coletsky conceded that as a matter of economics, cains was right. you could harness capitalism by regulating it and using policy, but it was a matter of politics. the capitalists would never let you do it. now, in the post-war era, which is the subject of my last book, it looked as though cains had won the argument with coletsky. capitalism was housebroken. for a remarkable period of about 40 years, the economy not only grew at record rates but it grew more equal at record rates. then the capitalist came roaring back. ever since the late '70s with reagan and thatcher, we have turned the capitalist economy back into a predatory economy run by and for capitalists. now, i want to say a little bit about ralph's career and a very polite disagreement i have with one aspect of his view of the world. part of what ralph has done, and he's done so much, has been to recognize the problem that coletsky identified. if you're going to make anything like a capitalism operate in a remotely public interest, you need a great deal of counterveiling power. so all the c

part of what ralph has done, and he's done so much, has been to recognize the problem that coletsky identify, if you're going to let capitalism operate in remote interest, you need counterproducer. all of the collective groups that ralph organized, very ingenious things like cubs, committees of utility subscribers and the grace piece of legislation that was killed at the last minute, it's consumer protection agency. this was all about countervailing power, so that when you divide forms of regulation they were less likely to be captured so the cannes stood that debate with coletsky, however one other facet of ralph's wonderfully complex odyssey was to make markets more efficient in a kind of brandeis is brandeisism way. here's the nuance of slight disagreement with this. there's a realm which we need marxists. we need entrepreneurists. there are some things that marxists do well. but we also need a nonprofit realm, a civic realm, the problem with the public realm is not that it's corrupted, but that it's too big. we need fewer markets altogether. because markets have this very unfortunate as