TED interviews Tabarrok

Following up on my TED talk, is this interview with Matthew Trost.  We cover whether limited natural resources are a constraint on growth, the Lebensraum fallacy, The Wire, the tragedy of the commons and other topics.  Here's one bit on growth and democracy in the context of China and India.

A lot of people say that India has been held back by its democracy. But let’s remember that despite being a poor country India’s democracy meant that its government never let millions of people starve. No politician wants to starve potential voters. In the long run, I think India is going to benefit from its democracy and not be harmed by it. Democracy is, in a sense, like markets. It provides information and feedback, it leads to a more open system and it constrains government from the worst kinds of abuses. I think that the more China proceeds along the wealth path, the more difficult they will find it not to have a democracy.

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