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The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market
The bestselling authors of Merchants of Doubt offer a profound, startling history of one of America's most tenacious-and destructive-false ideas: the myth of the "free market."
Merchants of Doubt exposed the origins of climate change denial. Now, its authors unfold the truth about another disastrous dogma. Why do Americans believe in the “magic of the marketplace”?
The answer, as The Big Myth reveals: a propaganda blitz. Until the early 1900s, the U.S. government's guiding role in economic life was largely accepted. But then business elites, trade associations, wealthy powerbrokers, and media allies combatted regulation by building a new orthodoxy: down with “big government,” up with unfettered markets. Unearthing eye-opening archival evidence, Oreskes and Conway document campaigns to rewrite textbooks, combat unions, and defend child labor. They detail the ploys that turned hardline economists Hayek and Friedman into household names, recount the libertarian roots of the Little House on the Prairie books, and tune into the General Electric-sponsored TV show that beamed free-market doctrine (and the young Ronald Reagan) to millions.
By the 1970s, this crusade had succeeded. Its ideology would define the next half-century across Republican and Democratic administrations, giving us the opioid scourge, climate destruction, giant tech monopolies, and a baleful response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Only by understanding this history can we imagine a future where markets will serve, not stifle, democracy.
Merchants of Doubt exposed the origins of climate change denial. Now, its authors unfold the truth about another disastrous dogma. Why do Americans believe in the “magic of the marketplace”?
The answer, as The Big Myth reveals: a propaganda blitz. Until the early 1900s, the U.S. government's guiding role in economic life was largely accepted. But then business elites, trade associations, wealthy powerbrokers, and media allies combatted regulation by building a new orthodoxy: down with “big government,” up with unfettered markets. Unearthing eye-opening archival evidence, Oreskes and Conway document campaigns to rewrite textbooks, combat unions, and defend child labor. They detail the ploys that turned hardline economists Hayek and Friedman into household names, recount the libertarian roots of the Little House on the Prairie books, and tune into the General Electric-sponsored TV show that beamed free-market doctrine (and the young Ronald Reagan) to millions.
By the 1970s, this crusade had succeeded. Its ideology would define the next half-century across Republican and Democratic administrations, giving us the opioid scourge, climate destruction, giant tech monopolies, and a baleful response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Only by understanding this history can we imagine a future where markets will serve, not stifle, democracy.
576 pages, Hardcover
First published February 21, 2023
About the author
Naomi Oreskes
16 books306 followersNaomi Oreskes is an American historian of science. She became Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University in 2013, after 15 years as Professor of History and Science Studies at the University of California, San Diego.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 76 reviews
July 27, 2023
In a sane world this book would have clearly convinced the reader of the big lie of the magic of the marketplace as all-knowing and all wise possessing an invisible hand that is justice incarnate and was foisted onto us by self-serving greedy capitalist who care more about money than goodness by using propaganda in the guise of public relations to convince us that freedom requires unfettered capitalism.
The author will even say that the real threat to Democracy is tyranny brought on by capitalist enablers who try to falsely convince us that freedom requires corporations doing what they want with only self-regulation and magic-fairies in a ‘free market’ and that result is what is best for us.
The problem is that we don’t live in a sane world. Facts don’t matter, only feelings do to MAGA morons. They want to hear the lie because it makes them feel good, it doesn’t matter what the lie is. Trump doesn’t care about the myth of the market-place. He daily creates a new reality and they embrace the new set of lies that he spouts. Only insane people believe he won the 2020 election or vaccines don’t work and it makes them feel good to believe that lie. The myth of the marketplace is only relevant on the days of the week that Trump makes it relevant.
Trump gets something that this book never will get, there is no central-overriding-authority for truth, and truth for Trump and his followers are how Trump feels that day; it doesn’t consist of shared facts about the world. Inside the cult of Trump there is a vague belief that markets are all knowing and the government is corrupt, but that only matters when Trump says so. Election denialism had nothing to do with market efficiencies. They are only concerned with Trump’s desire for his will-to-power, how Trump wants the world to experience the world through his actively engaging interpretation. Fox News (sic) followed Trump and his sycophants on election-denialism, not led. Trump is more powerful than the myth-enablers at Fox News (sic). He interprets the world not them, and he can change the perception of truth when he wants to, and magic fairies of the marketplace only exist when it is convenient for Trump. Before Trump this book's thesis would have been convincing, after Trump it misses the bigger myth, the myths that Trump creates daily. For MAGA morons, truth is what Trump says it is, for everyone outside of the cult we see him for the psychotic that he is.
Vaccine denialism had nothing to do with the big myth as described in this book. Businesses wanted vaccines distributed. Trump’s followers did not. They cited freedom as an end in itself and for them that meant the freedom not to have the government force a vaccine onto them. Truth is what Trump felt and his crazy followers loved him for it (it is crazy not to get vaccinated except for the person with the rare medical condition). The comment sections at the Wall Street Journal or Fox News (sic) are who they are and does not consist of facts from the world I share. In their mind they won the 2020 election, after all they believe through feelings that Democrats always cheat. They think, they believe, they feel therefore they know, since to feel is to know for them, and Trump tells them what to believe and they tell Trump what to believe.
I enjoyed the book. The author is right on the evils of unfettered capitalism and how tyranny is our real threat. The problem is facts don’t matter to Trump and his accolades and the real primal big myth is that truth is what Trump says it is and his followers outsource their meaning to a monster who changes the myths they believe in on a whim. Trump stokes their feelings about their social, cultural, and self-identified identities and his manipulation of his accolades is just a reflection of who they want to hate in order to feel taller, and at any moment Trump can pivot away from the myth of the marketplace towards a fear of government and they become convinced that he won an election he did not, or that vaccines don’t work because they just don’t trust the government.
The madness of today’s Republican party and their search for meaning and values transcend the myth of the marketplace. Trump negates the big myth as described in this book when it is convenient for his will-to-power, and his enablers don’t give a damn about the invisible hand since they prioritize truth as determined by Trump since it makes them feel good. We are not in a sane world and the problem is Trump gets that and takes advantage of his mindless moron followers (election deniers and vaccine deniers are morons).
The author will even say that the real threat to Democracy is tyranny brought on by capitalist enablers who try to falsely convince us that freedom requires corporations doing what they want with only self-regulation and magic-fairies in a ‘free market’ and that result is what is best for us.
The problem is that we don’t live in a sane world. Facts don’t matter, only feelings do to MAGA morons. They want to hear the lie because it makes them feel good, it doesn’t matter what the lie is. Trump doesn’t care about the myth of the market-place. He daily creates a new reality and they embrace the new set of lies that he spouts. Only insane people believe he won the 2020 election or vaccines don’t work and it makes them feel good to believe that lie. The myth of the marketplace is only relevant on the days of the week that Trump makes it relevant.
Trump gets something that this book never will get, there is no central-overriding-authority for truth, and truth for Trump and his followers are how Trump feels that day; it doesn’t consist of shared facts about the world. Inside the cult of Trump there is a vague belief that markets are all knowing and the government is corrupt, but that only matters when Trump says so. Election denialism had nothing to do with market efficiencies. They are only concerned with Trump’s desire for his will-to-power, how Trump wants the world to experience the world through his actively engaging interpretation. Fox News (sic) followed Trump and his sycophants on election-denialism, not led. Trump is more powerful than the myth-enablers at Fox News (sic). He interprets the world not them, and he can change the perception of truth when he wants to, and magic fairies of the marketplace only exist when it is convenient for Trump. Before Trump this book's thesis would have been convincing, after Trump it misses the bigger myth, the myths that Trump creates daily. For MAGA morons, truth is what Trump says it is, for everyone outside of the cult we see him for the psychotic that he is.
Vaccine denialism had nothing to do with the big myth as described in this book. Businesses wanted vaccines distributed. Trump’s followers did not. They cited freedom as an end in itself and for them that meant the freedom not to have the government force a vaccine onto them. Truth is what Trump felt and his crazy followers loved him for it (it is crazy not to get vaccinated except for the person with the rare medical condition). The comment sections at the Wall Street Journal or Fox News (sic) are who they are and does not consist of facts from the world I share. In their mind they won the 2020 election, after all they believe through feelings that Democrats always cheat. They think, they believe, they feel therefore they know, since to feel is to know for them, and Trump tells them what to believe and they tell Trump what to believe.
I enjoyed the book. The author is right on the evils of unfettered capitalism and how tyranny is our real threat. The problem is facts don’t matter to Trump and his accolades and the real primal big myth is that truth is what Trump says it is and his followers outsource their meaning to a monster who changes the myths they believe in on a whim. Trump stokes their feelings about their social, cultural, and self-identified identities and his manipulation of his accolades is just a reflection of who they want to hate in order to feel taller, and at any moment Trump can pivot away from the myth of the marketplace towards a fear of government and they become convinced that he won an election he did not, or that vaccines don’t work because they just don’t trust the government.
The madness of today’s Republican party and their search for meaning and values transcend the myth of the marketplace. Trump negates the big myth as described in this book when it is convenient for his will-to-power, and his enablers don’t give a damn about the invisible hand since they prioritize truth as determined by Trump since it makes them feel good. We are not in a sane world and the problem is Trump gets that and takes advantage of his mindless moron followers (election deniers and vaccine deniers are morons).
October 24, 2022
I could write forever about how interesting and informative this book was! The depth of research, and the writing skills of the authors shines, on every page. A deep dive on this topic could have proven to be tedious, but Oreskes and Conway make the material as engaging as it is educational.
The pathway charted through history through the looking glass of “the market” was enlightening on many levels. The narrative starts with child labor laws (the arguments supporting child labor mirror far too closely the arguments supporting today’s topics of homo/transphobia), moves through the ways that Christianity had to evolve out of socialism (how can we scare people into believing in our doctrine if security comes from somewhere else?) and wraps up with how Reagan really got the ball rolling on modern capitalism’s ethos of only helping the five guys at the top.
The number of times I would read a line and exclaim “that actually explains so much!” cannot be overstated. The historical, economic and political knowledge gained by reading this book is vital to understanding the current political rifts over business vs. actual people. I am absolutely adding these author’s other books to my “Pre-2024 Election Reading List.”
The pathway charted through history through the looking glass of “the market” was enlightening on many levels. The narrative starts with child labor laws (the arguments supporting child labor mirror far too closely the arguments supporting today’s topics of homo/transphobia), moves through the ways that Christianity had to evolve out of socialism (how can we scare people into believing in our doctrine if security comes from somewhere else?) and wraps up with how Reagan really got the ball rolling on modern capitalism’s ethos of only helping the five guys at the top.
The number of times I would read a line and exclaim “that actually explains so much!” cannot be overstated. The historical, economic and political knowledge gained by reading this book is vital to understanding the current political rifts over business vs. actual people. I am absolutely adding these author’s other books to my “Pre-2024 Election Reading List.”
February 26, 2023
Historian Richard Hofstadter once wrote that "the paranoid is a double sufferer, since he is afflicted not only by the real world, with the rest of us, but by his fantasies as well." A compelling case could be made that this affliction has taken hold among the highest ranks of Hofstadter's own profession. New academic "histories" now appear on a near-monthly basis, each blaming a variety of social ills on the conspiratorial machinations around a single idea: the free market.
Almost everything in this genre follows the same formula. When the American electorate fails to embrace the political priorities of an Ivy League humanities department, these disheartened authors cast about for a blameworthy culprit. They settle on "market fundamentalism" or "neoliberalism." The explanation then takes a paranoid turn, declaring the targeted theories a "manufactured myth" arising from the "inventions" of 20th century business interests, which allegedly hoodwinked voters into accepting the "magic" of the free market as a matter of received wisdom. Certain that they have found the source of their political obstacles, these historians then claim to uncover a "secret" history that has been hiding in plain sight. All eventually settle on a mundane conspiracy of business interests and libertarian economists, who allegedly derailed America from its progressive path by convincing people that markets work better than government at solving problems.
At some 550 pages, The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us To Loathe Government and Love the Free Market is among the most loquacious entrants into this crowded literature. Harvard University's Naomi Oreskes and California Institute of Technology historian Erik Conway lay out their conspiracy theory with formulaic precision, but their book is atypical in one significant way. While most of the other works in the anti-neoliberalism genre manage at least to excavate some interesting archival findings about libertarian economists (before badly misinterpreting them), this book is remarkably light on original content.
The Big Myth's argument most closely resembles that of Cornell University historian Lawrence Glickman's 2019 book Free Enterprise: An American History, which advanced a nearly identical thesis wherein the concept of "free enterprise" allegedly arose as a myth in the service of anti–New Deal business interests. But The Big Myth also weaves in recent tracts by Philip Mirowski and Dieter Plehwe, Kim Phillips-Fein, Kevin Kruse, Quinn Slobodian, and Jane Mayer. Oreskes and Conway round out their spartan use of economic sources (their recounting of "market failure" theory makes heavier use of Pope Francis' encyclicals than any actual economics texts) with a dash of Thomas Piketty's dubious inequality empirics and a touch of Ha-Joon Chang's attempts to resurrect trade protectionism.
A reader with even casual awareness of these other authors will be left wondering why this same story needed yet another repackaged recitation. The result is a meandering journey through secondary sources and Wikipedia entries, presented as if they were tacked to a basement wall amid a disorderly web of yarn and dental floss in a progression that only its authors truly comprehend.
The Big Myth is structured in sequential vignettes about various themes and figures such as Ludwig von Mises, Leonard Read, Friedrich Hayek, Rose Wilder Lane, and Milton Friedman, all of whom are portrayed as either willing propagandists for big business or hapless dupes of the same. The authors expend almost no effort on understanding the arguments of the thinkers they set out to debunk.
A revealing example appears in the book's treatment of Leonard Read's 1958 essay "I, Pencil." Read's story is a fairly straightforward allegory for Adam Smith's famous concept of the "invisible hand," showing how complex social coordination arises from routine economic exchanges and signals in the absence of a centralized design. To Oreskes and Conway, however, the metaphor is literally the hand of God working from above to ensure the market system provides. As they put it, "God made the marketplace and the marketplace made the pencil; ergo God made the pencil."
This peculiar reading originates in a remark by Read's titular pencil: "Since only God can make a tree, I insist that only God could make me." While Read was a practicing Christian who used religious imagery in his writing, this quip was not an invocation of divine intervention to account for the assembly of pencils. It is an allusion to a famous line from Joyce Kilmer's poem "Trees," a point that Read made obvious in a later printing that credited the saying to "a poet." Oreskes and Conway nonetheless carry their mistake to absurd lengths, sneering all the while that deviation from the progressive economic planner's impulse is a sign of superstitious philosophical Occasionalism about markets.
Interpretive peculiarities continue in their treatment of Ludwig von Mises' Socialism. After initially acknowledging that the book was written in German in 1922, Oreskes and Conway soon drift into anachronism by insinuating that it was intended as a critique of President Franklin Roosevelt. ("Mises's use of the term socialism was misleading," they contend, "because no credible American political leader in 1944 was advocating central planning.") They augment this ascription of prophecy with a sleight of hand, replacing the revolutionary Marxists of Mises' original commentaries with the comparatively benign Norman Thomas as their own preferred avatar of socialism. Like other texts in the anti-neoliberalism genre, The Big Myth removes 20th century free market authors from their historical context by hand-waving the Soviet Union out of existence and proceeding as if socialism means nothing more than a narrow swath of modern Scandinavian social democracies.
Such errors are frequently paired with another recurring theme: the authors' fundamental inability to approach their opponents with anything remotely resembling intellectual charity. The book is filled with gratuitous swipes, many of them comically ahistorical.
This usually means either a false accusation of racism or a disparaging attack on a target's qualifications. Mises receives both types of abuse. After dubbing him an "absolutist who sympathized with fascism," Oreskes and Conway launch into an extended attack on the Austrian economist's migration to the United States in 1940. In their telling, Mises was a relic of a bygone laissez faire ideology who struggled to find a respectable academic job until "dark money" funders created a succession of positions for him at New York University. It is doubtful they would pass similar judgment on the many academic refugees from Nazi Germany who hailed from the political left. Meanwhile, Mises' academic work in the United States gained higher honors than either Oreskes or Conway has ever achieved. By the decade's end, he had published three monographs with Yale University Press, including the decidedly anti-fascist book Omnipotent Government. Upon his retirement from teaching at age 88, Mises was named a distinguished fellow of the American Economic Association.
Only a paragraph after branding Mises a fascist sympathizer, Oreskes and Conway shift into gushing praise for John Maynard Keynes' "The End of Laissez Faire." Keynes' lifelong support for eugenics extended to this famous essay, which called on governments to "pay attention to the innate quality as well as to the mere numbers" of their citizenry. Interestingly, Keynes first delivered this message as a 1926 lecture at the University of Berlin. Mises, who attended as an academic observer, lambasted Keynes' irresponsible remarks out of concern that they could be interpreted as support for Nazi race theory. Keynes continued to flirt with fascist elements through at least 1936, when he penned a notoriously tone-deaf preface to the German edition of his book General Theory, announcing that he "expect[ed] less resistance from German, than from English, readers."
Oreskes and Conway's penchant for disparagement apparently extends only in the free market direction. They casually brand Milton Friedman a "racist extremist" and defender of segregation, but not for any actual defense of segregation. The authors simply disagree with his argument that markets were more effective tools for bringing about integration than government edicts.
Hofstadter wrote that the paranoic's accounts of his enemies "are on many counts the projection of the self." It is hard to resist a similar conclusion here. Oreskes and Conway label their opponents racists and eugenicists while lionizing progressive racists and eugenicists. They accuse Friedrich Hayek of eschewing "the essence of scholarship," which "is to look past the immediacies of time and place," while themselves constantly processing history through their modern partisan commitments. They accuse free market economists of venturing outside their scientific expertise while offering their own decidedly nonexpert opinions on everything from economic inequality to COVID-19.
The authors' discussion of the latter subject, which closes the book, is unintentionally comedic. Oreskes and Conway use the pandemic to contrast U.S. "market failure" with the alleged success of "countries that mounted a strong, coordinated response," China foremost among them. As their book went to press, China's centralized "zero-COVID" regime was collapsing into the same unfettered disease spread that Oreskes and Conway ascribe to free markets. But readers should not expect any self-interrogation from this pair.
Almost everything in this genre follows the same formula. When the American electorate fails to embrace the political priorities of an Ivy League humanities department, these disheartened authors cast about for a blameworthy culprit. They settle on "market fundamentalism" or "neoliberalism." The explanation then takes a paranoid turn, declaring the targeted theories a "manufactured myth" arising from the "inventions" of 20th century business interests, which allegedly hoodwinked voters into accepting the "magic" of the free market as a matter of received wisdom. Certain that they have found the source of their political obstacles, these historians then claim to uncover a "secret" history that has been hiding in plain sight. All eventually settle on a mundane conspiracy of business interests and libertarian economists, who allegedly derailed America from its progressive path by convincing people that markets work better than government at solving problems.
