Always. Be. Shilling.

For the first time on The Dispatch Podcast, author of the Capitolism newsletter and neoliberal shill extraordinaire Scott ...

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For the first time on The Dispatch Podcast, author of the Capitolism newsletter and neoliberal shill extraordinaire Scott Lincicome joins Sarah and Declan. On topics ranging from free-market fundamentalism to the crazy world of semiconductors, Scott brings his expertise to break it all down. As he says on today’s episode, “You know, Glengarry Glen Ross? It’s Always. Be. Shilling. … I will literally make any issue about trade and markets. It doesn’t matter what, whether it’s the chicken sandwich wars … or cheap T-shirts.” To cap it off, Scott speaks to being the reigning champion of the “Neoliberalism Shill” tournament.

Show Notes:

–“Capitolism” newsletter

–Scott’s Cato bio 

–Scott’s Twitter profile

–Scott’s latest Cato paper “Manufactured Crisis”

–Declan’s piece on semiconductors in TMD

–Scott’s article on semiconductors

–Vote your conscience in this year’s Neoliberal Shill Tournament

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Comments (22)
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  1. John Townson

    Sara, dont where else to send this comment so you win the prize!

    Would really like to see a deep dive on the 1776 Report. I have heard some snark about this document (from non Dispatch sources) but would really like to hear an honest assessment of the good and bad in it.

    Feel free to assign to somebody else!

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  2. Anonymous

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    1. Very Old Grumpy Guy

      Well, certainly the vast majority of laws cut taxes. I do not know Scott feels he needs to deny the obvious here. Occam's razor would state that he doesn't want to offend the (Almost 100%) Republican donors to CATO. I am hopeful there is some other answer.

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  3. Will

    Great interview; I really liked Scott's point (among others) on needing to see proof that the government can improve outcomes compared to the market (also made in his latest newsletter).

    Interview was nearly ruined in the last 2 minutes though. Dallas > Houston? Come on. I heard him spew this misinformation AFTER I voted for him in the neoliberal shill bracket, and I now deeply regret casting my vote for someone clearly so misguided in ranking Texas cities.

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  4. Very Old Grumpy Guy

    Full disclaimer - I am an avowed capitalist. One must be EXTREMELY careful when one wants to propose a a "modification" to market based price discovery. As such, I rarely find anything to argue with about a CATO driven narrative. I usually nit pick around the edges. Having said all that, my nitpick here is this shibboleth that Republicans are the "fiscally responsible" party and the Democrats are the crazy spenders. This leads to this warped thinking, brought up in this interview, that, by golly if Trump wasn't so fiscally irresponsible, we Republicans would have the high ground. The reality is that, since Reagan, one of my heroes, Republican presidents have done WAY worse, at controlling the federal debt. What appears to have finally happened is that the Democrats have said "screw it". Why should we behave like adults and try and reign in the debt, take the political hit of reduced economic growth, and then NOT GET ANY CREDIT FOR IT. Until 2016, I was ok with this lie I considered benign, because Republicans were unquestionably free market idealists. That stance would over come any negative economic impact of bad fiscal policy. However, when Republicans decided that we want crony capitalism through tariff policy, I could no longer live with the lie. So, like most of CATO, I feel painted into a corner by the natural center right party. Even CATO realizes this and is trying to become less shackled to the party of crazy, but it is too late. (I believe they no longer sponsor a booth at CPAC.) Had CATO maybe taken on some actual market failures, and used them to build bridges with "the left" they might be in a better position today. As an example, I would gladly replicate my experience with the DMV of both the People's Republic of California AND the Workers Paradise of New Jersey, to avoid any interaction with my cable company.

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    Ben Connelly

    Yes, Virginia basketball!

    Awesome podcast and great March madness pick. Always pick VA!

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  6. Jose A Rodriguez

    Excellent, excellent, excellent! Thank you. Great way to grow the brand :)

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    Angie

    That was fun, even for apathetic about economics people like me...lol
    It was cool to finally hear your voice Scott
    I even understood almost everything you said and learned stuff
    I did vote for you
    And I almost have forgiven you the disdain for cats....lol
    Thanks for being on the pod

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    Kevin Johnson

    A good one. Second pro baby, and thus pro mother, one in a row. Nice, although small, ref to nachos, which aren’t as good as babies, but pretty awesome (and they go well together.). Finally, Scott’s riff near the end about the limits of government’s ability to pivot to accomplish the resilience industrial policy fans claim justifies the huge losses in efficiency is awesome; even better than charts! We can all (or almost) agree government is needed in some emergencies, but it is vitally important to ask in each case if government control is likely to improve the situation or not. Scott makes clear case that on covid response, much of what folks wanted centrally controlled by federal government was better left to the market, with government acting as procurer or guarantor but NOT micro-manager. Even where good folk disagree about where to draw the line, Scott’s pitch that there IS a line, beyond which government often makes things worse, is Golden.

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    Jori Sackin

    I work closely with a lot of different US manufacturer’s that are going through distribution problems, some of it’s COVID related, but there’s also: the inability to get raw materials and not being able to find workers. An argument I’ve heard Scott make is that since this is “low skill” manufacturing it’s fine that these types of businesses atrophy or fall off because we’re replacing it with “high skill” manufacturing and that this is a good trade off.

    While business moves faster than government and can respond to market demand, it does not share the same interests, and so you can imagine weak points being exposed unintentionally as markets follow demand without the pressure of considering geopolitical risk.

    My question to Scott would be: what level of low skill manufacturing are you comfortable with losing? Are you fine making the same argument that steel is a low skill industry and we’d be better off trading it for something more complex?

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  10. Butch Kamena

    I could listen to Scott Lincicome discuss economic policy all day. Wonderful interview.

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      Angie

      I can too , but it is his personality and way of speaking I like..I think he is just a cool guy...I often either disagree or have no idea what he is talking about otherwise...lol ( economics is at the bottom of both my knowledge list and interest list...find it really boring...lol)

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