Elon Musk Doesn’t Say ‘Thank You Enough’ - Top Economist

Author and academic Mariana Mazzucato talks to Mehdi about Donald Trump’s 'destructive' industrial strategy and Keir Starmer’s failure to tackle 'barbaric' UK inequality.

Marianna Mazzucato, a Professor of Economics and best-selling author, doesn’t believe in “tech billionaires,” she tells Mehdi. “I don’t call them tech billionaires, I just call them billionaires.”

Why? Government investment, not billionaires or corporations, “got us everything that’s smart in our iPhones. The internet, GPS, touchscreen, Siri — these were all government-financed.”

In this wide-ranging interview with Mehdi, Professor Mazzucato, who was praised by the late Pope Francis and has been namechecked by the British prime minister, says Elon Musk doesn’t say “thank you enough” for all the government support his companies have received. It’s “important for the billionaires, once they make the money, to also admit all the public investments that they benefited from,” she says.

She also criticizes the UK Starmer government for not scrapping the two-child benefit cap and says “growth is not the mission” but a “result of investment.” She also tells Mehdi, in relation to Starmer: “You can’t just name-check a book, you’ve got to read it.”