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📚 Book Review: Talking to My Daughter 👍
A Brief History of Capitalism by Yanis Varoufakis
This short book offers a rapid and accessible introduction to economics, money, the banking system, and why human economic and political history has unfolded as it has so far. Varoufakis also does a great job of showing how the richest and most powerful of our species maintain power and control by bending our democratic institutions to their will. Along the way, he busts several myths and uses mythology, science fiction, and literature to provide memorable lessons and analogies.
In this extended letter to his daughter, Professor Varoufakis also casts his eye on the challenges on the immediate horizon, such as heightening automation may inadvertently shut down the recycling of commodities and money:
First automation of production pushes costs down. Second, the ruthless competition between producers stops them from charging prices above their falling costs. This has the effect of squeezing profits to a bare minimum. Third, the robots that have replaced human workers do not spend money on the products that they help produce. This has the effect of reducing demand…That’s the moment when, like Icarus, market society finds its wings melting.
He emphasizes the failing of economists and economic theories, which are…
