“we have entered a different phase for the economy, a new era where production matters less and what matters more is access to that production: distribution, in other words—who gets what and how they get it”[282]. In this context, there

Key takeaways ● The Great Safety Net 1.0 used to be built for and around the corporate world. But now our economy revolves around the networked individual: this is a Copernican revolution. ● With individuals harnessing the power of networks, it’s time to reinvent trade unions. As workers convert to the hunting way of life, bargaining becomes less a

Employees of small and medium businesses, self-employed workers[112], students, job seekers, and startup founders are all out of reach for most institutions that used to be part of the Great Safety Net 1.0. The vast majority of workers are outsiders in a world where risks are covered only for those employed by large domestic corporations.

Everyone—the US, the UK, continental Europe—needs a Great Safety Net 2.0 tailored for the new working class. This is what it is all about: creating many jobs in proximity services while improving the condition of workers in the related sectors and making the services they perform more affordable.

Carlota was born in Venezuela in 1939. Her first career there was as a civil servant specialized in energy and innovation policy[34]. Later in life, she switched to academia, settling in the UK where she started to focus on the relationship between technological change and financial markets. Almost by coincidence, her only book to date, Technologic

The overarching concept brought forward by Polanyi is that of the “double movement”[60]: driven by technology, the market starts imposing its dynamics onto society; then, reacting to the harshness of the unrestrained market and the suffering it brings about, society reacts and ultimately reshapes the corporate world to channel its power and serve t

To reverse the trend, my belief is that large Western tech companies—that is, US companies—should commit to building new institutions designed for economic security and prosperity. These companies are the ones that reveal the new techno-economic paradigm as they grow. And among their executives are leaders who best understand what is required to ma

An open world is a more prosperous world, but it is also a world in which both individuals and businesses must be better protected against critical risks. In the thalassocratic paradigm, instead of folding in on themselves, countries must continue to defend free trade but with its complement: a Great Safety Net 2.0 that is in sync with today’s econ

Yet initial learning should in fact be less about practice and more about abstract frameworks. What matters when you’re young is fundamental, imperishable knowledge such as reading, writing, counting, reasoning, learning history, and practicing foreign languages. It’s also about the people you get to know. In an economy dominated by networks, the g