New Books in Economics

Supply chains - and, especially, their points of failure - have become a global hot topic, encouraging us all to take a closer look at how goods move around the globe. Dr. Gero Leson has spent the better part of his career developing supply chains from the ground up, modeling a community-driven approach that holds a vision of interconnection and a broader understanding of success for Western culture.At natural soap company Dr. Bronner’s, Leson and his colleagues and collaborators have developed ingredient supply chains for key ingredients, including palm oil, cocoa, and olive oil, that have aimed to honor people and process as much as product. At times, the results have been humbling, but, also, educational and human-centered. Working in communities around the globe, including Ghana, India, and Sri Lanka, Leson’s sourcing stories demonstrate how working closely with people and recognizing the role of serendipity can have surprising and dynamic results--and lead to regenerative, more socially just supply chains. In Honor Thy Label: Dr. Bronner's Unconventional Journey to a Clean, Green, and Ethical Supply Chain (Portfolio, 2021), Leson shares case studies of his work and offers insight into the complexity of critical supply chain issues, including sustainability, regenerative organic agriculture, and fair trade.Dr. Gero Lasen is the vice president of special operations at Dr. Bronners, a top-selling brand of soaps in North America. After joining the company in 2005, he helped its transition to sourcing all major ingredients directly from certified fair trade and organic projects, built from scratch and supplied by small scale farms. Under his leadership, Dr Bronners has become a pathfinder in the global movement to establish socially just and environmentally responsible supply chains. Leson holds a masters in physics and a doctorate in environmental science and engineering. He is a regular speaker on business, sustainability, fair trade, and regenerative organic agriculture.Dr. Susan Grelock Yusem is an independent researcher trained in depth psychology, with an emphasis on community, liberation, and eco-psychologies. Her work centers around interconnection and encompasses regenerative food systems, the arts and conservation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

In Re-Union: How Bold Labor Reforms Can Repair, Revitalize, and Reunite the United States (Cornell UP, 2021), David Madland explores how labor unions are essential to all workers. Yet, union systems are badly flawed and in need of rapid changes for reform. Madland's multilayered analysis presents a solution--a model to replace the existing firm-based collective bargaining with a larger, industry-scale bargaining method coupled with powerful incentives for union membership.These changes would represent a remarkable shift from the norm, but would be based on lessons from other countries, US history and current policy in several cities and states. In outlining the shift, Madland details how these proposals might mend the broken economic and political systems in the United States. He also uses three examples from Britain, Canada, and Australia to explore what there is yet to learn about this new system in other developed nations.Madland's practical advice in Re-Union extends to a proposal for how to implement the changes necessary to shift the current paradigm. This powerful call to action speaks directly to the workers affected by these policies--the very people seeking to have their voices recognized in a system that attempts to silence them.David Madland is Senior Fellow and Strategic Director of the American Worker Project at the Center for American Progress. He is author of Hollowed Out: Why the Economy Doesn’t work without a strong middle class. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

Today I talked to Adam Kahane about his new book Facilitating Breakthrough: How to Remove Obstacles, Bridge Differences, and Move Forward Together (Berrett-Koehler, 2021).You’re helping South Africa make the transition from apartheid to democracy under Nelson Mandela. You’re helping end a half-century civil war in Columbia. You’re working with the First Nations in Canada. That’s a small part of the scope that Adam Kahane has been involved in over the recent decades. It’s meaningful, enlightened work that recognizes that the two typical modes of reaching “agreements” don’t yield optimal results. The vertical approach leads to rigidity and domination by ultimately shutting down dissent. The collegial, horizontal approach can lead to fragmentation and gridlock. What’s the new, third way forward? For Kahane, that means doing what Martin Luther King, Jr. did and looking for inspiration in the work of the German existential theologian Paul Tillich. Love offers unity, power the opportunity for self-realization, and justice looks to ensure that power bring equity for all. If ever you’ve had to work out disagreements to resolve a conflict, this episode is for you.Adam Kahane is the director of Reos Partners, an international social enterprise that helps people move forward together on their most important and intractable issues.Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

Is it possible that the consensus around what caused the 2008 Great Recession is almost entirely wrong? It's happened before. Just as Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz led the economics community in the 1960s to reevaluate its view of what caused the Great Depression, the same may be happening now to our understanding of the first economic crisis of this century.Foregoing the usual relitigating of the problems of housing markets and banking crises, renowned monetary economist Scott Sumner argues that the Great Recession came down to one thing: nominal GDP, the sum of all nominal spending in the economy, which the Federal Reserve erred in allowing to plummet. The Money Illusion: Market Monetarism, the Great Recession, and the Future of Monetary Policy (University of Chicago Press, 2021) is an end-to-end case for this school of thought, known as market monetarism, written by its leading voice in economics. Based almost entirely on standard macroeconomic concepts, this highly accessible text lays a groundwork for a simple yet fundamentally radical understanding of how monetary policy can work best: providing a stable environment for a market economy to flourish.Scott Sumner is the Ralph G. Hawtrey Chair of Monetary Policy at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He is also Professor Emeritus at Bentley University and Research Fellow at the Independent Institute.Kirk Meighoo is Public Relations Officer for the United National Congress, the Official Opposition in Trinidad and Tobago. His career has spanned media, academia, and politics for three decades. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

