Fear and fear-mongering: How economic policy without poverty creates hope

Fear and fear-mongering: How economic policy without poverty creates hope

In their book "Fear and Fearmongering. For an economic policy that gives hope", Marterbauer and Schürz criticize the fact that neoliberal economic policy specifically exploits people's fears in order to create certain behavioral incentives. An example of this is unemployment benefit, which is only paid for a limited period of time and is then reduced to a minimum of social benefits. This forces people to take “lousy jobs” and creates poverty for those who cannot find new work.

Instead, the authors advocate an economic policy that avoids fear as an incentive and enables people to live a fear-free life through higher social benefits, better health care and better educational opportunities. They also call for a restriction on the wealth of the rich through a wealth tax, an inheritance tax and a wealth cap.

The authors calculate that a “zero poverty strategy” and better conditions for low earners in Austria would cost around two billion euros per year, which corresponds to just one percent of annual economic output. This could be financed through a wealth tax on the assets of millionaire households.

The authors' demands are politically controversial, but the book offers an interesting change of perspective. It shows that things often look different from the employees' perspective than from the companies' perspective.

Source: According to a report by www.deutschlandfunk.de