Using ‘hiphopnomics’ to explain the economic crisis

Polyester jumpsuit, dollar-sign bling and hip hop. This is not your conventional response to an enormous economic crisis.

But Americans are jittery as their economy is dipping again, and the US government might even be about to run out of cash. Enter Remy Munasifi

In his ironic ryhmes to Raise the Debt Ceiling (see video below), he references “stimulus”, “Medicare” and even Dominique Strauss Kahn in his rhymes.

But this is not mere lyricism. He has hit a nerve. The American public is aware of impending doom. It is part of a rich vein of hiphopnomics emerging out the current fraught debates.

John Papola is half of the brains behind Fight of the Century: Keynes vs Hayek Round Two (see video below). It has gone viral and is now even being used in schools and colleges around the world.

Papola worked on the project with economist Russ Roberts, who says he is on a mission to demystify dense economic theory.

Their first collaboration, Fear the Boom and Bust, examined the big argument on ending America’s economic crisis. The current song, Fight of The Century, is their take on the repercussions of choosing the high spending stimulus at the expense of sound public finances.

It is an ancient debate, symbolised by the century-old fight between the theories of John Maynard Keynes and Friedrich Hayek.

And it is not confined to hip hop. There is a surprising amount of high economics in the lyrics of Merle Hazard’s Ode to Germany.

And while some of the concepts behind the trouble in the US and the eurozone may not be the most simple to understand, Germany’s unease at writing the cheques is.