Podcast appearances and mentions of Ricardo Hausmann

For market purists, any mention of the term industrial policy used to evoke visions of heavy-handed Soviet-style central planning, or the stifling state-centric protectionism employed by Latin American countries in the late 20th century. But that conversation turned dramatically over the last several years, as President Joe Biden's signature legislative achievements like the CHIPS and Science Act and the Inflation Reduction Act showcased policies designed to influence and shape industries ranging from tech to pharma to green energy. My guest today, Harvard Kennedy School Professor Ricardo Hausmann, is the founder and director of the Growth Lab, which studies ways to unlock economic growth and collaborates with policymakers to promote inclusive prosperity around the world. Hausmann says he believes markets are useful, but have shown themselves inadequate to create public benefits at a time when public objectives like the clean energy transition and shared prosperity have become increasingly essential to human society. In a wide-ranging conversation, we'll discuss why industrial policy is making a comeback, tools that the Growth Lab has developed to help poorer countries and regions develop and prosper, and the uncertainty being caused by President Trump's pledge to raise tariffs and protectionist barriers.Ricardo Hausmann's policy recommendations:Encourage governments to track industries that are not yet developed but have the potential for growth and monitor technological advancements to identify how new technologies can impact existing industries or create new opportunities.Develop state organizations with a deep understanding of societal trends and industrial potential, similar to Israel's office of the Chief Scientist or the U.S. Presidential Commission on Science and Technology.Encourage governments to develop a pre-approved set of tools—including training, educational programs, research programs, and infrastructure—that can be quickly mobilized for specific economic opportunities.Teach policy design in a way that mirrors medical education (e.g., learning by doing as in a teaching hospital), because successful policy design requires real-world experience, not just theoretical knowledge. Ricardo Hausmann is the founder and director of Harvard's Growth Lab and the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School. Under his leadership, the Growth Lab has grown into one of the most well regarded and influential hubs for research on economic growth and development around the world. His scholarly contributions include the development of the Growth Diagnostics and Economic Complexity methodologies, as well as several widely used economic concepts. Since launching the Growth Lab in 2006, Hausmann has served as principal investigator for more than 50 research initiatives in nearly 30 countries, including the US, informing development policy, growth strategies and diversification agendas at the national, regional, and city levels. Before joining Harvard University, he served as the first chief economist of the Inter-American Development Bank (1994-2000), where he created the Research Department. He has served as minister of planning of Venezuela (1992-1993) and as a member of the Board of the Central Bank of Venezuela. He also served as chair of the IMF-World Bank Development Committee. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from Cornell University.Ralph Ranalli of the HKS Office of Communications and Public Affairs is the host, producer, and editor of HKS PolicyCast. A former journalist, public television producer, and entrepreneur, he holds an BA in political science from UCLA and a master's in journalism from Columbia University.Scheduling and logistical support for PolicyCast is provided by Lillian Wainaina. Design and graphics support is provided by Laura King of the OCPA Design Team. Web design and social media promotion support is provided by Catherine Santrock and Natalie Montaner of the OCPA Digital Team. Editorial support is provided by Nora Delaney and Robert O'Neill of the OCPA Editorial Team. 

Ricardo Hausmann is the Founder and Director of Harvard’s Growth Lab and the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School. In this episode, Ricardo explains how the amount and diversity of knowledge within an economy shapes its current capabilities and influences a country’s possible economic growth. Resources and links: The Atlas of Economic Complexity website Connect: Simplifying Complexity on Twitter Sean Brady on Twitter Sean Brady on LinkedIn Brady Heywood website This show is produced in collaboration with Wavelength Creative. Visit wavelengthcreative.com for more information.

¿Logrará Nicolás Maduro mantenerse en el poder después del fraude del 28 de julio o es el fin a 25 años de chavismo en Venezuela? Ricardo Hausmann, economista, director del Growth Lab en la Universidad de Harvard, nos habla al respecto.

Ricardo Hausmann, the founder and Director of Harvard's Growth Lab and the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School, was Minister of Planning of Venezuela (1992-1993). Here, he reflects on the crisis in his country following a disputed presidential election which most say was stolen by Venezuela's autocratic regime.

O programa Os Pingos nos Is dessa sexta-feira (02) debateu a crise política da Venezuela. CNE confirma vitória de Maduro sem divulgar atas. Conselho Eleitoral diz que auditorias foram suspensas após ataque. Aumento das denúncias de perseguição: quase 420 venezuelanos entram no Brasil após eleição. Agentes do exército que atuam na fronteira relatam alta no fluxo. Escritório de Corina e sede de partido são invadidos. Maduro prometeu ampliar repressão contra quem questionar vitória. Entrevista: entenda os impactos da crise política na Venezuela com a análise de Ricardo Hausmann, professor de economia de Havard. Chanceleres do Brasil, Colômbia e México cogitam visitas. Países querem negociação direta entre governo e oposição. Nicolás Maduro fala com jornalistas em entrevista. Ele fala que prendeu mais de 1,2 mil após protestos.      Essas e outras notícias você confere nessa edição de Os Pingos no Is.

Nicolás Vergara y Matías del Río analizaron la detención y formalización de responsables del asesinato de tres carabineros. Además, conversaron con Ricardo Hausmann, economista venezolano y profesor de la Escuela de Gobierno John F. Kennedy de la Universidad de Harvard, se refirió a los desafíos de la comunidad internacional tras las elecciones en Venezuela.

Nicolás Vergara y Matías del Río analizaron la detención y formalización de responsables del asesinato de tres carabineros. Además, conversaron con Ricardo Hausmann, economista venezolano y profesor de la Escuela de Gobierno John F. Kennedy de la Universidad de Harvard, se refirió a los desafíos de la comunidad internacional tras las elecciones en Venezuela.

Yascha Mounk and Ricardo Hausmann discuss development economics and how globalization has changed the nature of knowledge. Ricardo Hausmann is an economist and the founder and Director of Harvard's Growth Lab and the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School. Hausmann has also served as Minister of Planning of Venezuela (1992-1993) and on the Board of the Central Bank of Venezuela. In this week's conversation, Yascha Mounk and Ricardo Hausmann discuss the effect of globalization on social stratification; how “brain drains” and immigration can have counterintuitive effects on growth; and why we may often overrate the economic effects of corruption. This transcript has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity. Please do listen and spread the word about The Good Fight. If you have not yet signed up for our podcast, please do so now by following this link on your phone. Email: podcast@persuasion.community  Website: http://www.persuasion.community Podcast production by Jack Shields, and Brendan Ruberry Connect with us! Spotify | Apple | Google Twitter: @Yascha_Mounk & @joinpersuasion Youtube: Yascha Mounk LinkedIn: Persuasion Community Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this introductory episode, Ricardo Hausmann, the founder and Director of Harvard's Growth Lab and the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School and Andres Fortunato, Research Fellow at the Growth Lab, discuss the key takeaways of their two year research engagement in South Africa.

To learn more about Building State Capability (BSC), visit the website, access the PDIA toolkit, read BSC blog posts, and listen to the podcasts.To learn more about what's discussed in this podcast, visit Leading Economic Growth's webpage, read about our work in Sri Lanka and Albania, and visit the HKS Growth Lab website.

In today's podcast, Peter Brooke delves into the intricacies of the South African economy, exploring the impending elections and the possible coalition governments. He also looks at the report by economist Ricardo Hausmann, shedding light on the 15-year growth slowdown and the urgent need for state capability. Despite economic woes, Peter identifies positive shifts and discusses opportunities in green energy and spatial development. Thanks for listening! Follow us on Linkedin.

Nicolás Vergara, Matías del Río y Consuelo Saavedra analizaron el veto que ingresó el gobierno a este proyecto de ley. Además, conversaron con Ricardo Hausmann, economista y profesor de la Escuela de Gobierno John F. Kennedy de la Universidad de Harvard, se refirió al futuro de las energías renovables en el país, en especial el hidrógeno verde.

Nicolás Vergara, Matías del Río y Consuelo Saavedra analizaron el veto que ingresó el gobierno a este proyecto de ley. Además, conversaron con Ricardo Hausmann, economista y profesor de la Escuela de Gobierno John F. Kennedy de la Universidad de Harvard, se refirió al futuro de las energías renovables en el país, en especial el hidrógeno verde.

Ana Paula Ordorica platica con Ricardo Hausmann, Director del Growth Lab en la Universidad de Harvard, y profesor de Economía del desarrollo en la Kennedy School of Government en Harvard sobre el ‘Atlas de la complejidad económica. Puedes consultarlo aquí: https://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/explore En otros temas: Alejandro Encinas presentó el segundo informe de la Comisión para la Verdad y Acceso a la Justicia del caso / Claudia Sheinbaum se deslinda del anuncio que apareció en las pantallas de Times Square / El Banco de México da a conocer su decisión de política monetaria / United Auto Workers analiza ampliar su huelga a otras plantas ante la falta de avance en las negociaciones.

Should the state shape the composition of economic activity? What are some arguments in favour of and against the use of the Industrial Policy? Anupam Manur and Sarthak Pradhan analyse and discuss some recent literature and trends on Industrial Policy. This paper analyses some trends in industrial policy: The Who, What, When, and How of Industrial Policy: A Text-Based Approach This paper explores the rationale behind industrial policies: The New Economics of Industrial Policy Do check out Takshashila's public policy courses: https://school.takshashila.org.in/courses We are @‌IVMPodcasts on Facebook, Twitter, & Instagram. https://twitter.com/IVMPodcasts https://www.instagram.com/ivmpodcasts/?hl=en https://www.facebook.com/ivmpodcasts/ You can check out our website at https://shows.ivmpodcasts.com/featured Follow the show across platforms: Spotify, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, JioSaavn, Gaana, Amazon Music Do share the word with your folks!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Why do some countries become rich while others stagnate? And can you predict which countries become wealthy in advance of them actually increasing their collective GDP? The answer may lie in the complexity of each nation's domestic economy. On this episode we speak with Ricardo Hausmann, a professor and director of the Growth Lab at Harvard University. He helps us understand what economic complexity is, how it's measured, and the process by which countries can move from being less complex to more complex over time.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ricardo Hausmann, economista venezolano y profesor de la Universidad de Harvard, habló en Mañanas Blu, cuando Colombia está al aire sobre la economía colombiana y el impacto que podría tener en ella las reformas propuestas por el Gobierno del presidente Gustavo Petro.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

South Africans are outraged to find themselves last in a prestigious survey of how well our fourth graders can read for meaning. And they should be angry. But the lack of education may not be, as so many people insist it is, the reason we cannot grow the economy. The reason we can't grow is that we don't have sufficient skills or we have discarded too early the people that do. In this episode of Podcasts from the Edge with Peter Bruce he revisits the argument for skills and the famous line from Harvard development economist Ricardo Hausmann that “to say that education is your growth strategy means that you are giving up on everyone who has already gone through the school system”.

En una nueva edición de Estado Nacional, iniciamos con un contacto en Buenos Aires para conocer el ambiente previo a la final del mundial de Qatar. Luego, la ministra de Relaciones Exteriores, Antonia Urrejola, abordó la crisis en Perú, los efectos en la frontera y la ratificación del TPP11. Posteriormente, el economista Ricardo Hausmann se refirió al escenario económico para el 2023. Finalmente, con nuestro panel político abordamos el nuevo acuerdo constitucional, y la votación en el Senado en torno al fiscal nacional.

En una nueva edición de Estado Nacional, iniciamos con un contacto en Buenos Aires para conocer el ambiente previo a la final del mundial de Qatar. Luego, la ministra de Relaciones Exteriores, Antonia Urrejola, abordó la crisis en Perú, los efectos en la frontera y la ratificación del TPP11. Posteriormente, el economista Ricardo Hausmann se refirió al escenario económico para el 2023. Finalmente, con nuestro panel político abordamos el nuevo acuerdo constitucional, y la votación en el Senado en torno al fiscal nacional.

Nicolás Vergara, Matías Del Río y Consuela Saavedra, conversaron con el economista venezolano, profesor de Harvard's Kennedy School y director del Growth Lab, Ricardo Hausmann.

Nicolás Vergara, Matías Del Río y Consuela Saavedra, conversaron con el economista venezolano, profesor de Harvard's Kennedy School y director del Growth Lab, Ricardo Hausmann.

In his foundational 1972 paper “More Is Different,” physicist Phil Anderson made the case that reducing the objects of scientific study to their smallest components does not allow researchers to predict the behaviors of those systems upon reconstruction. Another way of putting this is that different disciplines reveal different truths at different scales. Contrary to long-held convictions that there would one day be one great unifying theory to explain it all, fundamental research in this century looks more like a bouquet of complementary approaches. This pluralistic thinking hearkens back to the work of 19th century psychologist William James and looks forward into the growing popularity of evidence-based approaches that cultivate diversity in team-building, governance, and ecological systems. Context-dependent theory and practice calls for choirs of voices…so how do we encourage this? New systems must emerge to handle the complexity of digital society…what might they look like?Welcome to COMPLEXITY, the official podcast of the Santa Fe Institute. I'm your host, Michael Garfield, and every other week we'll bring you with us for far-ranging conversations with our worldwide network of rigorous researchers developing new frameworks to explain the deepest mysteries of the universe.This week on the show we dip back into our sub-series on SFI's Emergent Political Economies research theme with a trialogue featuring Microsoft Research Lead Glen Weyl (founder of RadicalXChange and founder-chair of The Plurality Institute), and SFI Resident Professor Cristopher Moore (author of over 150 papers at the intersection of physics and computer science). In our conversation we discuss the case for a radically pluralistic approach, explore the links between plurality and quantum mechanics, and outline potential technological solutions to the “sense-making” problems of the 21st century.Be sure to check out our extensive show notes with links to all our references at complexity.simplecast.com. If you value our research and communication efforts, please subscribe, rate and review us at Apple Podcasts or Spotify, and consider making a donation — or finding other ways to engage with us, including our upcoming program for Undergraduate Complexity Research, our new SFI Press book Ex Machina by John H. Miller, and an open postdoctoral fellowship in Belief Dynamics — at santafe.edu/engage.Thank you for listening!Join our Facebook discussion group to meet like minds and talk about each episode.Podcast theme music by Mitch Mignano.Follow us on social media:Twitter • YouTube • Facebook • Instagram • LinkedInReferenced & Related WorksWhy I Am A Pluralistby Glen WeylReflecting on A Possible Quadratic Wormhole between Quantum Mechanics and Pluralityby Michael Freedman, Michal Fabinger, Glen WeylDecentralized Society: Finding Web3's Soulby Glen Weyl, Puja Ohlhaver, Vitalik ButerinAI is an Ideology, Not a Technologyby Glen Weyl & Jaron LanierHow Civic Technology Can Help Stop a Pandemicby Jaron Lanier & Glen WeylA Flexible Design for Funding Public Goodsby Vitalik Buterin, Zöe Hitzig, Glen WeylEquality of Power and Fair Public Decision-makingby Nicole Immorlica, Benjamin Plautt, Glen WeylScale and information-processing thresholds in Holocene social evolutionby Jaeweon Shin, Michael Holton Price, David Wolpert, Hajime Shimao, Brendan Tracey & Timothy Kohler Toward a Connected Societyby Danielle AllenThe role of directionality, heterogeneity and correlations in epidemic risk and spreadby Antoine Allard, Cris Moore, Samuel Scarpino, Benjamin Althouse, and Laurent Hébert-DufresneThe Generals' Scuttlebutt: Byzantine-Resilient Gossip Protocolsby Sandro Coretti, Aggelos Kiayias, Cristopher Moore, Alexander RussellEffective Resistance for Pandemics: Mobility Network Sparsification for High-Fidelity Epidemic Simulationby Alexander Mercier, Samuel Scarpino, and Cris MooreHow Accurate are Rebuttable Presumptions of Pretrial Dangerousness? A Natural Experiment from New Mexicoby Cris Moore, Elise Ferguson, Paul GuerinThe Uncertainty Principle: In an age of profound disagreements, mathematics shows us how to pursue truth togetherby Cris Moore & John KaagOn Becoming Aware: A pragmatics of experiencingby Nathalie Depraz, Francisco Varela, and Pierre VermerschThe Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform The Worldby David Deutsch[Twitter thread on chess]by Vitalik ButerinLetter from Birmingham Jailby Martin Luther King, Jr.The End of History and The Last Manby Francis FukuyamaEnabling the Individual: Simmel, Dewey and “The Need for a Philosophy of Education”by H. KoenigEncyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti of The Holy Father Francis on Fraternity and Social Friendshipby Pope FrancisWhat can we know about that which we cannot even imagine?by David WolpertJ.C.R. Licklider (1, 2)Allison Duettman (re: existential hope)Evan Miyazono (re: Protocol Labs research)Intangible Capital (“an open access scientific journal that publishes theoretical or empirical peer-reviewed articles, which contribute to advance the understanding of phenomena related with all aspects of management and organizational behavior, approached from the perspectives of intellectual capital, strategic management, human resource management, applied psychology, education, IT, supply chain management, accounting…”)Polis (“a real-time system for gathering, analyzing and understanding what large groups of people think in their own words, enabled by advanced statistics and machine learning”)Related Complexity Podcast Episodes7 - Rajiv Sethi on Stereotypes, Crime, and The Pursuit of Justice51 - Cris Moore on Algorithmic Justice & The Physics of Inference55 - James Evans on Social Computing and Diversity by Design68 - W. Brian Arthur on Economics in Nouns and Verbs (Part 1)69 - W. Brian Arthur (Part 2) on "Prim Dreams of Order vs. Messy Vitality" in Economics, Math, and Physics82 - David Krakauer on Emergent Political Economies and A Science of Possibility (EPE 01)83 - Eric Beinhocker & Diane Coyle on Rethinking Economics for A Sustainable & Prosperous World (EPE 02)84 - Ricardo Hausmann & J. Doyne Farmer on Evolving Technologies & Market Ecologies (EPE 03)91 - Steven Teles & Rajiv Sethi on Jailbreaking The Captured Economy (EPE 04)

Joanna welcomes her Dad, noted economist Professor Ricardo Hausmann, as he tries to explain what it takes for some countries to be prosperous, why he followed a career in economics, and how his job as an educator is not so different from Joanna's job as an entertainer.

Ya hemos hablado de la recesión y los problemas económicos que se acercan, pero para conocer el impacto de la tecnología en la economía o viceversa, quisimos traer a un verdadero experto. Tuvimos el honor de hablar con Ricardo Hausman, uno de los economistas de más renombre en el mundo. Además de su doctorado en economía de la Universidad de Cornell, Ricardo es el director del Centro para el Desarrollo Internacional y profesor de Economía de desarrollo en Kennedy School of Government de la Universidad de Harvard. En este episodio estaremos hablando del crecimiento en el sector de la tecnología, las políticas de talento extrangero en los países. Y ojo, quédense hasta el final para poder ver la opinión de Ricardo sobre las criptomonedas y la posible recesión de la que venimos hablando en los últimos episodios de Coffee Power. EPISODIO 103 FULL VIDEO PODCAST Youtube: https://youtu.be/UeMh3bBcebM ✩ Ricardo Hausmann Twitter LinkedIn Charla de Ricardo 00:00 Intro 03:38 Los últimos 20-30 años de bonanza en el sector de tecnología 11:00 El conocimiento y su distribución en la sociedad 17:24 El “Know How” y por qué es difícil de mover 22:00 El rol del “Know How” en el desarrollo de los países 25:14 El “Know How” no es entendimiento 30:11 El talent extranjero y su influencia en el desarrollo de los países 31:30 Los porcentajes de talento extranjero en Silicon Valley 37:30 El caso de Colombia y su desarrollo en tecnología 43:21 Ricardo Hausmann opina sobre la recesión, cripto y demás ESCUCHA / SUSCRÍBETE AL PODCAST Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2Yt0GmO Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3go64h1 Google: https://bit.ly/3i4pTLM Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/CoffeePower?sub_confirmation=1 Curso Liderazgo - Gerencia en Tecnología / Ingeniería 2022: https://www.coffeepowerpodcast.com/cupon-udemy?utm_source=anchor.fm&utm_medium=ep103 ¿CÓMO PUEDES APOYAR ESTE PODCAST? ✅ Si estas en Apple Podcast puedes dejarnos un review con muchas estrellitas :) ✅ Comparte este episodio con tus amigos y/o compañeros de trabajo ✅ También puedes compartir el episodio y mencionarnos en tus redes sociales (Recuerda que nos encanta LinkedIn). ✅ SUSCRÍBETE con "todas" las notificaciones para saber cuándo haya un nuevo episodio ✅ Abajo en los comentarios puedes escribirnos qué te pareció el episodio y también puedes dar tu opinión sobre lo que hablamos * * * * * CONECTATE CON COFFEE POWER ✩ Website - https://www.coffeepowerpodcast.com ✩ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/company/coffeepower/ ✩ Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/coffeepowerpodcast/ ✩ Twitter - https://twitter.com/coffeepowerp ✩ Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/coffeepowerpodcast ✩ Comunidad en Slack - https://www.coffeepowerpodcast.com/comunidad CONECTATE CON

Ricardo Hausmann, the founder and Director of Harvard's Growth Lab and the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School, talks about Latin America's path to economic recovery. He examines a wide range of subjects, including the pandemic, global inflation, decarbonization and the impact of Russia's invasion of the Ukraine on Latin America.

