Die "The Purpose of the Economy"-Konferenz von PINE (Pluralism in Economics) Maastricht findet am 14. und 15. Juni 2019 am University College Maastricht (NL) statt. Es werden dabei fünf sogenannte Tracks organisiert, von denen Vorstandsmitglied Dirk Ehnts den Track What could be the Role of the State in a Modern Economy? leitet. Die Beschreibung des Tracks - wie die übrige Konferenz auf Englisch abgehalten - lautet wie folgt:
Thinking about the role of the state has until recently been an exercise in demonizing the state and politics in general. Welfare states have been under attack, liberties of individuals were highlighted and led to identity politics, lobbies and think tanks use their (intellectual) power to influence and shift public debate as well as public opinion. The corporate world is full of scandals, both in the real world – think about diesel engines – or in the financial world, where national governments were targeted by criminals that took billions from them. Global warming is not addressed by national government in any satisfying way, inequality of incomes and wealth is at maximum levels – it seems that the role of the State must be reinvented if current issues of today must be addressed effectively and without much delay. We will discuss what the State can do in policy fields like the Green New Deal, distribution policy, industrial policy, the Job Guarantee and financial market regulation. The track facilitator is Dr. Dirk Ehnts.