Professor Steve Keen #1362

In this incisive episode of Coffee and a Mic, host Mike engages Professor Steve Keen, the world's first rebel economist and predictor of the 2008 financial crisis, in a wide-ranging discussion on global economic systems, geopolitical tensions, and the future of civilization. Keen offers a compelling defense of China’s state-led, innovation-driven model, contrasting it with the dysfunction of Western political and economic institutions. He argues that China’s blend of state infrastructure planning and competitive private enterprise has created a resilient, rapidly developing society—evident in its high-speed rail, urban planning, and grassroots innovation—while criticizing the U.S. for abandoning manufacturing, succumbing to financialization, and enabling a narcissistic, unstable leadership under Donald Trump. Keen warns that the current U.S. actions in the Middle East constitute a dangerous 'mafia shakedown' and pump-and-dump scheme, risking global famine, economic collapse, and nuclear war. He calls for a radical overhaul of democratic systems, advocating for sortition, public funding of elections, and expert-driven governance. On technology, Keen sees the AI boom as a classic Schumpeterian bubble that will crash but leave behind transformative tools, urging a societal shift toward universal basic income and post-work culture. He concludes with a sobering vision: the end of the American empire is inevitable, but only if humanity can survive the nuclear and ecological threats it now faces.