Hi everybody
I'm Linda Solomon Wood. I'm the editor in
chief of Canada's National Observer. Good
evening hello if you're joining us from
the east good evening
if you're joining us from the West good
afternoon I'm so honored and thrilled
this evening to have Noam Chomsky as
my guest and it's great to be here
together at home with all of you so
welcome we've created a couple of ways
you can engage with us today one way is
through the question and answer button
on your screen at the bottom there where
you can type in a question you want me
to put to Noam Chomsky you will also be
able to vote for the questions people
are submitting and the second way to
engage is through the chat that's where
you can share your ideas your reactions
and your thoughts so I'm talking to you
tonight from my dining room table and
it's the very place I started Observer
Media Group 13 years ago with a site
called Vancouver
Observer and a readership of 10 my
family and friends it grew and we
launched National Observer five years
ago it grew too and mostly thanks to
people like you who are joining us
tonight who have subscribed and who have
donated and I'm so grateful to you for
that for allowing us to do the work that
we do. Last month we had a readership of
1.5 million people so I'm really
thrilled about that today here I am back
at the same dining room table this time
1,300 people signed up tonight to be on
our talk with Noam and so we've come a
long way but now to our topic for
the evening most of us have been in some
form of isolation for going on five
weeks now because of the pandemic
sweeping the world some of us are
struggling with the fear of losing jobs
and others with the fear of losing loved
ones and some of us already have
and there's a pervasive sense that we
really don't know what's coming
cities like Vancouver are on the edge of
default. Provinces are looking for help
and in the U.S., the same thing. States
cities and so are people in Canada half
of us according to an article today in
Bloomberg News live paycheck to paycheck
and over a million people in Canada for
over a million people in Canada those
paychecks just disappeared. Around the
world 250 million people are at risk now
of starvation according to an article
yesterday in the New York Times and in
an article in National Observer today
Maude Barlow who founded Council of
Canadians wrote that more than half of
the global population lacks access to
water to even wash with soap which is
the basic protection against Covid 19
so against that backdrop knowing it's
just so great to have you with us
tonight but before we get into our
conversation I briefly want to share a
few things I know about you with our
audience
I see 500 people are online now. You've
been described as the most cited living
author of all time. That's
after Marx Lenin Shakespeare Aristotle
the Bible Plato and Freud
You have 37 honorary degrees and you
have been teaching philosophy and
linguistics at MIT since 1955 now you're
a professor emeritus and you've been
described as the most important
intellectual alive by the New York Times
so wow. And thank you again for being
with us
and Noam, our topic tonight is can we
emerge from Covid-19 with a new economy
and if so how?
Well, the usual class war is operating right
now there are the people basically those
who call themselves the Masters of the
Universe who are already trying to plan
the future economy. There's another group
the general population who are at the
moment more quiescent if that continues
then the first plan will be implemented
their plan is to reconstitute the
economy pretty much the way it's been
under the neoliberal period roughly the
last 40 years but harsher with more
controls over people, more the means of
more authoritarian measures. More efforts
to ensure that there's no interference
with this model we see that in many ways
I could run through them. There's a
good opportunity to ask questions raise
questions about what kind of world we
want to live in do we want to live in a
very different world do we want to live
in a world where things like the
pandemic don't happen and remember that
although we're right now suffering from
the pandemic it's not the main crisis by
far. We can we will sooner or later
escape from the pandemic at severe cost. 
We are not going to escape from the
melting of the polar ice caps of the
rise in sea level the other extremely
harmful consequences of global warming.
Now the ones who
well it varies but the major country in
the world the most important country the
United States happens to be in the hands
of someone and in fact a party that
wants to exacerbate the crisis, wants to
ensure that the coming crisis which may
well end the prospects for organized
human life they want to make sure that
as severe as possible and as imminent as
possible and are putting all their
efforts into that right as we speak. (I) can
easily give examples if we want that to happen we can watch and not react.
