From The Real News Network
NOOR: So one of the
chapters in your book is titled "Lies about Government", and you start
off the chapter by talking about fake economics, which is the term you
use to describe mainstream neoliberal economics. And you say it includes
as a central message the inherent inefficiency and intrinsic
malevolence of governments at all levels. Talk about what you mean and
how governments and their role in our economy is so vilified and why
that's done.
WEEKS: It derives from a basic ideology that
says that everybody and everybody in the world is a consumer and that
you derive your pleasure in life from consuming, which, if you reflect
on it, obviously is a pretty sick idea. I mean, people who actually
behave that way I think are rather unhappy people. But at any rate, if
you take that position, if you take that analytical position, then it
follows that taxes are a burden--they take away an individual's ability
to consume. And they are--some of it may be absolutely necessary. You
might say that that's the more benign wing of this school of economics,
which I refer to as fakery. And so they begin by saying
everybody's a consumer. Taxes should be as small as possible so you can
go out and consume. And anything that can be produced through the
private sector should be produced by the private sector. And then, in
addition to that, if it ends up being produced through the government,
it will be produced inefficiently; that is, there are some things you
can't avoid, one presumes. You can't have a private fire department.
They would just go and put out the fires of the people that paid, not
the ones next door that hadn't. But most things, you should go from the
private sector, 'cause the government is inherently inefficient.
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