On this week’s BWB Extra where we get to know Steve Keen a little better. Steve's a Professor of Economics, an Author and winner of the Revere Award from the Real World Economics Review for being the economist “who first anticipated and gave public warning of the Global Financial Collapse in 2008, and whose work is most likely to prevent another one in the future.”

If you fancy hearing about why Steve is hell bent on eliminating economics before it eliminates society, then you're in the right place.

Steve’s Recommendations:

The New Economics: A Manifesto - Steve Keen

Dynamic Economic Systems - John M. Blatt

BWB is powered by Oury Clark

If you fancy hearing about why this week's guest wants to eliminate economics before it eliminates society, then you are in the right place.

Welcome to Bwb Extra, where we get to know Steve Kean a little better.

Steve's a professor of economics, an author and winner of the Revere Award for the Real World Economics Review for being the economist.

And I quote, who first anticipated and gave public warning of the global financial collapse in 2008, and whose work is most likely to prevent another one in the future.

Let's sort of take it back a bit.

How did you end up doing what you're doing?

Six years of lousy science teachers.

I had a brilliant lecturer, a school teacher in economics called Keating, no relation to the Prime Minister.

Yeah.

And he made it brilliantly exciting and I loved.

And so the mathematical focus had in physics went across to economic.

I find a good teacher, such a fascinating teacher.

Oh, huge.

And also the worst teacher you ever had is probably your best ever teacher.

The person who said, you never amount to anything, you're a fucking idiot.

You never amount to anything.

I had a couple of, most people have someone in their life they hated, did that.

Just a couple.

And And you think to yourself, what I think I'm gonna get with that bar, did they know, well, they were doing.

Because they had an enormous impact and they probably hated you.

But the weird thing is they're the ones like, you'll, you'll gimme the daggers right now.

They was like, oh, he's been well annoying in this podcast.

Um, yeah.

But the inspiration of a good teacher too, someone comes in and they're like, Right.

And they just start, look, this guy, Tim Keating, also taught us English.

And one thing we got to get to, to, to read was Choice's.

Canterbury Tales.

Yeah.

In the original old English.

Okay.

And we, I remember going back home and trying to read the damn thing and just walking in, completely puzzled Tim walked into the room, sat cross-legged on the desk and started to read it.

If you read it out loud to hear it Correct.

Old English accent.

And we all looked at each other in.

Because we could understand it.

Wow.

That was just brilliant.

So that's truly inspirational.

Teaching is an incredibly important part of our lives, and we should pay teachers accordingly, and we don't, uh, what's your long-term goal?

Eliminating economics before it eliminates human society.

So you want to eliminate the thing you do.

I, I actually wrote in debunking economics that if all economists on the planet committed Hara curi, including me, the world would be a better.

You feel that strongly that they're misleading government.

They have led us into the, they lead us into all the financial crisis.

You don't think the eco economists are leading us into the financial crisis is not the greed of humanity, you know?

Well, they, they excuse, they tell us it doesn't matter.

They say what causes financial crisis doesn't matter.

They give us their, that what they, they encourage the bad behavior that leads into the crisis.

They give us the ammunition to do it.

Yeah.

I think that's what I, they're the enabler.

My expression is, you might say fossil fuel companies are fighting the war against, you know, doing anything on climate change, but the bullets are being shafted, are crafted by economists.

Wow, that's deep.

That's really deep that you say that.

No wonder you're not so popular out the economi.

Absolutely.

Me.

Can't imagine why Chris are being hated by, I've noticed I didn't get the Christmas party invitation for Jeffrey.

Suffer all the Christmas party.

Well, you, you know, mate, not get invited all sorts of parties.

Yeah, and I'm very happy about that.

What's the most misunderstood thing about what you.

God , that takes more than five seconds.

Yeah.

Again, no, we are no longer on the five second bit.

You're fine.

Okay.

Okay.

Um, the fact that you don't, although this is gonna sound a bit technical, but you don't need microeconomics.

Okay.

Economic, mainstream economics is based on the theory of the individual firm.

Individual consumer.

We should throw it all away, right?

That's the, we can work from the top down.

We can, we can model, model the.

From macroeconomics itself, we don't need micro one.

One of Marks' greatest phrases who said, men make their own history, but not in times and circumstances of their own choosing.

Yeah, and the times and circumstances dominate what happens.

