Capitalism, Progress, and Environmental Challenges

In this episode from October 2019, a16z co-founder Marc Andreessen and former a16z podcast showrunner Sonal Choksi bring on MIT economist and bestselling author Andrew McAfee to discuss why the lessons of human growth in times past, from the Industrial Revolution onwards, might not apply to our future. It used to be that the only way for humanity to grow — and progress — was through destroying the environment. But is this interplay between human growth vs. environment really a zero-sum game? Even if it were true in history, is it true today? If capitalism is not responsible for environmental degradation, than who or what is? And where does (and doesn’t) technology come in?

The conversation is based on McAfee’s 2019 book More from Less: The Surprising Story of How We Learned to Prosper Using Fewer Resources -- and What Happens Next,  ranging broadly across many areas of growth, from the future of energy and agriculture to the role of capitalism and technology today and tomorrow, from dematerialization  to Tesla, Buckminster Fuller, and more.