At some 550 pages, The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us To Loathe Government and Love the Free Market is among the most loquacious entrants into this crowded literature. Harvard University's Naomi Oreskes and California Institute of Technology historian Erik Conway lay out their conspiracy theory with formulaic precision, but their book is atypical in one significant way. While most of the other works in the anti-neoliberalism genre manage at least to excavate some interesting archival findings about libertarian economists (before badly misinterpreting them), this book is remarkably light on original content.
The Big Myth's argument most closely resembles that of Cornell University historian Lawrence Glickman's 2019 book Free Enterprise: An American History, which advanced a nearly identical thesis wherein the concept of "free enterprise" allegedly arose as a myth in the service of anti–New Deal business interests. But The Big Myth also weaves in recent tracts by Philip Mirowski and Dieter Plehwe, Kim Phillips-Fein, Kevin Kruse, Quinn Slobodian, and Jane Mayer. Oreskes and Conway round out their spartan use of economic sources (their recounting of "market failure" theory makes heavier use of Pope Francis' encyclicals than any actual economics texts) with a dash of Thomas Piketty's dubious inequality empirics and a touch of Ha-Joon Chang's attempts to resurrect trade protectionism.
A reader with even casual awareness of these other authors will be left wondering why this same story needed yet another repackaged recitation. The result is a meandering journey through secondary sources and Wikipedia entries, presented as if they were tacked to a basement wall amid a disorderly web of yarn and dental floss in a progression that only its authors truly comprehend.
The Big Myth is structured in sequential vignettes about various themes and figures such as Ludwig von Mises, Leonard Read, Friedrich Hayek, Rose Wilder Lane, and Milton Friedman, all of whom are portrayed as either willing propagandists for big business or hapless dupes of the same. The authors expend almost no effort on understanding the arguments of the thinkers they set out to debunk.
A revealing example appears in the book's treatment of Leonard Read's 1958 essay "I, Pencil." Read's story is a fairly straightforward allegory for Adam Smith's famous concept of the "invisible hand," showing how complex social coordination arises from routine economic exchanges and signals in the absence of a centralized design. To Oreskes and Conway, however, the metaphor is literally the hand of God working from above to ensure the market system provides. As they put it, "God made the marketplace and the marketplace made the pencil; ergo God made the pencil."
This peculiar reading originates in a remark by Read's titular pencil: "Since only God can make a tree, I insist that only God could make me." While Read was a practicing Christian who used religious imagery in his writing, this quip was not an invocation of divine intervention to account for the assembly of pencils. It is an allusion to a famous line from Joyce Kilmer's poem "Trees," a point that Read made obvious in a later printing that credited the saying to "a poet." Oreskes and Conway nonetheless carry their mistake to absurd lengths, sneering all the while that deviation from the progressive economic planner's impulse is a sign of superstitious philosophical Occasionalism about markets.
Interpretive peculiarities continue in their treatment of Ludwig von Mises' Socialism. After initially acknowledging that the book was written in German in 1922, Oreskes and Conway soon drift into anachronism by insinuating that it was intended as a critique of President Franklin Roosevelt. ("Mises's use of the term socialism was misleading," they contend, "because no credible American political leader in 1944 was advocating central planning.") They augment this ascription of prophecy with a sleight of hand, replacing the revolutionary Marxists of Mises' original commentaries with the comparatively benign Norman Thomas as their own preferred avatar of socialism. Like other texts in the anti-neoliberalism genre, The Big Myth removes 20th century free market authors from their historical context by hand-waving the Soviet Union out of existence and proceeding as if socialism means nothing more than a narrow swath of modern Scandinavian social democracies.
Such errors are frequently paired with another recurring theme: the authors' fundamental inability to approach their opponents with anything remotely resembling intellectual charity. The book is filled with gratuitous swipes, many of them comically ahistorical.
This usually means either a false accusation of racism or a disparaging attack on a target's qualifications. Mises receives both types of abuse. After dubbing him an "absolutist who sympathized with fascism," Oreskes and Conway launch into an extended attack on the Austrian economist's migration to the United States in 1940. In their telling, Mises was a relic of a bygone laissez faire ideology who struggled to find a respectable academic job until "dark money" funders created a succession of positions for him at New York University. It is doubtful they would pass similar judgment on the many academic refugees from Nazi Germany who hailed from the political left. Meanwhile, Mises' academic work in the United States gained higher honors than either Oreskes or Conway has ever achieved. By the decade's end, he had published three monographs with Yale University Press, including the decidedly anti-fascist book Omnipotent Government. Upon his retirement from teaching at age 88, Mises was named a distinguished fellow of the American Economic Association.
Only a paragraph after branding Mises a fascist sympathizer, Oreskes and Conway shift into gushing praise for John Maynard Keynes' "The End of Laissez Faire." Keynes' lifelong support for eugenics extended to this famous essay, which called on governments to "pay attention to the innate quality as well as to the mere numbers" of their citizenry. Interestingly, Keynes first delivered this message as a 1926 lecture at the University of Berlin. Mises, who attended as an academic observer, lambasted Keynes' irresponsible remarks out of concern that they could be interpreted as support for Nazi race theory. Keynes continued to flirt with fascist elements through at least 1936, when he penned a notoriously tone-deaf preface to the German edition of his book General Theory, announcing that he "expect[ed] less resistance from German, than from English, readers."
Oreskes and Conway's penchant for disparagement apparently extends only in the free market direction. They casually brand Milton Friedman a "racist extremist" and defender of segregation, but not for any actual defense of segregation. The authors simply disagree with his argument that markets were more effective tools for bringing about integration than government edicts.
Hofstadter wrote that the paranoic's accounts of his enemies "are on many counts the projection of the self." It is hard to resist a similar conclusion here. Oreskes and Conway label their opponents racists and eugenicists while lionizing progressive racists and eugenicists. They accuse Friedrich Hayek of eschewing "the essence of scholarship," which "is to look past the immediacies of time and place," while themselves constantly processing history through their modern partisan commitments. They accuse free market economists of venturing outside their scientific expertise while offering their own decidedly nonexpert opinions on everything from economic inequality to COVID-19.
The authors' discussion of the latter subject, which closes the book, is unintentionally comedic. Oreskes and Conway use the pandemic to contrast U.S. "market failure" with the alleged success of "countries that mounted a strong, coordinated response," China foremost among them. As their book went to press, China's centralized "zero-COVID" regime was collapsing into the same unfettered disease spread that Oreskes and Conway ascribe to free markets. But readers should not expect any self-interrogation from this pair.
October 26, 2022
Overall I enjoyed this book (even the acknowledgments). The authors give a careful background to set the stage for what is to come. After the book goes through the background, which is essential to the story) the book takes off like a rocket. I really couldn’t put the book down. I felt that all of the authors’ points are well referenced and supported. The discussion of how we got here is second to none. To me, the book had only one real weakness, and that was that it got off to a slow start with a detailed discussion and too many examples. It was fascinating but information-dense. But once the groundwork was laid, this was the best discussion of this type of material that I’ve read. Not only do I feel that this book is worth reading, I consider it a must-read. Thank you to Netgalley and Bloomsbury Publishing for the advance reader copy.
February 17, 2023
What are your views of ‘Government’ and where do these come from?
How much should any government regulate industry, if at all?
With the fossil fuel giant Shell reporting their highest profits in 115 years of almost $40 billion this year, calls have intensified in the UK at least, for a bigger windfall tax on energy companies from the government.
When we observe how big businesses, and individual business owners behave today, wielding their power autocratically- surely it’s time to ask if this is really how we want business to behave. How can we hold them to account as they create mega-media conglomerates and monopolies?
Oreskes and Conway return in ‘The Big Myth- How American Business Taught Us To Loathe Government And Love The Free Market’ to reveal how the narrative and belief system of a ‘free market’ has dominated the American ideology- oftentimes in the face of evidence that leads to the opposition view. The meticulous, detailed, patient and thorough research that was the hallmark of ‘Merchants of Doubt’ is once again on display, as the authors evaluate ‘the history of a construction of a myth.’ The forensic unravelling of the dominant pro-business ideology is potentially more aimed at an American audience, with cultural and historical references throughout. The underlying moral however, has lessons for all countries, as the 21st century faces multiplying threats and the narrative continues as to where the solutions will come from. ‘Many people think climate change will be best addressed by technological innovation in the marketplace’
This book therefore, is not one which simply looks back to how a myth was constructed in one country throughout the 20th century, but rather a studious deconstruction of why we have thought of ‘government’ and ‘business’ in particular ways and who has benefitted from this conditioning.
The authors are keen to highlight that the presented false dichotomies of ‘Big Business’ or ‘Big Government’ are not the absolute choices that they appear to be. ‘Our choices are not confined to oppressive communism or heartless capitalism. To suggest that they are is a dangerous failure of vision.’
Understanding the insidious messaging and omnipresent integration propaganda that has existed, whether for the tobacco industry, the fossil fuel industry, or business interests can help with ‘pre-bunking’ the ‘The Big Myth’ that only one viewpoint can hold sway.
As Oreskes and Conway conclude, ‘The big myth’s expiration date is long past due. Our futures depend on rejecting it.’
How did so many Americans come to have so much faith in markets and so little faith in government?
Oreskes and Conway open the book by identifying the starting place for ‘market fundamentalism’ in the late 19th century, as a burgeoning USA was beginning to assert its identity. ‘Market fundamentalism is a quasi-religious belief that the best way to address our needs- whether economic or otherwise- is to let markets do their thing, and not rely on government.’
‘The market’ became this entity, almost in its own right, that existed nebulously outside of regulation, where ‘economic freedom’ could rule and any regulation of the marketplace ‘would be the first step on a slippery slope to socialism, communism or worse.’ However, the authors suggest that, ‘”The Market” doesn’t exist outside of society, but is part of society and like society’s other parts, must be subject to law and regulation.’
In Chapter 1 then, the authors explore that expressing any type of freedom is always a balance of competing rights. They scrutinise the impact of Amendments to the Constitution and how this balance of protection of citizens could be balanced with capitalist growth. They are also at pains to emphasise the importance of the opening of the Constitution, ‘We the People of the United States’, to highlight the omission of the capitalist focus, therefore opening the question to, where, when and why, did this narrative take hold.
As Oreskes and Conway find, ‘Americans in the early twentieth century were largely suspicious of “Big Business” and saw the government as their ally. By the later decades of the century, this had flipped.’ It is true to note as well that Governments tend not to spend their financial budgets on advertising and promoting their own narratives and ideology, whereas companies and businesses ringfence large amounts of their budgets for the promotion of a free market economy. It is also true to stress the importance of the ‘Tripod of Freedom’, which emerged as a claim that free enterprise was an inseparable part of American identity. ‘The myth of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom and free enterprise. Free enterprise appears in neither the Declaration of Independence nor the constitution.’
Experts for hire
Oreskes and Conway begin by exploring how this narrative started to change in the opening decades of the 20th century and how the electrical industry, and more particularly the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), which ‘insisted that the federal government should stay out of its way and not regulate the workplace.’ The power of industry and financial backing of industry for advertising campaigns and favourable editorials alongside industry backed ‘studies’ that demonstrated whatever the industry wanted them to demonstrate began to reach hundreds of thousands of consumers. Almost 100 years on, we can see the same playbook being used by fossil fuel companies and advocates to delay the full emergence of the renewable energy industry. Language began to be artfully used to create opposites. That ‘liberal’ now meant ‘anti-American’, or ‘anti-whatever convenient label’ that could be used, including the dreaded label of being a ‘socialist’, forgetting perhaps the Constitution words, ‘to promote the general welfare.’. These campaigns from the National Electric Light Association as well, ‘foreshadowed later efforts by the tobacco industry to fight the facts about their products and influence scientific researchers and educators to promote their point of view.’ And ‘helped to construct a key plank in the platform of American market fundamentalism and a key factor in the big myth of the Free Market.
This messaging came to a crashing halt on October 29, 1929, when the New York Stock Exchange collapsed and the scale of market failure could be clearly evidenced.
Business regroups
Despite the New Deal offering security, business interests regrouped and spent the decade following creating ‘the proposition that any compromise to economic freedom would inevitably lead to despotism- and that political and economic freedom were therefore inseparable- would become one of the fundamental tenets of market fundamentalism’s big myths… Freedom would be defined above all as economic freedom.
This created the necessary cultural semantic echo between ‘inseparable’ and ‘indivisible’- which, in turn, meant that business could now attack any government activity into the marketplace as a ‘threat to freedom, a threat to the American way of life.’ With radio being hugely important as a means of communication and reaching over 80% of American families by the end of the 1930s, a new platform for propaganda could be used continuously and invisibly. ‘Capitalism was about freedom, NAM would insist, and the survival of American democracy was at stake.’
Modes of communication
Oreskes and Conway analyse in depth popular media of the following decades- evaluating the impact the binary rhetoric that was promoted by religious Christian Libertarians of Government or God- or ‘You are either with us, or against us,’ had in promoting absolutes. Absolutes which led to the American people finding it difficult to have constructive conversations about identity, or how they had been led astray.
Influential film directors and writers, from Frank Capra’s ‘It’s a Wonderful Life, to Wilder’s ‘Little House’ books began to counter and promote the interests of business respectively. ‘During the 1940s and ‘50s, libertarian moviemakers and their allies in business deployed censorship, intimidation, and overt propaganda to change the tone of America’s screens and disseminate the myth of the free market.’
‘The era of Big government is over.’
As the final decades of the 20th century arrived, the messaging of the Big Myth of the ‘magic of the marketplace’ was completed by Ronald Reagan. ‘In the 1920s, Americans had hated “Big Business”; Reagan would persuade us to hate “Big Government.” Reagan’s repeated insistence of ‘the magic of the marketplace’- in reality, an empty clichéd phrase- became his catch phrase. A repeated message repeated daily and with the backing of industry can prove very effective at convincing people not to look beyond the words and look for the evidence instead- even when the public are being negatively impacted directly. This was a strategy that Donald Trump would later employ with deadly consequences during both his presidential campaign and during the Covid pandemic.
“Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”- Ronald Reagan.
In 1996, when Bill Clinton declared “the era of Big Government is over”, business must have rejoiced. What is often forgotten though is that ‘Clinton governed from the center-left, defending Social Security and Medicare.’
Oreskes and Conway begin to conclude ‘The Big Myth’ by drawing attention to the continued market failures to regulate itself, by highlighting the Enron implosion and by exploring the lack of business support for climate action, which hinders business progress.
‘The fossil fuel industry’s economic interests in preventing climate action have always been obvious; less understood is how it camouflaged those interests. No one ever said “I am denying climate change to protect corporate profits.” They said that they were protecting jobs, protecting the economy, and protecting free markets from government “encroachment”. They said they were fighting for capitalism and freedom.’
The response to the Covid pandemic is also highlighted as a market failure, as the authors comment that, ‘The Covid-19 pandemic has shown us how expensive overreliance on the “free” market can be.’ They also conclude that ‘the Covid-19 crisis has made crystal clear why some problems demand substantive governmental solutions, and why many of them can’t just be temporary.’
The era of ‘Big Business’ is over?
The authors caution that a century of programming and conditioning that loving the free market and loathing of Government ‘is not easily undone.’ They warn that ‘The Big Myth has a tenacious hold. Polls show that in many domains. Americans trust the private sector more that they trust “The Government.” This continued hostility and lack of trust allows for the rhetoric that any Government can’t be trusted, even in the face of existential threats like climate change. The true costs of the ‘free’ market may be becoming more visible, despite business interests to the contrary.
‘Five hundred thousand dead from opioids, over a million dead from Covid-19, massive inequality, rampant anxiety and unhappiness, and the well-being of us all threatened by climate change: these are the true costs of the “free” market.’
As Oreskes and Conway conclude,
‘Government is not the solution to all our problems, but it is the solution to many of our biggest ones.’
How much should any government regulate industry, if at all?
With the fossil fuel giant Shell reporting their highest profits in 115 years of almost $40 billion this year, calls have intensified in the UK at least, for a bigger windfall tax on energy companies from the government.
When we observe how big businesses, and individual business owners behave today, wielding their power autocratically- surely it’s time to ask if this is really how we want business to behave. How can we hold them to account as they create mega-media conglomerates and monopolies?
Oreskes and Conway return in ‘The Big Myth- How American Business Taught Us To Loathe Government And Love The Free Market’ to reveal how the narrative and belief system of a ‘free market’ has dominated the American ideology- oftentimes in the face of evidence that leads to the opposition view. The meticulous, detailed, patient and thorough research that was the hallmark of ‘Merchants of Doubt’ is once again on display, as the authors evaluate ‘the history of a construction of a myth.’ The forensic unravelling of the dominant pro-business ideology is potentially more aimed at an American audience, with cultural and historical references throughout. The underlying moral however, has lessons for all countries, as the 21st century faces multiplying threats and the narrative continues as to where the solutions will come from. ‘Many people think climate change will be best addressed by technological innovation in the marketplace’
This book therefore, is not one which simply looks back to how a myth was constructed in one country throughout the 20th century, but rather a studious deconstruction of why we have thought of ‘government’ and ‘business’ in particular ways and who has benefitted from this conditioning.
The authors are keen to highlight that the presented false dichotomies of ‘Big Business’ or ‘Big Government’ are not the absolute choices that they appear to be. ‘Our choices are not confined to oppressive communism or heartless capitalism. To suggest that they are is a dangerous failure of vision.’
Understanding the insidious messaging and omnipresent integration propaganda that has existed, whether for the tobacco industry, the fossil fuel industry, or business interests can help with ‘pre-bunking’ the ‘The Big Myth’ that only one viewpoint can hold sway.
As Oreskes and Conway conclude, ‘The big myth’s expiration date is long past due. Our futures depend on rejecting it.’
How did so many Americans come to have so much faith in markets and so little faith in government?
Oreskes and Conway open the book by identifying the starting place for ‘market fundamentalism’ in the late 19th century, as a burgeoning USA was beginning to assert its identity. ‘Market fundamentalism is a quasi-religious belief that the best way to address our needs- whether economic or otherwise- is to let markets do their thing, and not rely on government.’
‘The market’ became this entity, almost in its own right, that existed nebulously outside of regulation, where ‘economic freedom’ could rule and any regulation of the marketplace ‘would be the first step on a slippery slope to socialism, communism or worse.’ However, the authors suggest that, ‘”The Market” doesn’t exist outside of society, but is part of society and like society’s other parts, must be subject to law and regulation.’
In Chapter 1 then, the authors explore that expressing any type of freedom is always a balance of competing rights. They scrutinise the impact of Amendments to the Constitution and how this balance of protection of citizens could be balanced with capitalist growth. They are also at pains to emphasise the importance of the opening of the Constitution, ‘We the People of the United States’, to highlight the omission of the capitalist focus, therefore opening the question to, where, when and why, did this narrative take hold.
