Source: Beat The Press
by Dean Baker
“New York Times columnist Christopher Caldwell devoted his Thanksgiving piece to describing the German sociologist Wolfgang Streeck’s views on capitalism and democracy. I have not read much of Streeck’s work, but as recounted by Caldwell, he gets many of the basic facts about the U.S. economy badly wrong. According to Caldwell’s account, capitalists were willing to sacrifice profits in the decades after World War II for stability. This meant less dynamism but allowed for broadly shared prosperity and thriving democratic institutions. … The problem with this account is that, at least in the United States there is no evidence that capitalists were sacrificing profit. … There was also no lack of dynamism in this period when capital was supposedly sacrificing profit. The quarter century from 1947 to 1973 was by far the most rapid period of productivity growth the U.S. has seen.” (11/29/24)