Hello Interactors,Where, how, and when people work continues to shift. Meanwhile, scores of people are moving to urban regions in search of opportunities. Some of which are more accessible than others. It’s putting stresses on how cities plan, how we move, and what kinds of freedoms are afforded and to whom. But hidden in the complexities of societies are patterns of hope. As interactors, you’re special individuals self-selected to be a part of an evolutionary journey. You’re also members of an attentive community so I welcome your participation.Please leave your comments below or email me directly.Now let’s go…REMOTE CONTROLThe workplace will never be the same again. What it becomes won’t either. But don’t tell Elon Musk. He threw a temper tantrum last week accusing employees at Tesla of slacking off working from home. In a company-wide email he became the over-controlling parent and grounded everyone. He wrote, “Everyone at Tesla is required to spend a minimum of 40 hours in the office per week” and that they “must be where your actual colleagues are located, not some remote pseudo office.” He claimed had he not been on the factory floor “working alongside” his employees that Tesla would have “long ago gone bankrupt.” I’m sure every factory floor worker he has replaced by a robot might have something to say about that.Some work does require a physical presence. Teeth cleaning comes to mind. But there is something to coming together physically that is hard to replicate online. There are also many kinds of service jobs that require a physical presence, though some of those are getting replaced by robots. Last year, a Dallas restaurant turned to a Robot called Bella when they had trouble filling waiter jobs. The owner said, “They don’t complain and they’re happy to do it!” It even happily sings Happy Birthday.But even white-collar jobs require some together time. I heard one academic say he worked two years during COVID on a joint research project over Zoom. When the team finally came together physically, they accomplished more in a single day than they did in those two years.  Every company from Tesla to Target are feeling the reverberations of pandemic induced workplace alterations. Even Microsoft, a company that has long envisioned the promise of hybrid-work, is struggling through a new rhythm and workplace model. Mandatory in-office strategies like Musk tried aren’t practical. Even senior leaders are choosing to move to remote locations. Meanwhile, some high-tech teams were already distributed around the world. Despite these trends, companies continue to build new office space. Cranes loom on the horizon all around Seattle. While some of these high-rises will be housing, much of it is office space. What will they do with all this space?I met a new friend last week who is trying to figure that out. She works as a product designer for a company headquartered in Rotterdam called MapIQ. They build software and services that allow companies to optimize the space they have. She’s been busy conducting research. She talks to employees, facility managers, IT departments, human resources, and corporate realtors who are struggling with a new workplace reality. She told me one of the most acute issues for facility managers is space utilization. These companies pay a lot of money to have attractive and effective workplaces. Seeing them empty is troubling financially but also psychologically. She said, “Employees are struggling to know when it is best to come to the office. They don't want to be the only one at home in a hybrid meeting and they don't want to be in an empty office either.”Facility managers are scrambling to find ways to make the most of what they have. She said one popular outcome is subletting workspace. But even subletters will only use it occasionally and sporadically. They use software and sensors to better manage who is using it, when, and for how long. This was not how these buildings were designed and not how these companies were envisioned to be run. MapIQ has identified five trends emerging in the workplace:The office as standard. Most all employees work four or five days a week in the office.Local hybrid. Most people work two or three days a week in the office.Remote friendly. Most employees are in the office only once or twice a week.Remote first. Working in the office is completely optional with no geographic requirement.Fully distributed. There is no office at all and everyone works wherever they want.The nature of work in the foreseeable future is decidedly different than the past. It will take some time for optimizations to emerge. Meanwhile, how will this affect our built environment and how cities plan? Our roads, rails, wires, and spires, boulevards, buildings, drains and ditches were all planned and produced with a certain permanency and predictability that surrounds our economies, societies, and psychologies. These features of the physical and social landscape were assumed to be towering rocks anchored and resolute. But it turns out it was a mirage. They are made of sand and the winds of the pandemic has created a sandstorm. What shape these forms of fortune take is unknown and possibly unknowable.The landscape of living amidst this storm is hard to predict and control. The best way to know what direction we’re headed is to look where we came from. Only then can we understand how we got here. A lot has changed in how and where we live. Since the end of WWII, the world’s population has more than tripled. Over half alive right now live in urban areas and nearly three-quarters will by 2050. North America is one of the most urbanized regions in the world. In 2018 82% of the population lived in urban areas. And it’s growing every day. Europe is 74% urbanized and their cities are also growing. Half of the world’s population lives in Asia and half of those live in urban areas.Not all regions grow at the same rate. The fastest growing areas are projected to continue to be in low-income and middle-income nations. Thirty-three of the fastest growing countries between 2000 and 2020 were in Africa. Twelve were in Asia. But urbanization is both a blessing and a curse. Access to better public health, nutrition, and education improves the lives of those who suffer most, but puts increased strains on housing, transportation, energy, and other infrastructure systems. This is having widespread, varying, and compounding impacts on all who live in urban areas. But these growing pains are not equally felt by all. Understanding these sensitivities will be necessary if we’re going to find ways to solve them.SUPER SIZING THE SUPER RICH WITH SUPERLINEAR WEALTHUrban scientists have found naturally occurring mathematical patterns in growing cities. They mimic power-laws found across a diverse array of cities just as they do across plants and animals. For example, as cities grow in population their GDP, number of patents, and productivity grow at a predictable scale. However, congestion, crime, and contagious diseases also predictably grow. Doubling the size of a city will increase wages, wealth, and innovation (as measured by number of patents) by roughly 15 percent. But so will garbage and theft. Population growth has a predictable superlinear positive and negative effect on urban areas. It’s the great paradox of urbanity.There are big advantages to scale. With each doubling of population there’s also a 15 percent savings in total length of rail lines, electrical lines, water lines, and roads. This sublinear effect predictably leads to a city of 10 million people needing 15 percent less infrastructure than a city half its size. It pays to grow.But these numbers, as predictable as they are, can also be misleading. Whenever population datasets get crunched and averaged the analysis ends up crunching the realities of the average person. Hidden in the convenient clustering of ‘low-income‘, ‘middle-income’, and ‘high-income’ are varying degrees, durations, and directions as diverse as those lived experiences of the people behind the numbers. This realization has led some of those same urban scaling researchers to scrutinize their own findings. Increased wealth disparities, for example, got them wondering. If wage growth is so predictable compared to urban growth, and more people are predictably moving to urban areas, why aren’t all wages predictably growing?They wondered if there are similar scaling laws that predict income inequality based on city size. How are incomes different among the rich and the poor compared to the size of the city? After adjusting for cost-of-living differences, are poor people in a big city better off than poor people in a small city? Are rich people richer the bigger the city?To answer their questions, they broke down income brackets into percentiles. Traditional economic inequality research looks at dispersed distributions across income or wealth. Meaningful individual differences are hidden in these distributions. What they found is the wealth of the poorest 10% scales almost linearly with population size. In contrast, the top 10% shows superlinear growth. This means poor folks moving closer to the city in hopes of becoming wealthier may find themselves to be continually poor compared to those in higher income brackets. The rich get richer, and the poor stay poor.They conclude that “much has been written about the apparent increasing gains of large cities, such as greater GDP, higher wages, and more patents per capita.” But in the end, “the increasing benefits of city size are not evenly distributed to people within those cities.” For example, they found the ratio of housing costs to income is a function of city population size. The poorer the income brackets, the greater the proportion of income is spent on housing. This results in sharp increases in costs with city size. Meanwhile, in the wealthiest brackets the proportion of income spent on housing stays level.So whatever superlinear growth in GDP, innovation, and wage growth that comes with increased city size is highly concentrated in the upper income brackets. Existing research in urban scaling and innovation points to empirical evidence that these gains are due in large part to the increase in social interactions and sharing of ideas. Larger and more diverse pools of people co-located in urban areas results in an explosion of creativity, opportunity, and resources. The accumulation of shared knowledge and passion only increases the potential for innovation.This theory is found in the work of economist Karl Polanyi. In his landmark 1944 book, The Great Transformation, Polanyi gives this concept a name: embeddedness – those who share a common social context have an embedded relationship that drives a desire to provide for one another. Stanford economic sociologist, Mark Granovetter, reaffirmed the idea in his oft referenced 1973 paper, “The Strength of Weak Ties.”And one of the most influential economists in the 20th century, Austrian turned American, Joseph Shumpeter, described these acts of economic invention and innovation as ‘creative destruction’. For every new innovation that brings increased wealth another must be destroyed or devalued. Capitalists celebrate it as the unfortunate inevitability of social and economic progress while Socialists deride it as the inevitable annihilating force of capitalism.Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels wrote in their 1848 Communist Manifesto that, “Modern bourgeois society, with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells… In these crises, there breaks out an epidemic that, in all earlier epochs, would have seemed an absurdity – the epidemic of over-production. Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation, had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed; and why? Because there is too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce.”This grim prognosis from one of Capitalisms only inciteful critics is, sadly, all too relatable these days. Marx would not at all be surprised to hear there’s now empirical evidence to back his 174-year-old theory. But he would probably also be shocked to see China rising as a global superpower by combining elements of Capitalism with Socialism. Markets seem to have a way of formalizing Polanyi’s notion of embeddedness. He believed we all have the desire and creative ability to contribute to each others success and well being as part of our livelihoods. It’s not just goods and services that need exchanged but also values, moral concerns, and relationships. But to do that we must remain connected.CONNECTING THE DOTS TO FREEDOMThose urban scaling researchers hypothesize that one of the reasons income inequalities are so pronounce and unfairly propagated in our wealthiest cities is because the various income brackets have become increasingly geographically and socially segregated. Like ecosystems, the less diversity there is the greater the propensity to collapse. These researchers warn that urban regions that “inhibit mixing between diverse populations, will underperform with respect to income scaling.” If lessening income inequality is a goal, the research suggests “cities that are better mixed, allowing diverse parts of the population to be exposed to one another, should be overperforming with respect to urban scaling.”Connecting diverse sets of people across urban regions seems a more productive, and fun, way to tackle income inequality than redistribution of wealth through a government program. Ricardo Hausmann is the founder and Director of Harvard University’s Growth Lab. They uncover international growth diagnostics and develop economic complexity research methodologies. In a recent interview he said,“In my mind, the real solution to inequality is not so much redistribution as inclusion – as incorporating people into the possibility of mixing what they are…that leads to a very different agenda for inequality reduction. Do you send people a check or do you connect them to the urban transport network?...Do you connect it to the labor market? Do you connect to the schooling system?”He was joined in this interview by J. Doyne Farmer. He is the Director of Complexity Economics at the Oxford Institute of New Economic Thinking. Farmer points out that when economists look at the distribution of productivity, they commonly use a statistical technique that lops off a chunk of a giant tail of the distribution curve that is seemingly inconsequential to their analysis. This gives them a distorted point of view of productivity. And to underline Hausmann’s point about the importance of diversity needed to be connected, he said, “that there's a huge diversity out there” hidden in the fat tails those distribution curves. He adds, “And we really have to cope with that because it's inherent to the economy.”   The question is, how connected physically do people have to be, how often, and for how long to achieve optimal productivity gains? These are questions being asked by companies around the world and firms like MapIQ are there to help answer them. But how many of these companies are already segregating themselves from the socio-economic diversity of their headquarters, satellite offices, or shared urban and suburban workspaces?Arjun Ramani, a Stanford economist and journalist for The Economist, said last year in an interview by Leesman, a leader in workplace research, that “people are now willing to live an hour away in exchange for a bigger house, because they don’t have to commute in every day.” He believes it’s leading to the ‘donuting’ of cities which I mentioned may be occurring in Des Moines, Iowa. Ramani also reminds us that in the 1800s 40% of workers were working from home. He said, “working from home was quite common. Workers would go into a city or to a market to get raw materials and goods and return home to work – for example in the manufacture of clothes.”Today that just may be a 3D printer in a suburban garage or a rural toolshed, but the materials would probably be delivered to their door or flown in on a drone. But there’s no question some segment of jobs will require a more centralized physical presence. I’m not yet ready to have my teeth cleaned by a robot, though it looks like that also may be around the corner too. Even farming is moving toward robots.Regardless of what kind of job is available or desired or how much physical presence needed, there is little question getting more people connected – regardless of where they live – increases the odds of diverse interactions. My own experience tells me, and mounds of research supports, diverse collections of people and ideas yield unexpectedly miraculous outcomes. It’s not always easy or pleasant working with people of differing backgrounds, beliefs, and inclinations, but out of contention come good ideas.It's also hard to imagine how we become more connected amidst increasing geographic segregation, political polarization, religious ideology, and economic disparities. This may be today’s most perplexing social dilemma. It seems each opportunity to come together is met with an excuse to move apart. Meanwhile, there are powerful forces alive today bent on suppressing individual freedoms. And yet we live in a time when personal freedoms to choose where to live and where work are reignited. But those freedoms are not afforded to all which is an unjust outcome of an unjust history. And so the struggle continues.It’s sometimes hard to remain optimistic as the sand dunes of our institutions are shaped by the unpredictable storms of change. But hidden in the complexities of distribution curves, growing populations, and the shifting sands of urbanity are predictable patterns that offer us clues – kernels of clarity and certainty; pathways to pursue, and lessons to learn. It’s the certainty we need if we want to uphold our freedoms.When Polanyi wrote about the great transformation occurring in 1944 it was during a dark time. He started the book during the depression in the 1930s and had lived through political and economic upheaval in England. A world war preceded his writing, and the book was published during a second. He recognized the complexity of society and spoke of the freedoms that come with it.In the final chapter titled, Freedom in a Complex Society, he writes,“Uncomplaining acceptance of the reality of society gives man indomitable courage and strength to remove all removable injustice and unfreedom. As long as he is true to his task of creating more abundant freedom for all, he need not fear that either power or planning will turn against him and destroy the freedom he is building by their instrumentality. This is the meaning of freedom in a complex society; it gives us all the certainty that we need.” This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit interplace.io

Papo Raríssimo… com Edu Mancebo https://radinhodepilha.com/2021/12/17/papo-rarissimo-com-edu-mancebo/ conversando sobre impacto com… Edu Mancebo! https://vamosfalarsobreimpacto.today/2021/04/06/vamos-falar-sobre-impacto-com-edu-mancebo-2/ Ricardo Hausmann & J. Doyne Farmer on Evolving Technologies & Market Ecologies (EPE 03) https://pca.st/ixcq05ha Jonathan Rauch: Free Thought, Democracy, and the Nature of Science https://youtu.be/PLgg8qq3KoM The Scream: Great Art Explained https://youtu.be/d50FbuyswAU Edvard Munch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edvard_Munch A cidade francesa que quer usar organismos ... Read more

As our world knits together, economic interdependencies change in both shape and nature. Supply chains, finance, labor, technological innovation, and geography interact in puzzling nonlinear ways. Can we step back far enough and see clearly enough to make sense of these interactions? Can we map the landscape of capability across scales? And what insights emerge by layering networks of people, firms, states, markets, regions? We're all riding a bucking horse; what questions can we ask to make sure that we can stay in the saddle?Welcome to COMPLEXITY, the official podcast of the Santa Fe Institute. I'm your host, Michael Garfield, and every other week we'll bring you with us for far-ranging conversations with our worldwide network of rigorous researchers developing new frameworks to explain the deepest mysteries of the universe.This week on Complexity, we speak with two SFI External Professors helping to rethink political economy: newly-appointed Science Board Co-Chair Ricardo Hausmann (Website, Wikipedia, Twitter) is the Director of the Harvard Growth Lab and J. Doyne Farmer (Website, Wikipedia) is Director of the Complexity Economics program at the Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School. In this episode we zoom wide to try and find a way to garden all together, learning limits that can help inform discussion and decisions on the shape of things to come…If you value our research and communication efforts, please subscribe, rate and review us at Apple Podcasts, and consider making a donation — or finding other ways to engage with us — at santafe.edu/engage. You can find the complete show notes for every episode, with transcripts and links to cited works, at complexity.simplecast.com. Heads up that our online education platform Complexity Explorer's Origins of Life Course is still open for enrollment until June 1st! We hope to see you in there…Thank you for listening!Join our Facebook discussion group to meet like minds and talk about each episode.Podcast theme music by Mitch Mignano.Follow us on social media:Twitter • YouTube • Facebook • Instagram • LinkedInMentions and additional resources:The new paradigm of economic complexityPierre-Alexandre Balland, Tom Broekel, Dario Diodato, Elisa Giuliani, Ricardo Hausmann, Neave O'Clery, and David Rigbyin Research PolicyHow production networks amplify economic growthJames McNerney, Charles Savoie, Francesco Caravelli, Vasco M. Carvalho, and J. Doyne Farmer in PNASProductive Ecosystems and the arrow of developmentby Neave O'Clery, Muhammed Ali Yıldırım, and Ricardo Hausmann Horrible trade-offs in a pandemic: Poverty, fiscal space, policy, and welfareRicardo Hausmann and Ulrich Schetterin ScienceDirectHistorical effects of shocks on inequality: the great leveler revisitedBas van Bavel and Marten Schefferin Nature Humanities & Social Sciences Communications(Twitter thread)Complexity 56 - J. Doyne Farmer on The Complexity Economics RevolutionThe Multiple Paths to Multiple LifeChristopher P. Kempes and David C. Krakauer in Journal of Molecular EvolutionScaling of urban income inequality in the USAElisa Heinrich Mora, Cate Heine, Jacob J. Jackson, Geoffrey B. West, Vicky Chuqiao Yang and Christopher P. Kempesin Journal of The Royal Society InterfaceComplexity 12 - Matthew Jackson on Social & Economic NetworksComplexity 81 - C. Brandon Ogbunu on Epistasis & The Primacy of Context in Complex SystemsPitchfork Economicsby Nick Hanauer (podcast)Complexity 15 - R. Maria del-Rio Chanona on Modeling Labor Markets & Tech UnemploymentWill a Large Complex System be Stable?by Robert Mayin NatureInvestigationsby Stuart KauffmanThe Collapse of Networksby Raissa D'Souza (SFI Symposium Talk)

The world is unfair — but how much of that unfairness is inevitable, and how much is just contingency? After centuries of efforts to arrive at formal theories of history, society, and economics, most of us still believe and act on what amounts to myth. Our predecessors can't be faulted for their lack of data, but in 2022 we have superior resources we're only starting to appreciate and use. In honor of the Santa Fe Institute's new role as the hub of an international research network exploring Emergent Political Economies, we dedicate this new sub-series of Complexity Podcast to conversations on money, power, governance, and justice. Subscribe for a new stream of dialogues and trialogues between SFI's own diverse scholastic community and other acclaimed political economists, historians, and authors of speculative fiction.Welcome to COMPLEXITY, the official podcast of the Santa Fe Institute. I'm your host, Michael Garfield, and every other week we'll bring you with us for far-ranging conversations with our worldwide network of rigorous researchers developing new frameworks to explain the deepest mysteries of the universe.In this episode, we talk with SFI President David Krakauer about the goals of this research theme and what SFI brings to the table. We discuss the legacy of long-standing challenges to quantitative history and mathematical economics, how SFI thinks differently about these topics, and a brief outline of the major angles we'll explore in this sub-series over the next year-plus — including the roles of dimension, causality, algorithms, scaling, innovation, emergence, and more.Subscribe to Complexity Podcast for upcoming episodes with an acclaimed line-up of scholars including Diane Coyle, Eric Beinhocker, Ricardo Hausmann, Doyne Farmer, Steven Teles, Rajiv Sethi, Jenna Bednar, Tom Ginsburg, Niall Ferguson, Neal Stephenson, Paul Smaldino, C. Thi Nguyen, John Kay, John Geneakoplos, and many more to be announced…If you value our research and communication efforts, please subscribe to Complexity Podcast wherever you prefer to listen, rate and review us at Apple Podcasts, and consider making a donation — or finding other ways to engage with us — at santafe.edu/engage. You can find the complete show notes for every episode, with transcripts and links to cited works, at complexity.simplecast.com.Thank you for listening!Join our Facebook discussion group to meet like minds and talk about each episode.Podcast theme music by Mitch Mignano.Follow us on social media:Twitter • YouTube • Facebook • Instagram • LinkedInMentions and additional resources:Emergent Political Economies and A Science of Possibilityby David Krakauer for SFI Parallax Newsletter, Spring 2022 EditionPolicing stabilizes construction of social niches in primatesby Jessica Flack, Michelle Girvan, Frans de Waal, and David Krakauer in NatureConflicts of interest improve collective computation of adaptive social structuresby Eleanor Brush, David Krakauer, and Jessica Flack in Science AdvancesThe Star Gazer and the Flesh Eater: Elements of a Theory of Metahistoryby David C. Krakauer in History, Big History, and Metahistory at SFI PressThe Cultural Evolution of National Constitutionsby Daniel Rockmore, Chen Fang, Nick Foti, Tom Ginsburg, & David Krakauer in SSRNScaling of Hunter-Gatherer Camp Size and Human Socialityby José Lobo, Todd Whitelaw, Luís M. A. Bettencourt, Polly Wiessner, Michael E. Smith, & Scott Ortman in Current AnthropologyW. Brian Arthur on Complexity Podcast (eps. 13, 14, 68, 69)Reflections on COVID-19 with David Krakauer & Geoffrey West (Complexity Podcast)The Dawn of Everythingby David Graeber and David Wengrow at Macmillan PublishersMitch Waldrop speaks on the history of SFI (Twitter excerpts)The Hedgehog and the Foxby Isaiah BerlinWar and Peaceby Leo TolstoyOn the Application of Mathematics to Political Economyby F. Y. Edgeworth in Journal of the Royal Statistical SocietyHow Economics Became A Mathematical Scienceby E. Roy Weintraub at Duke University PressMachine Dreamsby Philip Mirowski at Cambridge University PressAll Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace (TV series)by Adam Curtis for BBCCan't Get You Out of My Head (TV series)by Adam Curtis for BBCThe Collective Computation Group at SFISeeing Like A Stateby James. C Scott at Yale BooksUncertain timesby Jessica Flack and Melanie Mitchell at AeonAt the limits of thoughtby David Krakauer at AeonPreventative Citizen-Based Medicineby David Krakauer for the SFI Transmissions: Reflections seriesThe uncertainty paradox. Can science make uncertainty optimistic?by Stuart Firestein (SFI Seminar)