As Oreskes and Conway find, ‘Americans in the early twentieth century were largely suspicious of “Big Business” and saw the government as their ally. By the later decades of the century, this had flipped.’ It is true to note as well that Governments tend not to spend their financial budgets on advertising and promoting their own narratives and ideology, whereas companies and businesses ringfence large amounts of their budgets for the promotion of a free market economy. It is also true to stress the importance of the ‘Tripod of Freedom’, which emerged as a claim that free enterprise was an inseparable part of American identity. ‘The myth of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom and free enterprise. Free enterprise appears in neither the Declaration of Independence nor the constitution.’
Experts for hire
Oreskes and Conway begin by exploring how this narrative started to change in the opening decades of the 20th century and how the electrical industry, and more particularly the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), which ‘insisted that the federal government should stay out of its way and not regulate the workplace.’ The power of industry and financial backing of industry for advertising campaigns and favourable editorials alongside industry backed ‘studies’ that demonstrated whatever the industry wanted them to demonstrate began to reach hundreds of thousands of consumers. Almost 100 years on, we can see the same playbook being used by fossil fuel companies and advocates to delay the full emergence of the renewable energy industry. Language began to be artfully used to create opposites. That ‘liberal’ now meant ‘anti-American’, or ‘anti-whatever convenient label’ that could be used, including the dreaded label of being a ‘socialist’, forgetting perhaps the Constitution words, ‘to promote the general welfare.’. These campaigns from the National Electric Light Association as well, ‘foreshadowed later efforts by the tobacco industry to fight the facts about their products and influence scientific researchers and educators to promote their point of view.’ And ‘helped to construct a key plank in the platform of American market fundamentalism and a key factor in the big myth of the Free Market.
This messaging came to a crashing halt on October 29, 1929, when the New York Stock Exchange collapsed and the scale of market failure could be clearly evidenced.
Business regroups
Despite the New Deal offering security, business interests regrouped and spent the decade following creating ‘the proposition that any compromise to economic freedom would inevitably lead to despotism- and that political and economic freedom were therefore inseparable- would become one of the fundamental tenets of market fundamentalism’s big myths… Freedom would be defined above all as economic freedom.
This created the necessary cultural semantic echo between ‘inseparable’ and ‘indivisible’- which, in turn, meant that business could now attack any government activity into the marketplace as a ‘threat to freedom, a threat to the American way of life.’ With radio being hugely important as a means of communication and reaching over 80% of American families by the end of the 1930s, a new platform for propaganda could be used continuously and invisibly. ‘Capitalism was about freedom, NAM would insist, and the survival of American democracy was at stake.’
Modes of communication
Oreskes and Conway analyse in depth popular media of the following decades- evaluating the impact the binary rhetoric that was promoted by religious Christian Libertarians of Government or God- or ‘You are either with us, or against us,’ had in promoting absolutes. Absolutes which led to the American people finding it difficult to have constructive conversations about identity, or how they had been led astray.
Influential film directors and writers, from Frank Capra’s ‘It’s a Wonderful Life, to Wilder’s ‘Little House’ books began to counter and promote the interests of business respectively. ‘During the 1940s and ‘50s, libertarian moviemakers and their allies in business deployed censorship, intimidation, and overt propaganda to change the tone of America’s screens and disseminate the myth of the free market.’
‘The era of Big government is over.’
As the final decades of the 20th century arrived, the messaging of the Big Myth of the ‘magic of the marketplace’ was completed by Ronald Reagan. ‘In the 1920s, Americans had hated “Big Business”; Reagan would persuade us to hate “Big Government.” Reagan’s repeated insistence of ‘the magic of the marketplace’- in reality, an empty clichéd phrase- became his catch phrase. A repeated message repeated daily and with the backing of industry can prove very effective at convincing people not to look beyond the words and look for the evidence instead- even when the public are being negatively impacted directly. This was a strategy that Donald Trump would later employ with deadly consequences during both his presidential campaign and during the Covid pandemic.
“Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”- Ronald Reagan.
In 1996, when Bill Clinton declared “the era of Big Government is over”, business must have rejoiced. What is often forgotten though is that ‘Clinton governed from the center-left, defending Social Security and Medicare.’
Oreskes and Conway begin to conclude ‘The Big Myth’ by drawing attention to the continued market failures to regulate itself, by highlighting the Enron implosion and by exploring the lack of business support for climate action, which hinders business progress.
‘The fossil fuel industry’s economic interests in preventing climate action have always been obvious; less understood is how it camouflaged those interests. No one ever said “I am denying climate change to protect corporate profits.” They said that they were protecting jobs, protecting the economy, and protecting free markets from government “encroachment”. They said they were fighting for capitalism and freedom.’
The response to the Covid pandemic is also highlighted as a market failure, as the authors comment that, ‘The Covid-19 pandemic has shown us how expensive overreliance on the “free” market can be.’ They also conclude that ‘the Covid-19 crisis has made crystal clear why some problems demand substantive governmental solutions, and why many of them can’t just be temporary.’
The era of ‘Big Business’ is over?
The authors caution that a century of programming and conditioning that loving the free market and loathing of Government ‘is not easily undone.’ They warn that ‘The Big Myth has a tenacious hold. Polls show that in many domains. Americans trust the private sector more that they trust “The Government.” This continued hostility and lack of trust allows for the rhetoric that any Government can’t be trusted, even in the face of existential threats like climate change. The true costs of the ‘free’ market may be becoming more visible, despite business interests to the contrary.
‘Five hundred thousand dead from opioids, over a million dead from Covid-19, massive inequality, rampant anxiety and unhappiness, and the well-being of us all threatened by climate change: these are the true costs of the “free” market.’
As Oreskes and Conway conclude,
‘Government is not the solution to all our problems, but it is the solution to many of our biggest ones.’
August 30, 2023
Magisterial.
"All this may make one wonder: was this ever really about capitalism? Or freedom? Or was it all just one long, semi-continuous, shape-shifting defense of the prerogatives of big business? Of freedom for capital and capitalists? Or had the market fundamentalists spent so much time defending the magic of the marketplace that they simply couldn’t accept market failure on a global scale? To accept the enormity of what climate change portended for civilization was to accept that capitalism, as practiced, was undermining the very prosperity it was supposed to deliver. And not just in some distant future, but now." (p.543).
Or, more simply, "'laissez-faire' really meant 'laissez-nous faire'—letting the captains of industry do what they wanted with little or no government oversight. The outcome was a Second Gilded Age that generated vast wealth for a few Americans but made life nastier, more brutish, and shorter for a far greater number.
The authors comment "that what our country (and the world) needed was the right policies to support a rapid and thoroughgoing transition to a green energy economy. Something similar to what the nation had done when it electrified the country in the first place, during the New Deal. But to do that, we needed to break through the mentality that told us, as the Wall Street Journal put it, that climate change would only be solved by the 'unregulated progress of markets and technology.' And so we began to try to answer the question: Why do so many people believe this? Why do people have so much faith in the “magic of the marketplace,” when history shows that none of the major technological transformations of the past century or longer was the product of the progress of unregulated markets? Not the railroads; not the telegraph, telephone, or radio; not civilian aviation or space travel; and above all, not the internet and all the astonishing technological transformations that have followed in its wake. / This book is the answer to that question."
And it indeed is the answer.
"All this may make one wonder: was this ever really about capitalism? Or freedom? Or was it all just one long, semi-continuous, shape-shifting defense of the prerogatives of big business? Of freedom for capital and capitalists? Or had the market fundamentalists spent so much time defending the magic of the marketplace that they simply couldn’t accept market failure on a global scale? To accept the enormity of what climate change portended for civilization was to accept that capitalism, as practiced, was undermining the very prosperity it was supposed to deliver. And not just in some distant future, but now." (p.543).
Or, more simply, "'laissez-faire' really meant 'laissez-nous faire'—letting the captains of industry do what they wanted with little or no government oversight. The outcome was a Second Gilded Age that generated vast wealth for a few Americans but made life nastier, more brutish, and shorter for a far greater number.
The authors comment "that what our country (and the world) needed was the right policies to support a rapid and thoroughgoing transition to a green energy economy. Something similar to what the nation had done when it electrified the country in the first place, during the New Deal. But to do that, we needed to break through the mentality that told us, as the Wall Street Journal put it, that climate change would only be solved by the 'unregulated progress of markets and technology.' And so we began to try to answer the question: Why do so many people believe this? Why do people have so much faith in the “magic of the marketplace,” when history shows that none of the major technological transformations of the past century or longer was the product of the progress of unregulated markets? Not the railroads; not the telegraph, telephone, or radio; not civilian aviation or space travel; and above all, not the internet and all the astonishing technological transformations that have followed in its wake. / This book is the answer to that question."
And it indeed is the answer.
Read
October 27, 2023Much of economics is politics by other means.
January 22, 2024
The Big Myth reviews how market fundamentalism – the idea that the “free market” is the best solution to all social problems and that government interference in the economy is detrimental - took root in the U.S. and became the dominant ideology, preventing government from addressing societal problems. It features prominent business leaders who funded and promoted market fundamentalism, including Henry Hazlitt, J. Howard Pew, Jasper Crane, Harold Luhnow, Alfred P. Sloan and Leonard Read.
In the early 20th century, economic reforms, such as worker’s compensation and a ban on child labor, advanced as part of Progressive Era reforms, but was often opposed by industry. The National Association of Manufactures (NAM) opposed child labor laws; arguing that it infringed on parental rights over their children, expanded federal power over state rights (while also opposing similar laws at the state level) and that it would lead to Socialism. NAM spread falsehoods about the reforms and the motivations behind it and argued that inequality was the natural order of things and that people of lesser talent and intelligence did not deserve more equal labor protections.
In the 1920s, evidence showed that public electric utilities successfully extended electricity to rural areas where private companies had failed to reach and offered electricity at lower rates, while private companies had been caught in corruption and other bad practices. As a result, there was a movement to expand public power, but private industry - through the National Electric Light Association (NELA) - launched a propaganda campaign against it by influencing school textbooks and college business programs to push the idea that limiting private business or pushing public ownership was detrimental to American prosperity and the sentiment has held in many American economic and business schools since.
After the market crashed in 1929 and the Great Depression set in, President Hoover refused to act because he felt the market would recover and solve the nations troubles and that it wasn't the federal government’s role to interfere in the economy. When Roosevelt was elected and implemented the various New Deal programs to save the economy; conservatives, led by the American Liberty League (composed of business leaders), accused him of attacking private property rights, which they argued threatened the liberty of the nation.
In the 1930s and 40s, NAM launched a massive propaganda campaign to convince the public that representative democracy and our fundamental rights in the Bill of Rights were inseparable from the economic freedom of business to do as it pleased. Any effort of government to regulate business, they argued, was a threat to all our freedoms and set us on the road to totalitarianism. NAM also led the effort to pass the anti-union Taft Hartley Act. NAM’s narrative, however, ignored the long history of the U.S. government fostering the economy we have; including extensive protective tariffs that helped build domestic industry and the government’s role in building canals, supporting railroads and the military research that has led to manufacturing innovations.
In the 1940s, NAM and other business interests promoted the work of Austrian economists Ludwig von Mises and Frederick von Hayek, both of whom likely would have passed in obscurity if it weren't for wealthy American business interests funding and promoting their work. This backing gave the ideas of laissez-faire capitalism a veneer of intellectualism. Hayek, however, actually acknowledged the need for government intervention in his book, The Road to Serfdom (though he didn't specify to what extent), but business interest omitted this acknowledgement in their simplified promotion of his work.
Business interests needed to get their market fundamentalism ideas out to the general public in a more accessible way and in that they had help from Rose Wilder Lane, the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder. Rose helped her mom write the Little House on the Prairie books, which were heavily fictionalized and promoted individualism themes while obscuring the role of government and community in the Ingles’ lives. For example, you’ll find no mention in the books of the role of the army in clearing natives from western lands, the government’s role in legalizing and supporting white settlement, and the fact that state government funded Mary's School for the Blind and Mary’s tuition to attend. In fact, Rose was an extremist who fantasized about assassinating FDR, praised Italian fascism, believed the south was right to secede in the Civil War and oppose democracy, believing that only some privileged people should be allowed to vote.
Christianity in the US had often led the way in providing aid to the poor and speaking against inequality, but in the 1930s, a minister named James Fifield became alarmed that communism threatened democracy and religious liberty and founded the Spiritual Mobilization Initiative to combat it. This drew the attention of business leaders who befriended Fifield and soon his message focused more on "the threat to free enterprise" then on religious freedom. Fifield’s efforts were well funded and amplified by business interests. Other religious leaders soon joined the effort of advancing the market fundamentalism economic message, including Norman Peale and Franklin Graham. Many popular publications were created, including Christianity Today, which promoted the message that government and union interference in the economy was a violation of God's will and set us on the path to totalitarianism that would threaten Christianity.
Before World War II, Hollywood films often addressed social problems. During the war, however, official government censorship ensured only positive messaging about the US. After the war, the McCarthyism era began and those criticizing the US or capitalism's failures were blacklisted as communists. Business interests funded their own propaganda that included a Russian immigrant, to be known as Ayn Rand, who turned her successful libertarian novels into movies. GE sponsored General Electric Theater, hosted by actor Ronald Reagan, that promoted individualism and self-reliance, as well routine promotion of GE’s work “advancing American progress.”
Business interests used their funding to convert the University of Chicago's economic department into a center of market fundamentalism theory. They forced the University to hire Aaron Director, Milton Friedman and, later, George Stigler. Stigler published a summary of Adams Smith's “The Wealth of Nations” that was widely used, but it omitted Smith's arguments in favor of reasonable government regulation and taxation. Instead, Stigler’s summary made Smith out to be a “free market” radical like those in Chicago. The Chicago school even argued against antitrust laws, suggesting monopolies were just the rightful survival of the fittest corporations.
Milton Friedman published “Capitalism and Freedom” in 1962, arguing that economic freedom guaranteed political freedoms and that the role of government should be minimal. In Friedman’s mind, unacceptable government interference in the economy included the minimum wage, Social Security, public schools, national parks and banking regulations. The book was a huge success and Friedman became a celebrity intellectual in the 1970s and then an advisor to Ronald Reagan in the 80s. The authors provide a good analysis of all Friedman’s arguments and why they are false.
General Electric had been caught in price-fixing and illegal anti-union activities. When Lemuel Boulware became an executive of GE, he pushed General Electric to engage in massive market fundamentalism and anti-union propaganda. Ronald Reagan was selected as the public spokesman for this messaging, allowing him to develop his talent for public speaking and making him a familiar person to millions of Americans. Reagan campaigned for Barry Goldwater for President in 1964 and against the creation of Medicare. Then, with backing of big business, Reagan ran for Governor of California and got elected by combining market fundamentalist messaging with racial animus, much like Goldwater had campaigned on. In the 1970s, Reagan added anti-environmentalism to his messaging.
In the 1970s, the US faced a combination of high inflation and a stagnant economy, known as stagflation. Recognizing that some of FDR’s New Deal regulations no longer made sense, President Jimmy Carter and Senator Ted Kennedy passed legislation deregulating energy, aviation and trucking and Carter signed a congressional effort to cut capital gains taxes for the rich. Carter also appointed a Federal Reserve chair, Paul Volker, who dramatically raised interest rates to curb inflation which would result in a massive recession. Then Carter lost reelection to Reagan.
In the 1970s and 80s, big business invested in an army of lobbyists and founded a number of think tanks to advocate their message of anti-regulation and anti-taxes, including the Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute and a reinvigorated American Enterprise Institute. They also founded the Business Roundtable.
Ronald Reagan came into office with the anti-regulation agenda of market fundamentalists, but also a new theory developed in the 1970s by Arthur Laffer called trickle down or supply side economics. This new theory argued that if you cut taxes on the rich, they will invest more in the economy and spur growth that would result in increased tax revenue, thus paying for the loss of revenue from the tax cuts. The only problem was that it was total bullshit and after massive tax cuts exploded the federal deficit, Reagan was forced to reverse course and raise taxes. During Reagan and his successor’s terms, the Savings and Loans banking crisis developed as a result of a lack of regulation of the industry and an effort not to enforce what regulation there was. Reagan took the same approach to environmental protection, appointing administration officials cozy with industry who would not enforce environmental regulations.
President Clinton continued the deregulation effort started by Carter and super charged by Reagan. Clinton deregulated telecommunications (resulting in massive media conglomerates) and finance (resulting in the 2008 financial crisis). Both were sold on the idea that it would increase competition and reduce prices, but actually competition decreased as mergers led to industry conglomerates. Clinton also signed NAFTA, which devastated workers in certain industries and resulted in depressed wages in the US and environmental damage, exploited workers and displaced farmers in Mexico. The 1990s also saw international institutions like the IMF, World Bank and the WTO push neo-liberal “free market” principles on developing countries. In the 2000s, market fundamentalists battled government interference in the market with regards to combating climate change.
Market fundamentalism has led to extreme income inequality, a failure to address climate change and a deterioration of quality of life and of life expectancy. The rich promoters of market fundamentalism, however, fail to see it because their wealth insulates them from such failures. Market fundamentalism works for them and they can use their wealth to ensure that market fundamentalism dominates all other ideas of how to order our society.
Other developed countries with higher taxes, stronger regulations and higher spending on social supports perform better than the US in almost every respect. History of the US proves this to be true here as well and that the US did better in the postwar period before market fundamentalism became dominant. Market fundamentalists want us to believe that it is a choice between the pure "free market" vs. strict socialism/communism, but they refuse to acknowledge that there is a lot of options that lie in between those option.
This was an excellent book and I wish I could gift it to everyone who flirts with the ideas of libertarianism as it reveals the folly of such thinking.
In the early 20th century, economic reforms, such as worker’s compensation and a ban on child labor, advanced as part of Progressive Era reforms, but was often opposed by industry. The National Association of Manufactures (NAM) opposed child labor laws; arguing that it infringed on parental rights over their children, expanded federal power over state rights (while also opposing similar laws at the state level) and that it would lead to Socialism. NAM spread falsehoods about the reforms and the motivations behind it and argued that inequality was the natural order of things and that people of lesser talent and intelligence did not deserve more equal labor protections.
In the 1920s, evidence showed that public electric utilities successfully extended electricity to rural areas where private companies had failed to reach and offered electricity at lower rates, while private companies had been caught in corruption and other bad practices. As a result, there was a movement to expand public power, but private industry - through the National Electric Light Association (NELA) - launched a propaganda campaign against it by influencing school textbooks and college business programs to push the idea that limiting private business or pushing public ownership was detrimental to American prosperity and the sentiment has held in many American economic and business schools since.
After the market crashed in 1929 and the Great Depression set in, President Hoover refused to act because he felt the market would recover and solve the nations troubles and that it wasn't the federal government’s role to interfere in the economy. When Roosevelt was elected and implemented the various New Deal programs to save the economy; conservatives, led by the American Liberty League (composed of business leaders), accused him of attacking private property rights, which they argued threatened the liberty of the nation.
