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Free Thoughts, Ep. 185: Why We’re Too Complacent (with Tyler Cowen)

923 views · Published 5 May 2017 · 49:10 · Indexed 25 October 2026

Channel: Libertarianism.org · 2017 · News & Politics

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Tyler Cowen joins us this week to talk about the slowing pace of innovation and growth in the United States over the past few decades. Has American society become too complacent? What would a more dynamic society look like?

Show Notes and Further Reading

Cowen’s book on the subject is The Complacent Class: The Self-Defeating Quest for the American Dream (2017).
https://www.amazon.com/Complacent-Class-Self-Defeating-Quest-American/dp/1250108691

Cowen refers to this study by Enrico Moretti and Chang-Tai Hsieh called “Why Do Cities Matter?,” which claims that “Lowering regulatory constraints in [major] cities to the level of the median city would expand their work force and increase U.S. GDP by 9.5%.”
https://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/chang-tai.hsieh/research/growth.pdf

Trevor mentions this episode of Free Thoughts featuring Yuval Levin, “Stuck in Political Nostalgia.”
https://www.libertarianism.org/media/free-thoughts/stuck-political-nostalgia

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