This lecture contends that the last 3-4 decades' increase in inequality and financialization threatens the success of democratic capitalism. It reviews the changes in income distribution and financialization of economies, with special attention to the US, that make the world increasingly diverge from free market ideals and argues that the economic interests of small groups of “crony capitalists” have come to dominate government responses to the financial crisis and ensuing recession. The danger is not an ever-expanding socialist state, per Hayek's Road to Serfdom, but of a move to economic feudalism, in which a small set of wealthy masters dominate markets and the state and subvert or outsmart efforts to regulate their behavior or rein them in. Professor Freeman will explore the way in which modern internet and communication technology and the increases in team-based production, worker participation in firm decision-making and in group incentive pay can restore the influence of the many and create a “shared capitalist” solution.

Richard B. Freeman holds the Herbert Ascherman Chair in Economics at Harvard University. He directs the National Bureau of Economic Research / Sloan Science Engineering Workforce Projects, and is Senior Research Fellow in Labour Markets at the London School of Economics' Centre for Economic Performance. He received the Mincer Lifetime Achievement Prize from the Society of Labor Economics in 2006. In 2007 he was awarded the IZA Prize in Labor Economics. In 2011, he was appointed Frances Perkins Fellow of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Science. His recent publications include Can Labor Standards Improve Under Globalization (2004), What Workers Want (2007 2nd edition), What Workers Say: Employee Voice in the Anglo American World (2007), Reforming the Welfare State: Recovery and Beyond in Sweden (2010), and Shared Capitalism at Work: Employee Ownership, Profit and Gain Sharing, and Broad-based Stock Options (2010).”

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This event is free and open to all with no ticket required. Entry is on a first come, first served basis. For any queries email events@lse.ac.uk or call 020 7955 6043.

Slides

A copy of Professor Richard B Freeman's powerpoint presentation is available to download. Download 'Toward Economic Feudalism? Inequality, Financialisation, and Democracy' (PDF).

Podcast

A podcast of this event is available to download from Toward Economic Feudalism? Inequality, Financialisation, and Democracy.

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CPD

This event has been certified for CPD purposes by the CPD Certification Service. Self-Assessment Record forms will be made available for delegates wishing to record further learning and knowledge enhancement for Continuing Personal and Professional Development (CPD) purposes. For delegates who wish to obtain a CPD Certificate of Attendance, it is the responsibility of delegates to register their details with a LSE steward at the end of the event and as of 1 September 2014 a certificate will be sent within 28 days of the date of the event attended by the CPD Certification Service. If a delegate fails to register their details at the event, it will not prove possible to issue a certificate. (For queries relating to CPD Certificates of attendance after a request please phone 0208 840 4383 or email info@cpduk.co.uk).