In the 1930s and 40s, NAM launched a massive propaganda campaign to convince the public that representative democracy and our fundamental rights in the Bill of Rights were inseparable from the economic freedom of business to do as it pleased. Any effort of government to regulate business, they argued, was a threat to all our freedoms and set us on the road to totalitarianism. NAM also led the effort to pass the anti-union Taft Hartley Act. NAM’s narrative, however, ignored the long history of the U.S. government fostering the economy we have; including extensive protective tariffs that helped build domestic industry and the government’s role in building canals, supporting railroads and the military research that has led to manufacturing innovations.
In the 1940s, NAM and other business interests promoted the work of Austrian economists Ludwig von Mises and Frederick von Hayek, both of whom likely would have passed in obscurity if it weren't for wealthy American business interests funding and promoting their work. This backing gave the ideas of laissez-faire capitalism a veneer of intellectualism. Hayek, however, actually acknowledged the need for government intervention in his book, The Road to Serfdom (though he didn't specify to what extent), but business interest omitted this acknowledgement in their simplified promotion of his work.
Business interests needed to get their market fundamentalism ideas out to the general public in a more accessible way and in that they had help from Rose Wilder Lane, the daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder. Rose helped her mom write the Little House on the Prairie books, which were heavily fictionalized and promoted individualism themes while obscuring the role of government and community in the Ingles’ lives. For example, you’ll find no mention in the books of the role of the army in clearing natives from western lands, the government’s role in legalizing and supporting white settlement, and the fact that state government funded Mary's School for the Blind and Mary’s tuition to attend. In fact, Rose was an extremist who fantasized about assassinating FDR, praised Italian fascism, believed the south was right to secede in the Civil War and oppose democracy, believing that only some privileged people should be allowed to vote.
Christianity in the US had often led the way in providing aid to the poor and speaking against inequality, but in the 1930s, a minister named James Fifield became alarmed that communism threatened democracy and religious liberty and founded the Spiritual Mobilization Initiative to combat it. This drew the attention of business leaders who befriended Fifield and soon his message focused more on "the threat to free enterprise" then on religious freedom. Fifield’s efforts were well funded and amplified by business interests. Other religious leaders soon joined the effort of advancing the market fundamentalism economic message, including Norman Peale and Franklin Graham. Many popular publications were created, including Christianity Today, which promoted the message that government and union interference in the economy was a violation of God's will and set us on the path to totalitarianism that would threaten Christianity.
Before World War II, Hollywood films often addressed social problems. During the war, however, official government censorship ensured only positive messaging about the US. After the war, the McCarthyism era began and those criticizing the US or capitalism's failures were blacklisted as communists. Business interests funded their own propaganda that included a Russian immigrant, to be known as Ayn Rand, who turned her successful libertarian novels into movies. GE sponsored General Electric Theater, hosted by actor Ronald Reagan, that promoted individualism and self-reliance, as well routine promotion of GE’s work “advancing American progress.”
Business interests used their funding to convert the University of Chicago's economic department into a center of market fundamentalism theory. They forced the University to hire Aaron Director, Milton Friedman and, later, George Stigler. Stigler published a summary of Adams Smith's “The Wealth of Nations” that was widely used, but it omitted Smith's arguments in favor of reasonable government regulation and taxation. Instead, Stigler’s summary made Smith out to be a “free market” radical like those in Chicago. The Chicago school even argued against antitrust laws, suggesting monopolies were just the rightful survival of the fittest corporations.
Milton Friedman published “Capitalism and Freedom” in 1962, arguing that economic freedom guaranteed political freedoms and that the role of government should be minimal. In Friedman’s mind, unacceptable government interference in the economy included the minimum wage, Social Security, public schools, national parks and banking regulations. The book was a huge success and Friedman became a celebrity intellectual in the 1970s and then an advisor to Ronald Reagan in the 80s. The authors provide a good analysis of all Friedman’s arguments and why they are false.
General Electric had been caught in price-fixing and illegal anti-union activities. When Lemuel Boulware became an executive of GE, he pushed General Electric to engage in massive market fundamentalism and anti-union propaganda. Ronald Reagan was selected as the public spokesman for this messaging, allowing him to develop his talent for public speaking and making him a familiar person to millions of Americans. Reagan campaigned for Barry Goldwater for President in 1964 and against the creation of Medicare. Then, with backing of big business, Reagan ran for Governor of California and got elected by combining market fundamentalist messaging with racial animus, much like Goldwater had campaigned on. In the 1970s, Reagan added anti-environmentalism to his messaging.
In the 1970s, the US faced a combination of high inflation and a stagnant economy, known as stagflation. Recognizing that some of FDR’s New Deal regulations no longer made sense, President Jimmy Carter and Senator Ted Kennedy passed legislation deregulating energy, aviation and trucking and Carter signed a congressional effort to cut capital gains taxes for the rich. Carter also appointed a Federal Reserve chair, Paul Volker, who dramatically raised interest rates to curb inflation which would result in a massive recession. Then Carter lost reelection to Reagan.
In the 1970s and 80s, big business invested in an army of lobbyists and founded a number of think tanks to advocate their message of anti-regulation and anti-taxes, including the Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute and a reinvigorated American Enterprise Institute. They also founded the Business Roundtable.
Ronald Reagan came into office with the anti-regulation agenda of market fundamentalists, but also a new theory developed in the 1970s by Arthur Laffer called trickle down or supply side economics. This new theory argued that if you cut taxes on the rich, they will invest more in the economy and spur growth that would result in increased tax revenue, thus paying for the loss of revenue from the tax cuts. The only problem was that it was total bullshit and after massive tax cuts exploded the federal deficit, Reagan was forced to reverse course and raise taxes. During Reagan and his successor’s terms, the Savings and Loans banking crisis developed as a result of a lack of regulation of the industry and an effort not to enforce what regulation there was. Reagan took the same approach to environmental protection, appointing administration officials cozy with industry who would not enforce environmental regulations.
President Clinton continued the deregulation effort started by Carter and super charged by Reagan. Clinton deregulated telecommunications (resulting in massive media conglomerates) and finance (resulting in the 2008 financial crisis). Both were sold on the idea that it would increase competition and reduce prices, but actually competition decreased as mergers led to industry conglomerates. Clinton also signed NAFTA, which devastated workers in certain industries and resulted in depressed wages in the US and environmental damage, exploited workers and displaced farmers in Mexico. The 1990s also saw international institutions like the IMF, World Bank and the WTO push neo-liberal “free market” principles on developing countries. In the 2000s, market fundamentalists battled government interference in the market with regards to combating climate change.
Market fundamentalism has led to extreme income inequality, a failure to address climate change and a deterioration of quality of life and of life expectancy. The rich promoters of market fundamentalism, however, fail to see it because their wealth insulates them from such failures. Market fundamentalism works for them and they can use their wealth to ensure that market fundamentalism dominates all other ideas of how to order our society.
Other developed countries with higher taxes, stronger regulations and higher spending on social supports perform better than the US in almost every respect. History of the US proves this to be true here as well and that the US did better in the postwar period before market fundamentalism became dominant. Market fundamentalists want us to believe that it is a choice between the pure "free market" vs. strict socialism/communism, but they refuse to acknowledge that there is a lot of options that lie in between those option.
This was an excellent book and I wish I could gift it to everyone who flirts with the ideas of libertarianism as it reveals the folly of such thinking.
December 23, 2022
The Big Myth dives into the history of how businesses and think tanks pushed their libertarian view of markets/government mainstream. While the book was a bit of a necessary slow build, I really enjoyed the section about Rose Wilder Lane and how her views influenced the Little House on the Prairie books. I’d highly recommend this for anyone into history as well as politics.
November 29, 2023
Excellent book! This book should be required reading for every American high school student. And every American -- no matter how old they are -- should be STRONGLY ENCOURAGED to read this book! It is high time we stop believing the propaganda of big business and corporate interests. Such propaganda is doing a lot of harm to our country and the world.
二零二三年： 第二十五本书
二零二三年： 第二十五本书
October 1, 2023
what a good fucking book
May 12, 2023
Transit, utilities, pharmaceuticals, oh my. A couple centuries of US history, modern enough to include the opiate crisis & (first) COVID pandemic, not quite enough to have recent exposés on exploited migrant children, nor documented the current Senate & House bills to “establish harsher civil and criminal penalties for violations of existing child labor laws and increase transparency for the American people about violations” & the complimentary legislative urgency to modify them: “Lawmakers in 11 states have either passed or introduced laws to roll back child labor laws — a push that’s come from industry trade organizations and mostly conservative legislators as businesses scramble for low-wage workers.” All in the name of upholding the status quo. (Kildeer, Baldwin, WI examiner)
read if in the mood for mendacity & immorality & the author’s delineation of the true cost of the free market. Includes suggestions for replacing a system of one dollar = one vote + a whole lot of cultural influence
read if in the mood for mendacity & immorality & the author’s delineation of the true cost of the free market. Includes suggestions for replacing a system of one dollar = one vote + a whole lot of cultural influence
May 12, 2024
Once I overcame an immediate dislike to the author’s approach, I was very swayed by their insights.
Suggest skipping over the first few chapters and going into topics of your personal interest such as critic of Chicago School of Economics, how American Christianity became pro-business, etc
Suggest skipping over the first few chapters and going into topics of your personal interest such as critic of Chicago School of Economics, how American Christianity became pro-business, etc
April 12, 2024
Infuriating, vital, mind-boggling, paradigm-shifting—I need to reread it as an ebook so I can underline things
August 2, 2023
This Orestes & Conway's follow up book to Merchants of Doubt. The book analyzes how the concepts of liberty & freedom were married to capitalism in the twentieth-century & how this ideology was promulgated by businessmen & Republicans. The study is careful & nuanced tracing how various groups latched onto the idea to use for their own self-interest & how this ideology later developed into a full fledged theory of thought that influenced not only economic policy but political thought. As the intellectual history the book is fascinating but also disturbing show how this self-serving ideology eventually became the norm for the American public.
"Some people call it market absolutism or market essentialism. In the 1990s, George Soros popularized the name we find most apt: market fundamentalism. It's a quasi-religious belief that the best way to address our needs-whether economic or otherwise-is to let markets do their thing, and not rely on government." 1
"Market fundamentals is not just the belief that free markets are the best means to run an economic system but also the belief that they are the only means that will not ultimately destroy our other freedoms. It is the belief in the primacy of economic freedom not just to generate wealth but as a bulwark of political freedom." 3
"Market fundamentalism, however, departs from Smith by insisting there is no 'common good,' merely the sum of all the individual private goods. For this reason, they reject government's claims to represent 'the people': there are only people-individuals-who represent themselves, and they do this most effectively not through their governments, even democratically elected one, but through free choices in free markets.
Milton Friedman, America's most famous market fundamentalist, went so far as to argue that voting was not democratic, because it could too easily be distorted by special interests and because in any case most voters were ignorant." 4
"Friedman held that capitalism and freedom are two indivisible sides of the same coin, but this 'indivisibility thesis' predates him by decades...
A key part of the manufacturers' propaganda campaign was the myth of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom, and free enterprise. This was a fabricated claim." 5
"Businessmen helped create America's first libertarian think tank, the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), established in 1946 by Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce manager Leonard Read to peddle pro-market, antigovernment ideology. They also founded the Hayek-aligned Mont Pelerin Society, a cadre of mostly European economists, cultural commentators, and political theorists promoting a renewed commitment to free-market principles under the aegis of what became known as neoliberalism." 6
"Market fundamentalism wasn't just about economics, however. It also involved religion and mass culture." 7
"By the 1970s, what had begun as a self-interested defence of business prerogatives-one that was factually dubious and characteristically supported by gross distortions and misrepresentations of history-had been transmogrified into a seemingly intellectually robust body of thought." 9
"Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey/Where wealth accumulates, and men decay," wrote Oliver Goldsmith in 1770, just six years before Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations." 12
"The late anthropologist Eric R. Wolf distinguished between tactical power-the power to choose between existing alternatives and make one of them win-and structural power, the power to create the alternatives from which people choose." 14
"To them, Roosevelt was a class traitor, a wealthy man who threatened the status quo that had enabled his (and their) own rise to power." 86
"NAM's 'education' efforts centred around a massive campaign to persuade the American people that big business's interests were the American people's interests. Americans needed to see that the real threat came not from 'Big Business,' but from 'Big Government." 89
"In the early nineteenth century, the term 'American System' emerged to refer to a system with high protective tariffs, a central bank to standardize current and promote industry, and federal spending on infrastructure (roads, bridges, canals) to support commerce. By the late nineteenth century, tariffs were the main source of federal government revenue...when Woodrow Wilson abolished them and instituted the federal income tax in part to reduce the government's dependance on tariff revenues, he did so over Republican opposition." 125-126
"In his 1936 work The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Keynes dismantled the notion that markets were rational and could be trusted to restore prosperity; rather, they required managing." 129
"The thesis of The Road to Serfdom is that capitalism and freedom are linked, and so if we wish to preserve political freedom, we must preserve economic freedom...Hayek reasoned that the free-market system, based on private property, is the guarantor of our political freedom, because markets distribute power: individuals making free choices in the marketplace every day hold power in their hands and prevent its concentration in centralized governments." 138
"A key element in the development and promotion of the indivisibility framework was the creation in 1947 of the Mont Pelerin Society (MPS...)..." 154
"Five years later, Peale would earn the title of 'God's salesman' with the publication of The Power of Positive Thinking, which sold more than five million copies." 195
"In his 2012 book Masters of the Universe, economic historian Daniel Stedman Jones refers to neoliberalism as 'faith-based policy,' because it has often proved impervious to evidence." 210
"Harvard law professor Yochai Benkler has demonstrated how disinformation and propaganda on the internet are asymmetric, with far more right-wing than left-wing claims. This should not come as a surprise: propaganda is bound to be asymmetric, because its purpose is political, not analytical, and propaganda requires time, money, and access to outlets." 236-237
"Still the ideological centre of the Chicago school would continue to be Luhnow's Free Market Project and the key participants it had brought together: Aaron Director, Milton Friedman, and later George Stiller..." 243
"that regulations do infringe liberty, but they are necessary when the 'natural liberty of a few individuals...endanger[s] the security of the whole society." 247
"To understand Smith's philosophy as a whole is to understand how we counterbalance self-interest in economic activities with morality in guiding society." 254
"Like Hayek before him, Friedman argues that capitalism is a bulwark against tyranny, because the market distributes power among many hands and prevents its concentration in government." 262
"Friedman situates himself in the tradition of classical liberalism which emphasizes, in his words, 'freedom as the ultimate goal and the individual as the ultimate entity in society." 263
"One part of the answer to Friedman's frame and influence is that, by the 1970s, the Keynesian framework was breaking down, people wanted answers to what had gone wrong, and Friedman had one." 282
"In 1959, he sent a copy of what was now emerging as 'The Speech' to Vice President Richard Nixon. Entitled 'Business, Ballots, and Bureaus.' it summarized Reagan's two major themes: the federal government encroaches on American citizens with excessive taxation, and people were 'fed' up with the situation." 300
"In a deft sleight of hand, the failures of capitalism were painted as failures not of the system, but of the government programs developed to remedy them." 304
"Presidential historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. Later said that one of the most stunning aspects of Reagan's ascendence was 'the revival in the United States of conservatism's a respectable social philosophy." 306
"Whatever Carter's intent, the 1978 Revenue Act helped to bring an end to the era in which the gap between the wealthiest and poorest Americans had shrunk, and to launch a new gilded age of inequality...A major consequence of placing the Federal Reserve in charge of the nation's economy was that it made the pursuit of low inflation, rather than low unemployment, the nation's primary economic goal." 329
"The Fed's new policy drove interest rates up to 14.5 percent by election day 1980. In December, commercial bank interest rates peaked at 21.5 percent and drove the United States into a recession that lasted well into the next administration." 331
"We might call what Carter and Kahn did marketization-the creation of competitive markets where they did not previously exist-or market liberalization, removing controls that were counterproductive or no longer justified, or simply price decontrol. Most people, however, just called it deregulation, and under that moniker Ronald Reagan would pursue a very different program." 332
"Corporations also began to hire lobbyists in force, and to create Political Action Committees (PACs). And they began to fund (and in some cases even to create) 'third-party' allies-organizations that appeared independent, but often had intricate ties to corporate patrons...Much of this work would be done through the antigovernment think tanks, foundations, and 'philanthropies' that proliferated in the 1970s and '80s-heavily financed by American corporations and billionaire industrialists. These included the American Enterprise Institute, founded in 1943 but reinvigorated in the 1970s; the Heritage Foundation, established in 1973 to 'build and promote conservative public policies': the Wall Street-friendly American Council for Capital Formation, also founded in 1973; the Cato Institute, founded in 1977...the George C. Marshall Institute, founded in 1984." 335-336
"The U.S. government was (and still is) effectively an insurance company with an army." 337
"Supply-side economics-now referred to as Reaganomics-didn't produce an American investment boom or surging tax receipts; neither did it produce the vaunted 'trickle-down' effect. What it did demonstrably do was explode income inequality." 343
"By the early 1980s, scientists had identified several major environmental threats-acid rain, the ozone hole, and anthropogenic climate change-that many economists identified as market failures." 356
"Korean...chaebol is literally a 'rich clan,' sometimes also translated as a 'wealth clique' or 'money clan')." 360
"Deregulation had also enabled the growth of overtly partisan, propagandistic news networks that have helped to create and sustain our current polarized society." 370
"Stiglitz thinks the biggest effect of the Glass-Steagall repeal was cultural: commercial banks, previously known for their pinstriped conservatism, were encouraged to shed their stodgy skins. Investment banks typically handled the money of wealthy clients with a high tolerance for risk, and when they merged with commercial banks, 'the investment bank culture came out on top." 378
"Naomi Klein framed it differently: 'Crises are, in a way, democracy-free zones-gaps in politics as usual when the need for consent and consensus do not seem to apply." 385
"Income inequality also decreases social mobility, which means that many Americans simply can't improve their situations, even if they really want to. The American Dream becomes a receding horizon." 400
"Study after study has shown that people are happiest not when they are more 'free'-however that might be assessed-but when they live in societies with strong social safety nets and robust family and community ties." 404
"In 1809, Thomas Jefferson concluded that the 'care of human life and happiness and not their destruction is the first and only legitimate object of good government." 405
"Some people call it market absolutism or market essentialism. In the 1990s, George Soros popularized the name we find most apt: market fundamentalism. It's a quasi-religious belief that the best way to address our needs-whether economic or otherwise-is to let markets do their thing, and not rely on government." 1
"Market fundamentals is not just the belief that free markets are the best means to run an economic system but also the belief that they are the only means that will not ultimately destroy our other freedoms. It is the belief in the primacy of economic freedom not just to generate wealth but as a bulwark of political freedom." 3
"Market fundamentalism, however, departs from Smith by insisting there is no 'common good,' merely the sum of all the individual private goods. For this reason, they reject government's claims to represent 'the people': there are only people-individuals-who represent themselves, and they do this most effectively not through their governments, even democratically elected one, but through free choices in free markets.