This episode is a conversation between Professor Steve Goldsmith and Ricardo Hausmann, the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy and director of the Growth Lab, one of the most well-regarded and influential hubs for research on international development. Professor Hausmann discusses the Lab's new Metroverse tool, a powerful yet easy-to-use data visualization of urban economies across the globe. Built for policy makers, economist, communities, and businesses, the Metroverse places a city's current technological and economic capabilities in context, showing how and where any specific urban economy can move into it's "adjacent possible" growth areas. Metroverse maps and visualizes "what a city is good at today to help understand what it can become tomorrow."Listen below, or wherever you get your podcasts, to hear Professors Goldsmith and Hausman discuss data-driven policy making, diversification in metropolitan areas, and how mayors can leave their city better than they inherited it.Music credit: Summer-Man by KetsaAbout Data-Smart City SolutionsData-Smart City Solutions, housed at the Ash Center at Harvard Kennedy School, is working to catalyze the adoption of data projects on the local government level by serving as a central resource for cities interested in this emerging field. We highlight best practices, top innovators, and promising case studies while also connecting leading industry, academic, and government officials. Our research focus is the intersection of government and data, ranging from open data and predictive analytics to civic engagement technology. We seek to promote the combination of integrated, cross-agency data with community data to better discover and preemptively address civic problems. To learn more visit us online and follow us on Twitter. 

This episode is a conversation between Professor Steve Goldsmith and Ricardo Hausmann, the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy and director of the Growth Lab, one of the most well-regarded and influential hubs for research on international development. Professor Hausmann discusses the Lab's new Metroverse tool, a powerful yet easy-to-use data visualization of urban economies across the globe. Built for policy makers, economist, communities, and businesses, the Metroverse places a city's current technological and economic capabilities in context, showing how and where any specific urban economy can move into it's "adjacent possible" growth areas. Metroverse maps and visualizes "what a city is good at today to help understand what it can become tomorrow."Listen below, or wherever you get your podcasts, to hear Professors Goldsmith and Hausman discuss data-driven policy making, diversification in metropolitan areas, and how mayors can leave their city better than they inherited it.About Data-Smart City PodNew from the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, the Data-Smart City Pod brings on top innovators and leading industry, academic, and government officials to discuss data, innovation, and government. This podcast serves as a central resource for cities and individuals interested in the intersection of government and innovations, the adoption of data projects on the local government level, and how to become data smart. Hosted by Stephen Goldsmith, former Deputy Mayor of New York,  Mayor of Indianapolis, and current Professor at Harvard Kennedy School.Subscribe to the Ash Center wherever you get your podcasts for future Data-Smart City Pod episodes. Music credit: Summer-Man by KetsaAbout Data-Smart City SolutionsData-Smart City Solutions, housed at the Ash Center at Harvard Kennedy School, is working to catalyze the adoption of data projects on the local government level by serving as a central resource for cities interested in this emerging field. We highlight best practices, top innovators, and promising case studies while also connecting leading industry, academic, and government officials. Our research focus is the intersection of government and data, ranging from open data and predictive analytics to civic engagement technology. We seek to promote the combination of integrated, cross-agency data with community data to better discover and preemptively address civic problems. To learn more visit us online and follow us on Twitter. About the Ash Center The Ash Center is a research center and think tank at Harvard Kennedy School focused on democracy, government innovation, and Asia public policy. AshCast, the Center's podcast series, is a collection of conversations, including events and Q&As with experts, from around the Center on pressing issues, forward-looking solutions, and more. Visit the Ash Center online, follow us on Twitter, and like us on Facebook. For updates on the latest research, events, and activities, please signup for our newsletter.

