The Overcapacity Argument

Brenner: There was a very clear view in those administrations that there was a very limited scope of activities that were appropriate for the public sector to take on. In general, it was entirely desirable and appropriate for pretty much every important decision about investment, productive activity to be made by the private sector," he says. Brenner: The argument they're making is that even if a real industrial policy program could actually be enacted and carried out, whatever additional employment it created would just sort of be subtracted one for one from growth and employment elsewhere in the world.