Milton Friedman, America's most famous market fundamentalist, went so far as to argue that voting was not democratic, because it could too easily be distorted by special interests and because in any case most voters were ignorant." 4
"Friedman held that capitalism and freedom are two indivisible sides of the same coin, but this 'indivisibility thesis' predates him by decades...
A key part of the manufacturers' propaganda campaign was the myth of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom, and free enterprise. This was a fabricated claim." 5
"Businessmen helped create America's first libertarian think tank, the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), established in 1946 by Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce manager Leonard Read to peddle pro-market, antigovernment ideology. They also founded the Hayek-aligned Mont Pelerin Society, a cadre of mostly European economists, cultural commentators, and political theorists promoting a renewed commitment to free-market principles under the aegis of what became known as neoliberalism." 6
"Market fundamentalism wasn't just about economics, however. It also involved religion and mass culture." 7
"By the 1970s, what had begun as a self-interested defence of business prerogatives-one that was factually dubious and characteristically supported by gross distortions and misrepresentations of history-had been transmogrified into a seemingly intellectually robust body of thought." 9
"Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey/Where wealth accumulates, and men decay," wrote Oliver Goldsmith in 1770, just six years before Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations." 12
"The late anthropologist Eric R. Wolf distinguished between tactical power-the power to choose between existing alternatives and make one of them win-and structural power, the power to create the alternatives from which people choose." 14
"To them, Roosevelt was a class traitor, a wealthy man who threatened the status quo that had enabled his (and their) own rise to power." 86
"NAM's 'education' efforts centred around a massive campaign to persuade the American people that big business's interests were the American people's interests. Americans needed to see that the real threat came not from 'Big Business,' but from 'Big Government." 89
"In the early nineteenth century, the term 'American System' emerged to refer to a system with high protective tariffs, a central bank to standardize current and promote industry, and federal spending on infrastructure (roads, bridges, canals) to support commerce. By the late nineteenth century, tariffs were the main source of federal government revenue...when Woodrow Wilson abolished them and instituted the federal income tax in part to reduce the government's dependance on tariff revenues, he did so over Republican opposition." 125-126
"In his 1936 work The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, Keynes dismantled the notion that markets were rational and could be trusted to restore prosperity; rather, they required managing." 129
"The thesis of The Road to Serfdom is that capitalism and freedom are linked, and so if we wish to preserve political freedom, we must preserve economic freedom...Hayek reasoned that the free-market system, based on private property, is the guarantor of our political freedom, because markets distribute power: individuals making free choices in the marketplace every day hold power in their hands and prevent its concentration in centralized governments." 138
"A key element in the development and promotion of the indivisibility framework was the creation in 1947 of the Mont Pelerin Society (MPS...)..." 154
"Five years later, Peale would earn the title of 'God's salesman' with the publication of The Power of Positive Thinking, which sold more than five million copies." 195
"In his 2012 book Masters of the Universe, economic historian Daniel Stedman Jones refers to neoliberalism as 'faith-based policy,' because it has often proved impervious to evidence." 210
"Harvard law professor Yochai Benkler has demonstrated how disinformation and propaganda on the internet are asymmetric, with far more right-wing than left-wing claims. This should not come as a surprise: propaganda is bound to be asymmetric, because its purpose is political, not analytical, and propaganda requires time, money, and access to outlets." 236-237
"Still the ideological centre of the Chicago school would continue to be Luhnow's Free Market Project and the key participants it had brought together: Aaron Director, Milton Friedman, and later George Stiller..." 243
"that regulations do infringe liberty, but they are necessary when the 'natural liberty of a few individuals...endanger[s] the security of the whole society." 247
"To understand Smith's philosophy as a whole is to understand how we counterbalance self-interest in economic activities with morality in guiding society." 254
"Like Hayek before him, Friedman argues that capitalism is a bulwark against tyranny, because the market distributes power among many hands and prevents its concentration in government." 262
"Friedman situates himself in the tradition of classical liberalism which emphasizes, in his words, 'freedom as the ultimate goal and the individual as the ultimate entity in society." 263
"One part of the answer to Friedman's frame and influence is that, by the 1970s, the Keynesian framework was breaking down, people wanted answers to what had gone wrong, and Friedman had one." 282
"In 1959, he sent a copy of what was now emerging as 'The Speech' to Vice President Richard Nixon. Entitled 'Business, Ballots, and Bureaus.' it summarized Reagan's two major themes: the federal government encroaches on American citizens with excessive taxation, and people were 'fed' up with the situation." 300
"In a deft sleight of hand, the failures of capitalism were painted as failures not of the system, but of the government programs developed to remedy them." 304
"Presidential historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. Later said that one of the most stunning aspects of Reagan's ascendence was 'the revival in the United States of conservatism's a respectable social philosophy." 306
"Whatever Carter's intent, the 1978 Revenue Act helped to bring an end to the era in which the gap between the wealthiest and poorest Americans had shrunk, and to launch a new gilded age of inequality...A major consequence of placing the Federal Reserve in charge of the nation's economy was that it made the pursuit of low inflation, rather than low unemployment, the nation's primary economic goal." 329
"The Fed's new policy drove interest rates up to 14.5 percent by election day 1980. In December, commercial bank interest rates peaked at 21.5 percent and drove the United States into a recession that lasted well into the next administration." 331
"We might call what Carter and Kahn did marketization-the creation of competitive markets where they did not previously exist-or market liberalization, removing controls that were counterproductive or no longer justified, or simply price decontrol. Most people, however, just called it deregulation, and under that moniker Ronald Reagan would pursue a very different program." 332
"Corporations also began to hire lobbyists in force, and to create Political Action Committees (PACs). And they began to fund (and in some cases even to create) 'third-party' allies-organizations that appeared independent, but often had intricate ties to corporate patrons...Much of this work would be done through the antigovernment think tanks, foundations, and 'philanthropies' that proliferated in the 1970s and '80s-heavily financed by American corporations and billionaire industrialists. These included the American Enterprise Institute, founded in 1943 but reinvigorated in the 1970s; the Heritage Foundation, established in 1973 to 'build and promote conservative public policies': the Wall Street-friendly American Council for Capital Formation, also founded in 1973; the Cato Institute, founded in 1977...the George C. Marshall Institute, founded in 1984." 335-336
"The U.S. government was (and still is) effectively an insurance company with an army." 337
"Supply-side economics-now referred to as Reaganomics-didn't produce an American investment boom or surging tax receipts; neither did it produce the vaunted 'trickle-down' effect. What it did demonstrably do was explode income inequality." 343
"By the early 1980s, scientists had identified several major environmental threats-acid rain, the ozone hole, and anthropogenic climate change-that many economists identified as market failures." 356
"Korean...chaebol is literally a 'rich clan,' sometimes also translated as a 'wealth clique' or 'money clan')." 360
"Deregulation had also enabled the growth of overtly partisan, propagandistic news networks that have helped to create and sustain our current polarized society." 370
"Stiglitz thinks the biggest effect of the Glass-Steagall repeal was cultural: commercial banks, previously known for their pinstriped conservatism, were encouraged to shed their stodgy skins. Investment banks typically handled the money of wealthy clients with a high tolerance for risk, and when they merged with commercial banks, 'the investment bank culture came out on top." 378
"Naomi Klein framed it differently: 'Crises are, in a way, democracy-free zones-gaps in politics as usual when the need for consent and consensus do not seem to apply." 385
"Income inequality also decreases social mobility, which means that many Americans simply can't improve their situations, even if they really want to. The American Dream becomes a receding horizon." 400
"Study after study has shown that people are happiest not when they are more 'free'-however that might be assessed-but when they live in societies with strong social safety nets and robust family and community ties." 404
"In 1809, Thomas Jefferson concluded that the 'care of human life and happiness and not their destruction is the first and only legitimate object of good government." 405
March 3, 2023
Loved how Little House series brainwashed generations of children presenting totally false views of “self reliance”. Also films like Grapes of Wrath became verboten and push to show American exceptionalism.
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February 12, 2024
One century ago, Americans debated a proposed Constitutional amendment that is forgotten today. It was a proposal to restrict child labor that Congress approved and sent to the states for ratification. American manufacturers organized opposition. They argued that the child labor ban would limit freedom and labeled amendment advocates as “socialists” or “communists.” Business prevailed in preventing the proposal from being ratified, so the amendment died.
What did not die was big business pursuing its self-interest by influencing public policy. The Big Myth is a detailed history of the century-long campaign by the business community to promote free market fundamentalism. It is a big book, at 565 pages, written by Naomi Oreskes, a history professor at Harvard, and Erik M. Conway, a historian who works for the California Institute of Technology. They previously wrote a bestseller, The Merchants of Doubt.
The basic tenets of free market fundamentalism are that the “magic” of the free market is the best way to solve problems, that government does more harm than good when it “interferes” in the free market, that political freedom is indivisible from economic freedom, so reducing economic freedom is the road to socialism and totalitarianism. The dogma also ignores or denies market failures.
Unregulated economic freedom means the right to employ child labor, as manufacturers wanted to continue doing in the 1920s. One of the leaders in that fight to keep child labor was the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). Formed in 1895, NAM fought for governmental involvement in the marketplace via high tariffs to protect American manufacturers from foreign competition.
Despite support for protective tariffs, NAM otherwise opposed government “interference” in the marketplace as an attack on freedom. For example, NAM also fought adoption of workmen’s compensation. “The captains of American industry invoked high ideals to sustain low practices.” NAM successfully “transmogrified a self-serving argument for business privilege into a seemingly virtuous defense of cherished American values. NAM members didn’t just manufacture cars and carpets; they manufactured a myth.”
Early in the Twentieth Century, Americans recognized some negative aspects of laissez-faire capitalism. That’s why the government created the FDA, enacted antimonopoly laws, workmen’s compensation, and so on.
One failure of the marketplace in the 1920s and 1930s was that most rural Americans did not have electricity. The market deemed it not profitable to bring electricity to rural customers. Where electric service was offered in the countryside, rates were much higher than in cities.
Proposals were made to regulate the industry in order to electrify rural areas. The electric industry, however, waged a comprehensive public relations campaign against government involvement.
“Like the tobacco industry, the electricity industry denied its failures, promoted disinformation, and, when confronted with adverse evidence, tried to change the subject to freedom.” The industry won in the short run, but the New Deal pursued rural electrification during the 1930s via the TVA, the Rural Electrification Administration, and other initiatives. The industry won, however, in influencing what is taught in the nation’s business schools.
The industry campaign was based upon two dubious premises that would become the standard arguments used for generations against government action in the market. 1) Government involvement in the economy is a foreign concept, not part of the American tradition. 2) Economic freedom is necessary to prevent government tyranny.
The truth is that from the start, the U.S. government was heavily involved in promoting economic growth. One of the first acts of the new government in 1789 was to adopt a protective tariff to shelter emerging businesses from foreign competition. Protective tariffs continued throughout the 19th century into the first half of the 20th.
The development of machine tools, which were essential to producing consumer products, was due to research funded by the Army. Railroads were promoted by government land grants and by federal relocation of the indigenous peoples. Government built roads and canals, not to mention the interstate highway system. Government played an indispensable role in developing electricity, telephone, radio, aviation, computer science and space travel. In short, it’s false history to claim that government involvement in the economy is an un-American concept.
The second argument of market fundamentalism presents the either/or fallacy: We can have either unconstrained capitalism or Soviet-style centralized planning – as if there are no other alternatives. The indivisibility thesis boiled down to “today, the eight-hour workday; tomorrow, the dictatorship of the proletariat.” Yet government health systems and a dense safety net did not destroy democracy in the UK or in Scandinavia. As historian Tony Jundt concludes, the European social democracies prove “government can play an enhanced role in our lives without threatening our liberties.”
The authors describe in detail the long-term process of influencing the nation’s business schools by funding such luminaries as Ludwig von Mises, Friedrick Hayak and Milton Friedman, among others, and in promoting their books. The nation’s clergy were also targeted with market fundamentalism. Rightwing think tanks were funded as was the Federalist Society. The most influential individual in shaping public opinion, however, was a former New Deal Democrat named Ronald Reagan.
Reagan had voted for FDR four times, and he was head of the actors’ union. His views changed, however, after he went to work for General Electric, which actively spread a pro-market, antigovernment ideology. Reagan gave thousands of speeches during his years representing GE, and he hosted the General Electric Theatre, one of the most popular television programs from 1953 to 1962. It depicted a pro-capitalist, individualist message. Ironically, during the same period GE was proclaiming the benefits of free enterprise, its officers were engaged in price fixing and anticompetitive practices, crimes for which they eventually pled guilty.
After the GE Theatre was canceled in 1962, Reagan ran for governor of California with financial assistance from the business community. He also served as a spokesman for the AMA in opposing the creation of Medicare in 1964, deeming it ”socialized medicine.”
As president, he continued to rail against Big Government, pledging to “get the government off our backs.” In practice, the term “our” actually meant business. One of his memorable quips is, “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” Reagan’s administration put the brakes on federal regulation and stopped enforcing the antitrust laws. Deregulation had started under Carter, gained momentum under Reagan, and was continued under Clinton.
Reagan’s deregulation led to the savings and loan debacle and to a large federal bailout. Clinton also did the bidding of big business by supporting deregulation of telecommunications, which led to decreased competition and higher prices, the opposite of what was promised. His deregulation of banking also reduced competition and led to the worst recession since the Great Depression. All of which demonstrates that deregulation can have unintended negative consequences, just as regulation can.
This is a valuable book because it explains how what FDR called “economic royalists” have shaped the status quo to serve their interests. Government doing the bidding of big business explains why we are in the second Gilded Age. There is more and more business concentration with a handful of huge corporations dominating industries. It also explains weak unions, stagnant median wages, an exploding national debt, steadily growing economic inequality, and why social mobility in the U.S. is now more sluggish than in any other member of the G7.
It also helps to explain climate change, “the greatest and most wide-ranging market failure ever seen by legally creating a problem that markets have proven unable to solve.” The fossil fuel industry still denies its role in climate change, while fighting measures to reduce emissions.
Oreskes and Conway have done an excellent job of documenting the long-term, successful campaign by business to deify the market and to demonize government. The market created climate change but can’t fix it. -30-
What did not die was big business pursuing its self-interest by influencing public policy. The Big Myth is a detailed history of the century-long campaign by the business community to promote free market fundamentalism. It is a big book, at 565 pages, written by Naomi Oreskes, a history professor at Harvard, and Erik M. Conway, a historian who works for the California Institute of Technology. They previously wrote a bestseller, The Merchants of Doubt.
The basic tenets of free market fundamentalism are that the “magic” of the free market is the best way to solve problems, that government does more harm than good when it “interferes” in the free market, that political freedom is indivisible from economic freedom, so reducing economic freedom is the road to socialism and totalitarianism. The dogma also ignores or denies market failures.
Unregulated economic freedom means the right to employ child labor, as manufacturers wanted to continue doing in the 1920s. One of the leaders in that fight to keep child labor was the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). Formed in 1895, NAM fought for governmental involvement in the marketplace via high tariffs to protect American manufacturers from foreign competition.
Despite support for protective tariffs, NAM otherwise opposed government “interference” in the marketplace as an attack on freedom. For example, NAM also fought adoption of workmen’s compensation. “The captains of American industry invoked high ideals to sustain low practices.” NAM successfully “transmogrified a self-serving argument for business privilege into a seemingly virtuous defense of cherished American values. NAM members didn’t just manufacture cars and carpets; they manufactured a myth.”
Early in the Twentieth Century, Americans recognized some negative aspects of laissez-faire capitalism. That’s why the government created the FDA, enacted antimonopoly laws, workmen’s compensation, and so on.
One failure of the marketplace in the 1920s and 1930s was that most rural Americans did not have electricity. The market deemed it not profitable to bring electricity to rural customers. Where electric service was offered in the countryside, rates were much higher than in cities.
Proposals were made to regulate the industry in order to electrify rural areas. The electric industry, however, waged a comprehensive public relations campaign against government involvement.
“Like the tobacco industry, the electricity industry denied its failures, promoted disinformation, and, when confronted with adverse evidence, tried to change the subject to freedom.” The industry won in the short run, but the New Deal pursued rural electrification during the 1930s via the TVA, the Rural Electrification Administration, and other initiatives. The industry won, however, in influencing what is taught in the nation’s business schools.
The industry campaign was based upon two dubious premises that would become the standard arguments used for generations against government action in the market. 1) Government involvement in the economy is a foreign concept, not part of the American tradition. 2) Economic freedom is necessary to prevent government tyranny.
The truth is that from the start, the U.S. government was heavily involved in promoting economic growth. One of the first acts of the new government in 1789 was to adopt a protective tariff to shelter emerging businesses from foreign competition. Protective tariffs continued throughout the 19th century into the first half of the 20th.
The development of machine tools, which were essential to producing consumer products, was due to research funded by the Army. Railroads were promoted by government land grants and by federal relocation of the indigenous peoples. Government built roads and canals, not to mention the interstate highway system. Government played an indispensable role in developing electricity, telephone, radio, aviation, computer science and space travel. In short, it’s false history to claim that government involvement in the economy is an un-American concept.
The second argument of market fundamentalism presents the either/or fallacy: We can have either unconstrained capitalism or Soviet-style centralized planning – as if there are no other alternatives. The indivisibility thesis boiled down to “today, the eight-hour workday; tomorrow, the dictatorship of the proletariat.” Yet government health systems and a dense safety net did not destroy democracy in the UK or in Scandinavia. As historian Tony Jundt concludes, the European social democracies prove “government can play an enhanced role in our lives without threatening our liberties.”
The authors describe in detail the long-term process of influencing the nation’s business schools by funding such luminaries as Ludwig von Mises, Friedrick Hayak and Milton Friedman, among others, and in promoting their books. The nation’s clergy were also targeted with market fundamentalism. Rightwing think tanks were funded as was the Federalist Society. The most influential individual in shaping public opinion, however, was a former New Deal Democrat named Ronald Reagan.
Reagan had voted for FDR four times, and he was head of the actors’ union. His views changed, however, after he went to work for General Electric, which actively spread a pro-market, antigovernment ideology. Reagan gave thousands of speeches during his years representing GE, and he hosted the General Electric Theatre, one of the most popular television programs from 1953 to 1962. It depicted a pro-capitalist, individualist message. Ironically, during the same period GE was proclaiming the benefits of free enterprise, its officers were engaged in price fixing and anticompetitive practices, crimes for which they eventually pled guilty.
After the GE Theatre was canceled in 1962, Reagan ran for governor of California with financial assistance from the business community. He also served as a spokesman for the AMA in opposing the creation of Medicare in 1964, deeming it ”socialized medicine.”
As president, he continued to rail against Big Government, pledging to “get the government off our backs.” In practice, the term “our” actually meant business. One of his memorable quips is, “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.” Reagan’s administration put the brakes on federal regulation and stopped enforcing the antitrust laws. Deregulation had started under Carter, gained momentum under Reagan, and was continued under Clinton.