The full conversation with Ricardo Hausmann - now with Transcript. This is a subscriber-only post.TranscriptOpening musicYou are listening to ideas Untrapped with Tobi Lawson. Tobi Lawson (intro) Welcome to another episode of ideas Untrapped and my guest today is Ricardo Hausmann, who is a professor of economic development at Harvard University, he is a former director of centre for International Development, and is currently the Director of the center's growth lab. Ricardo pioneered an approach of looking at economic development called economic complexity. My brief synopsis of the central idea is that an economy only grows and develop by learning to do many things by expanding its productive capabilities. I start by asking Ricardo, what we can learn, particularly from the East Asian experience, and what has happened in economic development over the last few decades. Thank you for always listening to the show and I hope you enjoy this one. Tobi Lawson You've been one of the most important thinkers in economic development throughout my adult life. So, it's a pleasure to speak to you. Ricardo Hausmann Pleasure to be with you. Tobi LawsonFrom Around 1990, when the results of the economic trajectory of East Asia became apparent, so many policy propositions have been developed by scholars. But, in your opinion, what do you think has been the most important lesson from that East Asian growth episode? Ricardo Hausmann I think the general experience of development is really, that development is about the growth of productive capabilities In a society, it's what our society is capable of doing and, what a society is capable of doing depends a little bit on, what are the tools and machines it has available to do things nd what are the recipes and formulas and routines and protocols it's aware of, but it's mostly about what is the know-how that it's people have and this idea of know-how is not just, you know, low and high. It's mostly How different is what each member of society knows. Because if everybody knows a lot of the same thing, the whole doesn't know much more than each individual. But if each individual knows different than the whole can know a lot, even if each individual doesn't know that much. So this division of know how in society allows for individuals to specialise and society to diversify, that a society is able to do more, because it's individuals are all different. I am originally from Venezuela, and we're Nigeria. And we all think that we are rich because we have¹ oil. And then something bad happened to explain why, given that we're rich, we're not so rich, but we're rich, because we have our, our society is rich, not because of what it has. But because of what it knows how to do. And the growth and development of a society is the growth and development of what it knows how to do well. That's the core of things. And so if you ask about East Asia, well, they started in agriculture, they move to garments, then they move to textiles, then they move to electronics, then they move to cars, and move to chemicals and shapes, and so on. So, if you look at what they have been good at, that is something that has been very rapidly changing. They become good at more things. And they can become sufficiently good at those things that they can sell them outside of the country. And if you look at their export baskets, they have been evolving dramatically. In the directions I just mentioned, if you look at the export basket of Nigeria, or the export basket or Venezuela, the only thing you'll find there is oil. But when you look at the amount of oil we're talking about, it's really peanuts. It's really, so it's not that we have a lot of oil, it's that it's the only game in town. You know, Nigeria is a society of about 200 million people, cruises about 2 million barrels of oil a day. That's like a 100th of a barrel of oil per capita. That's 100th of a $60. That's 60 cents. That's not much money that's coming out of here, right? So it's not that you have a lot of oil, it's that it's the only game in town. And that's a reflection of how little The company has got more things with the possible exception of Nollywood. Tobi Lawson You've finished Nigeria, I wouldn't just say Nollywood, sectors like telecommunications have been booming in the last 20 years. But looking broadly.... Ricardo Hausmann Wait, one second, one second, one second, that has allowed Nigerians to call each other. But that opens an enormous opportunity now, because one of the things that COVID has taught us is that many things that we used to do in the office, we can do from home. But anything that can be done from home, can be done from abroad. So there are many, many tasks that are currently done in rich countries. But that could be done by zoom in poor countries, in less developed countries. And that opens up new avenues for diversification, it will open up, you know, the possibility to participate in value chains that were unthinkable before, because people thought that, you know, the people doing those tasks had to live there. Now, we know that they don't have to live there. So you know, one message for all the youth in Nigeria, is that there's plenty of work in platforms like Upwork, and other such platforms where you can find jobs to do on the web. And that's thanks to the fact that you have you know, ICT information communication technology that has diffuse, but so far, that  diffusion has not changed what Nigeria is able to sell abroad. And that's, I think, where we have to aim, I mean, forms of livelihood, for Nigerians in Nigeria, by selling to people in the rest of the world Tobi Lawson Looking at your economic complexity approach to development, from your writings, and the writings of other scholars in that school, a society that knows how to do many things will grow rich, but how do we square that with the works of people like Robert Wade, who stressed the importance of manufacturing and industrialization in achieving growth and development? How should policymakers think about the knowledge we are getting from the sub discipline of economic developmentRicardo Hausmann Manufacturing was a very, very important stepping stone, for many of the societies that became rich, it was a very important stepping stone, because manufacturing require relatively low skilled labour. So it was easy to take people out of agriculture, with little education, put them in manufacturing, and manufacturing was, you know, generating much higher levels of productivity in agriculture at the time, and the levels of productivity manufacturing worldwide. So, for East Asia, this movement of people from agriculture to manufacturing was a very important stepping stone in the process of development. Some people think that manufacturing has become less unskilled labour intensive, it has become more skill intensive and more capital intensive. So it doesn't necessarily generate as many jobs as before and there aren't that many sort of like entry level jobs as as before. But I think they're still there. They're still there. So I think that, you know, a prosperous Nigeria would have much more manufacturing than it has today and creating the ecosystem for that manufacturing to happen is very important. And for that, I think that creating the ecosystem means what? It means that needs spaces where people can locate their factories, say, so that workers can go in and out efficiently and not spend two hours going there and two hours back home, that the materials can get in and out that you're relatively close to an efficient port, where you can bring materials from the rest of the world or send materials to the rest of the world, that you can participate in global value chain so that you give up on this idea that everything that you want to manufacture has to be manufactured with locally available raw materials, which is one of the most destructive ideas that is very popular in Africa that you want to, as you say, what's the term that you use there "beneficiate" your raw materials locally, and that that's like the angle of development. We can elaborate but that's a very, very dangerous and counterproductive idea. So you will need you know, a place that has electricity, water, security. So creating those spaces where manufacturing can thrive definitely is a path going forward and I would I would put the less attention to some of the things that goes by the older industrial policy name, and more attention to just making sure that you create spaces where a Nigerian manufacturer can be very, very productive. Tobi Lawson Let's talk a bit about the political economy of this. What exactly is the role of the state because what mostly obtains in countries like Nigeria, and the rest is heavy state involvement in trying to industrialise and doing industrial policy, allocate resources and credit and, there isn't more emphasis on the role of the private sector and even in the market. So how important is the state in this process, and what exactly is the role of the state in nurturing a growing economy? Ricardo Hausmann So, I think that the role of the state is huge. But it has to be smart, it has to be complimentary, it has to enhance the possibilities of the rest of society and not substitute the possibilities of the rest of society. So let me give you an example. Every technology you can imagine, is a combination of some things that you can buy in the market, and some things that cannot be purchased in the market that either they are provided by the state, or they're not provided. So you know, there is a market for cars, and you can go out and buy a car and different kinds of cars. There's no market for roads, or for traffic lights, or for driving rules, or for traffic police. So a car is a private good, it exists in a universe full of public goods. If the state does not provide the roads, the cars are not very useful, right? That's what I mean by the state complementing the rest of society. So society can organise some things and not others. So it's very important that the state be very good at providing the things that cannot be provided by markets. And those are quite a few. So for example, electricity penetration in Nigeria is still very low and remains a very, very significant obstacle to progress in spite of massive investments in that area. So electricity, you know, an efficient port system and efficient road system, and efficient urban transportation system, public education, you know no public health, there are so many so many tasks. Now in learning, things that can be done by markets, there's also a lot that can be done, let me tell you a little bit of a secret of the US success. If you look at Silicon Valley, for example, well, let's look first at the US as a whole, the US as a whole 14% of the population of the US is foreign born. But, if you look at the entrepreneurs in the US, 29% are foreign born. So the foreign born represent you know double the share of the entrepreneurs, than they represent the share of the population. If you look in Silicon Valley, and everybody's trying to imitate Silicon Valley, 54% of the science, technology, engineering and math workers of Silicon Valley, the stem workers 54% are foreign born, and the other 46% were not born in California, even though California is a state that has 40 million people. So the secret of Silicon Valley, is not that they have fantastic school systems and fantastic universities, and so on and so forth. It is really that they're able to attract global talent and one of the things that Africa has done in general, is that it has closed itself to the attraction of foreign talent. In many countries, it's very hard to get a visa to become a permanent resident or work permit. There is no path to citizenship. There are restrictions in how many foreigners a firm can hire, etc, etc. So, you know, in Africa, many countries cannot stop their citizens from going and working abroad. But the countries are very effective in preventing foreigners to come in, except at the very low end. So, one of the things that you want to think about in order to industrialise and to get into other things is to be able to attract talent, global talent that is capable of enhancing the capabilities you have. There's no shame in doing that. That's how it's being done in the in the rich countries. You know, everybody wants to become Singapore. But they don't know that Singapore is 45% foreign born. Singapore is what it is because it's able to attract global talent. So, you know, a lot of the improvements in the South African financial system is because they were able to attract all the Zimbabweans that were leaving Mugabe and get jobs, you know, all the educated Zimbabweans moved to South Africa. And that was very good for South Africa. So there's a lot in terms of attracting new know-how that can be done by trying to attract foreign talent. Another thing that you can do is to leverage your diaspora. Most African countries have a very significant diaspora. Much of that diaspora is in richer countries more developed countries and that diaspora is being exposed to new ways of doing business, to new industries, to new ideas, they can become a very, very important source of diversification of progress that has been documented by analysts at cellion, for the case of Taiwan, for the case of India, for the case of Israel, for many instances in which diasporas were very important in transforming the opportunities of the country. So, you want to leverage all of these things that can allow society to become more productive, more capable, more able to do more things. And no, the role of the government is in some sense not to prevent that from happening, to complement that with all the things that cannot be organised through markets, through private firms, and then, you know, maybe here and there, there's an additional space for, you know, focusing things, you know, just if there were good industrial zones, well connected by infrastructure ports, were supplied by electricity and water, well connected to places where workers live through an urban transport system, and so on. I'm sure that a lot of people would look into doing manufacturing in Nigeria. Tobi LawsonI want to get more from your answer by extending that question to state capacity. So many scholars have argued that state capacity is even the secret sauce, so to speak, of the success of East Asia, including China, and you get the impression that a state has to have fully formed capacity to deliver on so many things before it can then nurture growth and development. But you have argued in one of your lectures that I just saw that there is a coevolution, that happens between the state and the economy in terms of capabilities. So how does this co evolution work in practice, as opposed to the standard view of a fully formed capable state? Ricardo Hausmann Some people would like to say, Well, you know, first you have to have a capable state, and then you can have development. But until you get a capable state, you cannot get development. So focus on getting a capable state. But then you ask yourself the question, and how is that capable state going to rise? What's going to find that capable state if it's not a society that is able to pay the taxes and so on to feed that capable state. So So in fact, what you ended up having is a society that needs to develop in order to feed a more capable state, and a more capable state that is able to help society continuous development process. So at every point in time, you have states of very different capacities. And as a consequence, societies have a certain level of capacity consistent with that capacity of the state. So what you end up having is, the more society develops, the more resources can be put available to the state for it to do its thing. And the more the state does its thing, the more the society can develop. So these things are growing at the same time, or they're growing together. But a very important important question that you have to ask yourself, when you're thinking about the state, you're thinking about the Nigerian state. Now, what does it mean to be Nigerian? Who is Nigerian? Who is included in being Nigerian? When the state acts on behalf of Nigerians? It acts on behalf of whom? Is that on behalf of the Hausa? Does it act on behalf of the Yoruba? Does it act on behalf of the ibo? What does it mean to be Ibo and Nigerian or Hausa and Nigeria? How many things do you want to be decided in Abuja? And how many things we want to have decided at the different states, state government? So you have a relatively federal structure in Nigeria? Is that because you think that people have stronger regional identities than they have for a national identity? When you talk about Japan, or you talk about Korea, you're talking about societies that are internally very homogeneous. A Japanese person is somebody who speaks Japanese. A Korean person is somebody who speaks Korean. How many languages are spoken in Nigeria? Tobi Lawson (interjects) About 500… Ricardo Hausmann So obviously, it's not having a state is somebody's state, whose state is it? So I think one of the things that is a challenge is the construction of a Nigerian identity that can support the state. Right? Because the state is underpinned by a certain sense of us. The state is our state, it is done for us. It is how we do things collectively and it's Very important to clarify what do we mean by that we, who is inside the way, who's not inside the we, who is us, who's not us and those things are what makes often no state development difficult. Because, you know, if some people think that the state is going to be favouring some other group, then you would rather have a weak state than a state controlled by somebody who's not you and those things makes statecraft harder. Tobi LawsonI mean, devolution of powers from the centre is one of the conversations that Nigeria is having right now, especially in the light of the recent insecurity, issues and poverty, we would see how that works. But let me quickly pick up on another theme. Politicians usually valourize the role of small businesses in our economy, but in one of your essays that has made a very big impression on me. You took a different approach by looking at the role of big businesses in nurturing development and enrichment. Can you expatiate a bit on the role of big businesses in an economy. Ricardo HausmannSo I think when you have a very developed society, you tend to have, you know, markets for every possible input you want. You want electricity, somebody sells electricity, you want to photocopy or you want to print this stuff, there is a store that prints stuff for you, you want to design a campaign ad or television ad or cover it, you know, there's some people that design that. So you can start a business and buy everything else from the stuff that people produce around you. Right, so all of your possible inputs are things that other firms can do for you. So you can start small, and buy everything you need from everybody else. When you start in a less developed society. Many of those things that you wish you could buy from everybody else are just not there. And maybe you have to self provide your own electricity, maybe you'll have to print your own stuff, maybe you'll have to design your own covers, maybe we'll have to have all of these things done inside the company, because there are no reliable suppliers outside the company. So as a consequence, you know, modern firms tend to start bigger in less developed countries than in more developed countries, in more developed countries, you can just rely on other people doing stuff for you. As a consequence, no existing Corporation, or in some sense, organisations that have developed the capacity to provide internally things that markets cannot do for them. So once they exist, they have typically financial capital, they have a managerial capital, they have a reputational capital, that allows them to make it much easier for them to start a new line of business. You know, the Silicon Valley way to start a new line of business is that you create a startup, a startup is very easy to create in Silicon Valley, or in a very advanced place, because everything that the startup needs they can buy out there. But in the place where you cannot buy everything out there. You cannot start that small. But a corporation, a conglomerate, if it were to decide to diversify into more line of business, it could just reallocate some of its managers, it could reallocate some of its cash flows. It could because of its reputation, it could do joint ventures with other companies, maybe some foreign company or something that can bring in some technology and they can do things as a group that a startup cannot do. So that's why I wrote this piece saying, you know, a conglomerates can be and war in the case of Japan and Korea, a fundamental story of the growth process. Japan and Korea diversified because Toyota, Mitsubishi, di Woo, Samsung diversified internally as conglomerates. Right? It's not that just more companies appeared, it's that those companies diversified. So, I think that it's an important avenue for growth that a country should consider, but,  conglomerates can come You know, can be a force for good or they can be a force for bad either. conglomerates can just become you know, monopolist in one industry move to the next industry and become a monopolist there move to next industry and become a monopolist there and then suddenly become a huge barrier to entry for other people. It's very important that the conglomerates do well and this was the case of Japan and Korea, They are exporters, you tolerate conglomerates because they are exporters', a conglomerate that only sells domestically. It's like one of the local football teams. A conglomerate that exports is like the the national team. It's like the one that's playing at the World Cup. It's facing massive competition from other companies in other countries. So it deserves all the support of society. But a conglomerate that only sells domestically, you know, it has the danger of just becoming the local monopolist and stifling everybody else from competing against them. So, conglomerates can be a stepping stone, can be an avenue for growth, but they have to be good conglomerates. Tobi Lawson Let's talk about trade and I will set the scenario this way, a little over a year ago, about a year and a half. Nigeria closed its borders to all forms of trade. The justification was that the country is far too much of a dumping ground, especially for agricultural products, which we can actually produce locally. They were extreme measures to prevent imports of some of these products and the result, some would argue, as they argued against the move at the time, has been disastrous. Food inflation is through the roof, people became poorer. People are having to spend more on food than anything else, mostly vulnerable households. But you still hear people, either policymakers or even intellectuals, say that these are necessary sacrifices that developing countries have to make in order to industrialise. You have people like Ha Joon Chang, who provide intellectual guidance for this view, and that the West in its own process of industrialization went through much of the same thing, as a scholar who has also done a lot of work on trade for a poor developing country. What is the right way to think about trade policy? Ricardo HausmannOkay, first of all, let's separate trade from just macro-economic mismanagement. Because a lot of the problem of Nigeria comes not from trade mismanagement, but from the trade consequences of macro-economic mismanagement, you have exchange controls, dual exchange rate regimes, etc. That's not because you want to have an industrial policy. That's because you have messed up your macro policies. That is you have a government that has a deficit that is insufficiently finance. So it has to print money to finance it. As it prints the money, the dollar goes through the roof, the naira tanks, right. And then the government doesn't like that, And it wants to say that, you know, it's running out of foreign exchange. So it puts exchange controls, it tries to limit people's access to dollars, and so on. And in that context, it creates an environment where it's very hard for companies to get tools and machines from abroad, it's very hard for them to get raw materials, intermediate inputs, spare parts from abroad and it just makes them extremely unproductive and as a consequence, they have uncompetitive products that they cannot sell anywhere else, but in Nigeria, through enormous protection. Now, trying to do things without importing the tools, the raw materials, the intermediate inputs, the spare parts, is just trying to do things in a very, very difficult way. It's trying to, you know, as my father likes to say, "Why make things difficult if you can make them impossible," the way the world works, is that you don't have to make everything yourself. You just have to do some steps that add value to the things that they that you're going to put together. I remember having a conversation with Governor Fashola in Legos. And he's saying, you know, we want to have a furniture industry. So we want to prohibit the imports of foreign wood for furniture, we want it done with Nigerian wood, and said, You know, you're the governor of Lagos, not all furniture has to be made out of wood, could be made out of metals, it could be made out of plastics, it could be made out of other materials, right and all of the materials you want for furniture industry, or as far as the Lagos sport. So if you want a furniture industry, by all means have a furniture industry, but don't dump on the furniture industry the responsibility of only making furniture by buying inputs in Nigeria, because that's a recipe for disaster. If for some reason your inputs you couldn't buy in Nigeria for x or y or you could buy some inputs and not the others. Like you can buy two legs of the chair but not the other two legs. Well, then that's not a chair. So focus on making sure that your units of production have what it takes for them to succeed and that often implies access to the raw materials that intermediate inputs, the tools, spare parts that no Nigeria doesn't currently make. But that's fine. That's how East Asia did it. If you look at, you know, they started exporting garments, they weren't making the textiles, and they weren't making the fibres, and they weren't making the cotton. They started cutting and sewing and then they move from cutting and sewing to designing the shirts and so on, then they move to making the textiles then they move to maybe making the artificial threads that went into new forms of textiles and they did that gradually. But they did not start by closing themselves off from all the inputs that the world produces, and that you could use to make stuff in Nigeria. So I would say the problem in Nigeria, is that you have a fiscal problem that is being solved by printing too much money that generates an exchange rate mess, that exchange rate mess, creates an environment that makes it very difficult for companies to operate. And in that process, it generates an overvalued exchange rate, which makes manufacturing artificially uncompetitive, and you get less of it, not more of it, less of it because you want, you know, you're constraining the exchange rate at which they could be exporting. And you're constraining their access to raw materials and intermediate inputs. So if anything, you're hurting the chances for growth, not helping them. Tobi Lawson Part of the reasons asscribed to countries like Nigeria, finding it impossible to industrialise, or even diversify their sources of income is the "resource curse" hypothesis. First of all,  is this a real thing, are countries like Venezuela and Nigeria poor because of the so called Dutch disease? And secondly, how do countries that are also resource rich like Norway and Australia, who are rich and highly developed? How did they manage to break out of the "resource curse." Ricardo Hausmann So there are different interpretations of the resource curse when the Dutch disease was coined. It was coined because there was a boom in the Netherlands of a natural gas exports. And those natural gas exports meant that they were exporting a lot, generating a lot of foreign exchange, and their local currency strengthened and that strengthening of the local currency made the rest of the economy uncompetitive. So, if that were the problem, then that would have been a problem in 2007 In Nigeria when the price of oil reached $140 a barrel. But then it goes away as a problem now after 2014 when the price of oil went under $40. Right. So that's no longer the problem, right? I mean, Nigeria's exports of oil are coming down, oil production is stagnant, domestic oil consumption is up. So oil exports are going nowhere, and the price of oil is now lower than it was 10 years ago. Okay. So excess of foreign exchange that used to be called the Dutch disease is no longer a problem. I wrote a paper with my colleague Roberto Rigobon, saying that the problem may not be just how much foreign exchange your oil makes, but just the fact that it's a very volatile amount. Now that it goes up in some years down another year. So the exchange rate as a consequence is very unstable and unpredictable and it makes business in the country, very risky, because you don't know what is the exchange rate or you're going to face and that's not so much because you have a lot of oil, it's just because oil income is very volatile. So that's a separate problem. And that one typically has to be addressed by having some mechanism that stabilises government finances. So you have to run a government that has unstable income and wants to have stable spending programmes. So you want kids to be able to go to school every year. You want roads cleaned and repaired every year. You want to have the hospitals open every year. You want to police services every year but your income is going up and down. How do you do that? That's a problem of stabilising the government accounts and that's a different kind of problem of living with oil. A third problem of living with oil is something that they call rent-seeking. That is, all the money is in the government, then people who are very entrepreneurial, instead of setting up businesses may dedicate themselves to trying to grab the money that the government has. And so it distorts the incentives of society from, you know, doing things that are productive to doing things that are unproductive but profitable in just trying to seek the rents that the state has. I honestly, don't think that that's that big of a problem in Nigeria, given how small our oil revenues, vis a vis, the size of the society. So I think the big puzzle in Nigeria is why the country has not diversified more, given how little oil it has, you know, in a country like Kuwait or in a country like the United Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi, you know, you can ask yourself a question, Well, why would they diversify, they have so much foreign exchange that they don't know what to do with it? The question in Nigeria is why have you not diversified in spite of the fact that oil is generating so little revenue these days? Tobi LawsonI'll just ask you a few off the cuff question, what is your opinion on on the so called Washington Consensus, has it failed In Africa or Latin America? Is it misunderstood? Do developing countries need to think beyond macroeconomic stability and all the other recipes proposed by the IMF? What was the way to think about this? Ricardo Hausmann Okay, so the Washington Consensus is a term that was coined by John Williamson who just passed away a week or two ago in a seminar in 1989 or 1990. I think it was 1990, a seminar that was called 'Latin American adjustment, how much has happened?' So it was really a Latin American question. Latin America was in a debt crisis, the debt crisis was associated with the fact that during the oil boom of the 1970s, it had borrowed too much money, then it was unable to pay that money and it was mired in, in a debt crisis and the question is, how do you get out of there and john Williamson said, there are these 10 things that sort of like Washington institutions agree, would be good to sort of like get out of the Latin American debt crisis. But then these 10 things became like the 10 commandments. You can take them to Eastern Europe, you can take them to sub Saharan Africa, you can take them to