#AcademicRunPlaylist - 12/10/24

My day was fairly packed, but I was still able to get out a bit and listen to talks for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was an intriguing talk by Izabela Wnuk-Soares on the impact of immigrant employment rates on native employee injuries and sick leave at the Economics of Migration seminar. Using data from Germany Wnuk-Soares convincingly demonstrates that more immigrants joining a company relate to significantly lower number of injuries for native workers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Npxq3I7VU0M

Next was "Globalists" by Quinn Slobodian. While most other work on neoliberalism has understandably centered the influence of the Chicago School, Slobodian instead focuses on the relatively overlooked so-called "Geneva School," including Hayek and other early neoliberal thinkers. The account of that school's evolution and influence across the decades is fascinating and disturbing, illustrating just how overtly racist and colonial the aims of neoliberalism's boosters were. By espousing "neutral" targets and by explicitly deriding democracy, they aimed to create a framework that would re-entrench the white, privileged class. Highly recommend https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674244849

Last was "Utilitarianism" by John Stuart Mill. Mill's work, and this collection in particular (which includes his 1868 speech to the British House of Commons), is a standard of most ethics curricula. It's extremely useful to read this through the lens of future Western ethical thinking, with the focus on individual happiness and justice and the complete omission of systemic ethics and justice. Many of the things Mill "knows" as well have since been shown to be untrue or only partly true, and so with a bit of effort one can poke lots of holes in his conclusions. Overall, this is a flawed but important work that should be considered by those who are making ethical decisions in Western contexts. Highly recommend https://www.audible.com/pd/Utilitarianism-Audiobook/B0076AOF1W