Our behavior in the individual scheme of things is relatively trivial.

and that's the way that I model the economy and I get it right.

It's Steve, you know, there's something, uh, very silly that's hit me, that's sort of amusing me that might give you a bit more respect in these circles.

You know, you've got, you, you've very sensibly got a thing to keep the, uh, air clear.

Mm-hmm.

, you should get a DPH ADA kit.

And then you could turn up the Economist and then, and then you have to pick people up and go, you know, the world is ending.

I would love to be able to do that.

I must have been, oh, wouldn't that be fantastic?

And they'd be like, fucking hell, Jesus.

You know, , what are you doing about climate change then?

I'm writing a report for carbon.

and it's for their finance sector and telling 'em how they've been conned by economists.

And because they have a fiduciary duty towards particularly pensioners, they have to change what they're doing on climate change advice.

Or they could be sued for breaching finance, uh, fiduciary duties.

That's the one I'm working on.

They're gonna love that report.

Oh, I'm gonna go down getting a DAR theater out.

Fanning Darth Crow down there and kick some fucking ass.

Absolutely.

And then you get mechanical arms rather than my own ones these days to do any real damage.

There's, um, you can un quests, you can meet the, uh, the, the virtual reality thing.

You can meet Darth Vader in this game.

And I have to say it, I challenge any man to it because you're kind of, oh, it's virtual.

Reality's ridiculous.

Yeah, let's go meet Darth Vader.

And he walks up to you.

Is he really scary?

I love him.

Really scary.

I'm sorry darling.

He's massive.

What are you uh, most excited about?

Life.

Life will out life will.

. Okay.

The back to George Carlin's comment, I thought we just established that life was, could be fucked.

Life's gonna survive.

Okay.

We, we, we are not that powerful.

We're not gonna destroy life on this planet.

And that's the most exciting sap things on the planet.

Yeah.

Homo SAPs might disappear.

Well, it's true.

Even if it's really bad.

Some, some bacteria don't even need, like oxygen life.

People will be tidy.

Grades will take over.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But life will consume you.

That's so tiny.

What's your biggest error, do you think, in your career?

What's the biggest misstep you've taken in your career?

In my career?

Hmm.

Doing a law.

Yeah, I didn't do one, but I We would've been a mistake.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I never used a waste.

It's like, we don't really like to hire people who've done accountants at university.

What made you do a law degree?

My choice was I wanted to do engineering and economics.

That was my combination, and when I went to see a career advisor, there was no such combination and, and he said, we'll, do.

But he said, I know.

Be bored for three years.

You'll love it.

It was so fucking boring, honest and pe.

People think law is about logic.

Law is about finding reasons to distinguish your client from all previous cases.

Yes, your Honor.

I know that on the ev, on the law and the precedent, Mike Guilt client is completely guilty.

But this case could be distinguished by all of this because this, my client has three officers.

This sort of depends what kind of lawyer I am.

A.

I should, I should have mentioned full transparency.

I did not do a law degree.

I did archeology, ancient history.

Ingrid.

Yeah.

The kind of law I do now.

Yeah.

Effectively is being told what people want to achieve and then interpreting it into language that makes it work.

The way I got into the warning about the financial crisis was I was approached to be an expert witness in a case on predatory lending.

And in that situation, the fact that I had the law, yeah, background was useful.

So I'm not putting it down completely, but most law ends up being, you know, most of my friends who did law or accounting were.

Nobody I know that did a law degree is still a lawyer.

What's your worst advice you've ever been given Dood Law.

Love it.

I love it.

I love it.

Ding.

Congratulations.

Good advice is accountancy, by the way.

If you're having to give out career advice, you know, I'll give you a little tell you.

Love this particular one.

I let a student revolt at Sydney University in 1973 over the Teaching Eve Economics successful.

We actually got a new department there.

Here I was born.

I had a whole bunch of.

Of accountants who are part of the group of fabulous guys, mainly migrants, who did the best part of a research report I worked with as well.

I went to a restaurant one night there, they were the same bunch of guys for a bucks night.

So they asked me like 10 years after university stag night for the English night.

Okay, okay.

Uh, about five years after university, what have, what have you done?

And I explained what I've been doing.

And then there was silence.

And one of the guys said, I wish I'd done what you've.

and they all agreed.

And I said, hang on a sec guys.

Look on the negatives.

I'm unemployed right now.