Canada's hardly blameless in this. There are many
other problems. Do we want to have a
world in which people have to live
paycheck to paycheck in the United
States that's estimated maybe 60 or 70%
of the population, now that's the result
of policies of the past 40 years
generally called the neoliberal programs
they are designed so that wealth is very
sharply concentrated in very few hands
the United States happens to be somewhat
extreme but others are not all that
different. In the United States before
the crisis 0.1 percent not 1% 0.1% of
the population had about 20% of the
country's wealth and about 50 percent
have negative net worth liabilities
greater than assets and can barely get
by if anything goes wrong that's
not a necessity those are specific
policies but those policies can be
changed. In fact, it's not Utopian to think
that we could do back to a period before
Reagan, Thatcher, and the rest in which
they were different and you had different
consequences. So for example if you look
at I don't know how much detail you want
but yes we can make a very different
world. We can start doing it right now. So
for example there's a stimulus program
the Republican Congress has
passed, so take a look at it. For example,
let's take something that happened this
morning and gives you a good example. The
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
who's really the guiding hand he's a
thinker of the administration the real
evil genius came out and said that
the stimulus program cannot give money to
states -- blue states it's not
going to be a blue state
they'll have no money for places like
New York that vote Democratic and the
reason he said is that we're not gonna
the future generations don't have to pay
for the mistakes that these states have
made in the past. The mistakes are that
they granted pension plans for police
and firefighters and teachers and others
and if they want to waste their money
that way we're not going to pay for it
now let's look one inch away at the
stimulus plan. Who are we giving money to?
Enterprises like say the airline
industries which have spent the last
year gorging themselves on super profits
and using it then not to benefit
consumers, not to build up the industry
but on
stock buybacks to raise profits for
investors and crucially for managers and
CEOs how much did they spend that way
about forty five billion dollars. What
are they getting in the stimulus? Fifty
billion dollars. So in other words if the
rich and powerful and corporate sector
want to misspend their money by enriching
themselves we'll pay them off. But if states
misspend their money by giving
pensions to working people tough luck
we're not going to give it to you that's
the mentality of the administration it's
a level of sadism that is hard to
describe although it has very clear-cut
class basis you can see it very clearly.
Now, if you want another illustration just
kind of telling now have a look at the
federal budget proposal that many Trump
administration submitted on February
10th. On February 10th, the pandemic is
raging. People are dying, hospitals
can't keep up. What's the budget? The
budget proposal is to continue the cuts
in health related parts of the
government to cut back further on the
Center for Disease Control of Trump
throughout his term has been regularly
cutting it back and in the midst of the
pandemic let's cut back more let's not
cut back everything let's increase the
subsidies to fossil fuel industries. What are 
fossil fuel industries doing?
Undermining the prospect for organized
human life and of course let's have more
funding for the bloated military which
no ways most of the world and of course
for his famous wool not to keep those
rapists and murderers from
coming across the border with you where
I live what that's the mentality of the
administration which in fact is just an
extreme version of the mentality of the
Republican Party which drifted off the
rails years ago. That's so interesting
Noam, and when we were talking--before
we got started tonight, you said a couple
of things that really I think are
probably going to stay with me for the
rest of my life. You said that, I was
asking you about a tweet that I had a
headline I had seen where you said I
believe you said something like voting
for Trump would be worse than voting
like voting for Hitler or worse than
voting for Hitler and you just said back
to me that Trump is maximum
said maximum sadism, like worse than you
said he was worse than him oh I think
it's obvious. I've been saying it for
years. It's now become utterly
transparent let's take a look
Hitler was maybe one maybe the worst
criminal in human history he wanted to
murder six million Jews. He murdered my
extended family. 30 million Slavs,
Roma, homosexuals others.
That's pretty evil. What does Trump want to do? He wants to destroy
the prospects for organized human life.
All. Okay? And in the near future. That's
what it means to maximize the use of
fossil fuels to cut back on all
regulations that might diminish restrict
the danger. In fact let's take a look at
the documentary record probably the
worst document that we know of from the
Nazi era is a declaration in 1942 where
they basically decided to kill all the
Jews, and conquer
Eurasia and so on well
let's take the Trump administration. The
most interesting document that's
appeared there which apparently was
mentioned in the press was about two
years ago a document produced by the
National Transportation Agency which was
a long, I think, several-hundred-page
assessment of the environmental
situation and they concluded that by the
end of the century global warming will
reach four degrees Celsius higher than
pre-industrial levels now that's taken
to be catastrophic
by just about every analyst and they
drew a conclusion from it.  The conclusion
was, we should stop adding emissions
controls. We should have no
emissions controls on automobiles and
the logic is sort of clear we're going
off the cliff anyway so why not have fun
and make profit? How does that
compare with the  declaration
of 1942 we see this in every action so
it's not just global warming but let's
kill more Americans. Now so for example
look right in the middle of this crisis
the Environmental Protection Agency
which is no subsidiary of the corporate
world used to be functioning scientists
have been thrown out in silence and so
on so they decided to relax, eliminate
essentially, controls on emissions from
coal plants and others let's in mercury
into the waterways pollute them kill
lots of children and so on
so let's extend that. Why? Put some more
dollars in their pocket
okay once the deregulation goes on and
on whether they just cut back the Obama
administration efforts to place limits
on emissions. Although that's just harming
people in the United States.
