Does today’s economy foster the dynamism needed to create new capitalist heroes?
Advocates of economic freedom are losing a battle for the minds of American millennials. A recent YouGov poll found that the share of 18-to-29 year olds with a favorable view of capitalism slipped to 30% in 2018 from 39% in 2015. Socialism fairs equally well among the young, as shown by Sen. Bernie Sanders’s remarkable 2016 presidential run. Can anything convince future Americans of the superiority of free markets?
With “Capitalism in America” a towering figure of modern policymaking, former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, is giving it a shot. He and the Economist’s Adrian Wooldridge have authored a sweeping tome that takes us from the Founders to the election of Donald Trump. Their work is an accessible overview of American business history, but also presents a case for capitalism.
The book starts with a charming thought experiment: “Imagine that a version of the World Economic Forum was held in Davos in 1620.” (I envisioned sessions about the Battle of the White Mountain’s effect on long-term government debt, or what the Little Ice Age meant for beaver-pelt prices.) Messrs. Greenspan and Wooldridge daydream about a forum focused on the question: “Who will dominate the world in the coming centuries?”
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Edward L. Glaeser is the Glimp professor of economics at Harvard University, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, and contributing editor at City Journal.
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