From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
I've been doing this a long time and have very rarely seen a company with sustainable competitive advantage like Amazon has. They have a very low cost of capital, they are very efficient, and the government provide an additional advantage in that the transactions are not tax.
Our system has never defined what it means to be 'good' – what is the ideal human being in capitalism? Is it Jeff Bezos? Is it Steve Jobs? They thrived, they profited, are they 'moral'? The ideal human profile of capitalism does not fit with our basic human dignity.
In the advanced countries, it is a very challenging time for people in the middle-income and middle-education range. They are being subjected to greater competition from labour saving technology.
Contributing to society comes in many forms. Meaningful careers not only fulfil our team members but also drive the broader economy as employees become taxpayers. This virtuous circle is a fundamental contribution to society.
The EU needs reform. Countries have transferred jurisdiction over legislations to a centre that makes decisions in somewhat of a vacuum, featuring a European Parliament that cannot itself initiate legislation. We have a paradox therefore where national parliaments give certain powers to the centre, without being compensated through the creation of an essential federal sovereignty.
Now, the internet has democratized this, and you don't need to be wealthy to be a patron. You can help bring something to life with $10 because you like the project, not because you see it as a financial return.
Working for international organisations, I was caught up in the belief that we could fix broken systems simply by introducing the right resources, processes, and intentions. However, I've come to realize that good intentions alone are insufficient. The lack of access to essential services isn't a matter of moral failing but rather a systemic inability to assess risk and generate profit from these assessments.
For the creator economy, NFTs represent a way for creators and producers of content to directly engage with the people who support them. It's a completely different model… a way for artists and creators to monetise much more effectively than incumbent platforms.
This decade, their GDP will increase by about $12 trillion, i.e. they will create another one of themselves! More importantly, the share of consumption in this decade's growth will be bigger and this is where the big opportunity lies.
We have enough water on this planet for everyone's needs, but not for everyone's greed. The crisis is fundamentally about distribution, access, and governance - not absolute scarcity.
One thing that really helped us was NOT following the IMF prescription, and hence I think the fact that we insisted on having growth (alongside stability) was something that made for a big change in Brazil.
Economics is like artificial intelligence, it's not really there… there's no physical invisible hand…. It's about people interacting with people against a social order, a set of ethics, principles and practices.