Professor Steve Keen is one of the world’s top economists, an author, and an academic who was among the few economists to accurately predict and warn of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis years before it happened.
We dug into why the current AI boom is not just a story about overhyped chatbots, but also a tangled-up mess of bad economics, libertarian ideology, energy constraints, and environmental abuse all at once. Not to mention the cherry on top in the form of the Iran War and the consequential crises we are yet to face in the coming weeks, months and years!
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Timestamps:
(00:00:00) – Preview
(00:01:53) – Overview of the current global economic situation — AI bubble meltdown, climate disaster and the Iran war. Will it survive by the end of 2026?
(00:07:09) – Historical parallels: The Railway bubble and the AI hype led by mediocrity that caused financial markets’ meltdown with wider economic implications.
(00:14:14) – History of the “standard” economic theories that brought us to the current economic doom loop of damaged energy supply, the environment and innovation
(00:20:18) – What did China get right? They seem to be moving in the opposite direction from the West, achieving apparently better economic resilience
(00:23:20) – How the Iran War exposed the weakness of global dependence on fossil fuels and accelerated the switch to sustainability and energy independence
(00:25:35) – How conservative, right-wing ideologies and conventional economic theorists together deluded the world in ignoring climate change
(00:30:05) – Why the academia side of economics is, and has been, completely out of touch with reality for over 150 years!
(00:37:08) – The dangers of the zero-government, no-regulation, anti-democracy libertarian ideology led by top tech CEOs and billionaires, empowered by conventional economic theories
(00:43:38) – Despite the evidence of major failures of the conventional economic theories, why do governments keep on following failed models?
(00:49:39) – Why cannot people see these issues or choose to be ignorant about the current economic realities that will negatively impact their livelihoods?
(00:56:52) – AD: The Retort's Campaign to support our independence in light of the UK parliament's new terror threat laws targeting journalists and NGOs, and what you can do at RetortMedia.com/Support
(00:58:10) – Will the situation at the Strait of Hormuz and the developing conflict near the Bab Al-Mandab Strait at the Red Sea trigger points for the imminent economic collapse?
(01:01:38) – What will the world look like after the AI bubble collapse and the wider economic disaster that will follow?
(01:08:54) – The political responses Steve received following his wider campaigns for change of direction
(01:11:16) – The big problem with the economic theory is that it is treated like a religion, not science or accurate data-driven analysis – can anything ever break this religion?
(01:25:09) – Do the libertarian economists actually believe in their own theories, or are they being paid to push forward these theories and influence governments?
(01:25:09) – Once the economic disaster passes, how do we recover?
Episode Notes & Citations:
https://retortmedia.com/podcasts/ceoretort/2026/08/10/steve-keen-warns-the-iran-war-will-crash-the-worlds-economy-and-trigger-ww3/
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