Al Gore on capitalism
Al is asking for sustainable capitalism. Analysis…
It’s interesting that he seems to go to so much effort to brandish his “science credentials,” whatever those are. He evokes biological evolution as the reason for short-term thinking and also quotes Albert Einstein (note: he quotes non-scientists as well).
Al Gore isn’t completely wrong in his assessment that we need “sustainable capitalism.” My view, however, is that we already have sustainable capitalism (whatever that happens to be), and his true agenda is the usual suspects: a) relevance in a time of decline for him (his worthless Nobel notwithstanding); b) tying his environmental philosophy to economic prosperity (Thomas Friedman, a guy I like even if I don’t always agree with him, has fallen for the same logical fallacy).
As far as Wall Street “fat cats” (not his quote, I just like the term) using short-term thinking, we could go a long way to solving that by real problem by removing absurd restrictions on executive compensation. Those restrictions haven’t reduced CEO pay (CEOs still get huge salaries that they don’t necessarily deserve), but have instead made it more difficult for boards to align incentives such that executives focus on long-term growth and sustainability. Of course, in Gore’s tangential discussion on evolution, he failed to mention something economists are already aware of: incentives matter, and altering those incentives to fit some political agenda has real consequences.