Stiglitz previously criticized the tariff outbursts of the Republican president and even called the countries to “unite, rebel” and apply tariffs to US products and the transnationals that operate in their territories, remembering that Trump always “cowns” when a country rebels.
“Trump likes to persecute one country and then another, but he always cowns up, so everyone must be joined and new rules must be agreed,” Stiglitz said when referring that the United States only has 25% of global GDP, but “acts as if it were the owner and everyone was dependent on the US economy.”
“The play is not on the side of the United States, all other players must join and play against the ‘bully’ that is Trump,” said Stiglitz, starting the applause of a crowded auditorium.
Freedom at the expense of others
The economist, who for several years is a critic of neoliberalism, arrived in the Colombian capital to participate in the festival and present his book, in which he reflects on the concept of freedom in the current economic and political context.
Stiglitz argues that the conception promoted by neoliberalism is a “freedom for few”, so it questions the concept of “free market” of that economic model. “What happens when one person’s freedom is achieved at the expense of the other?” He questions in his book.
The Nobel Prize in Economics referred to the people who monopolize the wealth and power as the “oligarchs”, to whom Trump has given power, as to the technological entrepreneurs and owners of platforms and media, and allows them to mold the beliefs and preferences of society to their convenience, in addition to encouraging polarization.
“Your business model is to obtain more profitability, more participation, and that is achieved with the division and polarization of the people. You have to challenge technological giants if you want to have a less polarized society,” he warned.
(Photo: Mariel Ibarra/Political Expansion)
To do this, he said, it is necessary that governments and society invest in the media, public and private, to counteract them doing good research journalism.
For more than an hour, the economist also spoke of the failure of the neoliberal model, which has only accentuated inequality in societies. It is urgent, he said, to change for “progressive capitalism” (name given not to alarm in the United States) or boost a “social democracy”, as would be said in Europe.
According to Stiglitz, work must be done so that there are equal opportunities, where it is recognized that the most important good of a country is people and that with equal policies economic growth can be promoted.
“The rich must pay taxes, there must be taxes on income, income, to property and wealth,” said Stiglitz as part of their proposal.
To explain it, he mentioned the case of Warren Buffett, an American businessman and investor with presence in the lists of the richest men in the world, whose tax burden is low due to the high amount of fiscal deductions that is allowed, and finished: “He himself has said he pays less than his sectarian.”
He also made closer references about the freedom that a person has to possess and carry an assault rifle because the second amendment of the US Constitution is protected in front of another person’s right to life.
“Today a person can carry an AK-47 while the parents see in fear that a shooter arrives at a school and opens fire,” said the professor to also remember the case of the masks during the Covid, where there were people who refused to carry them or get vaccines, with it over the right to other people not to get sick.
