by Michael Liss
Let us try before we die to make some sense of life. We’re neither pure nor wise nor good; we’ll do the best we know; we’ll build our house and chop our wood and make our garden grow. —From Candide, Music by Leonard Bernstein, Lyrics by Richard Wilbur
On page 184 of Edmund Phelps’ new book, My Journeys In Economic Theory, he tells the story of a lunch party with friends, at which, presumably after the plates were cleared (but not the glasses), the then 80-something-year-old 2006 Nobel Prize winner in Economics belted out “Garden Grow.”
My kingdom for a YouTube of that one. If you wanted to characterize the second part of Ned Phelps’ career, you might very well have started with that bit of Candide and Phelps’ connection to the text of Voltaire’s book. The activity of work is fundamental to human happiness. Work need not define the whole of us, but it should provide challenges, a sense of worth, and an opportunity to participate in community itself. Work has value beyond a paycheck. With work, we create something for ourselves, and, as Phelps convincingly argued in his 2013 book, Mass Flourishing: How Grassroots Innovation Creates Jobs, Challenge, and Change, each person, in his or her own way, may also contribute to innovation that moves both the economy and society forward.
There is a dual-mindedness to Phelps, an intellectual fluidity, that makes you pay attention. In 2011, I heard him present at the 9th annual conference of Columbia University’s Center on Capitalism and Society. Phelps had co-founded the Center (with Roman Frydman) in 2001. While speaking of the essentialness of work, he added what seemed to be a fairly controversial, if throwaway, comment. I’m paraphrasing here a bit, but the import of what he said was that a government policy that favored the wealthy was not in and of itself bad, if part of the object of the policy was to help foster an atmosphere where any individual could achieve self-realization and growth. Read more »