9. Learning to handle the lizard brain – Andreas Bergh

Shouldn’t an economist count money all the time? ”No”, is the unequivocal answer from Andreas Bergh, associate professor in economics at Lund university in southern Sweden. In this episode you can hear Bergh develop his sharp observations of human behavior in all kinds of contexts. Some samples:

On globalization:

”We are seeing a backlash against the very forceful and rapid increase in globalization in the 80’s and 90’s, and what else is to expect, really?”

”But preventing people from communicating across borders, I don’t see that happening, not even if you try hard to stop it.”

On the negativity bias:

”We are not freeing ourselves from the lizard brain but we are learning how to handle it better.”

On the internet’s impact on polarization:

”Your friends, your family and your workmates are even more similar to you than the people you meet online. Yes, there are echo chambers, but they didn’t appear with the internet.”

On the rise of right-wing populism:

”I was shocked when the liberal elites acted as if these opinions had never existed. Many had naïve expectations of the effect of political participation. Democracy is working; that’s why we are seeing a rise of right wing populist parties.”

”At the same time the potential for these parties is decreasing because tolerance is increasing in the long run.”

On inequality:

”It is a problem if the biggest decision regarding your economic standard is the timing of your real estate transactions. It’s hard to get rich by working.”