقتصاد غير الم��لي، وباللامساواة في الدخل والثروة، وإنما أيضاً بآثاره على سلوك باقي الاقتصاد، الذي تم أمولة وتوريق أجزاء كبيرة منه. تركز النشاط في القطاعات التي تحرك القيمة وتستخلصها على حساب القطاعات التي تخلقها.
"بينما يتم خلق الثروة عبر جهد جماعي، فإن عدم التوازن الهائل في توزيع ثمار النمو الاقتصادي عادة ما كان نتيجة لاستخلاص القيمة الذي وسعت العولمة بشدة من نطاقه". تقول مازوكاتو إن هذا وضع يقود الرأسمالية العالمية لأزمة وراء أزمة، وإن إعادة الاعتبار للقطاعات التي تخلق القيمة ومواجهة الاحتكارات وتدخل الدولة لدعم الأنشطة المنتجة والتنازل عن سياسات التقشف هي شروط ضرورية لاستعادة "رأسمالية تعمل من أجل الجميع". إلا أن الكتاب لا يشرح كيف يمكن للدولة، وهي الآن ساحة لسيطرة هذه القطاعات المالية والاحتكارية عبر لوبيهات المصالح، خاصة وأنها تمثل أكبر مقرضيها عبر أذون وسندات الخزانة، أن تتحدى مصالحها وتواجهها، ناهينا عن أن يتبرع هؤلاء المستفيدون بالتنازل عن حصة من عوائدهم.
"من يروي الحكاية يحكم العالم"، تستشهد مازوكاتو بمقولة الفيلسوف الإغريقي أفلاطون في الإشارة للرواية التي تبرر للطفيليين من صائدي الريع جوائزهم على حساب الناس. وكتابها
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December 6, 2022
A decent summary of the rise (and implications thereof) of the financial sector in the US and UK from a recognised rentier / net cost through the 1970s to our world today in which Goldman’s CEO can state, with a straight face and without risk of ridicule, that Goldman’s staff, and, implicitly, other bankers, are the most productive personnel in the world (and this immediately after the Treasury bailed them all out).
Mazucatto is a decent (albeit by no means economical) writer for an econ professor, but the long walk through Smith, Ricardo, Marx, et al is utterly superfluous to anyone with more than a passing interest in economics. If based on net contributions, original thought / interpretation, or simply interesting voice, I’m afraid my rating here is quite generous.
Mazucatto is a decent (albeit by no means economical) writer for an econ professor, but the long walk through Smith, Ricardo, Marx, et al is utterly superfluous to anyone with more than a passing interest in economics. If based on net contributions, original thought / interpretation, or simply interesting voice, I’m afraid my rating here is quite generous.
July 3, 2023
Highly recommended reading for graduate students interested in the history of economic thought. This book shines in its sophisticated breakdown of the failings of national accounting for GDP and in tracing the 2008 Financial Crisis to the unfettered deregulation of the financial sector (which Chapter 4 and 5 are brilliant in doing). I also appreciate how this discourse is centered on a framework of value-theory and production boundaries, providing a reasonable explanation for the excessive state of extractive economies today (with Big Pharma/Tech/Banks).
March 23, 2019
Większość tez autorki jest mi bardzo bliska, jednak tą książką jestem rozczarowany. Bardzo duża jest wątków dotyczących historii myśli ekonomicznej, które dla mnie są mało interesujące. Mazzucato porusza istotne problemy, ale ogranicza się przede wszystkim do pokazania tego skąd się wzięły. W wymiarze pokazywania co się powinno zmienić oferuje bardzo mało konkretów.
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May 3, 2021Thought-provoking book on value creation - how, by whom and where value is created. It’s not hyper technical but still being untrained in economics, I would have preferred reading it instead of listening to the audiobook. At parts challenging to follow the fast moving analysis on audio.
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