Slouching Towards Utopia ft. Brad DeLong
The New Liberal Podcast
00:00
The Second Point, I Think the Extractive Point Is Right
The institutions that they set up were essentially extractive institutions meant to just get money out and once they left, they didn't leave them with a bunch of great inclusive institutions. The logic of let me create a base of supporters that benefits from my rule and will support me is very much antithetical to the logic of let's respect property rights so people have incentives to accumulate, reinvest, and build capital. And indeed, you find this in Europe since 1000, that wherever there are kings interested in building states, you know, economic growth dies. Only where the government is run as a kind of coalition of merchants, each of which is much more interested in having their own life proceed as normal,
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