Episode 53: Jennifer Burns
It’s the last month of the year and soon (but not yet!), it’ll be the last podcast of the season. We had a lot of people write in about our last episode and so this Christmas, on behalf of all of you, we’ll ask Santa for more Digging a Hole. But before we leave out some milk and cookies, we’ve still got some great episodes for you. Today, we’ve got a pre-recorded episode that – can you believe it – couldn’t be aired for contracts (?!) reasons. But the embargo has been lifted! And here on the pod to talk about no less than a prince of free trade is Jennifer Burns, Associate Professor of History at Stanford University, discussing her new book, Milton Friedman: The Last Conservative.
David and Sam start off by making Burns defend the subtitle of the book – was Friedman really the last conservative? Then we discuss the breadth of Friedman’s life and the breadth of Burns’s book, which travels the terrain of the intellectual history of economics to the study of Friedman as libertarian and television celebrity. We get deep into the debate between Keynesianism and monetarism – no math required, but make sure you’ve done your macro readings. Sam wants to know if the book is too easy on Friedman, especially his involvement in Chile. David wants to know if Friedman surrounded himself by sycophants to duck debates. And amidst all of that, Burns makes the case for Friedman as an underappreciated economic thinker who might be right about charter schools. Yes, we know that’s a lot. We hope you enjoy.
Referenced Readings
“The Mighty Wurlitzer Plays On” by Tim Barker