You are one of the
world's most renowned and most respected
social critics. I wonder what advice
you would have for we're now up to 650
people on this call
like when advice do you have for us and
for you know for all of us of how to
push back against the kinds of things
you're describing? Not hard. Popular movements. We've done harder things in the past. Activist movements.
The civil rights movement, the
It's not the same we were even 50 years okay so take
the fossil fuel industry take a look at
oil prices pretty low the major the
United States Canada others could simply
socialize the industries bottom up not
that expensive and put them out of
business there would be a great boon to
the world you can't do it in a day which
could be coming back on and using profit
be what resources you have to replace
and buy sustainable energy how much
would that take they want to carefully
an estimate it's been very good
economists about how much it would take
to how much would it cost to carry out
policies which will basically
trol the enormous climate environmental
crisis you're not going to end it we've
already done too much damage but to keep
it within livable limits turns out it
would be a small percentage very small
percentage of the mobilization for World
War two
and we're much richer countries no so is
that feasible
well it's feasible if I and this is only
one of the major problems we face there
are others which people aren't talking
about but are just as severe one of the
contributions of the Trump
administration to human life is to
dismantle the arms control regime which
has over some protection from terminal
nuclear war and anyone who's looked at
the record will find that it's appalling
it's almost a miracle that we've
survived that talk about it at this time
so I know Trump's decision is let's make
it worse so the last August
Trump dismantled the INF treaty which
was established by Reagan not a leftist
Reagan and Gorbachev reached
intermediate nuclear forces treaty in
1987 which has significantly reduced the
threat of nuclear war Trump abandoned it
and to make it clear to the Russians or
anyone else what he meant
immediately after abandoning the treaty
within days he arranged to launch a
missile that violated the treaty but
saying to Mr. Putin please develop
weapons to destroy us and that'll be
great for the arms control in just of
the arms in the military industry
in fact if you look at their
pronouncements they love it they're
getting a huge shot in the arm enormous
money to build weapons that will
destroy everything and then down the
road they'll get more money to try to
build defenses against these weapons
that we're encouraging others to produce
next on the chopping block it's just
announced couple of days ago is the Open
Skies treaty goes back Eisenhower
as Open Skies treaty has again reduced
the threat of accidental nuclear war
quite significantly so let's get rid of
that next on the agenda last in fact is
the New START treaty that limits
the number of missiles and nuclear
warheads on for Russia and the United
States Putin, not the most lovely guy in
the world, don't have to go into that,
has been pleading with the United States
to renegotiate the treaty. It's due early
next year the u.s. well Trump
administration won't do it
the trick that they're using to try to
prevent it is to say we want a broader
treaty that includes China. That's a bad
joke. Chinese nuclear facilities don't
even come anywhere near the minimal
level of the START treaty. It was just a
trick to use the Yellow Peril hysteria
to try to prevent the signing of the New
START treaty when that's done we're done
with the arms controllers. You how
serious is that it's so serious. It's so
serious and I know I'm I have one more
question for you before I see before I
start asking you questions from the the
crowd we have a lot and we won't be able
to get to as many of them as we would
like but I'm I just wanted to you know
like draw you back to where we are right
now and ask you you have lived a very
long productive amazing life I'm just
what is it like for you to see what's
going on right now with the Covid-19
pandemic and how do you see the world in
this moment. Now as before that your
mother's about my age
I suspect she has the same memories I do it's
all bringing back memories of early
childhood the early 30s the early
thirties you could see the beginnings of
the rise of the fascist plague actually
the first article I remember writing was
in 1939 right after the fall of
Barcelona - Franco it was about the the
terrible shadow that's spreading over
the world seems inexorable first the
Nazis took Austria and then they took
Czechoslovakia now they've got Spain
where is it going to end? Seems like
they'd taken over everything that's
early childhood memories there are
others I remember don't want to waste
time on it but that's back at that point
there were two choices the world had to
face the Great Depression had an
enormous impact much worse than this
effect in a much poorer country and
there were two ways out. One way was
fascism spread over a lot of the world
another way was basically New Deal style
welfare state style democracy and liberalism
that was another way out that was the
way the United States took overcame
depression established a version of
regimented capitalism which was
extremely beneficial to people it's now
being torn to shreds during the
neoliberal period but for a long time it