North Africa and the Middle East. You take them out of context, and they're supposed to work marvels no matter what. It's, it's it, in my mind, policies have to be solutions to problems. Tell me the problem, let's design a solution. It's not here are 10 solutions. You haven't told me what the problem is. So I think that policies have to be problem driven, and not solution driven and Washington Consensus is a set of solutions without a problem. So in my mind, it ended up creating an environment in which people stopped thinking about what are the policies that they need to adopt, and just as to whether they have or haven't adopted the 10 policies in the list, even if those 10 policies in the list wouldn't solve the problem that we're trying to solve? Because, you know, you haven't even asked the question, what is the problem you're trying to solve? So that's why, with my colleagues, Andres Velasco and Dani Rodrik, we develop this idea of growth diagnostics, that the first thing you have to do is to try to understand what the problem is and once you have a clear idea of what the nature of the problem is, then let's explore the solution space and most likely, you're not going to end in the Washington Consensus, because you know, it will be a coincidence that you do. So from a certain point of view, the worst thing that was delivered by the Washington Consensus, is that it encouraged people to stop thinking of what the right policies are and just assuming that they have an implemented as list of policies that may not be the right ones. Tobi LawsonYou've also been in government in Venezuela. So I'll ask you, what you think holds up the use of knowledge by policymakers? Or should I say what prevents the right diagnosis of the problems that some poor countries have? Because, what you find is that and Nigeria is also a good example of this. What you find is that a lot of these countries, even though different administrations different political actors, they come into power and repeat the same policies that have been tried in the past and failed. So, what prevents the diffusion of knowledge at a governmental level? Ricardo HausmannWell, I mean, I think that people do not act on the basis of how they see the world on the ideas that they have in their heads, and on the interpretations they make of the world. So ideas can change the world, if they change how people think about the world, how people interpret the world, how, how those ideas, help them to think how to act on the world. And I'm an optimist in the sense that I've tried to develop ideas, diffuse ideas, train people, educate people, work with governments, try to help them think through issues that they face. That's why I created the growth lab, the growth lab is a group of about 50 people, and we not only do fundamental research on the issues of economic development and growth. But, we also work with countries around the world, trying to help them think through these issues and we also you know, teach and educate them, and so on. So, I think ideas have a complicated way of diffusing. I think a lot of the problems in the world are related to the diffusion or the popularity of some bad ideas and if I didn't believe that I wouldn't be in the business of trying to produce new ideas, diffuse good ideas, and so on, or what I think are good ideas. So for example, I think that the Washington Consensus has been pretty much superseded by the idea that policies have to be solutions to problems and not solutions in search of a problem and that you don't start by assuming that you know, what the solution is, before you clarify what the nature of the problem is and I think those ideas have permeated even, you know, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and so on, with difficulty, because the alternative paradigm is still popular. I mean, this whole idea of best practices, very dangerous idea, it supposes that people know how to do things, like here's the right the right way to do things, which presumes something like, you know, there is the perfect suit and you know, there's no such thing as a perfect suit, there's only a perfectly tailored suit, and everybody has a different body. So you have to tailor the suit differently and there's a lot of detail in the tailoring. So one thing is how do you defuse better ideas? And the other thing is, is it a problem of politicians not wanting to know, because the ideas they have, are an expression more of their interests than not their knowledge? It's like they like the idea because it advances their interests? Or is it just that they are wrong, or they have the wrong view of the world and you know, there's a big debate on whether its interests or whether it's ideas, the nature of the problem. I'm an optimist in the sense that I think that a lot of the things that happen in the world can be fixed by proving the ideas with which people see the world, analyse the world, interpret the world, think about the world and that's why I'm in the business of, you know, research, and teaching, you know, researching better ideas and teaching about them and by the way, Nigeria is one of the countries that sends more people to our executive education courses at the Harvard Kennedy School. There's, there's a huge community of people who have had some connection with the Harvard Kennedy School in Nigeria and you know, these are the ideas that will teach. So I'm hoping that the, you know, the reason why you have a podcast, the reason why you are trying to promote these discussions is because you also believe that the nature of the ideas with which people think the world is important for progress. That's why you do what you do. Tobi Lawson Thank you. I have a question, the relationship between democracy and development is also one that comes up regularly. I know there is a Acemoglu and Naidu paper that more or less, infer that democracy is good for growth. But lots of people, I will see people with other interests, but that's speculative, would say, Oh, well look at China. China is an authoritarian one party state and look at all the growth they have, what are the nuances on these relationships between democracy and growth or any political system? Ricardo Hausmann So I like very much the ideas about this that have been, you know, growing in a certain political economy literature, where people like Hans Rosling or Mounk or Yascha Mounk, or Dani Rodrik have been proposing, and that's that you really want to distinguish between three different rights. Okay, One is the right of the majority to make decisions about democracy. Right. So, you know, the governments are decided by a majority of people. So that's, you know, making sure that the government represents a significant swath of the population. That's, that's one idea, call that democracy. A second idea, is the idea of some kind of universal rights, that they yes, no, you might be in the minority. But that doesn't mean that the majority can kill, you can expropriate, you can harm you and torture you. Right, that there are some inalienable rights that are protected for everybody, whether you're in the majority or in the minority. And that's different. That's an idea that is often associated with liberalism. So the idea of liberal democracy is this funny balance between the majority rules, but everybody has some guarantees, right and then there is the third problem. So this second problem is called individual rights, it's very important if you're going to have something like a market economy, because if property is going to be poorly distributed as as it is everywhere, then if the majority decides to expropriate the minority, then the minority is not going to play ball and if they are the ones that have dropped the knowledge, their capacity to organise businesses and so on, they don't play ball, then there's no development. So you have to balance this individual rights with these with the idea of majority rule and on top of that, you may have other rights, a social rights that that people might want to have protected, you know, the majority might be a Muslim, and and there's a Christian minority or vice versa, do the social rights of the minority, are they protected? So there's like individual rights, social rights and majority rule and when we say democracy, we don't necessarily make these distinctions. But, what I will tell you is that the protection of individual rights is fundamental. That majority rule is also important, that these two things making them compatible is difficult and what makes it difficult to make it compatible is that somebody has to tell the majority, the elected government, the majority of society, you cannot do these things to the others and who's that thing? Well, it's suppose it's, it's an independent judiciary, something that is not under majority rule and those are the things that these populists like to destroy.  These checks and balances, that are in the system to defend the rights of the individual or the rights of minorities. So I will tell you that democracy if it's majority rule, that does not protect the rights of the individual is not going to be good for development and a lot of the development of the 19th century in Europe, happen in liberal governments, that is governments that protected individual rights, that were not democratic. So I would, instead of asking the question, you know, democracy, good or bad, I would ask the question, majority rule, individual rights, minority social rights, are they being protected? And obviously, it's great if you have all three. But let's not assume that just because you have majority rule you have all three. Tobi LawsonWhat about the issue of globalisation? I know your colleague, Dani Rodrik has written about this, he has this famous trilemma. How much should developing countries worry about things like the globalisation of capital, the level of interconnectedness of the economies with the developed countries and other parts of the world and some of the risk that may come with that, like the global financial crisis of 2008. So how should developing countries think about this, we also have the Asian Financial currency crisis of 1997 as a backdrop. Ricardo  Hausmann So as a backdrop, so the way I think about it is that, you know, Nigeria is a country of 200 million people give or take, that give or take is about 3% of the world population. If ideas were one per capita, then 97% of the ideas are outside of Nigeria and you want to use all of the ideas available to create progress in Nigeria. So you want Nigeria to connect to this global social brain. So inserting Nigeria in the flow of these ideas, these know-hows, these technologies, these ways of doing things is very important for Nigeria's development and this quote unquote, 'globalisation' this interconnection. Now people emphasize a lot, on capital flows and, or maybe goods and services. But I want to emphasise insertion of Nigeria into other flows into the flows of people Nigerians abroad and how they connect back home that they asked for, or foreigners in Nigeria? How can they bring in stuff? ideas? Know how there was not there before? How do you connect your universities abroad? How you connect your research centres with the rest of the world, etc. So how interconnected are your possibilities with, you know, all the advances of the world. So from that point of view, I will say that globalisation is a force for good. I think that, as I mentioned before, one of the key developments going forward is going to be the fact that a lot of the tasks in the world can be done from anywhere and that creates an opportunity for Nigerians to be able to perform tasks, sell their their ideas, do stuff for the rest of the world, through zoom, or, you know, Microsoft Teams, or whatever. So, you know, right now, we are producing a podcast, you're in Nigeria, I'm in the US, we didn't ask permission for anybody to do this, we're producing something jointly and you wouldn't want a world where this becomes illegal or becomes regulated or restricted. So I think that these opportunities are probably more valuable for developing countries and therefore developed countries, it's a very important stepping stone forward. So I hope the world remains sufficiently open, so that the countries in the global south are able to tap into the flows of progress that are happening elsewhere in the world. Now, that doesn't mean that you have to renounce national sovereignty too much. But it's very important to understand that there are two competing goals. One goal is to have sovereign policy. So every polity, every political community can decide more or less what it is that they want to do and that's a good thing. The other good thing is to have common policies that, you know, if we can agree on, you know, whether computers are going to run 120 volts, or 240 volts, doesn't really matter. They can work equally well, at 120, or 240. But if we have a standard, it's easier for everybody, so my stuff can work in your country and your stuff can work in my country. So having common policies is also good, and to the extent that a lot of the human interactions are happening between people who belong to different political jurisdictions, you know, people who are in different countries, then the value of common rules becomes that much more important. I like to say that sovereign state can be half a bridge over say, the river that separates it from the neighbouring country, but the other half of the bridge has to be built by the other country and on half a bridge, you don't get half the traffic, you get zero. So there is some value of having common rules. I think part of the tension that is at the core of this is that there is a good thing of having sovereign national rules that the local political community can agree on, and have in common rules, rules that are respected both by us and by people in the rest of the world that are interacting with us and that that tension is a little bit what the world is trying to figure out. But, the forces that are favouring deeper globalisation, I think are technological in nature and they're very powerful they are not, it used to be the decline in the cost of transportation. Now, it's incredible expansion of the ability to move information around and you know, you just see by the magnitude of just the number of things that are available online for you to watch whether it's Netflix or Amazon Prime, 500 different television channels, and the news of the world, etc. You would want every society to have access to COVID-19 vaccines, you wouldn't want every society to have to produce its own vaccine. So there's enormous benefits from a world where international interactions are deeper, we just need to figure out what's the political arrangements that makes that as compatible as possible with local preferences. Tobi Lawson What about inequality, which is also a very topical issue now, whether it's on TV or Davos, talking, everybody's worried about inequality issue. Is the optimal point for poor countries or developing countries to start seeing these as a problem. So what I'm saying is, do countries need to concentrate on growth first, is there a trade off, because most of the remedies to inequality at least the policy proposals involve redistribution and poor economies may not have the fiscal capacity, some attempt it, but they may not have the capacity to do the kind of redistribution that some politicians are proposing to deal with the problem. So how do you think about this? Ricardo Hausmann So I think it's very important to finish the sentence, inequality of what, because if we don't specify the what we don't know what we're talking about, and I think that a lot of the discussion presumes a what we are concerned about what inequality we're concerned about and a lot of the discussion is what you might want to call the inequality of income and the idea out there is that there's sort of like a national pie, and some people are getting very big slices of the national pie and other people are getting small slices of the national pie. And then as you say, maybe can we redistribute how people are slicing the national pie. But an alternative way of thinking about this is that there is really no national pie. There are different pies that are being baked by different organisations, by companies or firms of a different size, and so on and so in reality, what you have is an enormous inequality in the sizes of the pies that different parts of society are baking. Okay, so it's inequality in the sizes of the pie, not in the way each pie is being sliced. Imagine that each pie is a corporation, it's a company or an organisation of some kind. Well, we know some of them are informal family, micro enterprises, and some are, you know, bigger companies, and so on. So, and inside each one of them, there is a division of, of the pie in slices. But what would strike you is enormous inequality in the sizes of these pies, to call it by another name, there is enormous inequality in productivity. There are some parts of society that are operating at very low levels of productivity, you know, I drove from Abuja to Kaduna and then on to Kano, and I stopped in a bunch of rural villages, and I looked at the farms and how they were farming and how much corn they were getting per hectare, and how many hectares they had to produce, and how they were doing things. Amazingly low productivity farms, where, you know, farmers would be able working very, very hard to tender to one or two hectares, and at very low productivity and very low incomes. So one thing I really worry a lot about is what can we do to reduce the inequality in productivities and I think that the inequalities in productivities, are very large, because there's many people who are excluded from access to the things that will make them more productive to the networks of energy, or transportation, of labour markets, of knowledge, of agricultural extension services, of value chains, of storage facilities, of logistics, and so on, that would allow their work to be much more productive. So to me, a strategy of inclusion, so as to make everybody's work more productive, especially the ones that are operating at the lowest level of productivity gains, that would be good for growth, because growth has to do with how productive are people and you're able to make them more productive, output will be higher. So it's a strategy for growth. But because we're focusing on the least productive and making them more productive, you're also reducing income inequality. So our strategy for inclusion is a win-win strategy. It's a strategy that makes everybody better off and it would reduce inequality to strategy for growth. It's a strategy that would reduce inequality, a strategy of redistribution. It's sort of like compensating people for their exclusion, saying, Well, given that, you know, you have to operate in a place where there's no electricity, there's no irrigation, or no good roads, there's no storage facilities, there's no logistics, you know, so there's nobody to take your crop when it's time and it's starting to run. So you have to sell it at whatever price you can get. So we live in an environment that is very unproductive and because of that, here's a check, or here's some money. Well, that's compensating them for the fact that they cannot operate in a more productive environment, and that that's a very, very secondary improvement. These people would be much happier. If instead of compensating them for their exclusion, you would stop excluding them and focus on including them and that can be as expensive or more expensive from a fiscal space point of view than redistribution. But it implies a completely different way to think about the problem and to allocate resources. So I think that what less developed societies need is a strategy for inclusion because it's Win win and because it's better. Tobi Lawson Africa is currently at about 50% urbanisation and that's projected to reach about 75% by the middle of the century. We are quite worried about our cities, overpopulation, infrastructure, and so many other things. What do you think of new ideas and development that are coming up, like charter cities, these was first proposed by Paul Romer, a little over a decade ago, but it's gaining some traction in some circles. I know there are experiments in Honduras, and some other places, what's your opinion about fancy ideas or  radical ideas like this?Ricardo HausmannSo first of all, I think the fact that Africa is urbanising is potentially a very good thing. You're mentioning that, you know, it's dangerous, because it might require more infrastructure and so on. Well, the truth is, it's cheaper to provide infrastructure and public services in urban areas than in rural areas. So it just makes, you know, the lack of provision of infrastructure more visible maybe. But it's cheaper to provide that infrastructure in urban areas than it is in rural areas. So in principle, urbanisation can be a good thing. Unfortunately, Africa has figured out ways, and Latin America too, to make cities that are poor, and that are disastrous, and that suddenly, you might get the increases in crime and insecurity and other sorts of problems that were not there in rural life. So it's very important to get urbanisation right and I think that a critical determinant of whether a city is successful or is not successful, is one of the things that can be done in the city, and sold outside of the city, or to people who live outside of the city, every place in the country and every place in the world is dependent on being able to buy things that it doesn't make and the way to buy things that you don't make is to trade for them and for that, you have to make things that are bought by people outside of their place. So whether it's a village, whether it's a state, whether it's a city or a country, it's very, very important that you have things that you can sell to people who live outside of your place. So you can trade for the things that your place doesn't do and what we found is many cities just don't develop those things and they end up for example, one of the reasons why capital cities are so big, it's because the way they get money is by taxing the rest of the country and spending the money. But it's not that the city itself is a source of activity and wealth and production and so on. So that's why it's so important that we get cities that are competitive in a line of things that can be sold outside the city. That's the critical thing. I am not particularly enamoured by the idea that charter city is a solution for something. The idea that Paul Romer deservedly won the Nobel Prize for making us understand how difficult it is to explain growth and he has a theory of, you know, what does it take to explain global growth, that is growth at the technological frontier of the world. He doesn't really have a theory of what explains why some countries catch up and other countries don't catch up. What explains the distance that countries have relative to the technological frontier? It's a country like Singapore, with a income per capita, say of 60,000? Why are countries at $1,000 or $2,000 so? What can you do to get to $60,000? Paul Romer's contribution to economics doesn't answer that question. It asks, What determines the rate of growth of countries that are at $60,000? So he, in some sense, borrowed the idea of the problem why countries are not at $60,000 the things that prevent you from being at the technological frontier. He thinks that the reason why countries don't approach the technological frontier is because they have bad institutions. That's his explanation. That they have bad institutions and, and charter cities are a way of like buying good institutions, important, good institutions and that's his interpretation of what happened in Hong Kong. Hong Kong because of, you know, the settlement of the wars with China, it was given to Britain and it was run by Britain and it was British rules that led to the growth of Hong Kong. So he's saying why can't we make other places like Hong Kong, I will put it to you that the reason why countries don't approach the technological frontier is not necessarily institutions that you can import. It's technology itself. Technology has trouble diffusing. So the distance with technological frontiers is of technological distance and the reason why you don't catch up in that technological distance is because of the nature of technology itself. The kinds of institutions that you can import are not the only thing there was because you know, after all, the British Empire had a bunch of charter cities under British rule. That didn't make Ghana or Bangladesh or Sri Lanka rich, right. So I don't necessarily think that that technological gap can be fixed by the kind of importing of institutions by chartering your city to somebody who knows how to run things. It might be in some sense, a way of importing government technology if you want to put it in my language. So I think that the problem is really trying to understand how technology diffuses, I think the future is a lot in the hands of people that it's much easier to move brains than it is to move know how into brains. That's why I emphasise before migration diasporas promoting foreign direct investment, maybe having your conglomerates internationalise and connect your country to the rest of the world, that it is through these channels that technology flows, and it's those channels that we need to focus on. Tobi Lawson One of my final question will be going further on that note, again, last couple of years, we've seen the rise of the use of RCT in economics research, particularly development economics, built on the work of Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, and, I'm Michael Kremer, who are Nobel winners and you can see the idea gained a lot of traction where you have nonprofit organisations like Givewell adopting a lot of the findings from the research from these new school of thought so to speak. What are your impressions of this turn in development economics research, generally, especially the influence on policy? I'll give you an example. Nigeria, for example has been trying we have this national policy of lifting a 100 million people out of poverty. But when you change the proposal, what you will find is this basket of proposals that have been lifted from RCTs, you know, social interventions, cash transfers and they haven't really worked and you will find that international aid organisations and policymakers love them. So, what is your impression of this turn in development economics, have we given up on growth, is that it? Ricardo Hausmann So I think that, you know, randomised controlled trials, RCTs are a tool and, you know, they are very good to answer some questions, they are useless to answer other questions. So for example, if you want to know if it's better, to give money to farmers at the time of harvesting, or give money to farmers at the time of sowing, and in terms of you know, the impact on their well being, and so on, maybe you find that it's better to give farmers money at the time of sowing because then they can use that money to sow and if you give them the money at time of harvesting, then they already have money. So giving them more money at the time when they already have money is not the ideal time to give them money. So so maybe that's something you can answer with a randomised control trial. What kind of structure should a country have? What Social Security structure should a country have? What infrastructure plan should a country have? What exchange rate regime should a country have? What, even educational system should a country have, those things you cannot do RCT on? You know, they're just not the instrument to answer those questions. So if you only do things for which you can do an RCT, you are going to be doing some kinds of things just because, you know, as they say, you look for the keys under the lamppost, not because you lost the keys on the lamppost, it's because it's the only place where you can see something. RCTs I think, have twisted the development agenda away from policies that are probably the most impactful, but for which you cannot do RCTs and into something that my good friend Lance Pritchard likes to call kinky development policies, that they are kinky in the sense that they want to do a small kink. So for example, you can do an RCT and whether putting flip charts in a school improves learning, or whether giving tablets to kids in a school improves learning, or whether taking a picture of teachers when they attend school improves teacher attendance and consequently, student learning. So all of these things you can do an RCT on, you can take a bunch of schools, you do it in some schools or another schools, and you see if it made a difference. But those are answers to super small questions to small kinks, in if you want in the way you do things. They don't go to answer more fundamental questions as to how to organise many, many aspects of society. So in my mind, the idea, by the way, and the answer much less than the promise, for example, they can tell you that if you do it this way, it works better than if you do it that way. If you give micronutrients to children in Guatemala, that it improves their learning. Okay, it doesn't answer two questions. The first question is, how does it do it? Does it do it? Because it improves their nutrition? Does it do it because we connected the family to a set of services that had other benefits for other reasons. For example, you can do an RCT, give half a million people, we force them to smoke and the other half a million people you force them not to smoke and then we look at the difference in cancer rates to see if smoking causes cancer. But, it doesn't tell you what about smoking causes cancer. What is the substance in smoking that triggers the cancer? We learn nothing about the biology of the process, the mechanism of the process and secondly, if you say give macronutrients in Guatemala, and it works, you don't know if it would work in Nigeria or if it would work in Norway, or in Singapore because maybe in other places kids don't have those deficiencies. You can do an RCT to find that, you know, whether if you give tablets to kids in school, you want to know if they can improve learning or not and you find out that it didn't improve learning. What have you learned? Well, you've already learned that that tablet used in that particular way, with that particular teaching materials in the tablet, by teachers trained in that particular way, didn't make much difference. But it doesn't answer the question. If you were to try to improve education in the school, and one of the elements would be the tablet, how should we use the tablet? What teaching materials should the tablet include? How should the teacher use those teaching materials? What should students be expected to do with those teaching materials? and so on? So it doesn't answer any of those questions? It just tells you, you did x, do some didn't have some effect or not have that effect. And as a consequence, I think one of the bad things that the RCT revolution has done is it has tended to put donors and a lot of attention to these small questions that can be answered by RCTs away from the really important questions that may not be answerable to RCTs. Tobi Lawson Do you think that economists should be more involved or influential in the politics in developing economies, for example, it's impossible to know this, but I want to pose the hypothetical anyway. How would Venezuela have fared if you were the president instead of the economic Minister? Ricardo Hausmann So, I think for economics to do its work? Well, it should be a science that answers questions. But that politics should be decided not only on the basis of technical solutions to questions, but also in terms of social preferences of what people want done, what priorities people have, what's more important for them, what do they want? And so I think that science cannot be a substitute of the political process. I think science should participate in the political process. I don't like when people say, you know, government should do what scientists tells them to do. Science doesn't answer the questions that many political systems need to address. For example, science can tell you if there is contagion, or there is a contagion in schools or how much contagion in schools varies. It might help you understand how are people getting infected and how they get

