Creativity, Corporatism and Crowds

Inventors and inventions drive economic growth, and it’s not just the titans like Thomas Edison who created new industries by filing hundreds of patents for products like the phonograph, the movie camera, an incandescent light bulb. By experimenting and comparing results, workers at different levels can streamline operations or create new products. Many inventions emerge at the workplace, but the loners working on revolutionary projects often capture the most attention. In an essay for Project Syndicate, Nobel laureate and Yale professor Robert Shiller urges tackling unemployment and under-employment, suggesting that stimulus spending, education and political courage are all needed to boost innovation. He reviews writings on “corporatism” and compares corporate methods to chaotic crowd funding based on popular appeal. “Ultimately, we need economic institutions that somehow promote the concerted creative actions of a wide swath of world’s people,” Shiller concludes. Innovation can be disruptive, he reminds, and new forms of economic organization should not neglect fairness. – YaleGlobal