was very effective
those are the two way out two's way is
pleased though we're in the same
situation
not exactly won't be the same things but
we can either choose to make the world
harsher and more brutal to march on to
short range destruction or we can
overcome these problems by means that
are readily available
but as I said small percentage of the
funding for the second and second world
war mobilization small percentage of
that would be sufficient to get the
environmental crisis under control to
ensure that human life and many other
species can survive nuclear weapons
straightforward
no reason for them to exist they can be
cut sharply cut back in fact eliminate
okay and we could go on with other
crises the economic crises that lead to
a world in which 0.1% of the population
holds 20 percent of the wealth and the
others struggled a bit by for a week no
reason for that to exist. We know exactly
how to end in fact we've been through
ways of ending. But those choices today are reminiscent of the early 1930s
I have so many questions and I see that the one that's
been voted up to the top of the list is
from Robert Hackett and I just want to
tell everybody even though it's gotten
so many votes up I'm gonna go to the
second question because I feel it's such
a good follow-up to what we've been
talking about already and then I'm gonna
get to Bob's question this is from James
Doyle he says I'm 14 years old what do I
do to take back my future? Well that's a
very good question and there's a very
good answer to it. Take a look at who's
on the front line to try to prevent the
world from being destroyed by the Trump
types. Young people. Take a look at the
climate strike last October who very
significant series of events who was out
there on the front lines young people
take one of the most
dramatic events in my lifetime which I
think will be played in every classroom
all over the world but for the meeting
of the Davos conference in January the
Davos conference are the ones who in
fact call themselves the Masters of the
Universe of CEOs of major corporations
big news media executives commentators
they get together once a year in Davos to Switzerland go swimming, tell
each other how wonderful they are and so
on the meeting opened with two talks one
after the other one was by Donald Trump
the people that they wasn't liking too
much he's too vulgar for them he drops
their image of humanism but they
applauded him lustily because there's
one thing he knows that they understand
how to pour money into the pockets of
the very rich on the portrait section so
he got enormous applause it was a crazy
rant if you look at it he was followed
by a young girl - Greta Thunberg. A
seventeen-year-old girl who gave a quiet
factual speech. Accurate, careful
describing the imminent crisis eloquent
as she ended quietly saying you the
people out there are destroying our hope
for any life. She got quiet clapping, pat on the
head nice little girl go back to school
that that's the answer to your question
it's the Greta Thunbergs and the 14
year-olds whose world is being destroyed
and they're on the front line of trying
to save it and the older generation is
betraying them and they should what continue
to work energetically to make this clear
I stress again that that the videotape
of the opening of the meeting is a real
classic. It tells you a lot about the world and about ourselves. Now this
said this question is from Robert
Hackett who writes for National Observer
greetings Noam, when I interviewed
you for your National Observer article
last year you presciently said that both
pandemics and climate change constituted
threats to organize human society but
you also said that mass social movements
could demand and mitigate climate change
do you feel that the pandemic makes
either of these outcomes extinction or
rebellion more likely what can we learn
from the pandemic about organizing for a
more climate-friendly economy that's
very important what we're seeing is many
things on the one extreme we're seeing
the Trump administration trying to
increase the severity of the pandemic I
didn't talk about it much but we could
on the other hand we see really heroic
people, you know the doctors and nurses
on the front line what they're doing is
indescribable they're trying to protect
people's survival and help people survive
under hideous conditions but without
protective gear because the government's
haven't given it to them they've
preferred to waste their money elsewhere
but they're on the front lines
constantly all over the world in China
United States Canada everywhere that's
an indication of the magnificence of the
human spirit it's a model for what can
be done and there's much more around
much of the world including the United
States the mutual self-help groups or
organizing spontaneously communities in
which people just get together to
try to help those in need, give food to
elderly people who are excluded you know
help people are in trouble this is
happening everywhere sometimes in almost
spectacular ways the most extreme that I
know happens to be in Brazil the favelas
in Rio the slums are miserable hopeless
places you can't ask people to wash
frequently because I don't have water
they live you can't sick sequester
because they're all packed into a small
room the government won't help they're
like the United States no we don't help
but there is a group that's organizing
to provide some help for them. You know who it is?