Reagan’s deregulation led to the savings and loan debacle and to a large federal bailout. Clinton also did the bidding of big business by supporting deregulation of telecommunications, which led to decreased competition and higher prices, the opposite of what was promised. His deregulation of banking also reduced competition and led to the worst recession since the Great Depression. All of which demonstrates that deregulation can have unintended negative consequences, just as regulation can.
This is a valuable book because it explains how what FDR called “economic royalists” have shaped the status quo to serve their interests. Government doing the bidding of big business explains why we are in the second Gilded Age. There is more and more business concentration with a handful of huge corporations dominating industries. It also explains weak unions, stagnant median wages, an exploding national debt, steadily growing economic inequality, and why social mobility in the U.S. is now more sluggish than in any other member of the G7.
It also helps to explain climate change, “the greatest and most wide-ranging market failure ever seen by legally creating a problem that markets have proven unable to solve.” The fossil fuel industry still denies its role in climate change, while fighting measures to reduce emissions.
Oreskes and Conway have done an excellent job of documenting the long-term, successful campaign by business to deify the market and to demonize government. The market created climate change but can’t fix it. -30-
August 6, 2023
A powerful and heartbreaking book about why things suck so much.
The authors posit -- with a daunting amount of evidence -- it's because we Americans have fallen for a myth that that benefits the few to the severe detriment of the rest: "that capitalism and freedom are two indivisible sides of the same coin." (5). This, the authors say, was promoted by industry groups who were fighting against attempts to ban child labor, provide worker's compensation, and provide electricity to everyone through propaganda and outright lies. They hired academics to rewrite textbooks to prevent pro-market, anti-government perspectives as established wisdom. They lied about electricity. They blamed labor for the Depression. And, assisted by the best minds money could buy, they came up with a story that appealed to people and promoted it in ways fair and foul. Or, as they summarize:
They did this through Reader's Digest versions of big books, dumbed down and propagandized to prove their point, through importing economists like Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich von Hayek who reasoned from "first principles" (insert sarcastic eyeroll here) that libertarian solutions are best; by promoting authors and reporters who sincerely believed terrible things (see Ayn Rand); and by hiring Ronald Reagan to host weekly market fundamentalist propaganda sessions presented as wholesome television.
I already disliked Baron von Mises, Hayek, and Milton Friedman. This book made me dislike them more. From this book I learned:
*That a young man born in American in 1899 would have been safer going to fight in WWI than a railroad worker. (16)
*That coal miners in Scranton were more likely to be killed, seriously injured, or permanently disabled than not. (16)
*That the private industry group National Electric Light Association (NELA) lied and attempted to suppress the fact that European farmers had electricity before American ones did (105)
*That NAM suppressed the fact that American wealth was built on genocide and slavery. (124)
*That von Mises was an advisor to Engelbert Dollfuss, the Austrian chancellor who ended the republic and and established an authoritarian regime. (128)
*That as early as 1945, NAM was promoting the lie that there was no difference between socialism and fascism. (150). ("This was absurd. It was as if one insisted there was no difference between the Greek and Orthodox Jews -- since both are forms of orthodoxy -- or between the American Republican party and the Republicans who battled Franco in Spain.")
*That Laura Ingells Wilder's daughter Rose Wilder Lane rewrote her mother's life story to falsely support the idea the family had been self sufficient when in fact they depended on the government and their neighbors. (164-69)
* That leaders in NAM and NELA fought hard to change how most Christians thought about their obligations to each other to fight the New Deal in part because the last two of the Four Freedoms - Freedom from Want and Fear" -- were perceived as anti-capitalist. Some Christian leaders went along with it because they thought less folks would go to church if they weren't hungry and afraid. These pastors got a lot of support from the folks funding NAM and NELA. (189-90).
*That the first federal law to promote competition was the Sherman anti-Trust act of 1890 -- more than a century after the constitution was written.
*That in 1946, the president of the Motion Picture Association, and former head of the US Chamber of Commerce told screenwriters that "We'll have no more Grapes of Wrath, we'll have no more Tobacco Roads, we'll have no more films that deal with the seamy side of American life. We'll have no more films that treat the banker as villain." He did not want calls for economic justice. He wanted glorification of the wealthy. (211)
*That Milton Friedman thought externalities like pollution should be tolerated because FREEDOM. (269)
*That Milton Friedman thought racial discrimination was wrong but inconsequential. (272)
*That Milton Friedman's central premise in Capitalism and Freedom, that capitalism and freedom are indivisible, was immediately proven wrong by economist Paul Samuelson. (276).
*That Milton Friedman supported the right of property owners to refuse to sell to Black people. (306)
*That Reagan supported restrictive covenants as late as 1966. (306)
*That the Reagan administration simply lied about the causes and dangers of pollution. (357)
*That at least 40% and possibly up to 90% of American COVID deaths could have been avoided if we had a better administration, greater trust in institutions, and greater trust in each other based on the death tolls in otherwise similar countries. (396)
*That the happiest countries are ones where people trust each other and their institutions, have strong social safety nets, and robust family and community ties. The idea that racial homogeneity plays a party has been falsified. (404).
*That Judge Richard Posner took a hard look at the 2008 Great Recession and rejected market fundamentalism. (415)
Ends with a bang:
I've wrestled with the Tripod all my life and have tentatively concluded that market fundamentalism is not coequal with representative democracy and personal liberty. But I've never seriously doubted that the people who believe there's a third leg to that stool weren't sincere and maybe even right. The thing that is really daunting about this book is that it strongly suggests that the folks who paid to have that myth spread were indifferent to its truth; they just cared about what it could get them.
A good book. Well worth the time.
The authors posit -- with a daunting amount of evidence -- it's because we Americans have fallen for a myth that that benefits the few to the severe detriment of the rest: "that capitalism and freedom are two indivisible sides of the same coin." (5). This, the authors say, was promoted by industry groups who were fighting against attempts to ban child labor, provide worker's compensation, and provide electricity to everyone through propaganda and outright lies. They hired academics to rewrite textbooks to prevent pro-market, anti-government perspectives as established wisdom. They lied about electricity. They blamed labor for the Depression. And, assisted by the best minds money could buy, they came up with a story that appealed to people and promoted it in ways fair and foul. Or, as they summarize:
A key part of the manufacturers' propaganda campaign was the myth that of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom, and free enterprise. This was a fabricated claim. Free enterprise appears in neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution, and the nineteenth-century American economy was laced with government involvement in the marketplace. But NAM [the National Association of Manufacturers] spent millions to convince the American people of the truth of the Tripod of Freedom, and to persuade Americans that the villain in the story of the Great Depression was not "Big Business" but "Big Government." They spread this myth to weaken Americans' confidence in government institutions that reined in abusive business practices and protected ordinary citizens.(5-6)
They did this through Reader's Digest versions of big books, dumbed down and propagandized to prove their point, through importing economists like Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich von Hayek who reasoned from "first principles" (insert sarcastic eyeroll here) that libertarian solutions are best; by promoting authors and reporters who sincerely believed terrible things (see Ayn Rand); and by hiring Ronald Reagan to host weekly market fundamentalist propaganda sessions presented as wholesome television.
I already disliked Baron von Mises, Hayek, and Milton Friedman. This book made me dislike them more. From this book I learned:
*That a young man born in American in 1899 would have been safer going to fight in WWI than a railroad worker. (16)
*That coal miners in Scranton were more likely to be killed, seriously injured, or permanently disabled than not. (16)
*That the private industry group National Electric Light Association (NELA) lied and attempted to suppress the fact that European farmers had electricity before American ones did (105)
*That NAM suppressed the fact that American wealth was built on genocide and slavery. (124)
*That von Mises was an advisor to Engelbert Dollfuss, the Austrian chancellor who ended the republic and and established an authoritarian regime. (128)
*That as early as 1945, NAM was promoting the lie that there was no difference between socialism and fascism. (150). ("This was absurd. It was as if one insisted there was no difference between the Greek and Orthodox Jews -- since both are forms of orthodoxy -- or between the American Republican party and the Republicans who battled Franco in Spain.")
*That Laura Ingells Wilder's daughter Rose Wilder Lane rewrote her mother's life story to falsely support the idea the family had been self sufficient when in fact they depended on the government and their neighbors. (164-69)
* That leaders in NAM and NELA fought hard to change how most Christians thought about their obligations to each other to fight the New Deal in part because the last two of the Four Freedoms - Freedom from Want and Fear" -- were perceived as anti-capitalist. Some Christian leaders went along with it because they thought less folks would go to church if they weren't hungry and afraid. These pastors got a lot of support from the folks funding NAM and NELA. (189-90).
*That the first federal law to promote competition was the Sherman anti-Trust act of 1890 -- more than a century after the constitution was written.
*That in 1946, the president of the Motion Picture Association, and former head of the US Chamber of Commerce told screenwriters that "We'll have no more Grapes of Wrath, we'll have no more Tobacco Roads, we'll have no more films that deal with the seamy side of American life. We'll have no more films that treat the banker as villain." He did not want calls for economic justice. He wanted glorification of the wealthy. (211)
*That Milton Friedman thought externalities like pollution should be tolerated because FREEDOM. (269)
*That Milton Friedman thought racial discrimination was wrong but inconsequential. (272)
*That Milton Friedman's central premise in Capitalism and Freedom, that capitalism and freedom are indivisible, was immediately proven wrong by economist Paul Samuelson. (276).
*That Milton Friedman supported the right of property owners to refuse to sell to Black people. (306)
*That Reagan supported restrictive covenants as late as 1966. (306)
*That the Reagan administration simply lied about the causes and dangers of pollution. (357)
*That at least 40% and possibly up to 90% of American COVID deaths could have been avoided if we had a better administration, greater trust in institutions, and greater trust in each other based on the death tolls in otherwise similar countries. (396)
*That the happiest countries are ones where people trust each other and their institutions, have strong social safety nets, and robust family and community ties. The idea that racial homogeneity plays a party has been falsified. (404).
*That Judge Richard Posner took a hard look at the 2008 Great Recession and rejected market fundamentalism. (415)
Ends with a bang:
The deification of markets and demonization of government has deprived us of the tools and the insights we need to address the challenges before us: to live long and healthy lives, to generate prosperity, and to coexists in concord with each other and with the nonhuman inhabitants of our planet. It is time we rejected the myths of market fundamentalism and re-embraced the proven tools we have at our disposal. It takes governance to address the problems that people, pursuing our self-interest, create. One does not have to be a socialist to come to this conclusion. Only an observer.
Ronald Reagan was wrong. Our most consequential problems have arisen not because of too much government, but because of too little. Government is not the solution to all our problems, but it is the solution to many of our biggest ones. 426
I've wrestled with the Tripod all my life and have tentatively concluded that market fundamentalism is not coequal with representative democracy and personal liberty. But I've never seriously doubted that the people who believe there's a third leg to that stool weren't sincere and maybe even right. The thing that is really daunting about this book is that it strongly suggests that the folks who paid to have that myth spread were indifferent to its truth; they just cared about what it could get them.
A good book. Well worth the time.
May 13, 2024
"The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic." John F Kennedy.
In a confusing world, powerful myths can be irresistible. Especially if those myths make us feel better about ourselves, our past, and our future. But they are still myths. Sooner or later they are bound to blow up and be exposed, because reality doesn't care about which myths we hold dear.
There is one particular myth that has taken hold in the last century that has gripped the economies and politics of the United States and other nations- the myth of market fundamentalism. Market fundamentalism is the belief that unregulated markets will result in the best interests of society- unbridled capitalism and the pursuit of self-interest will lift up entire societies, and any restraints will hurt them.
For Naomi Oreskes, this unquestioned belief in the wisdom of the markets is The Big Myth that has led our nation astray. She writes about it in a new book of the same name. Oreskes is a Harvard professor and science historian, and was the author of another great book- The Merchants of Doubt that showed how big business sowed confusion about climate change to prevent actions to mitigate it.
For most of the mid-20th century, government was considered a public good and admired for how it handled the Great Depression and won World War 2. The Big Myth details all of the action that went on behind the scenes during this period that turned the tide radically by 1980, turning government from the results of a social contract to a faceless, oppressive villain.
Those on the right proposed that economic freedom was equated with religious freedom and democracy- the tripod of freedom. Without free, unregulated markets, America wasn't truly free. For a long time the memories of the depression, which resulted from unregulated stock markets, kept voters from turning away from the comforts of big government. But beginning in the 1970's that began to change.
Under President Jimmy Carter, airline and trucking deregulation was one of the first to go. Under Ronald Reagan, regulatory agencies like the EPA, OSHA, and IRS were gutted and industry insiders were put in charge. Bill Clinton had a hand in deregulating the financial sector, sowing the seeds for the financial crisis of 2008. At every step along the way the champions of market fundamentalism have been there to spin the myth in new ways and combat the ideas that government needs to step in when bad things happen.
Oreskes names many of the 20th century actors like NAM, the Business Roundtable, Chamber of Commerce, Cato Institute, Ayn Rand, Heartland Institute, Milton Friedman, The Federalist Society, Heritage Society, and Koch Foundation that put huge amounts of money into lobbying, studies, and politicians who would fight for market freedom. Many of the names I had heard before, but there were some new ones. For instance, I had no idea that the stories of Little House on the Prairie were crafted by the libertarian daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder to appeal to right-wing fundamentalists who romanticized self-sufficiency in the wild west. (There is much debate about whether the stories are true or made up.) Libertarian heroine Ayn Rand relied on wealthy supporters to buy up her books, and then proved her hypocrisy by filing for Social and Medicare before she died.
Much of the Big Myth of market fundamentalism is magical thinking that has yet to be proven by economists. Countries in Europe have proven that strong governments can co-exist with religious freedom and democracy. In fact, democracy suffers currently from the oversized power that the rich have over our elections, and the market suffers from inefficiencies caused by over- consolidation and monopolies that stifle change and competition.
The 21st centuries is riddled with crises that haven't yet been solved by the marketplace- Covid, the opioid crisis, obesity, gun violence and mass shootings, unaffordability of housing, childcare, and education, income inequality, and of course climate change. The top 1% of Americans are shielded for the most part from these maladies, and they are now calling the shots while hiding behind the Big Myth. They are even trying to roll back the clock to the 18th century by pushing for child labor, a wrong that was righted over 100 years ago.
If history is any guide, communism, where government controls everything, has failed. Market fundamentalism, where government controls nothing, is also a failure, but it has strong backing from those it benefits. They have think tanks, unlimited funds, and plenty of propaganda to push their agendas. The best solutions lie in the middle, with government solving the big problems and businesses solving the smaller ones. There has to be some kind of "invisible hand" that looks out for the society at large, and not just the shareholders. This book points to government as the best option to solve our really big problems, and I have to agree- but only if the governments continue to be accountable through democracy and guardrails.
It's a delicate, complicated balance, but it's real. We can't afford to rely on myths anymore. The stakes are too high.
In a confusing world, powerful myths can be irresistible. Especially if those myths make us feel better about ourselves, our past, and our future. But they are still myths. Sooner or later they are bound to blow up and be exposed, because reality doesn't care about which myths we hold dear.
There is one particular myth that has taken hold in the last century that has gripped the economies and politics of the United States and other nations- the myth of market fundamentalism. Market fundamentalism is the belief that unregulated markets will result in the best interests of society- unbridled capitalism and the pursuit of self-interest will lift up entire societies, and any restraints will hurt them.
For Naomi Oreskes, this unquestioned belief in the wisdom of the markets is The Big Myth that has led our nation astray. She writes about it in a new book of the same name. Oreskes is a Harvard professor and science historian, and was the author of another great book- The Merchants of Doubt that showed how big business sowed confusion about climate change to prevent actions to mitigate it.
For most of the mid-20th century, government was considered a public good and admired for how it handled the Great Depression and won World War 2. The Big Myth details all of the action that went on behind the scenes during this period that turned the tide radically by 1980, turning government from the results of a social contract to a faceless, oppressive villain.
Those on the right proposed that economic freedom was equated with religious freedom and democracy- the tripod of freedom. Without free, unregulated markets, America wasn't truly free. For a long time the memories of the depression, which resulted from unregulated stock markets, kept voters from turning away from the comforts of big government. But beginning in the 1970's that began to change.
Under President Jimmy Carter, airline and trucking deregulation was one of the first to go. Under Ronald Reagan, regulatory agencies like the EPA, OSHA, and IRS were gutted and industry insiders were put in charge. Bill Clinton had a hand in deregulating the financial sector, sowing the seeds for the financial crisis of 2008. At every step along the way the champions of market fundamentalism have been there to spin the myth in new ways and combat the ideas that government needs to step in when bad things happen.
Oreskes names many of the 20th century actors like NAM, the Business Roundtable, Chamber of Commerce, Cato Institute, Ayn Rand, Heartland Institute, Milton Friedman, The Federalist Society, Heritage Society, and Koch Foundation that put huge amounts of money into lobbying, studies, and politicians who would fight for market freedom. Many of the names I had heard before, but there were some new ones. For instance, I had no idea that the stories of Little House on the Prairie were crafted by the libertarian daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder to appeal to right-wing fundamentalists who romanticized self-sufficiency in the wild west. (There is much debate about whether the stories are true or made up.) Libertarian heroine Ayn Rand relied on wealthy supporters to buy up her books, and then proved her hypocrisy by filing for Social and Medicare before she died.
Much of the Big Myth of market fundamentalism is magical thinking that has yet to be proven by economists. Countries in Europe have proven that strong governments can co-exist with religious freedom and democracy. In fact, democracy suffers currently from the oversized power that the rich have over our elections, and the market suffers from inefficiencies caused by over- consolidation and monopolies that stifle change and competition.
The 21st centuries is riddled with crises that haven't yet been solved by the marketplace- Covid, the opioid crisis, obesity, gun violence and mass shootings, unaffordability of housing, childcare, and education, income inequality, and of course climate change. The top 1% of Americans are shielded for the most part from these maladies, and they are now calling the shots while hiding behind the Big Myth. They are even trying to roll back the clock to the 18th century by pushing for child labor, a wrong that was righted over 100 years ago.
If history is any guide, communism, where government controls everything, has failed. Market fundamentalism, where government controls nothing, is also a failure, but it has strong backing from those it benefits. They have think tanks, unlimited funds, and plenty of propaganda to push their agendas. The best solutions lie in the middle, with government solving the big problems and businesses solving the smaller ones. There has to be some kind of "invisible hand" that looks out for the society at large, and not just the shareholders. This book points to government as the best option to solve our really big problems, and I have to agree- but only if the governments continue to be accountable through democracy and guardrails.
It's a delicate, complicated balance, but it's real. We can't afford to rely on myths anymore. The stakes are too high.
Want to read
April 28, 2023Just a maybe read. Hard to find objective reviews. Kirkus seems to like it. Other reviewers have mentioned how this book is very one-sided and extremely slanted ( cherry picking sources, straw-man logical fallacy, etc., )
September 2, 2023
Be forewarned: this is a serious, well-written, thoroughly documented investigation of how big business – and big money, of course – have concocted a tale of misdirection, deceit, and outright lies to mask what unregulated capitalism has exacted – and continues to – great costs on the working and middle classes.
