PODCAST: "Hexapodia" Is þe Key Insight XVIII: Þe Ecology of Innovation

"Hexapodia" Is the Key Insight: by Noah Smith & Brad DeLong

Key Insights:

* There is a four-day creative-destruction festschrift for Philippe Aghion & Peter Howitt starting June 9: The Economics of Creative Destruction <https://zoom.us/j/98595732585>

* When industrial policy in America has been successful, it has always had a profound political driving motive: maintaining independence, manifest destiny, Sputnik, and so on. The only such driver today—and it is urgent—is green energy to fight global warming…

* The U.S. used to be excellent not just on the “novelty” prong of Breznitz’s prosperity-in-an-unforgiving-world quadent, but also on the “engineering design”, “second-generation innovation”, and “production-assembly” prongs as well. We threw that away in the era Reagan began—the era of neoliberalism, financialization-driven short-termism, and tax cut-driven exchange overvaluation. We need to get those other three prongs back, lest we become a country of technoprinces and dopamine-loop brain-hacked technoserfs…

* When you do industrial policy, you need to think very carefully about what kind of economy you want to create…

* A better retranslation of the Arkhilokhos-Isaiah Berlin “Fox & Hedgehog” tag line is: “The fox knows many tricks; the hedgehog knows one good one…”

* Hexapodia!

References

* Bill Janeway: The Ecology of Innovation <https://www.project-syndicate.org/onpoint/innovation-according-to-philippe-aghion-and-dan-breznitz-by-william-janeway-2021-05>: reviewing:

* Philippe Aghion, Céline Antonin, & Simon Bunel: The Power of Creative Destruction: Economic Upheaval and the Wealth of Nations <https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Power_of_Creative_Destruction/7SAZEAAAQBAJ>

* Dan Breznitz: Innovation in Real Places: Strategies for Prosperity in an Unforgiving World <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Innovation_in_Real_Places/wr0cEAAAQBAJ>

* Stephen S. Cohen & J. Bradford DeLong: Concrete Economics: A Hamiltonian Approach to Economic Policy <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Concrete_Economics/BXoyBgAAQBAJ>

* Andrew DelBanco: The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War <https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_War_Before_the_War/FPq0DwAAQBAJ>

* John Helverston & Jonas Nahm: China’s Key Role in Scaling Low-Carbon Energy Technologies <https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31727813/>

* Elizabeth Janeway: Man’s World, Women’s Place: A Study in Social Mythology <https://www.google.com/books/edition/Man_s_World_Woman_s_Place/vRYpAAAAYAAJ>

* Òscar Jordà, Moritz Schularick, & Alan M. Taylor: The Great Mortgaging: Housing Finance, Crises, and Business Cycles <https://www.nber.org/papers/w20501>

* Sill Family: Vineyard <https://sillfamilyvineyards.com>

* Wikipedia: Applied Materials <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applied_Materials>

* Wikipedia: ASML Holdings <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASML_Holding>

* Wikipedia: Kate Mulgrew <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kate_Mulgrew>

* Wikipedia: Orange Is the New Black <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_Is_the_New_Black>

* Wikipedia: TSMC <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSMC>

* Wikipedia: Sematech <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEMATECH>

* Wikipedia: Star Trek: Voyager

&, of course:

* Vernor Vinge: A Fire Upon the Deep <https://books.google.com/books?id=fCCWWgZ7d6UC>

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