It was enlightening as expected to talk to Harvard professor of economic development Ricardo Hausmann. He has a refreshing take on all of my questions - and I believe he is one of the most important thinkers on development ever. You can check out some of his work for Harvard’s CID Growth Lab (where he is the Director) here - you can also find many of his lectures on Youtube.You can listen and download directly on the website or simply search for the podcast on any of your preferred platforms (Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, etc). I wrote a companion essay discussing the core of Ricardo’s ideas, through the lens of the evolution of the popular ideas in development in recent past decades. The essay is only available to paying subscribers - it is also available to our patrons on Patreon or here. You can support the work my team and I do by becoming a paying subscriber or through Patreon. This is a public episode. Get access to private episodes at www.ideasuntrapped.com/subscribe

El 7 de junio de 2017 tuvo lugar en la Fundación Rafael del Pino la conferencia de Ricardo Haussamnn, director del Center for International Development de la Universidad de Harvard, titulada “Nosotros y la prosperidad”, en la que analizó la relación entre desarrollo económico y sentimiento de identidad, de pertenencia a un grupo o comunidad, de las sociedades. Hausmann empezó preguntándose qué hace que los países sean ricos o pobres, una cuestión que se viene planteando desde que Adam Smith publicó “La riqueza de las naciones” en 1776. Por entonces, el país más rico del mundo era Holanda y su renta per cápita era cuatro veces superior a la de los países más pobres. Pero lo que era un problema de 4 a 1 se convirtió en un problema de 256 a 1. La razón de ello es que la renta per cápita tiene un comportamiento particular a lo largo del tiempo. Durante toda la historia ha permanecido estancada, hasta los 200 últimos años en que empezó a crecer. Su representación gráfica es cómo un palo de hockey, con los dos últimos siglos formando la base de la “J”. Acemoglu y Robinson, en su conocida obra “Por qué fracasan los países”, explican que la diferencia entre los países ricos y los países pobres se debe a la mayor o menor calidad de sus instituciones. Sin embargo, cuando se observan países como México, en el que las diferencias de renta entre sus distintos estados son muy altas, a pesar de tener el mismo sistema económico, político, judicial, etc., cabe concluir que la explicación es otra. La respuesta puede encontrarse en la tecnología o, mejor dicho, en la combinación de las herramientas y protocolos que proporciona con el know how, o saber hacer, de las personas que trabajan con la tecnología. Es preciso complementar la tecnología con ese know how porque sin él no es casi nada. Ese know how, sin embargo, se mueve con dificultad. Las herramientas se pueden transportar de un país a otro, de un país rico a uno pobre. Los protocolos se pueden subir a internet para que estén disponibles para todo el mundo, pero con el know how no sucede lo mismo, fundamentalmente porque la tecnología moderna necesita equipos de personas que poseen distintos know how que colaboran en la producción. Eso es lo que hace que sea difícil moverlo, que hay que desplazar no personas, sino equipos de gente. Una sociedad tiene más know how porque sabe hacer más cosas y la gente está especializada. Como los individuos saben distintas cosas y estas difieren de una persona a otra, las sociedades en conjunto saben mucho. Las organizaciones modernas movilizan una gran cantidad de conocimiento para funcionar porque los productos son como las palabras: se producen juntando know how de la misma forma que las palabras se construyen uniendo letras. A medida que aumenta la diversidad de know how en un sistema, aumenta no solo la cantidad de productos distintos que pueden hacerse, sino también la de productos difíciles de hacer. Eso se puede medir con el índice de complejidad económica. Los países con un índice bajo tienden a ser pobres, mientras que los que tienen un índice alto tienden a ser ricos. El problema de la difusión del conocimiento es que hay que resolver los problemas de coordinación. El know how se mueve de empresa a empresa, pero para moverlo hay que mover a las personas. El problema es que los países en desarrollo han sido muy cerrados a la inmigración e imponen grandes restricciones a la contratación de extranjeros, lo que dificulta el movimiento del know how. La razón de ello es que la presencia extranjera violaría el sentimiento de identidad colectiva, de pertenencia al grupo o a la comunidad, con lo que ese sentimiento frena las posibilidades de desarrollo económico.

Read the Productive Ecosystems and the arrow of development paper, published in Nature Communications.Learn more about the authors Neave O'Clery, Muhammed Yildirim, and Ricardo Hausmann.Explore the Product Space via the Atlas of Economic Complexity.

Once upon a time at UC Santa Cruz, a group of renegade grad students started mixing physics with math and computers, determined to discover underlying patterns in the seeming-randomness of systems like the weather and roulette. Their research led to major insights in the emerging field of chaos theory, and eventually to the new discipline of complexity economics — which brings models from ecology and physics, cognitive science and biology together to improve our understanding of how value flows through networks, how people make decisions, and how new technologies evolve. As the human world weaves new global economic systems and sustainability looms ever-larger in importance, it is finally time to heed the warnings — and the promises — of this new paradigm of economics.Welcome to Complexity, the official podcast of the Santa Fe Institute. I’m your host, Michael Garfield, and every other week we’ll bring you with us for far-ranging conversations with our worldwide network of rigorous researchers developing new frameworks to explain the deepest mysteries of the universe.This week on Complexity, we speak with SFI External Professor J. Doyne Farmer at INET Oxford, to tour his fifty years of pioneering work and current book-in-progress, The Complexity Economics Revolution. Topics include how ecology inspires novel forms of macroeconomics; how “bounded rationality” changes the narrative about rational self-interested economic actors; how leverage leads to greater instability; how new tools can help us predict emerging innovations and engineer a better banking system; the skewed incentives of science funding and venture capital; his take on cryptocurrencies; and more…If you value our research and communication efforts, please rate and review us at Apple Podcasts, and/or consider making a donation at santafe.edu/podcastgive. You can find numerous other ways to engage with us at santafe.edu/engage. Thank you for listening!Join our Facebook discussion group to meet like minds and talk about each episode.Podcast theme music by Mitch Mignano.Follow us on social media:Twitter • YouTube • Facebook • Instagram • LinkedInKey Links:Doyne Farmer’s Personal Website | SFI Page | INET Oxford Page | Google Scholar PageDoyne Farmer and related talks on our YouTube channelComplexity Economics from SFI PressRelated Complexity Podcast Episodes:W. Brian Arthur on The History & Future of Complexity Economics[Farmer’s PhD student] R. Maria del-Rio Chanona on Modeling Labor MarketsMatthew Jackson on The Science of Social NetworksGeoffrey West on Scaling and Superlinear InnovationDavid Krakauer on Collapse & High-Beta Investment Strategies

Economists on Zoom Getting Coffee (#ezgc) hosts Prof. Ricardo Hausmann, a highly influential and respected figure both in academic and policy circles, to talk about his thoughts about the #globalrecession caused by #COVID19, about his very own research on the power of #knowhow as an engine of #economicgrowth and #economicdevelopment, and beyond.   Prof. Hausmann is the Rafik Hariri Professor Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard University and the Director of the Growth Lab at Harvard Center for International Development. In the early 1990s he was Minister of Planning of  his home country Venezuela. After that he became the first Chief Economist of the Inter-American Development Bank.   For future episodes please don't forget to SUBSCRIBE to this podcast, and don't forget to visit our website www.economistsonzoomgettingcoffee.com to WATCH this and other episodes, and to get more information about the show. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit danybahar.substack.com

According to economist Ricardo Hausmann of Harvard's Kennedy School, the economic crisis triggered by the COVID pandemic is going to be very different from any we have faced in memory. It will be different in scope, in severity, in what it may demand of afflicted governments, and in what it will demand of the global financial system. It is a massive problem and observes Hausmann, one of the world's foremost development economists, we are ill-prepared to deal with it. We discuss the challenges with him and Edward Luce of the Financial Times, Kori Schake of the American Enterprise Institute and Rosa Brooks of Georgetown University Law Center. Don't miss this thought-provoking conversation. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

According to economist Ricardo Hausmann of Harvard's Kennedy School, the economic crisis triggered by the COVID pandemic is going to be very different from any we have faced in memory. It will be different in scope, in severity, in what it may demand of afflicted governments, and in what it will demand of the global financial system. It is a massive problem and observes Hausmann, one of the world's foremost development economists, we are ill-prepared to deal with it. We discuss the challenges with him and Edward Luce of the Financial Times, Kori Schake of the American Enterprise Institute and Rosa Brooks of Georgetown University Law Center. Don't miss this thought-provoking conversation.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/deepstateradio. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Mientras en Venezuela, continúa la dificultad de convertir en una sola voz, la atomizada oposición que tenemos, hay muchos ya trabajando en el proyecto de la transición. Ellos saben que cuando el cambio se dé, debemos estar listos. Ellos se dedican a la Venezuela del futuro con soluciones y estrategias. Uno de ellos es el economista y profesor en la Kennedy School of Government de la Universidad de Harvard, Ricardo Hausmann. El otro, es el doctor en derecho y procurador especial del gobierno interino, José Ignacio Hernández, quien trabaja en una ley ómnibus, que recoge todas las reformas legislativas necesarias para reconstruir los mecanismos de mercado y atender las restricciones que impiden el crecimiento económico y el financiamiento internacional. César Miguel Rondón aborda el tema precisamente con dos de los protagonistas: Ricardo Hausmann @ricardo_hausman y José Ignacio Hernández @ignandez --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/sincodigo/message

Ricardo Hausmann, the founder and director of Harvard Kennedy School’s Growth Lab, is helping developing countries around the globe create capacity to model the coronavirus pandemic and develop economic and epidemiological responses. The Growth Lab COVID-19 Task Force explores the macroeconomic and fiscal implications of the pandemic and offers strategic guidance on policy decisions for collaborating nations including Albania, Ethiopia, El Salvador, Honduras, Peru, Namibia, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia. For more about this effort, Growth Lab COVID-19 Task Force, please visit the Growth Lab COVID-19 Task Force home page.Under Hausmann’s leadership, the Growth Lab, which is based in the Center for International Development, has grown into one of the world’s most well regarded and influential hubs for research on international development. Hausmann has served as principal investigator for more than 50 research initiatives in nearly 30 countries and is the Rafik Hariri Professor of the Practice of International Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School.

Andrés Oppenheimer profundiza en las consecuencias económicas de la pandemia de coronavirus en el mundo con el expresidente de Chile, Ricardo Lagos y con Ricardo Hausmann, profesor de Economía de la Universidad de Harvard. También conversa con Ismael Cala, conferencista y motivador, sobre cómo tener una cuarentena productiva.

