Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Anybody that likes John Papola's new video on Elysium needs to google "colonialism".

Posted by dkuehn at 4:55 PM
I just haven't complained about Papola for a while, that's all.


Do people really walk away from that movie thinking it's a criticism of capitalism and technology?

20 comments:

  1. RyanOctober 21, 2014 at 6:38 PM

    Google elysium obamacare

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  2. RyanOctober 21, 2014 at 6:40 PM

    Also: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sanjay-sanghoee/what-elysium-reveals-abou_b_3768916.html
    and infinite more, so yes.

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  3. Daniel KuehnOctober 21, 2014 at 6:55 PM

    When I saw it (I was a little late) I said it was great for really capturing the zeitgeist - a combo of Piketty, health reform debate, immigration debate, and the militarization of the police.

    Some people can't pull "worries about inequality as a problem" apart from "doesn't think markets are good".

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  4. RyanOctober 21, 2014 at 7:09 PM

    Well if you believe if it's a failure of markets, then on the margin you believe markets are less good. Total versus marginal bro

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    1. Daniel KuehnOctober 21, 2014 at 7:54 PM

      If I believe what is a failure of markets? And what do we mean by "failure".

      If as an economist I can't worry about inequality without nine minute videos popping up intermittently explaining that markets and technology are in fact good this is going to be a very tiresome career.

      But I think you're missing my point - the inequality in Elysium has more to do with colonialism and control than markets. But this crowd takes every concern about inequality to be an indictment of the market.

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    2. RyanOctober 21, 2014 at 8:43 PM

      Well as I linked to, plenty of people across the spectrum saw it as an indictment of the system in place right now, neoliberalism, etc. You're the first I've heard who thinks that what it's really about is colonialism.

      Reality is the opposite of what your post implies. Just a casual glance of the internets show that people interpret it as X, the video interpreted it as X, and you're saying "X? Silly libertarians, we all know it's about Y! Stopping being so defensive about everything!"

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    3. Daniel KuehnOctober 21, 2014 at 9:04 PM

      Now I think we need to Google "neocolonialism".

      I'm not surprised there are people out there with dumb views about Elysium. It's a low bar. I can find a dumb Huffpost article on anything. But I contend the vast majority of people came out of the movie thinking jerk rich people in a hyper-inegalitarian future forcibly kept down the population of Earth as a slave workforce, and practically none of these viewers came out thinking "wow the market and technology really blows". We don't have a good way of testing between your view and mine but that's my claim. Certainly there was nothing obviously anti-market or bad economics about the movie.

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    4. dkuehnOctober 21, 2014 at 9:09 PM

      I remember some article about how orcs in LOTR represented black people and was an expression of the inherent racism of Hollywood. I think it's a great opportunity for Papola to make a video about Becker on discrimination.

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    5. LorenzoOctober 21, 2014 at 11:12 PM

      The contemporary city which most resembles Elysium is Havana, Cuba
      http://www.city-journal.org/2014/24_2_havana.html

      If you treat the citizens of the film as the equivalent of "Party member" in a Leninist command economy, it is about right. Just without the funky technology.

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    6. LorenzoOctober 21, 2014 at 11:14 PM

      And most of what is written about "neoliberalism" is crap: sadly, particularly what many academics write.
      http://lorenzo-thinkingoutaloud.blogspot.com.au/2014/08/ahistorical-pomposity-and-gnostic.html

      Delete
  5. LorenzoOctober 21, 2014 at 11:11 PM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

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  6. Dallas WoodOctober 26, 2014 at 5:24 PM

    Well, I think these Econ Pop videos are not meant to be true critiques of the films they discuss. The films are really just a fun way to initiate a discussion on a particular topic. You can see this by checking out some of their other videos. I mean, Elysium has at least as much to do with income inequality as Ghostbusters does with Entrepreneurship.

