The value of everything Making and taking in the global economy

Mariana Mazzucato, 1968-

Book - 2018

"Who really creates wealth in our world? And how do we decide the value of what they do? At the heart of today's financial and economic crisis is a problem hiding in plain sight. In modern capitalism, value-extraction is rewarded more highly than value-creation: the productive process that drives a healthy economy and society. From companies driven solely to maximize shareholder value to astronomically high prices of medicines justified through big pharma's 'value pricing', we misidentify taking with making, and have lost sight of what value really means. Once a central plank of economic thought, this concept of value--what it is, why it matters to us--is simply no longer discussed. Yet, argues Mariana Mazzucato in ...this penetrating and passionate new book, if we are to reform capitalism--radically to transform an increasingly sick system rather than continue feeding it--we urgently need to rethink where wealth comes from. Which activities create it, which extract it, which destroy it? Answers to these questions are key if we want to replace the current parasitic system with a type of capitalism that is more sustainable, more symbiotic - that works for us all. The Value of Everything will reignite a long-needed debate about the kind of world we really want to live in"--Publisher's description.

Saved in:

2nd Floor Show me where

330/Mazzucato
1 / 1 copies available
Location Call Number   Status
2nd Floor 330/Mazzucato Checked In
Subjects
Published
New York : Public Affairs [2018]
Language
English
Main Author
Mariana Mazzucato, 1968- (author)
Edition
First US edition
Item Description
"First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Allen Lane, an imprint of Penguin Random House UK" -- Title page verso.
Physical Description
xix, 358 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 281-330) and index.
ISBN
9781610396745
  • Acknowledgements
  • Prefacet Stories About Wealth Creation
  • Introduction: Making versus Taking
  • Common Critiques of Value Extraction
  • What is Value?
  • Meet the Production Boundary
  • Why Value Theory Matters
  • The Structure of the Book
  • 1. A Brief History of Value
  • The Mercantilists: Trade and Treasure
  • The Physiocrats: The Answer Lies in the Soil
  • Classical Economics: Value in Labour
  • 2. Value in the Eye of the Beholder: The Rise of the Marginalists
  • New Times, New Theory
  • The Eclipse of the Classicals
  • From Objective to Subjective: A New Theory of Value Based on Preferences
  • The Rise of the 'Neoclassicals'
  • The Disappearance of Rent and Why it Matters
  • 3. Measuring the Wealth of Nations
  • GDP: A Social Convention
  • The System of National Accounts Comes into Being
  • Measuring Government Value Added in GDP
  • Something Odd about the National Accounts: GDP Facit Saltus!
  • Patching Up the National Accounts isn't Enough
  • 4. Finance: A Colossus is Born
  • Banks and Financial Markets Become Allies
  • The Banking Problem
  • Deregulation and the Seeds of the Crash
  • The Lords of (Money) Creation
  • Finance and the 'Real' Economy
  • From Claims on Profit to Claims on Claims
  • A Debt in the Family
  • 5. The Rise of Casino Capitalism
  • Prometheus (with a Pilot's Licence) Unbound
  • New Actors in the Economy
  • How Finance Extracts Value
  • 6. Financialization of the Real Economy
  • The Buy-back Blowback
  • Maximizing Shareholder Value
  • The Retreat of'Patient'Capital
  • Short-Term ism and Unproductive Investment
  • Financialization and Inequality
  • From Maximizing Shareholder Value to Stakeholder Value
  • 7. Extracting Value through the Innovation Economy
  • Stories about Value Creation
  • Where Does Innovation Come From?
  • Financing Innovation
  • Patented Value Extraction
  • Unproductive Entrepreneurship
  • Pricing Pharmaceuticals
  • Network Effects and First-mover Advantages
  • Creating and Extracting Digital Value
  • Sharing Risks and Rewards
  • 8. Undervaluing the Public Sector
  • The Myths of Austerity
  • Government Value in the History of Economic Thought
  • Keynes and Counter-cyclical Government
  • Government in the National Accounts
  • Public Choice Theory: Rationalizing Privatization and Outsourcing
  • Regaining Confidence and Setting Missions
  • Public and Private Just Deserts
  • From Public Goods to Public Value
  • 9. The Economics of Hope
  • Markets as Outcomes
  • Take the Economy on a Mission
  • A Better Future for All
  • Bibliography
  • Notes
  • Index
Review by Booklist Review

British economist Mazzucato (Rethinking Capitalism, 2016) offers a fresh look at the meaning of value to the economy. She says value should be the center of all economic thinking. To her, this means value is defined by price set by supply and demand and as long as the activity accrues a price legally, it creates value. Since the economic crisis in 2008, Mazzucato notes that the rise of entrepreneurship, along with the past deregulation of financial industries, is fueling the fire of economic inequality and an economy without value. This skewed view, she notes, creates scenarios such as stagnant or falling wages for the majority of Americans, although the GDP has increased significantly since the 1970s, driving up wealth for only the elite. She also presents case studies, from Silicon Valley to Big Pharma, which drive home the disparity between value and perception of value. The book includes discussions on the wealth of nations, investments, inequality, government roles, privatization and more. This organized and easy-to-read book will appeal to curious readers as well as those interested in economics, investing, and public policy.--Jennifer Adams Copyright 2018 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Kirkus Book Review

A British economics professor is debunking again; this time, her target is the conventional wisdom that so-called wealth creators deserve to accumulate massive riches.In the consequential battle of perception between the makers and the takers, Mazzucato (Economics of Innovation and Public Value/Univ. Coll. London; The Entrepreneurial State: Debunking Public vs. Private Sector Myths, 2015) sides with the actual makers, those who struggle in an economy tilted in favor of the ultrawealthy. The author mixes easily accessible lay language with technical jargon as she constructs her case that investment bankers, multinational pharmaceutical companies, and other billion-dollar enterprisesas well as small tech startupsactually create little of societal value but reap outsized benefits. Meanwhile, laborers continue to be shortchanged. The result is widespread income inequality. As Mazzucato builds her argument, she expresses specific incredulity about the banking sector's self-serving statements about wealth creation. As recently as the 1970s, the author maintains, economists viewed financial institutions as merely transferring existing wealth rather than creating new wealth. The shift in emphasis caught on quickly, and suddenly, bankers were perceived as wealth creators. "If we cannot differentiate value creation from value extraction," writes the author, "it becomes nearly impossible to reward the former over the latter." She wants to convince those in power that so-called value-creating entities should be viewed as value-extracting entities and thus regulated accordingly. When Mazzucato cites specific corporations and individuals feeding at the trough of income inequality, readers will be able to see through the abstractions and grasp the theories dividing economists. She is especially eloquent when commenting on arrogant tech-giant billionaires such as Peter Thiel, who claims that his wealth accumulation occurred in spite of, rather than because of, government presence. Mazzucato characterizes the statements of Thiel and his ilk as "entrepreneurs good, government bad." Actually, the author argues, national, state, and local government agencies offer countless incentives to corporate employers.An accessible academic treatise worth understanding. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.