I started these conversation series to further the underlying philosophy of this publication - helping the spread of good rival ideas. I want to speak to brilliant people with experience, who also have interesting things to say about Nigeria's political economy and society in general. In the first episode, I spoke with Affiong Williams - Founder/CEO of Reelfruit. I learned a lot from Affi and it was hard to condense our conversation into the bits that made the cut. Her take on economic complexity, and how social systems and expectations can change culture are quite refreshing takes. She is an advocate of epistemic humility, and she practices what she preaches. But make no mistake, she is a deep and profound thinker.You can listen to our conversation above or read the transcript(it’s looong) below. You can also listen on Stitcher here. I owe an immeasurable amount of gratitude to Quadbee, who is the producer and editor of these series.TRANSCRIPTTobi: Affiong, it's nice to have you.Affiong: Thank you.Tobi: So I want to start with human capital...because, there was something you said on Twitter a while back and I think I ran a poll on that idea, that some African countries do have a lot more human capital than Nigeria. So can you try to unpack what you mean by that because, obviously, when you look at the data you can see it differently sometimes but as an entrepreneur, you experience human capital daily - so can you unpack a bit of that?Affiong: This tweet you're referring to was borne out of my visit to Zimbabwe a country that was once known for quite a superior educational system and maybe good leadership under the early days of Robert Mugabe but also has been known in the last twenty years as a place where the economy has been completely topsy-turvy and they face one crisis of hyperinflation after the other etcetera. But in my visit to Harare, what I noticed was... (And I'll use the specific example), was that in the lodge we were staying where we were about thirty people. There were only three people were managing it, only three people managing in terms of cleaning, the lodge manager, maybe four or five and the cooks who would come in to make breakfast etcetera. But in terms of facilitating the entire lodge which was like ten room lodge with about like thirty guests, I would say, I've realized in Nigeria there is absolutely no way three people could manage complexities of giving people stellar, sort of warm service and as well as keep the grounds as pristine as it were and it got me thinking about this learning that I've uncovered in my years of just operating as an entrepreneur but also reading about development that a lot of education is in firms not in schools. And even though Zimbabwe has had a history of good education like Nigeria...we want to brag has had in the past, the idea is that the economy was way more diversified and specialized in things like tourism so you found that people are much more equipped to handle...to be more productive than in countries where there's not been any specialization or the economies are less diversified.So, that, for me was sort of the link that the diversification of an economy makes human beings more productive, much more than 1) the educational sector, and 2) that the inverse is true. The less diversified a country is in terms of its learnings, what it can do, what it's good at, the less productive people are. If you look at Zimbabwe, a hotel manager there could probably manage the equivalent of a mid-sized hotel in Nigeria or a large hotel in Nigeria whereas the reverse will not be true. A hotel manager in Nigeria is just not quipped to do the same in another country and offer the same type of service and Zim is known for its stellar...the development of its tourist industry and actually it receives tourists from across the world. So the industry has had to become more competitive and be able to sell tourism from across the world; whereas Nigeria has not, so you can see the quality of our hotel etcetera just being under par.People may dispute this but I posit that the more complex and the more diversified your economy is, the more people learn and get to know. - AWAnd it is easy to make this comparisons with countries like America which is a first world nation with all the resources in the world but if you look at more comparable countries like Kenya or Ghana, when you compare sectors like...for instance, and I'll use Ghana as an example - food processing - because Ghana has learnt to build this industry for export and self-diversified companies, you find that a factory manager in Ghana will be better on average than a factory manager in Nigeria. And people may dispute this but I posit that the more complex and the more diversified your economy is, the more people learn and get to know. You look at the banks in Nigeria and I’ll use India as an example, a bank manager in India, a middle manager can do mergers and acquisitions. That's because the economy allows for it. The economy is diversified enough where companies are buying each other up, and that skill and that learning is necessary for the competitiveness and growth of that bank. In Nigeria, people who've been in banking for ten years still push paper and I know that as an entrepreneur who have bank relationship managers working for me, and they haven't even learnt how to do that seamlessly. Every time you want to do some complex different deal, there's reporting to head office, there's all these issues that even a middle manager someone with ten years [of] experience in the bank cannot solve at that level. And that speaks to the diversification and complexity of the economy, we're simply not doing mergers and acquisition at a rate in Nigeria that can forces that learning on everybody. So those people are less productive than if you compare them with an Indian banker or... not to talk of an American banker or even a South African bank where you have such a diversified and sophisticated economy. So, for me, human capital is very much driven by the firms in the country and the make-up of firms in the country and you find that in Nigeria, it stagnates because our companies were not getting new industries really coming in to improve and increase that learning.And Nigerians love to talk up how smart and how they do well abroad and how given the right tools etc., and that's true. But that's also a factor of what those countries offer. it's not really inherent to being Nigerian or being here because you find that that logic almost collapses...Tobi: There's a place premium to it.Affiong: Exactly. So it's where you are that unearths that potential versus inherently in you. And you see that with human capital deficiencies in Nigeria; and I didn't have that small country, smaller GDP perspective until I went to Zim and I was like, “wow!”, these people by virtue of having a more diversified economy know more and could produce more in their industries and businesses. Somebody told me something that in India, even on the factory floor, what one person does in India you need three people to do it here and I think that's telling. That the capacity of one person to solve and make decisions around three processes increased over there just because the economy demands that.Tobi: It's an interesting point you're making because a lot of the problems we talk about in development centers on productivity. And firms have to be productive for us to be able to call an economy developing so to speak. A lot of the effect, the aggregate effects that gets measured transmits out of firms...but you made two points that I want us to speculate on a bit.Affiong: Okay.Tobi: One is economic complexity. And from I think Ricardo Hausmann and co., they actually say that economic complexity is a better predictor...Affiong: Yeah.Tobi: Of development...Affiong: Yeah.Tobi: But there is this other school of development that says you have to specialize. Oh, you have to...Affiong: Competitive advantage, yes.Tobi: Yeah, you have to find your comparative advantage, you have to, oh, do agriculture or its manufacturing or whatever [else]. But you are saying from experience that complexity actually works. So how do we get policymakers to absorb that message? How do you craft policy for complexity, really?Affiong: That's a great question. I feel like I should preface by saying I'm by no means an economist, I just enjoy talking about and thinking about it. This I could do for free. I geek out on development especially and firm productivity and things like that. But the schools of thought are... from what I've read and understand, I think...the way I see it and please for the audience this is a very layman’s way of thinking...that when you look at something like economic complexity and doing different things and countries that are successful do things they're not previously good at. It's somewhat walking backwards, somewhat looking at developed economies and saying, "well, they're very diverse in their output", but they also started somewhere and built up. So I do think there is ...comparative advantage is almost like a first-level sort of step for policymakers to begin to say "well, where should we deploy resources and deploy thinking and deploy attention to". It's easier to sort of start with what you have and maybe the comparison to countries that have really been good at starting with what they have, that have been able to create what they didn't have is the wrong comparison in terms of policy because if you look at America or Asia or all these countries that are highly specialized, are highly diverse, they all started somewhere. Compare that to a country like Nigeria where we haven't yet really kicked off industrialization in anywhere. It may be too big a job to say start crafting policy for diversity. I would say that the negatives of focusing on comparative advantage is what you see in Nigeria - ban, protect a small pie, we talked about, oh, agriculture is our thing so let's ban import because that's what we have comparative advantage in production in.So it is a dangerous hill to die on as it were if you are not able to really multiply your comparative advantage. What you end up doing is saying, “oh this is a small pie let's protect it”, and all the policies are somewhat skewed [against] actually widening the pie. So my thinking is that there's still room for countries like Nigeria to focus on their comparative advantage. So if I'm looking at, like, an example is petroleum or oil and gas. There is still billions of dollars in unlocked investment in oil and gas that is trapped by bad policy. So it's saying…well, we produce oil and gas but we can still derive a lot more value from that for long as shale and all these renewables don't stand in the way. Although I think despite that, there's still room for investment. On agriculture - if you're saying you're the largest grower of cassava in the world. There's still room to be hyper productive at growing cassava which will create jobs. We're not even talking about processing, just producing cassava that can be used for different resources, producing enough high-quality cassava to export, all sorts of things. So there is room for policy attention to go to actually developing your comparative advantage and I think that then spurs you to start getting into more complex policy around say wanting to be the financial services capital of Africa, which you don't have skills to do that yet. But yes, you can sort of engineer that through policy. That's probably a harder reach for government and people. We're still stuck on what we're doing but I don't think that it's bad to focus on what you're good at. But I do think that there is room to unearth a lot of value in that. So yeah.Tobi: Okay. So, I worry about timing though, because obviously when we talk about comparative advantages, the go-to example is always Asia. East Asia. South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam now. But what I mean about timing, which to me is a bit of an argument in favour of freer markets…(I don't want to say free markets because that attracts a lot of angry letters)... is that the rules of global trade has changed a lot. Asia industrialized at the time when there were a lot of permissiveness in trade and trade regimes around the world today has changed. And also if we want to do comparative advantage now, however bad it is [the economy], some companies here have built-in competencies, learning over years, you will be sort of redirecting resources and human capital away from those people to few chosen sectors. So I'm wondering will that be a way to go. Can we really do comparative advantage? Has the time not passed?Affiong: From my understanding or from my perception is that the things we're talking about in terms of comparative advantage, the sectors or industries, (they) are still very largely agrarian sector. They're sectors that one would assume human capital at the lowest level can absorb [a lot more capacity] versus a large redirection of specialized skills to actually play in the sector. So if you look at agriculture for instance, I'll take agric because we are largely an agrarian society and that's where fifty percent of jobs are created. Increasing agriculture input is not necessarily... yes there is huge technological, in terms of machinery component to it but a lot of it is fertilizer and if you look at Asia, a lot of it was people who were not doing anything getting on the farm. We have a lot of people who are not doing anything who can get on the farms and be a little bit more productive. We're not talking about people who are going to go on to start agribusinesses and do those kinds of things. But if we focus on that comparative advantage, I think we can drive up human capital that would otherwise not be doing anything and I think that that might be a benefit. I read the book how Asia works and sort of household farming, going into smallholder farming with people farming on their own, in their homes, outside their lots and then moving them into some sort of small holder...being a little bit more productive than what they were doing...which puts them into jobs and make them employed. I think that opportunity may still exist and I think when you start driving up that kind of productivity you hopefully can attract more human capital from outside to sort of buildup on that. Then start the processing for factories, do more complex manufacturing and things like that. I think there is still a window of time and maybe Nigeria's population has a lot to do with it as well that for domestic consumption there's huge opportunity to make the price of every commodity cheaper by growing more so that more people consume it and increase consumption. That could be some sort of out [for] job creation. I'm not a big fan of produce what you consume but I think in my view, consumption of almost every sort of product is low compared to even African averages and that's because the price is high and bringing these prices down by increasing productivity would help drive local demand of them and hopefully that will then bring more people into employment, make them more productive that way. I hope that theory is... sort of makes sense in a way.LaughsYeah, I'm making a case for increased…focusing on comparative advantage and the impact of that on really using a level of docile, docile is not the right word, but stagnated human capital which are people who are not employed, can't do much but if you've got them farming more, they're generally becoming more productive. Yeah, that's my thinking around that.Tobi: Alright, let's talk about perception a bit because you mentioned earlier that I don't know maybe because of our size we think “oh, Nigeria is awesome, we have this huge stock of human capital and any day now we are going to zoom ahead”...Affiong: Yeah, unleash it and take our rightful place on the African continent.Tobi: What's the biggest perception difference you've observed in the business landscape in Nigeria. What do you think Nigerian business owners, entrepreneurs or professionals are mostly wrong about that they think they are right about?Affiong: That's a very very good question. I think its human nature for everybody to overrate our capacity, that is what we do. We are not logical about what we can realistically achieve. Studies, everything, proves this. But in Nigeria, what I think a lot of entrepreneurs are wrong about is that idea that there's something innate in the capacity of Nigerians to sort of make a plan or make things happen. I think we are very wrong about a lot of times why firms or businesses fail in Nigeria and a lot of it is around lack of structure. I mean, yes, there are market issues and there are lots of issues but I'm going to focus on this - the need to sort of build in systems and processes vis-a-vis firm failure and I think a lot of people, a lot of entrepreneurs think that kind of disorder or not building that order within companies is not necessary to their success because Nigeria is a very disorderly place and things don't happen. But I think a lot of firms damn it and die when there are no systems built-in businesses were basically - capacity and decision-making (etc.) is filtered down and processes are filtered down from the top to the bottom. So you find in a lot of businesses [that] the CEO knows a lot and owns a lot but there is no(t) emphasis on management and middle management being equally (skilled up) upskilled, being able to make decision, being able to do stuff… so there's literally only very few resources being aimed at growing a business - which is the CEO, usually his or her networks and things like that versus upskilling the management team to be growth led.There is this idea that systems and processes don't matter but i think they contribute. I don't have empirical evidence to prove it but I think they contribute more to the failure of businesses than we give credit to. Yes, market realities are real but it's a slower way to grow a business if you start looking at...There [are] different stages of growth in a business. You don't need a full management team in day one but when you need that and that system is not put in play, I think you're already regressing as a business and you just don't know it. Then things start to unravel and you point fingers at the market or the economy or you point fingers at competition or import etc. whereas there wasn't that sort of universal firm learning that comes from everybody - [having] more people being involved in the growth and capacity of the business. And you see businesses at all sizes where there's a disproportionate amount of the responsibility of the business to grow on one person versus the entire firm. That is also [a] lack of systems and processes (and making everybody's job at a particular level to see the business grow from their departmental perspective) that's missing and I think it leads to regression of businesses. Some entrepreneurs don't [consider it important] because it's not a cost per say that come out of the business, and in fact the cost is hiring (these) people to do it, [so] it's not measured as a real or a lack thereof of a strong team and processes in the business. It’s not measured as importantly as it should in a business. That’s something I think we are all still very wrong about. Yeah.Tobi: I like where you went with that. So let's talk about management a bit.Affiong: Yeah.Tobi: There was this study I read, and I'll try and put up links for context, by I think John Van Reneen and Nicholas Bloom. Their argument is that management also determines the wealth of nations, that is, how firms are managed is an underrated factor. In fact, there was another study where they found that management is a better predictor of a firm's success than every other factor, even technology. But obviously here, management is something we don't really talk about as such. It is endogenous. So what's your experience been like with other business owners, how do we improve management and how do we increase our awareness in that area?Affiong: That's very very interesting, and I think quite a study to bring up because I tend to agree with that. People will say "well, if you're in a great industry and have terrible management you'll still be successful" and I think that might be true. But it's true for very few. It’s true when you are maybe the only player, there's two of you and there is not much competition for the market. But when there's a lot more competition for a market like we're seeing in a more globalized world, the quality of the people who are in firms matter and accelerate or decelerate the growth of the company. Now, I'll use myself as a case study, I have a really strong management team, I have managerial heads in all facets of the business and all departments of the business and that has helped us grow tremendously - from a sales perspective, from being invested ready, from being able to handle numerous things at a go, from our ability to launch new products (be)cause there are just people who are responsible for getting these things done and understand it and the collective output of that means that things are done better. If we want to enter a new territory, for instance, it's not one person doing it, I have somebody from finance looking at the numbers, somebody from admin calling agents to figure of the space, my production team figuring out product integrity, my sales manager finding the stores that we're going to go in to and we can execute that in two to three months - of people putting their collective outputs together to get that done. Now, if that management team was not as strong or not as defined, it will be one person trying to be all those things and we will invariably make a poorer decision; and if we make a poorer decision, you'll either fail at that or you're operating sub-optimally, which then impacts, for me, revenue, which then impacts the signal of whether the business as legs or not.So might find that there is market, but because there is less execution capacity in your firm, you can't actually achieve that market. But what does it look like? It looks like your firm is a non-growing firm, and not doing well primarily because you alone cannot do everything and the people around the table are not equipped to actually access the market available - and then as you learn within the firm to do these things, you can replicate them much easier. So I kind of find that, tied my previous point, that decentralization of output and expectation of output and productivity obviously helps the firm grow faster, make better decisions; and those businesses are more likely to demonstrate investment readiness, demonstrate that they can scale, demonstrate better unit economics (etc.) because there's just a talent or pool of people who are equipped in each of their departments to make and optimize the decision making - make the best decision etc.Tobi: That's interesting. You talked about processes, but I want to push on the personnel aspect of it. Obviously you have a great management team but what do you have to get right to build a great management team because, well, when you talk to people, what they say is that "oh, managerial talent is actually scarce and that it's our culture to be sloppy management wise". We're going to talk about culture in a bit, but what do you have to get right to build a great management team?Affiong: That's a fantastic question because I also struggle with that. I say “do I have a good management team because I have sort them out, and can that be devoid of a growing company?” This is, for me, one of the big things. I also find that a lot of Nigerian companies are not growing and they are sort of stagnant, sort of peaked in terms of learning. So sometimes the need or the ability for the firm to attract people and keep them and sustain them and even pay them is limited when the company is not growing. So if you're not growing as a company, can you attract people to grow the company with you which is how they learn and get better at doing well? If you're a company that's not doing a lot of things and doing more things, people's learning pretty much stagnates, right? It's like government agency…LaughsSo I'll say what are the inputs in a growing company? In a growing company people are learning more, people are learning things they've not done before, so there's a lot of external learning coming in, there's a lot of self-learning; which then becomes process because we've learned what to do. We didn't know what to do before, we've learnt it and now we’ve agreed that’s the right thing to do - sort of install it as a process and people repeat it. For me, a growing company is necessary to [not only] keep attracting really good pool of management, but also the pool of people who are curious and who are excited by growing a company. It's somewhat a chicken and egg thing. (People who are curious about doing things they've not done before.) Because that's what a growing firm is, you are learning to do stuff you've never done before. That's how you grow, and then being able to apply that curiosity in a company that is growing - so that they are learning to do things they've not done before - is my idea of how you get a good managerial team or how you can bring in the talent. It is not just for today but for tomorrow when you're not doing [well]. When we started for instance, we were selling 2 products in Lagos. We're now selling 6, actually our SKU is about 16 right now in Lagos and 12 other states… Tobi: Wow.Affiong: and in over 300 stores. So the learning to be able to scale up and do that comes from the fact that we're growing but also comes from the fact that there are people who can actually achieve that successfully and those people started up not working in 12 States but have now grown to the capacity to be able do that. So, it's a chicken and egg thing.LaughsI don't know where I fit in. Can you grow without people who are not curious about growth and cannot execute things they didn't know? That's a tough one. I don't know all the right answer.LaughsTobi: It's interesting you mentioned growth…Affiong: Yeah.I think that people don't know - and even I myself irrespective of - how much having money to survive and stay in business is what ultimately leads to growth of companies. - AWTobi: Because we're zooming out a bit. Now, people would say "well, it's tough to build a growing business in Nigeria". It's almost a cliché hearing that. So what I want to know is...okay, we hear that X or Y isn't helping. As a business owner, what does it take to build a growing company? Does government have to get out of the way or help in a certain way? What are the things that has to go right to have a growing company that then attracts quality managerial talent?Affiong: That's a great question and I have a very loaded answer. I'm not going to focus on the banal part of government policy and initiatives. I think businesses are very limited in how much they can grow outside of government policies but let's sort of control for that. I think we underrate the need for capital. I think that people don't know - and even I myself irrespective of - how much having money to survive and stay in business is what ultimately leads to growth of companies. People will tell you - and I find a lot of the advice to entrepreneurs quite asinine and platitudinal…Tobi: That money doesn't matter.Affiong: "Oh, you don't need money at every level"...oh, yeah, I do. I always need money because money is one resource that can unlock others. I say that not facetiously in the sense that money does not solve all problems. But when you start a business, in my opinion, you're assuming a product-market fit. You're making a lot of assumptions around your customer wants, around your product's ability to solve that customer's problems or service, and you may not get it right in the first time. It doesn't mean that you cannot solve that customer’s problem, where you can then generate the value that we see in [a] growing company. But those pivots, those mini pivots that happen in companies, they are not free. Innovation is not free. Changing of business model is not cheap. And that's where capital comes in. Capital helps you overcome some of those mistakes you make or right those wrong assumptions you made that ultimately lead to growth. When I started my business, I'll use myself again as an example, and I'm very wary of using anecdotes but this is an opinion conversation…Tobi: Please go ahead.LaughsAffiong: it's not one that requires all that fact. But the first two products we launched are not our best selling products today. Our best-selling product is a product that we got out of putting two products in the market, the customer rejecting one and telling us what they wanted. Now launching that next product requires significant investment for me to get new packaging, get new suppliers, get new staff, get all these things and had I not had the capital to do that, you would have said "well, there's no market for dried fruits because these two product, out of them, one was rejected". But really, what capital helped me do is bridge the gap to learn more about what the customer wanted and be able to provide for them and then scale that and then launch new products. So money is important. Capital is important. And I think that...People always say "oh don't give an entrepreneur too much capital in the beginning". I'm sorry, very few entrepreneurs get too much capital in the beginning. And, even if you give an entrepreneur a lot more capital than they are able to absorb in the beginning, you're increasing their chances of actually figuring out where the value is, where the customer”s need really is so that they can solve that problem and that's how firms grow. So, for me, we talked a lot about training, and we talk a lot about product-market fit and understanding your customer; that's not free, that's not cheap. It takes money to survive to do it. You have to be in existence, ou have to have enough working capital, you have to serve them different iterations of this product. And in my view, capital is, as simple and basic as it is, one of the big things that would help firms grow.Tobi: It's a very great point. It's sad some of our capital control measures, because...again, talking about Asia, take a country like China. When China started industrializing, a lot of the capital came from Chinese overseas. In Taiwan, in Korea, in Japan... but here, you find that even government is fighting against remittances and stuffs like that and we don’t have enough capital.Affiong: No, we don't. We absolutely do not and a lot of the capital that's coming in is quite conditioned and I think sometimes also... (complex). We simply do not have enough capital that is needed to spur any sort of growth in enterprise, at even a modest rate I would say.Tobi: What other things do you need to build a growing [business]? I read a blog of yours, once, where you mentioned networking. What role does that play?Affiong: I think it plays a huge role especially in a country like Nigeria where access to opportunity is not democratized (anywhere), but it certainly is more unequal here than in other parts of the world. So in a country where a lot of the resources and opportunities are in the hands of a few, to sort of gain access to that where you are not from that class or cadre, I think networking is absolutely vital. And I think the power of networking is proven globally, it is not just about Nigeria. Take any example, you can't just walk into anywhere and say you have a product/service or whatever and say “you to want to sell it” where you don't need some network, some sort of reputational stamp of approval or something like that to get you through those doors. So networking is simply trying to to do that, and, say leapfrog some of the challenges you face in running a business where the decision rests in the hands of a few people. For me, expanding your network and going outside of your traditional network of family and friends and knowing people who know people, and knowing people who are not in your circle increases your chances of success as a company to raise funding, raise awareness, raise purchases etc.It's sort of very difficult to measure in terms of firm success but I think one of those underrated things that really really help businesses, and people in general, the world over at that.Tobi: So networking in this case functions as a bit of a social capital?Affiong: Yes, it's leveraging your social capital to sort of grow your business directly through getting financing, through getting buyers. Yes, it's sort of a resource. A standalone resource that adds to the growth of your business is how I look at it.Tobi: But how does this square with merit? What you hear is that there has to be a level playing field for businesses to compete fairly. But if successful businesses are better networked, isn't that problematic for, let me say, our idea of merit?Affiong: I think that idea is unfounded. I think the idea of equality is a nice virtue that people think is what leads to the success of societies and I don't think that that's true. I don't think it's played out in history. I think there's a lot of circumstance that leads people down the path that they get on to and if you trace back people's history especially successful people. I know you have this very interesting comment which I leverage (a lot) on privilege analysis. And what people do is, if you see people doing successful things, you go backwards and say they are privileged…Tobi: Yes.I think that if people are allowed to thrive individually as humans are meant to do, using all the resources at their arsenal, society wins more than it loses. -AWAffiong: And I think that’s true. You find that success is certainly not equally distributed, and I think you find successful people are more likely to be successful. You find that people who are better networked and experienced tend to build better businesses. It's an amalgamation of people's histories and where they are coming from. It's not that you just said, "Everybody run", and you open the playing field and everybody has an equal footing in terms of what they can do. And, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. I think that... especially for entrepreneurial success, you don't need to so many entrepreneurs to be successful to build a successful economy. I look at America, the most successful economy in the world, with three hundred million people who are all most(ly) working in private institutions, very small percentage are successful. So for me, equality in terms of entrepreneurial success is not something you can control for and I don't think it is fair to punish people who have the means to build bigger businesses - that would absorb more people, create more income and productivity for the country - to try and taper that or to try temper that because you want to build an equal playing field. It is like dragging people down to the mean and I don't think that creates the kind of success that benefits society as a whole. So I say "everybody, work with the privilege you have" because that is not something you can easily trade. People don't give up their privilege or people cannot automatically say because I have this kind of access I going to give it away and expunge it [or] I will exchange it for somebody else to have. It’s a very difficult thing to do and you cannot erase centuries of history that has led people to where they are today to try control for equality. I don't think it makes much sense. I think that if people are allowed to thrive individually as humans are meant to do, using all the resources at their arsenal, society wins more than it loses. It’s not a perfect system but I think it's the best.Tobi: Interesting point on priviledge. My favourite example of that point is Bill Gates. You hear today how his middle school was selected in his district for a pilot computer program and how that is some kind of privilege and what you don't hear is, he was not the only kid in that school… Affiong: Yeah, in that school, exactly...every other kid had access to that computer…LaughsTobi: And people just sort of discount the hours he had to work, all the nights of misery, of uncertainty and hard work that people put into this. Another thing I discovered and I would like to know your insight on that is, on this privilege issue, people think that group traits transmits individually like “oh, if you're born into a certain income class (X percent of the income distribution) it means you enjoy privileges that come with that regardless of whatever you do” and often I find that that's not true. There are lots of rich dumb kids who are failures. Absolute failures, who I wouldn't want to be in a second regardless of their privilege. In our social discuss, we're importing a lot of that and maybe my experience is limited to social media, so I want us to lean into that here a bit.Affiong: I think there is certainly and I would say at this point, also an attack of individual virtue and individualism in a way. Where it seems, like you say, people discount the individual components that make people successful and they want to tag it as a privilege of wealth or a privilege of going to Ivy League schools or one privilege or another which is a very simplistic way to look at it. You find that everybody's route to success has a mixture of lottery of birth, economy you're born in, the time in which government policy favoured you or your parents or not. There is a huge very complex mix of things that make people - that lead and support people's success.But there is also, like you mentioned, thousands other people who grew up in those similar conditions. The individual trait of wanting to, of striving or building or doing something is one that is discounted. And I think that there is a general attack on individualism, free thought and individual thought. Even in societies where there is a lot of success, people want to demerit their own individual input to their success and sort of collectivize it as a way of diminishing that. In those societies where everybody else had access, there are also failures. So it's not just that the society was the reason you did well, it's that there is something about you as individual who has been able to build whatever success that you have. So this social discourse around collectivism and collectivizing people's successes and things like that is a worrying kind of phenomenon happening because I think it is us going against who people are as individuals. It is going against the way human beings are made and are built and I think it's worrisome to start punishing and tagging people who are individually successful has being [this] sort of greedy barons (as it were) for being successful or feeling bad for being successful, feeling bad for building a lot of wealth, because somehow they are meant to collectivize their wealth, or somehow they also stepped on other people to be able to get wealthy. So there's sort of very dangerous and insidious ideas around individual productivity and individuals building that I think are being disproportionately spread in a way where they are being accepted much more than I think they should be, and not being critiqued.I certainly don't subscribe to privilege identification of any kind. I think it's actually an insidious thing to do to point at people and say “declare your privilege, declare your privilege”. It is tagging people in a negative way that I don't subscribe to. I think does not do anything for anyone really. So, I say, as individuals we'll always look for all the resources at our disposal to get to whatever level of self actualization we're trying get on and that should not be diminished in any way. I don't care if you're a billionaire or you're having 100 Naira in your pocket. That is human, that's what we do and shouldn't be discouraged.Tobi: So, now, how much do you think categorical disadvantages like gender or social class matter? If we're talking about individuals like you said, what you find is that individual still fits, however defined - however poorly defined sometimes - into certain categories. Of course, you're a woman in business, you hear things like X is difficult for a woman in business whereas for a man they don't face the same barriers or challenges or maybe things around sexual solicitation. So, how much do you think that matters in terms of striving and success?Affiong: Like you said, equality in general doesn't exist and I think that that's the general premise. That even if you control for gender and look at men, there is huge inequalities in men. (In one gender where you sort of look at different strata, for instance.) So, for me, this idea of gender equality is....let me be careful here...I am not dismissing at all there are categorical disadvantages for women in business and women as a whole. But, again, what do we compare it to? We often compare it to men. We don't compare it to categorical differences that men face as a gender, that there are differences between men. So, the men versus women view is the most obvious way to look at the disadvantages for women. But I generally think that we need to look at that from the perspective of the history of women and [ask] when did women start moving out of the home as a primary occupation into business and does that explain why there are differences in the number of women represented in the industry versus not? Because if you take a different look at it, I think you'll find huge successes, I think you'll find that in a generation of women or someone like my grandmother not being educated, in only 200 years her granddaughter can become the CEO of a business. But if you look at it from the perspective of “well, let's try equal the playing field where we have 50/50 men and women”, that's not really solving the problem in my opinion. The problem is wanting to encourage more women - that women are moving into formal careers and rising to the top - versus saying that the dearth of women in top management is because of some patriarchy or some system that is blocking women. It's that just from the get-go men got into those roles more and more women are getting into those roles [too]. It depends on how you look at it, you might see that what we're actually seeing is an advancement of women versus women [in] the world today still being disadvantaged. And that's true. I think trying to uncover the root cause is very complex and not based on one thing and certainly not based on the fact that men are advancing at the expense of women is a hundred percent true. And that is the simplistic discuss that you're hearing that “okay, men are patriarchal, they are all-boys club etc.” Well then, how do you explain for women being more university graduates than men in developed economies? Women are getting more degrees, women are advancing, more women in management. The way to look at it to solve the problem matters and I think it's more sensationalist to look at it one way versus another.Now, bringing it back to myself as a woman in business, I can't categorically say and I'm not going to speak for every woman because that's silly to do and my experience is very unique. But I can't categorically say that my gender has hindered my progress as an entrepreneur. I've never gotten a "No, you are a woman so therefore you cannot get progress". I don't know that there are many women starting businesses who have heard that. Now, are there other challenges women face, maybe the impact of motherhood, the impact of social conditioning to make women maybe not...? Social conditioning is even a stretch for me to actually apply to this scenario but whatever experience women face as a collective (their collective experiences growing up which is actually very individualistic [because] it is not all collective) matter but they matter for men too. Men success is not equal. It's...you know, two men that grow up in the same household don't automatically become successful because they grow up in the same household. Two women who grow up in the same household don't automatically just ascend to the same levels because they grow up in the same household. There is something that we're trying to, I think, aggregate which should be disaggregated to actually find ways to advance with it. Now again back to me, no one has ever said "you're a woman so you will not succeed because you're a woman and I don't do business with women". That never happened to me. I don't know how many women that's happened to. And when I look at the impact of challenges that affected me as a woman, say sexual misconduct - Yes, I've had people say inappropriate things to me as a woman and I take that as a challenge that is it different from another challenge that a man faces where... that is a hindrance to his success in business? We have to weigh those up. There are those challenges that affect women but do they disproportionately affect them to the challenges affecting men's success? I don't know that that's the case. I can't say, I can't say that...Tobi: What about the implicit bias? Like maybe there might not be explicit stuff [and] nobody is going to tell you because you are a woman. But some think that there are implicit biases against women that, oh, because you're a woman I can implicitly conclude that I'm not going to offer you that promotion because I imagine that five years from now you're going to get married and have a child. What about implicit bias, do you think that plays a huge role and can it really be corrected? Is it a problem we can solve, really?Affiong: I've read some studies around this and I'm not going to say that my reading is up-to-date on it but if you look at even the studies around senior management and why women are dropping out of management, a lot of it has to do with motherhood - becoming mothers, suspending their career advancement. But a lot of it is...if a woman who has an MBA and is a mother, was working and halfway becomes a mother and decides to quit and become a mother full-time, it's a choice. And it's her choice because she wants to really be [a mother]. There are various reasons people make those kinds choices but I guess the point I'm trying to drive at is that the dearth of the female management is that women at the stage of becoming mothers don't go back into work or take part time jobs etc. So for me, if you look at that you're saying "are women being punished for being mothers or are women choosing - that they enjoy motherhood so they want to do that?" The narrative is that "no, women cannot go back to work because they're mothers". That's not true or that what should be an ideal solution to allow women to have children and are not overburdened by childcare to make that choice and women who choose to actually stay and not want to go back to work are doing so because it is their own desirous outcome. For me, that's something to unpack and I think we're seeing more flexibility around women being able reintegrate in the workplace versus their careers ending because of having children.Again, I can't say how much that bias of “let me not give a woman a chance because in five years she'll be a mother” is? Maybe it's a bias that is probably more widely held in a different age or category of person. It's hard to test. Does it exist? Probably. Does it exist to the extent that people think that it does? I'm not sure, I'm not sure. I think you're finding a lot of self-selection out of [going up]. I think women are self-selecting out of going up because of motherhood and the demands of motherhood. And if that is to change, we should unpack that as the issue, not necessarily say that, it's because men are stopping women from going up in their careers. So that makes sense. I mean, where would you pinpoint the solution? Where would you pinpoint where to investigate…Tobi: Exactly.Affiong: And how to solve the problem? I think it's looking at that time where you become a mother and your career takes second place. And again, we assume that there is no payoff for people who are deciding to choose that path. The narrative is that it is completely "oh, a do-or-die affair"Tobi: You ought to find satisfaction in work.Affiong: Exactly...and because every woman is made to be this career sort of [person]. Every woman who is working in career is meant to get up to the total ranks and become the boss therefore having a child is not [or] choosing "motherhood" as it were is not success. For some people it is, absolutely. And some people the payoff and trade-off of being a mother is absolutely a form success. I recently become a mother and while I'm an absolute workaholic, I can appreciate why women would want to focus on motherhood. And it's not a failure that they want to do that, and it's not patriarchy or misogyny or a man stopping them from doing that. It's a choice. It's a valid choice for a woman to do. So where women don't want to make that choice and want to advance is where I say let's find solutions for. But not automatically paint it as a huge deal in the world that women choose motherhood. They love being mothers, if they didn't we would not exist as a race, right? Like if women didn't actually enjoy the journey of motherhood. So I think that that's more nuanced than people like to understand.Tobi: Yeah, this is an interesting area, so I'm just going to ask you straight up. Are you a feminist?Affiong: Ah, am I a feminist? Yes I am. I would say that. Do I believe in the equality of sexes which is the traditional definition of feminism? I say I am. I do believe in that. What I don't believe is that equality is that anything a man can do, a woman can do. There is not equality amongst the female gender, there is not equality amongst the male gender in terms of the playing field or in terms of people's access, networks, everything. So this view of feminism that anything a man can do a woman [can] that defines equality as like "oh, I must pick myself up and get what a man does, has, says" (etc.) is equality... is not...it fails to me. It's not real. And I can barely stand by that. Now, what I believe should be equal is access. Whatever a woman wants to do, her gender should not prevent her from doing as a man.But I don't believe that the male standard is what "success" looks like so if women are not equal, (if) they're not exactly on the level as men. Men are not on the level as men; women are not on the same level. So that sort of generic ideology of equality falls flat for me when you think about it logically and it's not a measure that you can even attain because you cannot control everybody's individual experiences.What you can try and democratize is access - to education. I don't believe no woman should not have access to education, and neither should any man. Access to working, access to things, access to people making their lives better. I believe equality of access is what I'll say I understand feminism to be and I'll consider myself a feminist.Now, new age feminism.LaughsNo. If that is what the decision is, I'll hundred percent say "No, I'm not". I don't even call it feminism, I think it's more...let's not even go into what I think it is because I have strong views about that.Tobi: Laughs...Affiong: Don't get me in trouble. But, yeah…Equality of access is, for me, the best chance...even that is hard to assimilate. it's really hard when you think about it...Tobi: Yeah.Affiong: you can't control for all the things that makes a person's experience in this world.Tobi: You see a lot of, of course, discuss around gender issues these days and I've been trying to really tease out what it is that we as a society are going for actually. But you see a lot of anger. I don't know how much that helps, but...Affiong: Laughs...yeah.Tobi: certainly there's a lot to be angry about. But I don't know how much anger helps in that area. But one idea I want to put forward and I would like to hear your views here is gender issues and economic development generally. Like, when I see people, protesting or campaigning to end rape for example. Of course rape is a huge huge problem that no society should tolerate but I also wonder on the other side about state capacity…Affiong: Uh hmm.Tobi: You know?Affiong: I doTobi: How does a police force that cannot stop petty crimes investigator rape? how can a police force that can not prevent murders or investigate... properly investigate and prosecute rape? People talk about passing laws where we have laws that are not enforced and where you can easily wiggle your way out of [crime].So shouldn't a lot of this activism be focused on development generally because I think a lot of social progress is positively correlated with income growth?Affiong: Yeah, exactly.Tobi: You'll be surprised.Affiong: And that is a hill I'll die on because I talked today about a lot of lending a voice to causes and social media making it easy for people to join causes and say they support things on a very very superficial level. It's easy to say I support no sexual abuse to women and I completely agree. Only a deviant will support sexual abuse or rape of women or any other cause or out of school kids. But the reality is that a lot of these things are a byproducts of poor societies. You find these ills are more common in societies that are not economically advancing (that are getting poorer). And like you said, for me, in the history and development of a country, the way you solve problem is not...let me take this back to the size of government.When you have a society where people are too poor to send their kids to school, it doesn't matter what you legalize around the need for education. People simply can't afford it. - AWThe size of government for Nigeria relative to its GDP and the complexity of the economy is completely inflated. You have over-regulation where you should have less government and let industries thrive. Look at China. Like you said, a lot of things where allowed that will not be allowed today in China but those things that were allowed, allowed economic progress and allowed for the wealth of that nation to be possible, right? And it's the same thing when you take it to any social cause. A lot of it is rooted...you call it culture, you call it tribalism, but it is really a competition for resources. Who wants to say that children should stay out of school? But when you don't have a country that is rich enough to build schools (good schools for people), are they better off in schools where they're not learning anything? It's easy to say "well, everybody should be in school". Yes it is, but when you're churning out kids that cannot do anything or cannot learn anything or when you have a society where people are too poor to send their kids to school, it doesn't matter what you legalize around the need for education. People simply can't afford it. So I think with all these causes, there is a very crucial stage of economic development that actually solves a lot of the problems, and it's not more laws. Right now you'll say "well, they're signing a law against this sort of victory". It's not a victory. If you go to the police station and somebody who perpetrates [a crime] can simply pay off his way or somebody who doesn't have access to a lawyer cannot get justice or the fact that the police do not even have the capacity or, Jesus Christ, the petrol to drive to come and see what you're talking about...Tobi: Or even basic investigation… Affiong: Yes, exactly. So for me, a lot of focus should really be on how do we get Nigeria richer? A lot of gender issues are byproducts of poverty. It's not a byproduct of patriarchy or people's cultures. It's that if women got richer…there's a stat that says if women go to school till...(we talk about Nigeria's population or overpopulation, for instance), if women go to school up till high school they have like two or three fewer kids. If women get better education they are likelier to choose who they marry and get in better domestic situation. All these things that are underpinned on just income, education. Those two simple things that are as basic as having more money in your pocket to give you the agency to make more decisions and being literate that improve the outcomes of women and protect them from all these social issues that they're exposed to. But we make a lot of fuss around the symptoms and not the underlying issues. You talked about rape being a huge problem. It is a problem but what would stem that problem is, I think, often invariably linked to increased wealth.Tobi: Yeah.Affiong: If you punish more people who rape, probably less people would rape. But to punish more people who rape, you need a whole host of things to happen.Tobi: You need to be able to catch rapist for one.Affiong: So I do agree that a lot more focus should be on those basic foundations. I believe I live that through my values in terms of being an entrepreneur. My thesis is that if you give people, especially women... I'll shamelessly plug that my company is over 65% female employees and my management team is a 100% women. And my thesis is if you give women opportunity to earn their own money they have more agency with their lives. I'm not going to sit here and say I support a million causes, I support that cause, I believe in that. I believe that if women get better educated and work for themselves and earn their own money, their outcomes in life are better. And that's my thesis and I'm going to stick to that for as long as I can. I may be criticized for not saying "oh, I don't support this kind of mission or social"... I believe human beings are limited in what they can support and I am somebody who believes in depth over breadth anyway. So I want my life's work to unearth that and multiply that as much as possible. I'm not going to say I can be all things to all people. I don't think people can and I think if you focus on core issues, your outcomes are better. So that's my view. That's my hypothesis and I am walking that talk as an entrepreneur in business, and in person.Tobi: That's interesting. Another point that I want to mention is, of course, we see a lot of funding into social impact programs for women. I was reading a post lately (again, I'm going to put up links for listeners). It was a field study on fertility which is a huge problem in Africa. Nigeria is about five children per woman which we don't have enough income to cover that much. So what they found from the experiment was that fertility interventions and education were more effective within groups where the men were targeted as opposed to the women. What that tells me is that fertility decisions are not made individually. Couples make that decision. But what you see is that a lot of the social intervention programs target women specifically. They don't target families or couples and that's usually celebrated. You think that's a problem? Or how can we resolve that tension?Affiong: I'm not going to say that I know too much about it. I remember reading one study or was it a summary of the interventions of women in the North, who are getting injections and how they have to lie about where they're going because they can't take pills because if their husbands sees them taking their pills, that is a problem and they have to make an excuse to go get injections. Now, where they can't do that, then the intervention completely fails. Because they will get pregnant if you don't take these injections very regularly. So, what's the better solution if you want family planning to be truly adopted and not done in secret? (This is obviously a must on the most vulnerable way women have no rights in these domestic situations.) I would say it makes sense to get men on board and to get them to see the value in family planning because there [in the North], women barely have rights and women disproportionately suffer from having the burden of having too many children. Not just health-wise, income [wise], in most outcomes. A woman who has more children is worse off than a woman who had less where resources are scarce is my view. And to target the man means to help to ease the burden of women. Maybe it feels like more resources are going towards men than women but if the beneficiary is a woman, I don't care how you achieve it. If you really care about women's progress (however you achieve it, if that is the outcome and the aim), that should be what counts not necessarily that the interventions must directly benefit them because sometimes it's counter-intuitive but they [women] are more likely to be benefited if you take an intervention that targets the man. And this might be the case in this situation.Tobi: Let's talk about poverty a bit...Affiong: Okay.Tobi: One of your, should I say mentors or people you admire, Esther Duflo, recently won…Affiong: Yes, I stan.Tobi: [Esther Duflo] recently won the Nobel prize and there's been a lot of coverage around that area. Earlier we talked about employment and things like that. But what do you think is the best way to address the poverty issue? I know you do a lot of work in that area.Affiong: I think the best way is not to assume that there is a best way. And if I leverage the work of Esther Duflo, the biggest take for me from her book, Poor Economics (which was my 2017 book of the year), [is] it opened my mind to how hard poverty is to solve. The idea that (even economic growth) capitalism has solved poverty more than any other system, it still has its shortcomings in terms of its ability to actually rid the world of poverty. Poverty will always exist and that's the first thing but, for me, all the interventions and the mini studies showed that it's very difficult to isolate a driver of poverty and think that when you eradicate that driver or when you add an intervention, you're going to see outcomes that you can replicate. The biggest for me was microfinance. So everybody touts microfinance...Tobi: Massive failure... Affiong: ...has it helps the poor come out of it. No, the studies have shown that what it does is, it just gives people more trading capital. It doesn't make people richer. They just have more money to trade and…Tobi: And more debts in some cases.Affiong: And yes, in many ways, it really burdens people with a lot of debts. So if you look up microfinance and say you're giving finance to the poorest most risky customers at the most exorbitant interest rate. That hasn't changed their lives. Giving them more cash doesn't necessarily mean that they have amassed or built more wealth. That just, to me, shows how hard it is to solve poverty. If we say "well, we have scarce resources, gun to head, what would I pick?" I will pick economic growth. I will say do that,&#