I haven't got a car or a house.

Don't even have a girlfriend, let alone married.

Look on the negative side of what I've done.

And the kingpin of the group said, Steve, we would still, or rather have done what you have done.

Yeah, yeah.

How boring were their lives as accountants because of that.

So safety was a, was a.

And now a quick word from our sponsor,

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Now back to the chat.

What's the best piece of advice you've ever been given?

I, I think it was to follow your heart.

I had one person, like, you know, telling me a big gap, do I take a safe career or a dangerous one?

He said, you don't want to take stuff, which makes you safe cuz you'll be bored later in life.

Yeah.

And that's, that's take risk when you're young too.

Yeah.

Take risk and, and continue taking them, which I've continued doing and I'm still standing.

Great advice.

Uh, what advice would you've given your younger self?

Probably just, you know, do what you've done.

I made all sorts of mistakes in my life.

Absolutely.

Okay.

But.

, you know, I've enjoyed my life and I continue enjoying it.

Within your own life, you've been very independent.

You know, you've got the, you've got the bulls of free thought, so that comes from somewhere and you probably base it in empirical.

Sorry, the bulls of free thoughts.

It's good there.

I like that.

I'm gonna use that.

Yeah, yeah.

No, but there's suddenly, there's, there's something in you that's not afraid to be the odd one out.

That probably goes back all the way to being very young.

And that's true.

Like, um, like I, most of my friends at school were migrant.

For example, interesting where you went to school in Sydney.

Yeah.

I went to Sydney Catholic School, which is one of the, the religious version of a public school.

And I remember being, having some of the, the white guys saying, you know, you'd hate to find, you have.

, you know, non-white jeans inside you and I, I'd actually be quite pleased to find And when you say this would be Aboriginal or this would be just multicultural, anything at all?

Yeah, I mean it's quite possibly some aboriginal in my background because my family comes from uh, Western New South Wales.

Right, right.

Which is a possibility I'd like, I would actually like to find that out.

But I enjoy diversity and I don't mind being a minority in a majority.

That's different to me.

And I think that's partly why I.

successful.

You almost feel a minority yourself then?

Oh, minority in economics.

Almost a minority of one.

A minority with a flame fur apparently to the entire thing.

I have a few friends who help me with the flame.

Throw fucking Steve's lasick and don't invite him to this year's Christmas party.

Not with that doth theta suit again, fucking al.

He your are strangled Bernie.

Um, have you got any recommendations for us on what to read or watch or listen to?

Uh, in economics, I, I obviously recommend my own book, the New Economic, of course, you Manifesto course.

Anyone tell us what it's called so that we can The New Economics of Manifesto.

I'd also recommend reading a totally obscure book for those who really wanna know the stuff called Dynamic Economic.

by a guy called John Blatt, b l a.

Doublet.

Will it make my head hurt?

Huh?

Will it make my head hurt?

Potentially, yes.

But also your head I think has got a fair bit of muscle inside there, so you give it a good try.

But Blatt, this is a lovely story.

Blatt was a, a professor of mathematics and he was, Twice nominated for the Nobel Prize in physics in the 1950s.

He wrote the reference on quantum mechanics, and he was at the University of New South Wales and one other guy at the University of New South Wales was also nominated for the Nobel Prize in economics.

Guy called Murray Kemp.

He's actually a good friend of mine, a great tennis player.

Uh, Murray, the important face, the important points.

Murray Murray's regarded John is his only.

Because he's the only guy at the university to get nominated for the Nobel Prize.

So he invited John along to a concert, a seminar, and John was Austrian and famously rude.

Okay.

So, okay, uh, Murray finished giving his presentation and then spoke over the audience to John and said, what do you think?

And John said, that is the greatest Lord of rubbish that I have sat through in my professional career.

If this is advanced economics, there's something terribly wrong with economics.

I intend finding out what it is.

Good.

Wow.

So he wrote a brilliant book called Dynamic Economic Systems, and I can take credit for the fact that it's now being republished.

He basically says You're full of shit.

Full of shit, and he did it mathematically.

Now we're gonna do the quick, far round.

Favorite part of the show, deq the music.

So we're in real awesome terms and you've gotta tell us whether you think they're business or bullshit.

You're gonna put up the sign and we're allowed to in question.

We're allowed to if we want, if we're like, you know, if you feel strongly, you can talk if you want to, but you know, you got the visual aids, let's go going viral.

