I recently reread Thorstein Veblen’s The Theory of Business Enterprise. To my amazement, the book is more relevant today than when I first read during my college days

Published in 1904, the book expands the author’s view that business organization was incompatible with making money. The industrial system, he argues, requires men to be diligent, efficient, and cooperative. On the other hand, those who rule it are overly concerned with making and spending money.

Personally, I have grown tired of hearing today’s executives call for a renewal of a corporate entrepreneurial spirit. Meanwhile, their employment contracts guarantee bonuses keyed to meaningless metrics, access to one or more corporate jets, gross-ups and “uber”-luxury car leases. Their rhetoric sounds as short-sighted as Marie Antoinette’s “Let them eat cake.”

Coining the phrase “conspicuous consumer,” Veblen revealed the roots of these excesses more than a century ago. Writing about the robber barons of his day, he ravaged the greed and corporate malfeasance in his books.

Educated at Carleton College, Johns Hopkins University and Yale University had a short teaching career as a lecturer at the University of Missouri and a subsidized position at the New School for Social Research.

Veblen's reputation reached its pinnacle during The Great Depression. Often viewed as a political radical or socialist, Veblen committed himself to any form of political action.

Eerily relevant today, “The Theory of Business Enterprise” earned him a deserved reputation as a social critic that extends far beyond his limited academic roots. ( )