A discussion with the Director of Harvard's Center for International Development and Professor of the Practice of Economic Development at the Kennedy School of Government We spoke about his research and his insights on development policies, looking at binding constraints, political ecology, and creation of the World Economic Forum Gender Gap Index. Interviewers: Nathan Adams - Project Officer, Green Spaces, United Nations Association in Canada Ian Chow - Project Officer, Green Corps, United Nations Association in Canada

Complexity is a powerful multi-disciplinary idea that combines insights from both the natural and social sciences, especially economics and economic geography, to study the dynamics of complex systems of heterogeneous agents, the multiple interactions between them, and the aggregate behaviours that emerge from those interactions. Arguably, the most prominent empirical approach to complexity is that of the Atlas of Economic Complexity, developed by Ricardo Hausmann and Cesar Hidalgo (H&H) at Harvard’s Growth Lab. The Atlas itself is a remarkable – and strikingly beautiful - online resource, which uses network theory methods to provide a snapshot of a country’s productive structure, as well as a measure of the complexity and diversity of its production and those of individual products. This ‘Product Space’ approach is rooted in the idea that ‘countries become what they produce’. It is a view of economic development as the accumulation of productive capabilities of increasing sophistication. As countries develop, they produce more and more products and those products attain higher and higher levels of complexity, embodying more and more productive knowledge. This in turn provides more capabilities to produce yet more products and so creates a virtuous circle. Countries in which more detailed policy analysis has been carried out within the last two years include Sri Lanka, Uganda, Rwanda, Panama, Algeria, Mexico and Peru. This paper contextualises H&H’s work within the recent resurgence of interest, in both academic and policy circles, in industrial policy. Comparing and contrasting the Product Space approach with other contemporary approaches to industrial policy, from authors including Justin Lin, Dani Rodrik, Joseph Stiglitz, Ha-Joon Chang and Mushtaq Khan, this paper sets out the strengths and weaknesses of conceptualising industrial development in terms of increasing economic complexity and diversity. In the technical section, the paper critiques the mathematical methods by which complexity is defined and rewrites the concept in terms of Markov chains on weighted graphs. This alternative formulation permits the application of Markov chain concepts, such as convergence to the stationary state, similarity and spectral clustering, in order to reinterpret complexity and other spectral data. These techniques are then related to economic aspects of complexity, such as production, technological change and capabilities. It is argued that the changing nature of production poses particular challenges to the ‘Product Space’ approach as well as other modes of industrial policy, and on this basis an ‘industrial ecosystems’ approach is outlined.

The creators of the Atlas of Economic Complexity - Harvard Growth Lab’s free online tool that translates economic growth research into policy actions to expand global prosperity - are proud to introduce: Country Profiles, a first-of-its-kind platform that revolutionizes how to think about economic strategy, policy, and investment opportunities for over 130 countries. Country Profiles invite users to take an interactive, step-by-step journey to analyze a country’s economic dynamics and future growth prospects, including identifying what new industries are poised to take-off. In this podcast, Annie White, Senior Product Manager for the Atlas of Economic Complexity and interviews Professor Ricardo Hausmann, Director of Harvard’s Growth Lab, about their new Country Profiles. www.atlas.cid.harvard.edu Recorded on Sept. 5th, 2019

Gema and Kenny join us again as we discuss recent events in Venezuela and Iran. What’s Left? Website: Podcasts: iTunes: stitcher: Googleplaymusic: Recommended Links: On Venezuela, Lavrov again warned the U.S. against any attempts to overthrow President Nicolás Maduro. Joanna Hausmann is lying about Venezuela The truth behind Maduro’s critic Joanna Hausmann NYT Helping Guaidó-Connected "Comedian" Shill For Regime Change In Venezuela Ricardo Hausmann’s 'Morning After' for Venezuela: The Neoliberal Brain Behind Juan Guaido’s Economic Agenda While online audiences know YouTube comedian Joanna Hausmann from her videos making the case for regime change, her economist father has flown below the radar. His record holds the key to understanding what the U.S. wants in Venezuela. Harvard Adviser to Venezuela’s Guaido Has Harsh Message for Bondholders Elliott Abrams, prominent D.C. neocon, named special envoy for Venezuela Who is Elliott Abrams, US special envoy for Venezuela?Abrams has a history of supporting interventionist policies in Latin America, including a role in the Iran-Contra affair Elliott Abrams, Trump’s Pick to Bring “Democracy” to Venezuela, Has Spent His Life Crushing Democracy Allan Nairn: Trump’s Venezuela Envoy Elliott Abrams Is a War Criminal Who Has Abetted Genocide

So, Beto O'Rourke enters the 2020 race with no substantive legislative accomplishments after having served three terms as a congressman. He speaks in very broad platitudes, but I have no idea from a policy perspective what he can do - not what he wants to do, but what he can do. Over the coming days, he's going to travel the country to listen to those whom he seeks to serve to understand from their perspective how we can best meet these challenges. That sounds very “Bernieesque” to me, in that during the last campaign, Bernie Sanders was often asked: how do you plan to accomplish your agenda? He would say, it's not up to me, it's up to the voters, or something similar. Some analysts are asking if a white male is the best fit for 2020 with such a diverse Democratic field, particularly after many midterm successes powered by female and nonwhite candidates. What does this mean for the Democratic political landscape? What is O'Rourke about, based upon what he has accomplished rather than what he campaigns on? How does he get so much traction when a candidate like Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) is currently getting very little? According to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro must go – even if the military has to intervene. This is part of the misinformation and disinformation campaign that you find in varying degrees in mainstream corporate media. Gingrich writes for Fox News Thursday, “There is one simple answer to the humanitarian disaster in Venezuela. The dictator Nicolás Maduro and his corrupt, violent, repressive regime must go. Venezuela is part of the immediate American neighborhood. If our commitment to change is not effective in our own backyard, the impact on our prestige and leadership worldwide will be substantial.” Anya Parampil's piece in MintPress News, "Ricardo Hausmann's 'Morning After' for Venezuela: The Neoliberal Brain Behind Juan Guaido's Economic Agenda," articulates a different narrative based upon research and historical context. We'll examine the differences.GUESTS:Garland Nixon — Co-Host of Fault Lines on Sputnik News. Anya Parampil — Washington, DC-based journalist. She previously hosted a daily progressive afternoon news program called "In Question" on RT America.

Marty Schenker, Bloomberg Chief Content Officer, says the indictment of Roger Stone is not related to the crime but the cover-up. Maxim Oreshkin, Russia's Economy Minister, says oil is not a story for Russia anymore. Ricardo Hausmann, Harvard's Kennedy School of Government Professor, says Venezuela's Juan Guaido has massive support. Shannon O'Neil, Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow for Latin America Studies, says we should be watching what happens with the protests in Venezuela.  Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

Marty Schenker, Bloomberg Chief Content Officer, says the indictment of Roger Stone is not related to the crime but the cover-up. Maxim Oreshkin, Russia's Economy Minister, says oil is not a story for Russia anymore. Ricardo Hausmann, Harvard's Kennedy School of Government Professor, says Venezuela's Juan Guaido has massive support. Shannon O'Neil, Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow for Latin America Studies, says we should be watching what happens with the protests in Venezuela. 

Ricardo Hausmann, a Harvard-based Venezuelan economist, has constructed his own indicator, one that captures the horrifying scale of the economic catastrophe in Venezuela. (This episode is from our other podcast, The Indicator. Subscribe to it wherever you get your podcasts.)

Starting in November 2015, the Center for International Development’s Growth Lab has been engaged in economic policy research with the Government of Sri Lanka. Led by Professor Ricardo Hausmann, the team has focused on a single question: what is holding back investment in Sri Lanka – especially in new and non-traditional export-oriented sectors – and what can the government do about it? In this podcast, members of the Sri Lanka team explain what they learned from the project which includes: First, a lack of new economic “knowhow” has meant that there are few easy opportunities for innovative investors to exploit. Next, the investors who do arrive find significant roadblocks to their success; these include policy barriers to reaching markets and key inputs, and infrastructural gaps at the regional level. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Anna Mysliewic, Masters in Public Policy student at the Harvard Kennedy School, interviews Dan and Tim, who share their learnings from the project and how they partnered with key counterparts in the government and civil society to support potential solutions, and better understand the deeper institutional gaps that prevent proactive policymaking. // www.growthlab.cid.harvard.edu // www.bsc.cid.harvard.edu // Interview recorded on November 16, 2018. About the speakers: Daniel Stock rejoined the Center for International Development's Growth Lab as a Research Fellow in 2015. He also held this position from 2011-2013. He studies how countries apply proactive strategies to promote structural transformation. His research focuses on using network models to uncover new opportunities for diversifying exports and attracting new sources of investment. Prior to joining CID, Daniel was a Junior Professional Associate at the World Bank, working with governments to improve the investment climate for local businesses and FDI. Daniel has also worked as a researcher at the MIT Media Lab's Macro Connections group, and a Research Intern at the International Labour Organization (ILO) in Santiago, Chile. Daniel earned a B.S. in Quantitative Economics and International Relations from Tufts University. Tim O’Brien joined the Center for International Development in 2015, working on both Growth Lab and Building State Capability projects.He has led growth diagnostic research in Albania and Sri Lanka. Tim holds a Master in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) degree from the Harvard Kennedy School and a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Northwestern University. Tim served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Malawi from 2008-2010 and has experience working with the World Bank and in environmental engineering. Tim’s research interests center on the challenges of economic transformation and adapting to climate change in developing countries and vulnerable communities. Sehar Noor is a Research Assistant at the Center for International Development's Growth Lab. Sehar graduated from Rollins College in May 2016 with honors in Economics and International Affairs. While at Rollins, she served as captain of the debate team, and studied abroad in Cuba and China. Her previous experience includes conducting fieldwork in disaster relief camps as an intern for the Aga Khan Rural Support Program in Gilgit, Pakistan, and interning with the Human Trafficking and Migrant Smuggling Unit of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in Islamabad, Pakistan.

Razón de Estado con Dionisio Gutiérrez. Entrevista de Dionisio Gutiérrez a Ricardo Hausmann. Debate de Samuel Pérez Attias y Olav Dirkmaat.

Over the last two decades South America has witnessed a series of large scale economic experiments where countries have introduced their own brand of left wing politics. Dubbed Socialism of the 21st Century its successes and failures are debated by Dr Asa Cusack from the LSE Latin America and Caribbean Centre and Professor Ricardo Hausmann of Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.

Venezuela is currently experiencing 44 million percent (not a typo) annual inflation. Apart from forcing everyone to do more math, what is the Maduro regime doing about it? Unfortunately, nothing that matters, according to Professor Ricardo Hausmann from Harvard’s JFK School of Government. Moises Rendon of CSIS joins us to describe the human cost, including Venezuelans fleeing their country, starvation, and misery. Both predict that nothing will improve without a new government, but even then, it will take at least a decade to put Venezuela back together.

In this episode, Haley interviews Ricardo Hausmann at the Ninth International Conference on Complex Systems. Hausmann is Professor of Economic Development at Harvard's Kennedy School and Director of the Center for International Development at Harvard University. He talks with Haley about the scale of the current economic collapse in Venezuela, economic complexity, systemic resilience, and the invisible hand.   

CID Student Ambassador Alexandra Gonzalez interviews Ricardo Hausmann, Director of CID and Professor of the Practice of Economic Development at the Harvard Kennedy School. Ricardo discusses how he became CID’s director, our current work throughout the world, and what you can expect from future research. // www.cid.harvard.edu // Interview recorded on April 23rd, 2018. About Ricardo Hausmann: Ricardo Hausmann is Director of the Center for International Development and Professor of the Practice of Economic Development at Harvard University. Previously, he served as the first Chief Economist of the Inter-American Development Bank (1994-2000), where he created the Research Department. He has served as Minister of Planning of Venezuela (1992-1993) and as a member of the Board of the Central Bank of Venezuela. He also served as Chair of the IMF-World Bank Development Committee. Hausmann was Professor of Economics at the Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administracion (IESA) (1985-1991) in Caracas, where he founded the Center for Public Policy. His research interests include issues of growth, macroeconomic stability, international finance, and the social dimensions of development. He holds a PhD in economics from Cornell University. For contact and course information, visit Professor Hausmann's HKS faculty directory page. For publications, teaching, media, visit Professor Hausmann's personal website

Professor Ricardo Hausmann, director of the Kennedy School’s Center for International Development, and Tim Cheston, a research fellow with the center’s Growth Lab, explain how they leveraged data from the Atlas of Economic Complexity to assess the knowhow of more than 130 countries and predict their economic growth over the next eight years. Learn more about CID's new growth predictions: http://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/rankings/growth-projections/

Ricardo Hausmann, Harvard economist and Former Minister of Planning for Venezuela, discusses Venezuela’s elections and economic outlook.Alan Bjerga, agriculture reporter for Bloomberg, on how the agriculture sector is hurting from GOP policies on trade, NAFTA, and the rejection of farm legislation in the House.Leigh Curyer, CEO of uranium mining company NexGen Energy, on how Russia may countersanction uranium, and the outlook for nuclear energy. Travis Briggs, CEO of ROBO Global, on investing in robotics, automation and AI.

US President Donald Trump is bringing back sanctions on Iran and is threatening to extend the sanctions to European companies that do business there. The Iran announcement came in the same week that the USA announced more sanctions on Venezuela, ahead of controversial elections later this month. Since coming into power, President Trump has used economic sanctions as a weapon of choice. But do sanctions actually work? And how do they affect businesses trading with the countries concerned? Ed Butler is joined by a panel of experts to discuss what to expect as the US grip tightens over the economies of countries it is in conflict with. (Picture: An Iranian woman walks past a mural on the wall of the former US embassy in Tehran on May 8, 2018. Photo credit:ATTA KENARE/AFP/Getty Images) Contributors: Elizabeth Rosenberg from the Center for a New American Security. Former Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of the Treasury where she helped to develop and implement financial and energy sanctions. Nigel Kushner, specialist sanctions lawyer, CEO of W Legal. Professor Ricardo Hausmann, Director of Harvard's Center for International Development. Former Minister of Planning of Venezuela. Producer: Audrey Tinline

Interview recorded on April 23rd, 2018.

El 7 de junio de 2017 tuvo lugar en la Fundación Rafael del Pino la conferencia de Ricardo Haussamnn, director del Center for International Development de la Universidad de Harvard, titulada “Nosotros y la prosperidad”, en la que analizó la relación entre desarrollo económico y sentimiento de identidad, de pertenencia a un grupo o comunidad, de las sociedades. Hausmann empezó preguntándose qué hace que los países sean ricos o pobres, una cuestión que se viene planteando desde que Adam Smith publicó “La riqueza de las naciones” en 1776. Por entonces, el país más rico del mundo era Holanda y su renta per cápita era cuatro veces superior a la de los países más pobres. Pero lo que era un problema de 4 a 1 se convirtió en un problema de 256 a 1.

El 7 de junio de 2017 tuvo lugar en la Fundación Rafael del Pino la conferencia de Ricardo Haussamnn, director del Center for International Development de la Universidad de Harvard, titulada “Nosotros y la prosperidad”, en la que analizó la relación entre desarrollo económico y sentimiento de identidad, de pertenencia a un grupo o comunidad, de las sociedades. Hausmann empezó preguntándose qué hace que los países sean ricos o pobres, una cuestión que se viene planteando desde que Adam Smith publicó “La riqueza de las naciones” en 1776. Por entonces, el país más rico del mundo era Holanda y su renta per cápita era cuatro veces superior a la de los países más pobres. Pero lo que era un problema de 4 a 1 se convirtió en un problema de 256 a 1.

In episode ten of "Global" our hosts learn about the Western Hemisphere's newest dictatorship: Venezuela. How has the most resource-rich country in South America suffered an economic collapse? Our hosts talk to Dr. Ricardo Hausmann of Harvard's JFK School of Government, Alexandra Ulmer of Reuters, and Miriam Kornblith of the National Endowment for Democracy to learn more.

After Goldman Sachs purchased $2.8 billion in Venezuelan bonds, many were quick to point out the deal's adverse effects on the country's people. PS editors Whitney Arana and Jonathan Stein discuss the matter, using analysis from a recent column by Ricardo Hausmann, a former minister of planning of Venezuela. He proposes a way out for index investors wanting to finance emerging markets, but not odious regimes. Read Hausmann's column at http://bit.ly/2qm7sHR. Like what you hear? Please subscribe, rate, and review our podcasts.

Ricardo Hausmann, the director of the Center for International Development at Harvard's Kennedy School and Venezuela's former planning minister, discusses Venezuela's debt outlook and political climate. Ariel Cohen, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, grades Donald Trump's NATO visit and foreign tour. Bloomberg Intelligence's Vincent Piazza talks about his oil outlook following the OPEC meeting and ahead of the summer driving season. Finally, Ravi Saligram, CEO of Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, discusses the recent acquisition of IronPlanet.

When you want to get a better job or achieve personal development, you might choose to increase your skills. This might mean learning something new, or acquiring more education. It's the same with countries, if they want to climb up the ladder of development, they need to develop their capacity, or "capabilities," says top economist Ricardo Hausmann.

Have you ever wondered what goes into the making of a t-shirt, business shirt or blouse – like the one you are most likely wearing right now? Recently, a collaboration between physicist, César Hidalgo and Economist, Ricardo Hausmann has seen the development of fascinating techniques to do just that – to study not just the trading relationships amongst the nations of the Earth, but the product relationships that lie behind this trade. Such analysis leads to some tantalizing prospects like mapping capabilities, or measuring the product- or capability- complexity that each country possesses. In this pod-cast, we'll introduce and explore this remarkable analysis which goes under the heading: Economic Complexity.