Bullshit.

I don't even know what going viral means is.

Yeah.

NFTs bullshit.

You think they're bullshit?

NFS bullshit.

Do you think they're a Ponzi scheme, don't we?

I'm so, but what about when they're like a.

Song or like I'm an artist, get like a get a NFT and nobody else can play, you know, sweet Home Alabama.

Okay, then that's definitely business.

I can't believe that's the thing you picked.

Why not?

It's, it's about the same as bullshit as NFTs.

No business plans Bullshit.

bullshit.

Oh, I wanted to ask you about this earlier.

Excellent.

Universal income.

No, sorry.

No business.

Ah, Jesus.

You're into it.

Yeah, I am.

I'm.

Separate.

Tell me about your view cuz there's lots of verses is like, have a little bit of income to help people a really bad bit or have a lot expression that I know people who started the whole scheme in, in an America and their argument is not paying you to do nothing, it's paying you to do anything.

It gives people freedom to be creative and that's what people, what they're, and, and, and, and the fact that it costs a lot of money and it makes money that people can.

You want demand inside there.

Otherwise what?

What do homeless people buy?

Yeah.

Cause even homeless people get it.

Yeah.

It would be's, right.

Will you end homelessness in a night?

Yeah, pretty much.

They'd be able to go afford to pay rent and so on.

Team outings.

Team outings.

Bullshit.

with you in the D Fade outfit.

That fucking, yeah.

Yeah.

A little more than bullshit.

They're terrify.

Microdose thing.

I haven't tried it yet.

There's still time, Steve.

There's still time.

Think tanks.

Bullshit.

Are you a miniature think tank?

I am.

Probably.

I wanna start my own called the Keen Institute, so yeah, but I wouldn't be publishing bullshit.

Yeah.

Think tanks.

You think they're mostly common?

Bullshit bullshit.

Those days particularly, they're economists and they're definitely bullshit MBAs.

I, you know, you, you heard of it.

Ever heard of a database broken called dBase two was designed by a guy called Wayne Ratcliff.

Wayne Ratcliff was a NASA engineer and he designed dBase to make money of the football pool with the idea of artificial intelligence.

At the time.

His company was taken over by Harvard MBAs and destroyed it, called Ashton Tate.

The software disappeared.

He came off the plane.

I interviewed him in Sydney when he came out to Australia, spewing about Harvard MBAs.

So definitely bullshit breakfast meeting.

Okay.

Before you mind gets locked in.

You, you eat breakfast with a meeting?

I do.

Yeah.

Yeah, but it's always the same thing.

Eggs with eggs and, and yogurt.

I'm sorry.

I'm bored.

That's why you don't mind.

Breakfast meeting.

It's obviously the fried egg.

And the bacon.

And the bacon eaters.

The meat.

People like me who wanna have a good old fry up of breakfast, I'm gonna have breakfast.

Let's have breakfast, you know, and then I've gotta eat and I don't enjoy that, you know?

But use these a secret easy.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Flexible working bullshit.

There's a lot of bullshit going on, I'm afraid, sir.

Yeah.

Your society is full of it.

Hot desking.

Definitely.

Bullshit.

Asking favors.

Mm.

This, this.

Humans are all about favors.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Humans are based on that was business each other.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Bitcoin.

Do you think Bitcoin is bullshit?

I should have bought it when I was from Max State Max's scheme.

Yeah, I could have bought a hundred of them for 10.

10, 10 Pounder.

I'm sorry I didn't do it, but it's a Ponzi scheme.

You think it'll have to fall over you?

The reason I was given, and I think there's a lot of sense to that, and I loves one of the main comments on Coinbase, which is I wish I could go back to like 2014 and repeatedly punch myself in the face.

Um, But the reason I was given that it's useful is, yeah, you used to have governments back in currency, blah, blah, blah, but there's lots of countries that go into fucking civil war, don't have a currency or whatever, and it becomes the, a sort of non-governmental vestige of currency, you know?

Yeah.

If they, if they hadn't based it on 10 minutes of processing time to generate the nos right.

And a huge energy costs, then that'd be okay.

It's the energy cost that are gonna bring it unstuck.

When we realize we're using too much energy, the first thing it'll be shut down is a Bitcoin.

So that was this week's episode of Bwb Extra, and we'll be back with a new episode next Tuesday.