Karl Marx, Hurricane Irene and the Financial Crisis

NOTE: It's only slightly ironic that economist and Senior Economic Adviser to UBS Investment Bank, George Magnus, urges policy makers to turn to Karl Marx for a solution to the "once-in-a-lifetime crisis of capitalism" we are facing. After all, Marx had no interest in solving the problems of capitalism. Along those lines, I'd like to quote a less famous line from Marx's Theses on Feuerbach: "No. 10 - The standpoint of the old materialism is civil society; the standpoint of the new is human society, or social humanity."

Let's hope humanity wins this fight.

LAST WORD(S)

• Hurricane Irene and the Financial Crisis - Two disasters, partially of the government's own making (Ira Stoll, Reason.com) The similarities are striking. In both the financial crisis and Irene, the government actions taken were exceptional and involved depriving people of private property without the due process required under the Fifth Amendment.
• Irene creates strange political bedfellows in NY (Associated Press, Wall Street Journal) City Comptroller John Liu issued a statement praising the mayor on Monday.
• Give Karl Marx a Chance to Save the World Economy: George Magnus (Bloomberg) So how do we address this crisis? To put Marx’s spirit back in the box, policy makers have to place jobs at the top of the economic agenda, and consider other unorthodox measures. The crisis isn’t temporary, and it certainly won’t be cured by the ideological passion for government austerity.