The crime gangs that have been
terrorizing the community they are now
getting together to try to help people
in the miserable slums to try to survive
this you see things like this all over
the world there's something else
happening on the international level
there is the Progressive
International is being formed that's the
name to have its first meeting in
November it was initiated by Bernie
Sanders in the United States and Yanis Varoufakis, a wonderful economist, former Greek
Treasury secretary in Europe he's the
founder of the organization DiEM25
Europe wide organization which is
working to try to salvage what makes
sense in the European Union and to
overcome its deep flaws so they're
calling for the meeting of the
Progressive International which will
bring together activist groups around
the world also crucially bring in the
global South those who will suffer the
worst from this endemic and what they're
doing is hoping to counter something
that's developing before our eyes
and isn't discussed very much a
reactionary international an
international of the most cruel the
harsh reactionary states organized from
the White House which is heading it
including Bolsonaro in Brazil who's
described as even worse than Trump
doesn't do as much damage because it's
not at that powerful of country he's in
fact helping to destroy the world by
wiping out the Amazon which will have an
overwhelming effect, horrible. People
affected in the country. (He says) it's all a flu, don't worry go out you know go
to your restaurants. So he's part of
it. Moving to the Middle East the el-Sisi
dictatorship in Egypt the worst
dictatorship in Egypt's history the
family dictatorships of the Gulf of the
Gulf states brutal harsh dictatorships
Israel which has moved so far to the
right that you can't see it anymore is
right in the center moving further
Modi's India. Modi is working to destroy,
demolish Indian secular democracy and
institute a right-wing Hindu nationalist
virtual dictatorship crush
Kashmir. In Europe, bring in Orbán's
Hungary. Turning Hungary from wiping
out Hungarian democracy bringing in
turning it to a dictatorship. Salvini in
Italy
gets his kicks out of making sure that
ships barges his little group sink in
the Mediterranean killing people fleeing
from characters like that around the
world
so forge that into a international it's
happening right now the main geo-
strategic program of the Trump
administration
well so let's counter that with a
progressive international. Well, can that
be done? If you look at the level of
states they see it seems totally out of
balance you look at the level of people
that's not true most people in the world
want what the progressive international
stands for so the question and the
answer your question is can they be
mobilized to take over I should say that
the people who own the world are worried
about it
go back to that Davos conference and
imagine it was very interesting usually
every year is just self-congratulation
this year the mood was different the top
people there recognized that the
peasants are coming with the pitchforks
now we better do something about it so
the mood of the conference was let's
apologize for what we've been doing for
the last year's yes we did bad things we
harmed people but we now understand so
we're now going to be the gentler more
humane, we're going to be concerned not
just with stockholders and executives
but communities and the workforce we're
really nice guys and trust your future
to us we'll take care of you that was
the mood at Davos and they didn't bother
telling us that we heard this tune
before so in the 1950s the tune was from
now on corporations are going to be what
was called soulful corporations
overflowing with human sentiments
wonderful lovely benefactors of the
human species
soulful corporations well we seen sixty
years of to discover how soulful they
are but the point is they're running
scared they see what's happening the
peasants are coming with the pitchforks
that's so interesting and I just wanted
to
you know that we have a lot more
questions. "I'm Dave Cuddy is asking can
you discuss any threats of Blackrock The
Wall Street investment firm that claims
to be going green yet its invested
heavily and fossil fuels manages
trillions of the global economy how
concerned should we be that the Bank of
Canada very recently appointed Blackrock
as its advisor for a new quantitative
easing program for corporations how
important is it to lobby the Canadian
government to cut its ties with
Blackrock?" well that's part of the
creating the image of social
corporations they're not doing it out of
love for the human race they're doing it
because they're being pressed to do it
they're under pressure to do it recently
there was a memo from JPMorgan Chase
biggest American Bank saying we're under
reputational pressure what does that
mean means people are banging at our
doors and telling us we don't like what
we do so we've probably better cut back
on the funding for fossil fuels ok you
know you can put one of the ways to--I mean
short of dismantling these institutions
which my view should be done but much
sort of that lots of pressure can be put
on them to turn them to become soulful
at least an image and improve things and
way beyond that but that's what you're
describing is an indication of the
significance of constant popular
pressure that's had a lot of effect. To give
you an example, for example in the United
States
now take the notion of a Green New
Deal. Some version of a Green New Deal is
essential for survival. A couple of
years ago it was just something to be
ridiculed in the center of the
legislature
how did that happen well group small
group called Sunrise Movement, a group of
young activists young turned back to the
first question young activists were
pressing very hard to move this to
Congress whether they got to the point
of sitting in congressional offices they
were noticed that they were backed by
some of the young congressional
representatives who came into
office on the Sanders movement pressure
especially Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,  local voters and they were
joined by  Ed Markey senator from
Massachusetts has been interested in
environmental issues now it's on the
legislative agenda. You don't laugh at it anymore.