The text is 426 pages; the supporting notes that document their evidence, including quotations, published articles, and other substantive data amount to another 120 pages!
Their central argument is simple and concrete:
“This is the story of how American business manufactured a myth that has, for decades and to our detriment, held us in its grip. It is the true history of a false idea: the idea of ‘the magic of the marketplace.’
“Some people call it market absolutism or market essentialism…. It’s a quasi-religious belief that the best way to address our needs – whether economic or otherwise – is to let markets do their thing, and not rely on government. Market fundamentalists treat ‘The Market’ as a proper noun: something unique and unto itself, that has agency and even wisdom, that functions best when left unfettered and unregulated, undisturbed and unperturbed. Government, according to the myth, cannot improve the functioning of markets; it can only interfere. Governments therefore need to stay out of the way, lest they ‘distort’ the market and prevent it from doing its ‘magic.’ In the late twentieth century, market fundamentalism was cloaked in the seemingly ancient raiments of received wisdom. In fact, it was more or less invented in the twentieth century.
“Classical liberal economists – including Adam Smith – recognized that government served essential functions, including building infrastructure for everyone’s benefit and regulating banks, which, left to their own devices, could destroy an economy. They also recognized that taxation was required to enable governments to perform those functions. But in the early twentieth century, a group of self-styled ‘neo-liberals’ shifted economic and political thinking radically. They argued that any government action in the marketplace, even well intentioned, compromised the freedom of individuals to do as they pleased – and therefore put us on the road to totalitarianism. Political and economic freedom were ‘indivisible,’ they insisted: any compromise to the latter was a threat to the former – any compromise at all.” (P. 1)
“Market fundamentalism is not just the belief that free markets are the best means to run an economic system but also the belief that they are the only means that will not ultimately destroy our other freedoms. It is the belief in the primacy of economic freedom not just to generate wealth but as a bulwark of political freedom. And it is the belief that markets exist outside of politics and culture, so that it can be logical to speak of leaving them ‘alone.’” (P. 3)
Market fundamentalists insist that “there is no ‘common good,’ merely the sum of all the individual private goods. For this reason, they reject government’s claims to represent ‘the people’” there are only people – individuals – who represent themselves, and they do this most effectively not through their governments, even democratically elected ones, but through free choice in free markets.” (P. 4)
A key part of the propaganda campaign waged ever more effectively from the 1920s forward “was the myth of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom, and free enterprise. This was a fabricated claim. Free enterprise appears in neither the Declaration of Independence, nor the Constitution, and the nineteenth century America economy was laced with government involvement in the marketplace.” (Pp. 5-6)
The rest of this substantive book “dots the i’s and crosses the t’s,” impressively documenting the names of individuals and organizations involved over the 100 years since.
The solution to returning to sanity and greater equity is not “rocket science.” Rather, it is re-embracing the wisdom of our ancestors – the economy must be at the service of the people rather than the other way around and, to ensure this, appropriate government regulation of business and the economy is necessary.
While people of good will can, of course, differ on what regulation is necessary and/or when, that it is sometimes so is irrefutable.
I recognize that many “true believers” will remain unmoved by what I have written.
The solution? Read the book! Our current overflowing basket of serious problems has been caused in large measure by people who do not read or think for themselves but, rather, are all too willing to swallow the unfiltered swill of the propaganda pushed by the moneyed elite on social media and through conservative and rightwing broadcasts and publications. These latter want people to remain ignorant; and, as long many are enraged and focused on revenge, they will easily continue to realize their wish.
The text is 426 pages; the supporting notes that document their evidence, including quotations, published articles, and other substantive data amount to another 120 pages!
Their central argument is simple and concrete:
“This is the story of how American business manufactured a myth that has, for decades and to our detriment, held us in its grip. It is the true history of a false idea: the idea of ‘the magic of the marketplace.’
“Some people call it market absolutism or market essentialism…. It’s a quasi-religious belief that the best way to address our needs – whether economic or otherwise – is to let markets do their thing, and not rely on government. Market fundamentalists treat ‘The Market’ as a proper noun: something unique and unto itself, that has agency and even wisdom, that functions best when left unfettered and unregulated, undisturbed and unperturbed. Government, according to the myth, cannot improve the functioning of markets; it can only interfere. Governments therefore need to stay out of the way, lest they ‘distort’ the market and prevent it from doing its ‘magic.’ In the late twentieth century, market fundamentalism was cloaked in the seemingly ancient raiments of received wisdom. In fact, it was more or less invented in the twentieth century.
“Classical liberal economists – including Adam Smith – recognized that government served essential functions, including building infrastructure for everyone’s benefit and regulating banks, which, left to their own devices, could destroy an economy. They also recognized that taxation was required to enable governments to perform those functions. But in the early twentieth century, a group of self-styled ‘neo-liberals’ shifted economic and political thinking radically. They argued that any government action in the marketplace, even well intentioned, compromised the freedom of individuals to do as they pleased – and therefore put us on the road to totalitarianism. Political and economic freedom were ‘indivisible,’ they insisted: any compromise to the latter was a threat to the former – any compromise at all.” (P. 1)
“Market fundamentalism is not just the belief that free markets are the best means to run an economic system but also the belief that they are the only means that will not ultimately destroy our other freedoms. It is the belief in the primacy of economic freedom not just to generate wealth but as a bulwark of political freedom. And it is the belief that markets exist outside of politics and culture, so that it can be logical to speak of leaving them ‘alone.’” (P. 3)
Market fundamentalists insist that “there is no ‘common good,’ merely the sum of all the individual private goods. For this reason, they reject government’s claims to represent ‘the people’” there are only people – individuals – who represent themselves, and they do this most effectively not through their governments, even democratically elected ones, but through free choice in free markets.” (P. 4)
A key part of the propaganda campaign waged ever more effectively from the 1920s forward “was the myth of the Tripod of Freedom, the claim that America was founded on three basic, interdependent principles: representative democracy, political freedom, and free enterprise. This was a fabricated claim. Free enterprise appears in neither the Declaration of Independence, nor the Constitution, and the nineteenth century America economy was laced with government involvement in the marketplace.” (Pp. 5-6)
The rest of this substantive book “dots the i’s and crosses the t’s,” impressively documenting the names of individuals and organizations involved over the 100 years since.
The solution to returning to sanity and greater equity is not “rocket science.” Rather, it is re-embracing the wisdom of our ancestors – the economy must be at the service of the people rather than the other way around and, to ensure this, appropriate government regulation of business and the economy is necessary.
While people of good will can, of course, differ on what regulation is necessary and/or when, that it is sometimes so is irrefutable.
I recognize that many “true believers” will remain unmoved by what I have written.
The solution? Read the book! Our current overflowing basket of serious problems has been caused in large measure by people who do not read or think for themselves but, rather, are all too willing to swallow the unfiltered swill of the propaganda pushed by the moneyed elite on social media and through conservative and rightwing broadcasts and publications. These latter want people to remain ignorant; and, as long many are enraged and focused on revenge, they will easily continue to realize their wish.
April 26, 2023
Listened via Audible.
Paraphrasing an old adage - it is said - that the only thing more powerful than an existing idea is a new that takes its place.
The 'old idea' which came to prominence during the Depression and Franklin Roosevelt's administration was the enlargement of the U.S. Government in order to 'make life better' for those suffering during the Great Depression (25% unemployment and etc.). Government intervention was continued during WW2 when a Government involved economy organized itself created the "Arsenal of Democracy" and helped win WW2.
During this time the conservatives - didn't want a big U.S. Government - didn't want to pay for it - and started programs/idea creations concerning the downside of 'Big Government'.
This book is the story of since the 1920's and 1930's groups of industrial trade associations - organized themselves, threw money in the pot and created programs to oppose New Deal and WW2 Government Programs. From this beginning - with enough $ and having bought intellectual fig leafs - "The Road to Serfdom" and Milton Friedman and the University of Chicago tribe - they pursed the creation and distribution of the MYTH that the Free Market can do it all - and that Government should be loathed. Reviewers Note: U.S. WW2 production levels were astonishing - it WAS NOT ACCOMPLISHED BY THE FREE MARKET, left alone unregulated, unanalyzed...
A thorough history concerning how various business segments organized themselves to advocate for an unrestrained free market.
A history of the original texts of Capitalism - "An Inquiry into the Wealth of Nations" - where Adam Smith - recognizes some role for Government, roads, education and etc.....Smith's words were selectively edited out by the recent 'Free Marketeers' abolishing all references to any value of a Government.
History through the 1920's and 1930's - with National Association of Manufacturers - 1950's with General Electric Theatre - with their pitchman Ronald Reagan. Followed in the 1970's by Lewis Powell's memo to the U S Chamber of Commerce that "Business needs to fight back" - with this Conservatives funded think tanks, academics (Milton Friedman and etc.) and propaganda. Also the linkage that any critique of raw pure capitalism means that you were/are a socialist - Capitalism the way its practiced in the U.S. - is 'perfect' does not need to be reviewed, understood, regulated..."it is (as Ronald Regan and others have said) "magic". It's not "magic" - and it has a negative impact for some segments of the population.
Oreskes' model is that Economics should be a science - where there should be a proof (peer review) of what these theories say. When data/experience is forthcoming the theory could/should change so as to accommodate this new information. In Oreskes telling Conservative Economists Bible - Tax Cuts a la Supply Side Economics - which under even a cursory review show that reductions in tax rates - rarely if ever pay for themselves - despite this - Conservative advocate these up-until-today. The reviewer is old enough to remember Ronald Reagan's promise - that he could "Cut Taxes, Increase Defense Spending and Balance the Budget" - His true believers believed him and his Supply Side Economics BUT - it didn't work then (1980's) and hasn't worked since- but that hasn't diminished its popularity. Supply Side Economics can be found in the Wall Street Journal today....with revisionist history that 'it worked' and should be continued....
Issue for this reviewer is the relative size of the U.S. Government's power versus the power of Big Business - for 40 plus years Big Business has had its way - while the Government, its people and its power have been reduced starting with Ronald Regan - "Government is not the solution; Government is the problem". During that time we've had 'n' bailouts and etc....still the Myth lives on.
Not sure if public mood swung so as to support a more involved Government - we have the people with skills to engage the Fortune 500 $'s and skill set to argue Supply Side Economics and the Limits of the Administrative Practices Act - so that the EPA cannot regulate Automobile Tailpipe emissions against a well funded set of ideologues and a disinterested public.
A good history - not too many projections of how to return to fact based economic theories (a beginning of this perhaps is starting (?) but..).
Should be of value to those who read politics and economics.
Carl Gallozzi
Cgallozzi@comcast.net
Paraphrasing an old adage - it is said - that the only thing more powerful than an existing idea is a new that takes its place.
The 'old idea' which came to prominence during the Depression and Franklin Roosevelt's administration was the enlargement of the U.S. Government in order to 'make life better' for those suffering during the Great Depression (25% unemployment and etc.). Government intervention was continued during WW2 when a Government involved economy organized itself created the "Arsenal of Democracy" and helped win WW2.
During this time the conservatives - didn't want a big U.S. Government - didn't want to pay for it - and started programs/idea creations concerning the downside of 'Big Government'.
This book is the story of since the 1920's and 1930's groups of industrial trade associations - organized themselves, threw money in the pot and created programs to oppose New Deal and WW2 Government Programs. From this beginning - with enough $ and having bought intellectual fig leafs - "The Road to Serfdom" and Milton Friedman and the University of Chicago tribe - they pursed the creation and distribution of the MYTH that the Free Market can do it all - and that Government should be loathed. Reviewers Note: U.S. WW2 production levels were astonishing - it WAS NOT ACCOMPLISHED BY THE FREE MARKET, left alone unregulated, unanalyzed...
A thorough history concerning how various business segments organized themselves to advocate for an unrestrained free market.
A history of the original texts of Capitalism - "An Inquiry into the Wealth of Nations" - where Adam Smith - recognizes some role for Government, roads, education and etc.....Smith's words were selectively edited out by the recent 'Free Marketeers' abolishing all references to any value of a Government.
History through the 1920's and 1930's - with National Association of Manufacturers - 1950's with General Electric Theatre - with their pitchman Ronald Reagan. Followed in the 1970's by Lewis Powell's memo to the U S Chamber of Commerce that "Business needs to fight back" - with this Conservatives funded think tanks, academics (Milton Friedman and etc.) and propaganda. Also the linkage that any critique of raw pure capitalism means that you were/are a socialist - Capitalism the way its practiced in the U.S. - is 'perfect' does not need to be reviewed, understood, regulated..."it is (as Ronald Regan and others have said) "magic". It's not "magic" - and it has a negative impact for some segments of the population.
Oreskes' model is that Economics should be a science - where there should be a proof (peer review) of what these theories say. When data/experience is forthcoming the theory could/should change so as to accommodate this new information. In Oreskes telling Conservative Economists Bible - Tax Cuts a la Supply Side Economics - which under even a cursory review show that reductions in tax rates - rarely if ever pay for themselves - despite this - Conservative advocate these up-until-today. The reviewer is old enough to remember Ronald Reagan's promise - that he could "Cut Taxes, Increase Defense Spending and Balance the Budget" - His true believers believed him and his Supply Side Economics BUT - it didn't work then (1980's) and hasn't worked since- but that hasn't diminished its popularity. Supply Side Economics can be found in the Wall Street Journal today....with revisionist history that 'it worked' and should be continued....
Issue for this reviewer is the relative size of the U.S. Government's power versus the power of Big Business - for 40 plus years Big Business has had its way - while the Government, its people and its power have been reduced starting with Ronald Regan - "Government is not the solution; Government is the problem". During that time we've had 'n' bailouts and etc....still the Myth lives on.
Not sure if public mood swung so as to support a more involved Government - we have the people with skills to engage the Fortune 500 $'s and skill set to argue Supply Side Economics and the Limits of the Administrative Practices Act - so that the EPA cannot regulate Automobile Tailpipe emissions against a well funded set of ideologues and a disinterested public.
A good history - not too many projections of how to return to fact based economic theories (a beginning of this perhaps is starting (?) but..).
Should be of value to those who read politics and economics.
Carl Gallozzi
Cgallozzi@comcast.net
October 3, 2023
This 2023 book is an information jewel. And the authors' writing style makes it easy to understand and comfortable to read. As a side note, it does not, unfortunately, link to the needed topic of heterodox Modern Monetary Theory.
If you know people who loath government, especially those who revere money as God, then waste no time obtaining a copy because information is power.
The book has 116 pages of end notes organized by chapter and page number to substantiate claims of historical fact. Abundant source information for additional reading is also provided within the end notes. The book's index is especially helpful and well done. This is the best nonfiction book, I've read in ages.
A couple of examples of useful information provided:
A) "The fight against child labor was squarely in the center of the Progressive movement, whose leading lights included former Republican president Theodore Roosevelt."
B) "In the late 1930s and early 1940s, Ronald Reagan was a moderately successful actor, but not a star. After WWII, he appeared in several trite pictures, such as the infamous 1951 comedy, 'Bedtime for Bonzo', in which he plays a professor trying to teach morals to a chimp and score a win for the nurture side of the nature verses nurture debate (Spoiler alert: he fails).
Reagan played a larger role in Hollywood as the president of the Screen Actors Guild (continuously from 1947 to 1952 and then again in 1959-60); TVs General Electric Theater revived Reagan's acting career, as his voice and face reached each week into tens of millions of American homes, and the seeds of his reputation as 'the great communicator' were sown.
The didactic quality and the show's pro capitalist, individualist message was no accident. General Electric Theater was not just pitching electricity, it was pitching capitalism. General Electric Theater arguably succeeded as propaganda because it also worked as entertainment.
Originally, as a revived mediocre actor and then as a traveling spokesperson paid by General Electric, Ronald Reagan made the case for market fundamentalism to the masses. Nevermind that his past work as president of a large labor union conflicted with key objectives of General Electric and market fundamentalism, in general."
Market fundamentalism rooted in the myth that business markets can operate on their own, without government oversight is nonsense that has been carefully cultivated since before Ronald Reagan's time. Gee Willikers! A stop sign is regulation. Regulations don't just protect us; in many cases they enable us to do the things we could not otherwise do.
Our choices are not confined to oppressive communism or heartless capitalism. To suggest that they are is a dangerous failure of vision.
Become better informed. "Ronald Reagan was wrong. Our most consequential problems have arisen not because of too much government, but because of too little. Government is not the solution to all our problems, but it is the solution to many of our biggest ones."
If you know people who loath government, especially those who revere money as God, then waste no time obtaining a copy because information is power.
The book has 116 pages of end notes organized by chapter and page number to substantiate claims of historical fact. Abundant source information for additional reading is also provided within the end notes. The book's index is especially helpful and well done. This is the best nonfiction book, I've read in ages.
A couple of examples of useful information provided:
A) "The fight against child labor was squarely in the center of the Progressive movement, whose leading lights included former Republican president Theodore Roosevelt."
B) "In the late 1930s and early 1940s, Ronald Reagan was a moderately successful actor, but not a star. After WWII, he appeared in several trite pictures, such as the infamous 1951 comedy, 'Bedtime for Bonzo', in which he plays a professor trying to teach morals to a chimp and score a win for the nurture side of the nature verses nurture debate (Spoiler alert: he fails).
Reagan played a larger role in Hollywood as the president of the Screen Actors Guild (continuously from 1947 to 1952 and then again in 1959-60); TVs General Electric Theater revived Reagan's acting career, as his voice and face reached each week into tens of millions of American homes, and the seeds of his reputation as 'the great communicator' were sown.
The didactic quality and the show's pro capitalist, individualist message was no accident. General Electric Theater was not just pitching electricity, it was pitching capitalism. General Electric Theater arguably succeeded as propaganda because it also worked as entertainment.
Originally, as a revived mediocre actor and then as a traveling spokesperson paid by General Electric, Ronald Reagan made the case for market fundamentalism to the masses. Nevermind that his past work as president of a large labor union conflicted with key objectives of General Electric and market fundamentalism, in general."
Market fundamentalism rooted in the myth that business markets can operate on their own, without government oversight is nonsense that has been carefully cultivated since before Ronald Reagan's time. Gee Willikers! A stop sign is regulation. Regulations don't just protect us; in many cases they enable us to do the things we could not otherwise do.
Our choices are not confined to oppressive communism or heartless capitalism. To suggest that they are is a dangerous failure of vision.
Become better informed. "Ronald Reagan was wrong. Our most consequential problems have arisen not because of too much government, but because of too little. Government is not the solution to all our problems, but it is the solution to many of our biggest ones."
April 5, 2024
Merchant's of Doubt was a (gloomy) but extremely informative and accessible book about how big industries such as Tobacco have specifically and purposefully obfuscated the science behind how damaging their respective businesses are.
The Big Myth was originally going to be a similar book but focused on Global Warming in particular - however the authors explain they got somewhat derailed by trying to understand the ultimate WHY of opposition to dealing with Climate Change was so strong. They explain that they realized the Free Market had just become so important and idealized in U.S. society that it was almost a default position that attempting to address Climate Change was 'interference' - therefore the authors found themselves diving into a broader topic - why the Free Market is so worshipped.
