How to Build an Economy That Works for Everyone | Nick Romeo
Apr 15, 2025
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Nick Romeo, a journalist featured in The New Yorker and author of 'The Alternative: How to Build a Just Economy', shares compelling insights on transforming our economic landscape. He discusses the urgent need for a new definition of living wage and the power of cooperative ownership models. Romeo critiques traditional economics for oversimplifying human needs and explores innovative gig work solutions that prioritize fairness. The conversation also highlights sustainable business practices and the potential of collaborative ownership in reshaping societal norms.
Reevaluating the definition of a living wage is essential, encompassing not only survival needs but also societal and moral considerations for a fulfilling life.
Nick Romeo advocates for cooperative business models as a pathway to empower workers and ensure ethical practices in future enterprises.
Redesigning gig work as a public utility has the potential to prioritize worker benefits and create a more equitable economic system.
Deep dives
Challenging Traditional Economic Assumptions
Traditional arguments against minimum wage laws claim that imposing higher wages leads to business closures and increased unemployment. However, economists David Card and Alan Kruger conducted a pivotal study that demonstrated this negative impact is significantly smaller than previously believed. Subsequent research has further validated the idea that it is possible to raise wages without adversely affecting employment levels. This insight encourages a reevaluation of long-held economic beliefs and highlights the necessity of adapting our understanding of wage dynamics.
Redesigning Work Around Human Needs
Nick Romeo's book, 'The Alternative', explores the concept of creating economic models that prioritize justice and human flourishing instead of profit maximization. It proposes a shift away from traditional market-focused perspectives towards business practices that incorporate human interests and cooperation between labor and management. This approach includes examining cooperative enterprises and alternative work platforms, which challenge conventional views about economic interactions. By focusing on what kind of businesses we can build for the benefit of society, the discussion calls for a fundamental rethinking of work's role in our lives.
Rethinking Living Wages
The concept of a living wage encompasses more than just the basic calculations of survival expenses like housing and food; it involves a deeper understanding of what it means to live well. Historically, definitions of living wages included considerations for savings, leisure activities, and family needs, which have been marginalized in contemporary discussions. Current tools like MIT's living wage calculator provide a more limited view of essential needs, reflecting a shift in societal expectations. This chapter argues that advanced discussions on living wages must also account for the broader societal and moral implications of what it means to lead a fulfilling life.
Gig Work as a Public Utility
The traditional gig economy model is often criticized for its exploitative commissions taken from workers' earnings, leading to a need for alternative frameworks. The idea of gig work as a public utility suggests that services should be structured to prioritize worker benefits while keeping transaction costs low. By redefining these platforms to serve both workers and consumers without excessive profit extraction, there is potential for a more equitable system. Examples from municipalities like Long Beach may illustrate the possibility of scaling such initiatives to address local labor needs without sacrificing worker rights.
Cooperative Takeovers and Purpose-driven Businesses
Cooperative takeovers involve acquiring businesses and converting them into cooperative models that empower workers and incorporate shared governance. This approach can not only preserve but also enhance the founding vision of businesses that prioritize ethical practices over profit maximization. With many retiring businessowners seeking favorable exit strategies, the opportunity for cooperative models to flourish grows. By securing the future of these enterprises through purpose-driven trusts, there's a pathway to maintain equitable treatment for workers and sustain ethical business practices.
As a journalist, Nick Romeo has interviewed people doing remarkable things, from running worker-owned companies to redesigning gig work as public infrastructure. These experiences shaped his new book, The Alternative: How to Build a Just Economy, and led him to one big insight: a better economy isn’t just possible—it’s already here. In this episode, Nick and Dart talk about the difference between market wages and living wages, why mainstream economics underestimates people, and how everything from co-ops to experiments in building gig work platforms as public utilities are reimagining the role of work in society right now.
Nick Romeo is a journalist whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and The New York Times. He writes about policy, power, and the systems that shape how we live and work.
In this episode, Dart and Nick discuss: - Why we need a new definition of a “living wage” - The power of co-ops, trusts, and employee ownership - How gig work can be redesigned to serve workers - What it means to design an economy around fairness - How ownership models shape the future of work - Why traditional economics misses what really matters - And other topics…
Nick Romeo is a journalist and author who covers bold ideas in economics, policy, and philosophy. He’s reported for The New Yorker on everything from Austria’s job guarantee experiment to Spain’s Mondragon cooperative and Nicholas Humphrey’s theory of consciousness. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, and Scientific American. He teaches at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. His latest book, The Alternative: How to Build a Just Economy, offers a roadmap for a fairer, more sustainable economy. Praised by The Guardian as “enlightening and inspiring” and called “brisk and sensible” by The Washington Post, it showcases real-world models that are already changing how we think about work, wages, and ownership.
Work with Dart: Dart is the CEO and co-founder of the work design firm 11fold. Build work that makes employees feel alive, connected to their work, and focused on what’s most important to the business. Book a call at 11fold.com.
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