alerting maybe it can be pushed through
we can survive this case if their case
okay and we're familiar with it in the
past I mean take a look at the United
States in 1960. It was one of the
freest countries in the world it also
had anti-miscegenation laws which were
so extreme that the Nazis refused to
adopt it had federal laws requiring that
Governor 'le government subsequent
supported housing had to be segregated
no blacks and women were still legally
treated under the initial laws of the
founding of the country which they took
over from Britain in which women were
technically property not persons handed
from the father to the husband it had
been eroded somewhat over the years but
it wasn't until 1975 after the pressure
of the women's movement that women were
legally recognized to be peers they had
a right to serve on federal jury
we can go on and on country has changed
enormously, Canada too. It didn't happen by
magic was not a gift from social
corporations or benign government it
came from extensive popular mobilization
and action which can change things and
has in the past in many ways we're a
much more civilized world thank you so
much
I'm we have so many good questions here
"Mr. Chomsky, do you think the post
Covid-19 pandemic will create a
more positive economical and social
global world or will it continue to be a
downward spiral?" Whoever the
questioner is that's up to you the
choices are there just as in the early
to thirties the choices were between
fascism and liberal social democracy
there are those who are going to be
struggling consciously to make it just a
continuation of the neoliberal world
with harsher texture there'll be others
like you who will be trying to change it
in another direction
the ones who for example will be meeting
the ones who carried out the climate
strike led up to the ones we were
working constantly to make Blackrock
shift its policies to make JP Morgan
Chase cut back on fossil fuels.
What world will come out depends on the
balance of forces. Thank you
this question is from Maxine Kaufman-Lacusta
Maxine asks, you mentioned clean
energy but after viewing the recent
documentary Planet of the Humans which
convincingly argued that the fossil
fuels required to produce short lived
solar panels and wind turbines and for
backup to these technologies equal or
exceed
what's used currently from burning coal oil
gas have we been misled by the
environmental NGOs what's your view on
this? I think the question is
clean energy is it kind of--are we
being duped that the clean energy like
solar panels and wind turbines is
actually clean because a documentary
called planet of the humans convincingly
argued that it's equivalent to burning
coal oil and gas I think I got that
right Maxine you're on the chat over
solar panels and (wind) turbines is equivalent to
burning folks are near oil
yeah burning fossils yeah so we had a
slide couldn't have convincingly argued
that because it's not even remotely true
I mean there are costs to solar panels.
You have to dispose of them so you
have to manufacture but that's not even
remotely in the domain of what happens
with the use of fossil and it simply
suggest to the questioners to look into
the details of the matter apparently
Bill McKibben wrote an article debunking
that so maybe that's something the
questioner could refer to. Noam, who has
written widely, sorry who has written
widely on what a sustainable economy
would look like is it even possible a
sustainable economy? A lot of interesting
work - Robert Pollin
economy very good economist, a co-author of mine
occasionally has written extensively in
great detail about how to develop a
sustainable economy which would also
ensure that those who are losing their
jobs as the fossil fuel industry goes
out of existence
will in fact have ways of being
integrated successfully into the new
economy and he also points out that it'll 
be a much more livable economy it isn't
much fun to spend maybe many hours a
week with sitting in traffic jams be
much easier to have be much pleasure
life now the decent mass transportation
system instead of having a huge electric
bills we could pay almost nothing like I
do have solar panels there are many ways
to make the world a much more pleasant
to live in and not to be destroying it
with the use of fossil fuels pollen as
elaborated this in detail. Robert Pollin, is that correct? Robert Pollin is that the
author. OK. A lot of people are
asking. He's an economist at
the University Massachusetts great
another one is Jeffrey Sachs very good
economist - is it Columbia - runs the
Earth Sciences Institute that he's
written extensively on has a very long
careful article in the journal American
Prospect a couple of months ago, he spells it out. It is within reach. The next question
thank you and this question is from
Senator Rosa
Galvez she asks what are the three most
critical changes that we have to apply
to hyper capitalism to induce major
shift for example to a circular economy
or to decrease growth and there was a
follow-up to that question so I'm just
going to ask you that as well from
Annabelle White. What would the world
become if the
institution the institution of global
finance totally collapsed? 
