060: Manu Saadia on Trekonomics - The Economics of Star Trek: Scarcity, Productivity and Public Goods

Manu Saadia fell into science fiction and Star Trek fandom at the age of eight, back in Paris, France, where he was born and raised.

Manu studied history of science and economic history in Paris and Chicago. After many happy years in the Ivory Tower, he yielded to his childhood passion for the future.

Manu embarked on his continuing mission to explore strange new worlds by boldly going where many have gone before: Los Angeles, CA, where he advise and (occasionally) builds tech companies.

Manu received the 2005 Wayne C. Booth Graduate Student Prize for Excellence in Teaching at the University of Chicago.

His book, Trekonomics, is currently available for pre-order at www.inkshares.com and will be released in 2016.

In this episode you will learn:

• why Manu Saadia wrote Trekonomics.
• about the Star Trek Economics panel at Comic Con.
• why economists love Star Trek.
• about inkshares and how it can help authors publish their book.
• how traditional media rather than social media boosted pre-order sales of Trekonomics - an ironic outcome.
• when Manu’s interested in economics and Star Trek collided.
• about the work of Isaac Asimov and how his stories are a discourse on economics.
• how the stories of robots and the future by Asimov influenced and shaped the storyline in Star Trek.
• about the replicators in Star Trek and how they solve the problem of economic scarcity.
• about the Ferengi’s and how they represent capitalism and trade.
• why The Federation or the humans in Star Trek do not use money but have a foreign account to trade with the Ferengi’s.
• and much much more.
• Check out the shownotes page and links mentioned in this episode at www.economicrockstar.com/manu-saadia
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