    That being said, even though I like the IDEA of using these videos to get a discussion going in an undergrad econ course, I would probably never use most of the videos made by EconStories. They seem too intent on making a political point and windup oversimplifying things as a result. This problem was particularly bad with the second Keynes/Hayek video where they conflated countercyclical fiscal policy with central planning. Personally, I prefer to keep my politics out of my teaching.

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    1. Daniel KuehnOctober 26, 2014 at 8:40 PM

      :) Haven't seen the Ghostbusters one - I'll have to look.

      Elysium is DEFINITELY about inequality, no doubt about it. So here's some context - the day prior to my facebook post about this I saw a lot of people linking to the Econ Pop video and talking about how atrocious the movie was and it was just some ideological anti-market gripe, etc. Perhaps the makers of the video didn't take it that seriously, but a lot of people did seem to think of it in the terms that were in the video - that it was anti-market and anti-technology. Hell even Ryan above seems to think it's a valid interpretation. So that was my starting off point. If I had to guess I'd think Papola really does think this, that it's not just a jumping off point (in fact I seem to remember a Papola facebook rant when the movie came out).

      Part of this dynamic, to be honest, is Matt Damon. A lot of these people are predisposed to gripe at any politically tinged things he does given his advocacy around public schools.

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    2. Daniel KuehnOctober 26, 2014 at 8:41 PM

      Oh ya - Papola is all about pushing the libertarian politics, not actual economic science. Like a lot of libertarians out there he sees himself as understanding economics on a deeper level than most professionals. But at the end of the day it's all about the political ideology.

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    3. Dallas WoodOctober 31, 2014 at 12:28 AM

      "Oh ya - Papola is all about pushing the libertarian politics, not actual economic science"

      YES! And its too bad. These videos are entertaining and well made. Its just a shame they're don't try to teach economics instead of how libertarians think about certain economic issues.

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  7. CarlOctober 29, 2014 at 6:33 PM

    "the inequality in Elysium has more to do with colonialism and control than markets. But this crowd takes every concern about inequality to be an indictment of the market."

    Colonialism?! Reverse colonialism, perhaps, seeing as the evil rich white people flee earth rather than invade it.

    Not everyone makes the fine distinctions you do Daniel as an expert economist! So the conflation of "market" with "inequality" goes on quite a bit.

    Can't tell if it's the "right" or the "left" you are bothered by in this post, it's quite ambiguous!

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    1. Daniel KuehnOctober 29, 2014 at 6:36 PM

      Absentee landlords, that's all.

      In this particular post, it's Econ Stories I'm bothered by, not right or left.

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    2. CarlOctober 29, 2014 at 6:38 PM

      Gotcha. Thanks.

      Delete
  8. CarlOctober 29, 2014 at 6:37 PM

    "Certainly there was nothing obviously anti-market or bad economics about the movie."

    What about the ridiculous medical tech on Elysium? It looked like potentially the most successful product ever invented but the movie suggests that Elysium folks were too greedy not to make even more money from charging 10 bucks a go. Surely as an economist that set-up seemed bizarre to you?

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    1. Daniel KuehnOctober 29, 2014 at 8:24 PM

      It's not entirely clear how much it costs to operate and if the rich really segregate themselves that much those sorts of material inequities can easily arise. Think of how many of the wealthy think about impoverished neighborhoods. It's not like Earth in Elysium had no hospitals. I could easily see an Elysium resident not thinking much about it one way or another because they simply didn't pay people on Earth very much mind. The tech could also be bundled with the Elysium experience and the exclusivity of the bundle could give it a status level that justifies forgoing the ten bucks. Given the disparity in medical care that my kid receives vs. much of Africa, with nobody rushing to get my physician over there I don't see how this is really a hurdle.

      If you want to say "these rich bad guys seem meaner than the average rich guy!" I'd agree with that - that's how Hollywood or really any story works. But to extrapolate that to "bad economics" isn't very credible. Certainly not worth the effort these guys put into this video.

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