Why We Owe: David Graeber on the Origins of Debt

From unpaid bills to entire governments facing bankruptcy, debt is never far from our minds or the news. It’s deeply embedded in our lives: our language, culture, even major religions. It’s also at the heart of many of our most pressing political debates. But have you ever thought about where debt comes from? On this edition of Making Contact we hear from Anthropologist David Graeber, author of “Debt: The First 5,000 Years.” Graeber traces the history of debt and asks what might we learn from how societies in the past dealt with it. His 2011 talk was recorded by Allan Campbell, producer of People United at KOOP radio, in Austin Texas and featured on Bread and Roses Radio.

Debt is deeply embedded in our lives: our language, culture, even major religions. It’s also at the heart of many of our most pressing political debates. But have you ever thought about where debt comes from? On this edition of Making Contact we hear from Anthropologist David Graeber, author of “Debt: The First 5,000 Years.” Graeber traces the history of debt and asks what might we learn from how societies in the past dealt with it. His 2011 talk was recorded by Allan Campbell, producer of People United at KOOP radio, in Austin Texas and featured on Bread and Roses Radio.