Now I have to start off by saying I have a lot of bias on this topic. It's already something that I've studied up on, even reviewed similar books and thought about for a lot of my life. So in respects for the topic its already going to be a 5-star positive review. But I wanted to add before I gushed about this book that I did think as a piece of work there are some limits and concerns.
Namely this book is really, very detailed. Like, not only do we sail back to the Great Depression Era, and cover almost all the decades since, the authors discuss specifics about organizations, individuals and ensure they detail the specifics well. This is great from an academic perspective, and to be honest this book almost reads as a textbook. It's quite dry, and while there is plenty of flavour and personality within the book its a matter of quantity and if you're not like me and already curious and into this topic, I find it hard to fathom someone getting into this book. Where Merchants of Doubt focused on illuminating the specific "doubt" tactics with good examples - the Big Myth is more of a historical expose. The difference between that The Big Myth feels longer, more repetitive, and at times more distant.
That all said from the perspective someone who didn't mind the deep dive the book is amazing. I'd read a similar tome "the economics of the 1%" which did a good job detailing some common economic myths, but The Big Myth detailed and explained where these beliefs arose and have been supported for decades. It's obviously a bit depressing to read as a progressive, however its less depressing than not understanding some of the horror show we observe most days in the World-News.
For me the most telling part was when high level economists supporting the worship of the Free Market literally couldn't explain or even robustly theorize the 'whys' of their beliefs or even present evidence of good outcomes of said beliefs.
It seems unlikely that those who need to read this will - however I urge anyone who is looking at this book and on the fence to give it a crack. Yes its lengthy and specific but its also super important stuff. (with a heavy huff of irony I wish there were a Reader's Digest version)
The Big Myth was originally going to be a similar book but focused on Global Warming in particular - however the authors explain they got somewhat derailed by trying to understand the ultimate WHY of opposition to dealing with Climate Change was so strong. They explain that they realized the Free Market had just become so important and idealized in U.S. society that it was almost a default position that attempting to address Climate Change was 'interference' - therefore the authors found themselves diving into a broader topic - why the Free Market is so worshipped.
Now I have to start off by saying I have a lot of bias on this topic. It's already something that I've studied up on, even reviewed similar books and thought about for a lot of my life. So in respects for the topic its already going to be a 5-star positive review. But I wanted to add before I gushed about this book that I did think as a piece of work there are some limits and concerns.
Namely this book is really, very detailed. Like, not only do we sail back to the Great Depression Era, and cover almost all the decades since, the authors discuss specifics about organizations, individuals and ensure they detail the specifics well. This is great from an academic perspective, and to be honest this book almost reads as a textbook. It's quite dry, and while there is plenty of flavour and personality within the book its a matter of quantity and if you're not like me and already curious and into this topic, I find it hard to fathom someone getting into this book. Where Merchants of Doubt focused on illuminating the specific "doubt" tactics with good examples - the Big Myth is more of a historical expose. The difference between that The Big Myth feels longer, more repetitive, and at times more distant.
That all said from the perspective someone who didn't mind the deep dive the book is amazing. I'd read a similar tome "the economics of the 1%" which did a good job detailing some common economic myths, but The Big Myth detailed and explained where these beliefs arose and have been supported for decades. It's obviously a bit depressing to read as a progressive, however its less depressing than not understanding some of the horror show we observe most days in the World-News.
For me the most telling part was when high level economists supporting the worship of the Free Market literally couldn't explain or even robustly theorize the 'whys' of their beliefs or even present evidence of good outcomes of said beliefs.
It seems unlikely that those who need to read this will - however I urge anyone who is looking at this book and on the fence to give it a crack. Yes its lengthy and specific but its also super important stuff. (with a heavy huff of irony I wish there were a Reader's Digest version)
June 7, 2023
‘The Big Myth’ by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway chronicles the history of the idea, prominent in American discourse, that unregulated capitalism equals political freedom - essentially a near religious belief that the “invisible hand” of the market is the answer to all ills. This idea has led to the belief that all government is bad government (except when it protects the owners of capital), that any use of resources to help regular people is a slippery slope to totalitarian communism, and that greed and massive inequality is good. As a near foundational American myth at this point, it has caused red scares that destroyed innocent people’s lives, was the main weapon in the late 20th century destruction of unions, and is fundamental to continued inaction on climate change.
But, this myth didn’t come out of nowhere. It has a source: a concerted, and often coordinated, effort by libertarians, right-leaning economists, conservative institutions, Christian evangelists and corporations to plant the seed of this idea in the public mind and water it with pseudo intellectual discourse until it grew into a tenacious vine; a thing that “everyone knows.”
The book ranges from modern roots in business lobbies response the Roosevelt’s New Deal, through Laura Ingles Wilder’s ‘Little House on the Prairie’, Ayn Rand, General Electric Theater, Ronald Reagan, Oliver Stone’s ‘Wall Street’ and into the opioid epidemic and the use of Ivermectin to “cure” COVID. It has a cast of economists and their theories, including Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman. All lending intellectual support to the movement; many of their University positions funded by wealthy backers. It chronicles the effects of these beliefs on workers rights, income inequality, the environment and human health.
The book is really quite exhaustive, and well worth the read for the history alone. But, the real power of this work is how Oreskes and Conway connect the dots, showing how this myth was shared and reinforced by powerful people and their mouthpieces. The reason why so many Americans believe this myth is that a lot of money and effort was expended to make them believe it. And the myth and its powerful backers continue to roll on to this day.
This book has a point of view, to be sure. And at first it grated a little bit on me. Counter arguments are often offered as obvious, even though they are not always obvious. This seemed more pronounced early in the book, or maybe I just got used to it. But, in the end, this is a minor quibble. The history, and its interconnections, is the real value here, and the counter arguments, backed up or not, are not necessary to its illumination.
If you want to understand the origin of this myth, which holds America in its sway and affects the rest of the world, this is a must read.
But, this myth didn’t come out of nowhere. It has a source: a concerted, and often coordinated, effort by libertarians, right-leaning economists, conservative institutions, Christian evangelists and corporations to plant the seed of this idea in the public mind and water it with pseudo intellectual discourse until it grew into a tenacious vine; a thing that “everyone knows.”
The book ranges from modern roots in business lobbies response the Roosevelt’s New Deal, through Laura Ingles Wilder’s ‘Little House on the Prairie’, Ayn Rand, General Electric Theater, Ronald Reagan, Oliver Stone’s ‘Wall Street’ and into the opioid epidemic and the use of Ivermectin to “cure” COVID. It has a cast of economists and their theories, including Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman. All lending intellectual support to the movement; many of their University positions funded by wealthy backers. It chronicles the effects of these beliefs on workers rights, income inequality, the environment and human health.
The book is really quite exhaustive, and well worth the read for the history alone. But, the real power of this work is how Oreskes and Conway connect the dots, showing how this myth was shared and reinforced by powerful people and their mouthpieces. The reason why so many Americans believe this myth is that a lot of money and effort was expended to make them believe it. And the myth and its powerful backers continue to roll on to this day.
This book has a point of view, to be sure. And at first it grated a little bit on me. Counter arguments are often offered as obvious, even though they are not always obvious. This seemed more pronounced early in the book, or maybe I just got used to it. But, in the end, this is a minor quibble. The history, and its interconnections, is the real value here, and the counter arguments, backed up or not, are not necessary to its illumination.
If you want to understand the origin of this myth, which holds America in its sway and affects the rest of the world, this is a must read.
August 7, 2023
This book was challenging and dense but without exaggeration, it changed the way I think about the world around me. Like Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, but with a much more ambitious scope.
The authors are both scholars - each chapter methodically and clearly examines a specific organization or group of people at a key point in history, to do two things: (1) show how wealthy businessmen and their trade associations used money to influence political and public discourse in favour of their interests, and (2) how the actual sources, data and arguments are manipulated, misinterpreted or flat out invented to suit these goals.
It goes as deep as General Electric and Ronald Reagan, Milton Friedman and Hayek, The Fountainhead and Little House on the Prairie. The authors show how a willful misreading of An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations set the agenda for the deregulation craze and lack of antitrust action starting in the 70s. How big business co-opted religion in the mid-20th century to support its pro-inequality stance. How presidents from across the political spectrum were either convinced or duped into supporting laws that directly benefit corporations at the expense of the citizens.
It is convincing, effective and entirely upsetting.
I’m Canadian, so I often think about how connected culturally and economically we are to the US today. This book helps illustrate how different the two countries were throughout the 20th century (including the surprising use of Ontario Hydro as an example of how a public utility can outperform a private one), and I’d say we’re better for it.
The authors are both scholars - each chapter methodically and clearly examines a specific organization or group of people at a key point in history, to do two things: (1) show how wealthy businessmen and their trade associations used money to influence political and public discourse in favour of their interests, and (2) how the actual sources, data and arguments are manipulated, misinterpreted or flat out invented to suit these goals.
It goes as deep as General Electric and Ronald Reagan, Milton Friedman and Hayek, The Fountainhead and Little House on the Prairie. The authors show how a willful misreading of An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations set the agenda for the deregulation craze and lack of antitrust action starting in the 70s. How big business co-opted religion in the mid-20th century to support its pro-inequality stance. How presidents from across the political spectrum were either convinced or duped into supporting laws that directly benefit corporations at the expense of the citizens.
It is convincing, effective and entirely upsetting.
I’m Canadian, so I often think about how connected culturally and economically we are to the US today. This book helps illustrate how different the two countries were throughout the 20th century (including the surprising use of Ontario Hydro as an example of how a public utility can outperform a private one), and I’d say we’re better for it.
April 13, 2023
I wasn't a big fan of this book. Some of the history was interesting and I feel its often a good idea to hear multiple perspectives on an issue, but there are just too many problems with this book. The authors do many of the things they accuse "the other side" of doing - over generalizing, selectively viewing history, narrowing down a complex issue to two simple options, and assuming that the majority shares their view on what the world's problems are and what the "right" solution is. If the conclusion of this book were left at "government's job should be to keep markets from getting out of hand by determining the rules of the game" and "we should have more discussions about which risks government should try to limit in the markets" and "where should we draw the line between one person's freedom when it starts to encroach on another's whether intended or not," all points that were made in one part or another of the book, it would have been pretty good. The trouble is, the authors already "know" the answers and it is their particular version of social democracy. They seem to use that term interchangeably with "well-regulated capitalism." I don't think those are necessarily the same thing. I think well-regulated capitalism is a great thing. Government's job is to make sure that what I call exercising my freedom isn't actually infringing on someone else's. It is also there to provide services that we all need that no one individually is going to pay for - roads, police, defense, etc. But does that necessarily entail shifting to a European-style social democracy as the authors suggest repeatedly, with government sponsored pensions, massive taxes, single payer healthcare and riots if we try to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64? I think that is a discussion we can and should have without breaking it down to one side calling the others communists while the other suggests if you don't agree with them you hate the poor, support slavery, want child labor, are racist and don't care about the environment. What kind of country do we want to be? What goods and services are rights and should be provided by the government? How much would that cost and are we willing to pay it? Those are legitimate questions that people can and do have different opinions on and an honest discussion of them would be a much better use of time than reading this book.
May 15, 2023
The Big Myth described in this book is that of free market fundamentalist dogma—a deliberate (and unfortunately successful) campaign over the past century to promote the falsehood that the free market (which isn't actually free) brings prosperity to everyone instead of just a few. In a work peer-reviewed by a wide range of experts competent in this field—including Nancy MacClean, author of Democracy in Chains—Oreskes and Conway document in extensive detail the efforts of the wealthy captains of industry to undermine government protection of the general welfare for their own illicit profits.
The authors name persons and organizations that utilize millions of dollars from wealthy donors to formulate false narratives about the efficacy of government services such as Social Security and regulations of all types on corporations. This goes beyond the usual suspects such as Friedrich Hayek and Ayn Rand to detail how economists such as Milton Friedman distorted even Hayek to produce an even more extreme version of free market ideology. Other persons less known as players in this field are also named, such as the author of the Little House on the Prairie series, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Ronald Reagan during his time as host of General Electric Theater. The distortion of Christianity as a means of promoting the un-Christian facets of free market dogma is also documented in detail—Norman Vincent Peale's involvement in this is only one of the prominent examples covered in this book.
The tide finally may be turning on the general public's acceptance of this scam—people are starting to see it for the lie that it is. The false appropriation of Adam Smith as an 18th Century endorsement of free market ideology has been exposed as the deceitful slight of hand that it is. The fact is that Capitalism cannot survive without sufficient regulation. The perpetrators of free market dogma know that their position is unpopular, and thus their earnest efforts throughout the country to impose voter suppression.
Sunshine is a great disinfectant, and this book sheds essential light on a century-long deception campaign. We need to apply this disinfectant—wash, rinse, repeat.
The authors name persons and organizations that utilize millions of dollars from wealthy donors to formulate false narratives about the efficacy of government services such as Social Security and regulations of all types on corporations. This goes beyond the usual suspects such as Friedrich Hayek and Ayn Rand to detail how economists such as Milton Friedman distorted even Hayek to produce an even more extreme version of free market ideology. Other persons less known as players in this field are also named, such as the author of the Little House on the Prairie series, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Ronald Reagan during his time as host of General Electric Theater. The distortion of Christianity as a means of promoting the un-Christian facets of free market dogma is also documented in detail—Norman Vincent Peale's involvement in this is only one of the prominent examples covered in this book.
The tide finally may be turning on the general public's acceptance of this scam—people are starting to see it for the lie that it is. The false appropriation of Adam Smith as an 18th Century endorsement of free market ideology has been exposed as the deceitful slight of hand that it is. The fact is that Capitalism cannot survive without sufficient regulation. The perpetrators of free market dogma know that their position is unpopular, and thus their earnest efforts throughout the country to impose voter suppression.
Sunshine is a great disinfectant, and this book sheds essential light on a century-long deception campaign. We need to apply this disinfectant—wash, rinse, repeat.
August 12, 2023
This book traces the evolution of the phrase "free market" in American economic history. Briefly "private enterprise" became "free enterprise" and joined freedom of speech and freedom of association as a constitutional value, even though neither private enterprise nor free enterprise appears in the founding documents. Buoyed by business groups that wanted to deny freedoms of association (unions) to workers and who wanted to create an apparent value that capitalism was somehow an essential element democracy, they've achieved quite a success in selling that bit of propaganda.
The authors don't pull any punches in recounting that history. This has ruffled some reviewers' feathers, since they call Milton Friedman a racist. Their rationale however, is based on Friedman's own writing, which denies Black advancements due to civil rights and instead assigns it to "the market system."
Particularly eye-opening was the section on how Ronald Reagan was a creature of the GE PR department.
I do think that they occasionally go overboard in highlighting the faults of their opponents however, For example they note that Rose Wilder Lance spoke well of Mussolini, but this is only true in a limited case (regarding his ability to rouse the Italian people). In other writings she denounced him.
That caveat aside, they do have citations to back their assertions and copious footnotes. Much of the book, as its title implies, is about the history, and the sources of the propaganda effort to make market capitalism appear co-equal with the liberties actually found in the Constitution. They do point out the flaws in the "free market", with regard to external effects (e.g., climate change) and I wish they'd spent a little more time on those and similar failures. Also, it's clear that "socialism" was a curse word to the business class well before this history begins and I would have enjoyed seeing some of the history on how that word has been twisted into all its derogatory associations as well, but I guess you only have so much room in one book.
The authors don't pull any punches in recounting that history. This has ruffled some reviewers' feathers, since they call Milton Friedman a racist. Their rationale however, is based on Friedman's own writing, which denies Black advancements due to civil rights and instead assigns it to "the market system."
Particularly eye-opening was the section on how Ronald Reagan was a creature of the GE PR department.
I do think that they occasionally go overboard in highlighting the faults of their opponents however, For example they note that Rose Wilder Lance spoke well of Mussolini, but this is only true in a limited case (regarding his ability to rouse the Italian people). In other writings she denounced him.
That caveat aside, they do have citations to back their assertions and copious footnotes. Much of the book, as its title implies, is about the history, and the sources of the propaganda effort to make market capitalism appear co-equal with the liberties actually found in the Constitution. They do point out the flaws in the "free market", with regard to external effects (e.g., climate change) and I wish they'd spent a little more time on those and similar failures. Also, it's clear that "socialism" was a curse word to the business class well before this history begins and I would have enjoyed seeing some of the history on how that word has been twisted into all its derogatory associations as well, but I guess you only have so much room in one book.
July 14, 2023
Will this change anyone's mind? Maybe not. As Upton Sinclair said, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." Market fundamentalists whose jobs depend on that dogma will likely stick with it. Beyond that, ordinary people with common sense will likely understand--without 400 pages of history--the book's conclusion that you need rules and referees in order to have real competition, as in basketball or football or whatever. So why give this 5 stars?
This is old school "serious" non-fiction. The author picks a topic, digs into it and then shares facts (backed up by references) that build up a theme. For the polemic aspects, the author cites the opposing side's arguments at length, says how they are correct to a point, but then shows how they are overall inconsistent with the evidence, and logically self-contradictory.
Sure it's a bit long and didactic, but this process matters. There are all these books out there from the past few years about how to detect bullshit, but I think it's better to just read something like this on a topic of interest to figure out HOW one figures out if something is evidence-based or bullshit-based. The first point is you have to look stuff up; you need to know the topic; you need to go deep. If you don't want to do that, that's fine but then don't be writing books or going on TV or podcasts about it.
I know about what this book calls the Big Myth from following the fight over tobacco control and the opioid epidemic, but it's the same story over and over for other issues up to today and going back to child labor, etc. The authors got into it from global warming, but they cover the S&L scandal, the 2008 financial collapse, etc., etc. I am not an expert on all these topics. If people disagree with this book, I hope they will point out misquotes or factual errors, as opposed to just making ad hominem attacks.
This is old school "serious" non-fiction. The author picks a topic, digs into it and then shares facts (backed up by references) that build up a theme. For the polemic aspects, the author cites the opposing side's arguments at length, says how they are correct to a point, but then shows how they are overall inconsistent with the evidence, and logically self-contradictory.
Sure it's a bit long and didactic, but this process matters. There are all these books out there from the past few years about how to detect bullshit, but I think it's better to just read something like this on a topic of interest to figure out HOW one figures out if something is evidence-based or bullshit-based. The first point is you have to look stuff up; you need to know the topic; you need to go deep. If you don't want to do that, that's fine but then don't be writing books or going on TV or podcasts about it.
I know about what this book calls the Big Myth from following the fight over tobacco control and the opioid epidemic, but it's the same story over and over for other issues up to today and going back to child labor, etc. The authors got into it from global warming, but they cover the S&L scandal, the 2008 financial collapse, etc., etc. I am not an expert on all these topics. If people disagree with this book, I hope they will point out misquotes or factual errors, as opposed to just making ad hominem attacks.
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