In every era, the people face a defining question: Will they build a future worthy of free people or slip into the managed decline of debt, speculation and cultural decay? The answer turns not on temporary political moods but on the system of political economy a nation chooses as its operating philosophy.

There are two competing systems in modern history.

One system treats money as the measure of value, markets as the arbiter of destiny and society as an arena of consumption, competition and extraction. Under this system, banks and asset values are placed above labor and production. Financial engineering replaces physical engineering, and speculative gains masquerade as economic growth. This is the monetarist system.

The other system measures value not in money but in the productive powers of labor. It treats human creativity as the source of wealth, public credit as a tool of national purpose and infrastructure as the foundation for rising living standards. Under this system, progress is defined by increasing productive output, rising real wages, expanding scientific capabilities and improved conditions of life for each generation. This is the credit system, also known as the productive economy.

Every great advance in American development came from the credit system. Every major period of decline followed a retreat into monetarism.

The United States now stands at a decisive moment. Decades of financialization, offshoring, infrastructure neglect and cultural fragmentation have hollowed out the economic and civic foundations of the republic. We must again choose the system that builds nations, not the one that extracts from them.

This is a call not only for economic reform, but for civic renewal. It is the blueprint for a National Credit and Productive Investment Era—a return to building a high-wage, high-energy, high-technology republic.

Follow the conversation at https://politicaleconomyproject.substack.com

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“You are also competing with the guy that goes on TikTok and eats 10,000 pieces of meat and is a superstar. Right? So Superstardom is no longer exclusive to artists or filmmakers or actors. I really feel for the artists.”

Foza Fawehinmi, President, Digital Music Commerce and Exchange Limited

Foza Fawehinmi is an award-winning lawyer and the President of Digital Music Commerce and Exchange Limited, an intellectual property valuation, management and administration company serving sub-Saharan Africa. Over the last 9 years, she has served as a legal advisory and business consultant for some of Africa’s most reputable entertainment companies and artists including, Chocolate City Music, Premier Records, Boomplay Music, Infinix Nigeria, K1 De Ultimate, Teni, Adekunle Gold, The Sarz Academy, Sarz and more

Learn more about Foza’s work at:

• https://digitalmusicce.com
• https://fozadoza.com/category/newsletter
• https://www.instagram.com/fozadoza
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/oyinkansola-fawehinmi
• https://www.facebook.com/fawehinmi.oyinkansola
• https://twitter.com/fozadoza

About EMLab’s Artist Works

Artist Works is an EMLab brand that explores the labor, concepts, and inspiration behind the artists illuminating and shaping our world.

EMLab is produced by Evan Matthew Papp and we are a proud member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network. Support media, authors, artists, historians, and journalists, and laborers who are fighting for a brighter day for everyone, everywhere. Union solidarity forever.

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“We tend to be so lucky in Zambia and Africa because much of the land that we own, most people just inherit it. You don't buy it. And and yet you're sitting on this inherited land and not making it productive.You can’t send your kids to school, you can't have decent housing, you can't actually sustainably feed yourself and yet you're sitting on this resource, So my focus was how do we turn this resource that we sit on, which we don't even value into something that we can actually get jobs out of,”

Conrad Bwalya, Bwando Farms

Conrad Bwalya is the co-founder of Bwando farms with his wife Linda. Based in Zambia, Bwando Farms was started in 2015 as a small farm that has been transformed into a successful integrated farming business, while also creating financial opportunities for rural Zambians by training local farmers. The goal of Bwando Farms is to be one among the best protein food suppliers that feeds a growing population while continually raising expectations for what good food can do.

Learn about Bwando Farms and support their mission by visiting: https://bwandofarms.com.

About EML Publishing

EML Publishing is produced by Evan Matthew Papp and we are a proud member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network. Support media, authors, artists, historians, journalists, and laborers who are fighting for a brighter day for everyone, everywhere. Union solidarity forever.

All Links: https://wlo.link/@empathymedialab

“Look at economics from the standpoint of the ability to increase the potential relative population density the number of people that you can potentially support in a given square kilometer.

“And that's what economics really is about. It's about increasing the power of labor, the power of an individual to do productive work. The way you increase that is through machine tools, through technologies, and you increase it through fundamental breakthroughs in energy.

“You want to go to more intense, higher qualities of fire if you think about it from that perspective. If we go from wood to coal, to oil to fission, which is where we should be, we should be in a fission economy right now, which would be many times more productive than our present economy is. And then fusion, that's where we should be headed. Because at every leap you fundamentally, qualitatively change the power that mankind has over the universe.”