Data is now central to the economy, government, and health systems—so why are data and the AI systems that interpret the data in the hands of so few people? Alex Pentland and Alexander Lipton's Building the New Economy: Data As Capital (MIT Press, 2021) calls for us to reinvent the ways that data and artificial intelligence are used in civic and government systems. Arguing that we need to think about data as a new type of capital, the authors show that the use of data trusts and distributed ledgers can empower people and communities with user-centric data ownership, transparent and accountable algorithms, machine learning fairness principles and methodologies, and secure digital transaction systems.It's well known that social media generate disinformation and that mobile phone tracking apps threaten privacy. But these same technologies may also enable the creation of more agile systems in which power and decision-making are distributed among stakeholders rather than concentrated in a few hands. Offering both big ideas and detailed blueprints, the authors describe such key building blocks as data cooperatives, tokenized funding mechanisms, and tradecoin architecture. They also discuss technical issues, including how to build an ecosystem of trusted data, the implementation of digital currencies, and interoperability, and consider the evolution of computational law systems. Galina Limorenko is a doctoral candidate in Neuroscience with a focus on biochemistry and molecular biology of neurodegenerative diseases at EPFL in Switzerland. To discuss and propose the book for an interview you can reach her at galina.limorenko@epfl.ch. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

Today I talked to Sue Unerman about her new book Belonging: The Key to Transforming and Maintaining Diversity, Inclusions and Equality at Work (Bloomsbury, 2020)How is it that $8 billion a year gets thrown at diversity training and yet next-to-nothing changes? One person who isn’t giving up is Sue Unerman, who along with her co-authors Kathryn Jacob and Mark Edwards favors a full-court press of changes in order to improve the degree to which women get represented in the ranks of senior management at companies. From how meetings are run, to how teams are built, and of course who gets promoted and receives how much in compensation, the scope of this episode is broad. A particular focus is detrimental “banter” that’s hardly as light-hearted as it’s made out to be. Add to that the Glass Slipper problem of people trying to fit into a culture that should, instead, be blown wide-open and allow all types, and you’ve got a feel for how Unerman is urging reforms.Sue Unerman is the Chief Transformation Office at MediaCom, the largest media agency in the UK with over 200 clients. Along with Kathryn Jacob, she is also the co-author of The Glass Wall.Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

It's time to rethink how we create and allocate moneyIn Outgrowing Capitalism: Rethinking Money to Reshape Society and Pursue Purpose (Fast Company Press, 2021), Marco Dondi sheds light on the fact that most people do not have the economic security to focus on purpose and life fulfillment. He proposes that this is not the way things have to be; there is an alternative. In a quest to change our economic system to cater for everyone, he identifies deep issues in how money is created and allocated and connects these to capitalism. He shows that the assumptions and circumstances that made capitalism a success are no longer true today and then describes a new socio-economic model, Monetism. Dondi's solution is to provide a pragmatic roadmap to institutionalize Monetism and solve societal issues that seemed as permanent as time.Kirk Meighoo is Public Relations Officer for the United National Congress, the Official Opposition in Trinidad and Tobago. His career has spanned media, academia, and politics for three decades. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

In this episode, Daniel Peris, the host of the “Keep Calm and Carry On Investing” podcast, and David Finegold have a wide-ranging discussion of economics and governance questions inherent in K-12 and higher education. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

A century ago, it was a given that a woman with a college degree had to choose between having a career and a family. Today, there are more female college graduates than ever before, and more women want to have a career and family, yet challenges persist at work and at home. This book traces how generations of women have responded to the problem of balancing career and family as the twentieth century experienced a sea change in gender equality, revealing why true equity for dual career couples remains frustratingly out of reach.Drawing on decades of her own groundbreaking research, Claudia Goldin provides a fresh, in-depth look at the diverse experiences of college-educated women from the 1900s to today, examining the aspirations they formed—and the barriers they faced—in terms of career, job, marriage, and children. She shows how many professions are “greedy,” paying disproportionately more for long hours and weekend work, and how this perpetuates disparities between women and men. Goldin demonstrates how the era of COVID-19 has severely hindered women’s advancement, yet how the growth of remote and flexible work may be the pandemic’s silver lining.Antidiscrimination laws and unbiased managers, while valuable, are not enough. Career and Family: Women’s Century-Long Journey toward Equity (Princeton UP, 2021) explains why we must make fundamental changes to the way we work and how we value caregiving if we are ever to achieve gender equality and couple equity.Marshall Poe is the founder and editor of the New Books Network. He can be reached at marshallpoe@newbooksnetwork.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics

Today I talked to Jackie Fast about her new book Rule Breaker: Rebellious Leadership for the Future of Work (Kogan Page, 2021).Imagine finding yourself in a career sector, sponsorship, because it’s the way to get a visa and stay in England. Well, that’s what happened to Jackie Fast. And as things turned out, she was very good at sponsorship work. In a few years her ability to put two brands together for a campaign, or more, a kind of temporary Merger and Acquisition, meant she was spending time doing work for Richard Branson on an island he owns in the Caribbean. From the vantage point of her highly successful, entrepreneurial career, what strikes Fast is, indeed, how fast the world is changing. Few if any older executives will manage the transition, she believes, to a world where the internet has democratized big business and where Millennials and Gen Z members favor a values-based approach that puts meaningful work you enjoy front and center in their career aspirations.Jackie Fast is the founder of the venture capital firm Sandbox Studios, which invests in celebrity-owned brands and has worked with The Rolling Stones, Red Bull, Zoom, Formula One, Virgin, Allianz and Universal Music among others.Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/economics