What would the world become if
the institution of global finance
totally collapsed? so there I just gave
you four questions here the last words
if global what collapses finance the
global economy collapses collapses well
there's no reason for the global economy
could collapse with rotten policies on
the part of governments but there's
certainly no reason for it I mean
actually we've been through worse
pandemics than this take a look at
what's called the Spanish flu a
century ago. It was far worse than this and
in a much poorer country and there were
no means that nobody knew at the time
how to control it. did we did everything
disappear? Economies recover. far worse
and now we're in much better shape to
deal with it
what are the I don't know if I can
mention three things but there are a lot
of things that can be done to overcome
the immediate -- not only the
immediate crisis but the causes. Let's
take a look I'll use the United States
as the example for two reasons one I
know more about it and secondly it's the
most important country so right now
there's a big stimulus bill being given
almost no surveillance no does it have
to be let's take the airline industry
which I imagined
I suppose we decide to bail them out for
their having spent the last years
enriching themselves with stock buybacks
instead of building up the enterprise
and suppose we decide ok we'll do it
anyway
it can be done with conditionalities
okay saying you wanted some money from
the government you have to commit
yourselves to never carry out
stock buybacks to never put your money
in tax havens which robs the public of
tens of trillions of dollars to put
workers on the management board
let's have ensure a livable wage for all
your workers to pay some attention to
the needs of passengers instead of
investors and CEOs we can put all of
those conditionalities on you don't want
to make them get lost
we'll just take over the industry things
like that is that utopian incidentally
not not least before Reagan all of this
was law. It was implemented. It's not
Utopian to say let's go back to the law
as it was implemented before the neoliberals
It's not new. Can we go
beyond that? Sure can. Let's take think for
a moment about the origins of this
pandemic what why did it ever happen?
You go back to 2003 SARS epidemic
scientists all over knew that it's very
likely that another coronavirus
epidemic is coming now they knew how to
prepare for it but it didn't happen.
Why? Knowledge isn't enough you have to
have the institutional structure so who
could have worked out well there's the
drug companies enormous resources we
pour money into their politics by
protectionist measures like incredible
patent protection  what's called
intellectual property rights huge gift
to enrich the drug companies so they are
overflowing with money that we've given
them they have a lot of resources could
they take this up no because of
something called capitalism which says
that what you're supposed to do is
follow market signals
okay market signals or you're not going
to make any profit out of this you don't
make profit out of preventing a
catastrophe a couple of years down the
road that you make profit by selling
something tomorrow so they're out
because of capitalist logic then comes
the second question why doesn't the
government step in so when I was a kid
when your mother was a kid one of the
terrors of the world was
Polio was a
real terror I remember. It was overcome by a
government funded program which led to
the Salk vaccine which had no patent
Salk had not selected giving
it away well why not do that cost of the
neoliberal plague which says the
government's not allowed to help
remember Ronald Reagan government is the
problem not the solution
it's corporations that are a solution of
course the government is the solution
when they're in trouble and we bail them
out and subsidize it well in the
populations in trouble government is not
the solution okay that's the second part
of the hammer neither of those is
necessary they can all be eliminated
easily. Easy to think through the
measures and we can go on we can change
the institutional structures that are
driving us to disaster it's all within
reach. Noam that's a great note. I cannot
believe it but are we've already come to
the end of our hour that just flew by
it's you're it's so amazing to hear what
you have to say what you're thinking
about things and I just want to thank
you so much for your time and your
expertise and I want to thank everybody
for coming tonight and today if you're
out here in the West and stay safe stay
healthy see you next time. Very good
to be with you. Thank you.
