Back to Basics Series: Why do we call it Pitchfork Economics? (with Ganesh Sitaraman & Walter Scheidel)

Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer

Civic Ventures

Business, Government, News, Politics

4.8 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 1 July 2025

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 2014, Nick Hanauer sounded the alarm: if economic inequality kept growing, the pitchforks would come—for him, and for the rest of America’s wealthy elite. Then 2016 happened. Donald Trump was elected president on a wave of economic populism that correctly identified massive inequality as a problem, but which offered all the wrong solutions. The inaugural episode of Pitchfork Economics lays the groundwork for everything that followed. We revisit the urgent warning that launched the show, explore the deep myths that still shape our economy, and explain why telling a better story about how the economy works is the first step toward building one that works for everyone. Part of our Back-to-Basics summer series—essential listening for anyone ready to ditch trickle-down and think middle-out. Ganesh Sitaraman is a law professor at Vanderbilt University and a leading expert on constitutional law, economic inequality, and political economy. He’s the author of several influential books, including The Crisis of the Middle-Class Constitution, The Great Democracy, and Why Flying Is Miserable and How to Fix It. Sitaraman has served as a policy advisor to Senator Elizabeth Warren and co-founded the Vanderbilt Policy Accelerator. Walter Scheidel is a historian at Stanford University whose work explores inequality, economic history, and the rise and fall of civilizations. He’s best known for his acclaimed book The Great Leveler, which argues that throughout history, extreme inequality has only been reduced through violent shocks like war, revolution, or plague. This episode originally aired December 11, 2018. Social Media: ‪@ganeshsitaraman.bsky.social‬ @walterscheidel.bsky.social‬ Further reading: The Pitchforks Are Coming… For Us Plutocrats by Nick Hanauer Website: ⁠http://pitchforkeconomics.com⁠ Instagram: ⁠@pitchforkeconomics⁠ Threads: ⁠pitchforkeconomics⁠ Bluesky: ⁠@pitchforkeconomics.bsky.social⁠ Twitter: ⁠@PitchforkEcon⁠, ⁠@NickHanauer⁠, ⁠@civicaction⁠ YouTube: ⁠@pitchforkeconomics⁠ LinkedIn: ⁠Pitchfork Economics⁠ Substack: ⁠The Pitch⁠

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, pitchfork listeners, Goldie here. We've been doing this podcast for a long time now,
0:05.6	so we thought we'd take a little break this summer. But we don't want you to miss us too much,
0:10.4	so we thought we'd revisit some of the most essential episodes from early in our history
0:15.5	with a Back to Basic summer series. And what could be more back to the basics than this OG episode? Why do we
0:24.5	call it pitchfork economics? People are the people. People are angry and It's not anger. It's not bigger. It's not bigger. It's not bigger.
0:38.3	People are angry and they have a right to be angry because they have been taken advantage of for 40 years.
0:44.3	Thousands took to the streets in Milan in a protest over the level of illegal immigration into Italy.
0:50.3	Now what we do with that anger, how we express it, what change we enact to remedy it,
0:57.3	that's the question. Anarchists wearing black clothing and masks attacked supporters of President
1:02.4	Trump during a demonstration in Berkeley, California Sunday. If you don't get economics right,
1:07.3	the pitchforks come out.
1:19.2	From the offices of civic ventures in downtown Seattle, this is pitchfork economics with Nick Hanauer, a pointed conversation about who gets what and why, with one of America's
1:24.8	most provocative capitalists.
1:29.3	Well, think all the rich are quietly breeding a sigh of relief.
1:31.3	Their taxes might not be going up next year after all.
1:34.3	Meet one millionaire who is signed because he wants them to go up.
1:38.3	He has founded or financed or sold dozens of companies making billions of dollars.
1:43.3	And now he says only the wealthy
1:45.8	can really cure the U.S. of its inequality and economic anxiety.
1:50.3	Seattle-based entrepreneur and venture capitalists. Now he is known as the godfather of
1:54.8	raising the minimum wage. Nick Hanauer, Nick, how you doing, sir?
2:04.3	I'm Nick Hennauer, founder of Civic Ventures.
	...

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