Soaring cost of essentials is severely testing democracies, economist says

Detailed summary

Isabella Weber, an associate professor of economics, says policymakers need to make affordability the centre of "anti-fascist economics".

Isabella Weber, an associate professor of economics, says the soaring cost of essentials is severely testing democracies.

In a new book, she says policymakers need to make affordability the centre of "anti-fascist economics".

Dr Weber says it would require "structuralist measures" that change the ways in which we provision the essentials in society.

Isabella Weber, a rising-star German economist, says it's something we need to pursue again.

She says fascism has made a comeback. Our economic and political systems have stopped making our lives better and people are furious about it.

She says illiberal forces are exploiting voters' anger and, rather than addressing the material causes of their pain, are deliberately redirecting people's rage towards migrants and other minorities, and promising that salvation can be found in nationalism, ethnic purity, or patriarchy.

To combat the phenomenon, she argues, we have to make life's essentials affordable again, housing, food, energy, water, health care, transport, so the foundations for a dignified life are available to everyone, no matter your household income or class.

"It's funny that today we think of anti-fascist economics as provocative," she told the ABC Business Daily podcast.

"In the 1940s it was actually a mainstream point for economists to say that economics had a role to play in 'Never Again'.

Opening of the article, excerpted from ABC Business. To read the rest, open the article on the publisher's site.