Daniel Burke, Schiller Institute

Daniel Burke ran for U.S. Senate in New Jersey and is with the Schiller Institute, which is organizing to establish a just global economic order ensuring populations are no longer subjected to the horrors of imperialism and geopolitics premised on the anti-entropic development of all nations, and a classical cultural renaissance supporting the creative spirit and potential of all people on this planet, through a dialogue of civilizations that brings forth the best traditions of each culture.

Follow Daniel’s work on Twitter https://twitter.com/Burke4Senate.

About The Political Economy Project

The Political Economy Project is seeking to create a blueprint to unify our fellow humans on a common purpose to work together based on a harmony of interests of the human spirit leading to a new cultural and economic renaissance.

The Political Economy Project is an EML Publishing brand produced by Evan Matthew Papp and we are a proud member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network. Support media, authors, artists, historians, and journalists, who are fighting to improve the prosperity of the working class everywhere.

Follow our work on Substack at: https://politicaleconomyproject.substack.com or on Twitter at https://twitter.com/PolEconProject.

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“If you do look at the renewable industry today, it's very hostile to unions. They're very hard jobs to organize. They're spread out, they're dispersed, very transient workplaces and so they're very low density unions. And also, renewable energy projects because of the tax credit system in our country, are owned by Wall Street. Some of the wealthiest people in the whole economy are the ones that have financing and stakes in these renewable energy projects. So, renewable energy right now is a very anti-labor, pro-Wall Street kind of regime.”

Matt Huber, Author and Professor of Geography

During this interview, we discuss Matt’s new book, Climate Change as Class War - The climate crisis will take a class struggle to solve. In this book, Matthew T. Huber argues that the carbon-intensive capitalist class must be confronted with its disproportionate effect on the climate. Yet, at present the climate movement is unpopular and rooted in the professional class, where it remains incapable of meeting this dizzying challenge. As an alternative, Huber proposes a climate politics to appeal to the majority—the working class—and he evaluates the Green New Deal as a first attempt to channel working-class material and ecological interests. He advocates building union power in the very energy system that must be transformed. In the end, winning the climate struggle will require an internationalist approach based on planetary working-class solidarity.

You can buy Climate Change as Class War - The climate crisis will take a class struggle to solve from Verso Books.

About Matt T. Huber

Matthew T. Huber is Professor of Geography in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. He is also the author of Lifeblood Lifeblood (2013) that uses oil to retell twentieth-century American political history and finds a deeper and more complex explanation in everyday practices of oil consumption in American culture.

You can follow him on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/Matthuber78.

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About the Labor Solidarity Podcast

The Labor Solidarity Podcast highlights the work of labor leaders while discussing historic struggles and the importance of organizing with the goal of building international labor solidarity. Learn more at: https://www.empathymedialab.com/laborsolidarity/

The Labor Solidarity Podcast is a part of the EML Publishing brands and we are a proud member of The Labor Radio Podcast Network. Learn more: https://wlo.link/@empathymedialab

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“There's still people on social media who say, ‘You know, we should just shut up and suck it up. We can get through the winter, even if it's a bit colder.’ But it won't be a bit colder. It might end up being a lot colder and there might be energy rationing, which is the worst case scenario. I think it will be a brutal wake up call for those people.”

Irina Slav, Energy Journalist

Irina Slav is an energy journalist who writes about energy, mining, and geopolitics for Oilprice.com with occasional gigs for Seeking Alpha and other news outlets. She also has one of the best Substack columns writing on energy. During this interview, we discussed her essay titled, Life with Energy Scarcity 101 (https://irinaslav.substack.com/p/life-with-energy-scarcity-101).

Follow Irina’s work on Substack (https://irinaslav.substack.com) and Twitter (https://twitter.com/SlavEnergy).

About The Political Economy Project

The Political Economy Project is seeking to create a blueprint to unify our fellow humans on a common purpose to work together based on a harmony of interests of the human spirit leading to a new cultural and economic renaissance.

The Political Economy Project is an EML Publishing brand produced by Evan Matthew Papp and we are a proud member of the Labor Radio Podcast Network. Support media, authors, artists, historians, and journalists, who are fighting to improve the prosperity of the working class everywhere.

Follow our work on Substack at: https://politicaleconomyproject.substack.com or on Twitter at https://twitter.com/PolEconProject.

#PoliticalEconomyProject

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