From myths to models: How we build the inclusive economy Generation Hope needs
How community-led models and new policy frames create an economy that enables everyone to thrive
This is Part 2 of our exploration into corporate narratives and inclusive economics. If you missed Part 1, "The stories we've been sold," I'd recommend starting there to understand how corporate myths have shaped our economic thinking.
In part 1, we explored how breakfast cereal marketing, Coca-Cola's Santa, and oil companies' "carbon footprint" campaigns have shaped cultural beliefs that serve corporate interests rather than community wellbeing. We saw how these manufactured narratives block pathways to inclusive prosperity by making us accept artificial constraints and individual responsibility for systemic problems.
But recognising the myths is only the beginning. How do we move from critique to construction, from debunking harmful stories to building economic systems that actually work for everyone?
The deeper myths that shape our economy
Before we can build alternatives, we need to understand the more sophisticated narratives that maintain economic inequality. These aren't just marketing slogans, they're foundational stories about how economies must work that have become so embedded in policy-making that questioning them seems almost unthinkable.
The NHS "crisis" narrative
For over a decade, British governments have declared the NHS "unsustainable" whilst systematically underfunding it below inflation and population growth. This manufactured crisis creates public acceptance for privatisation, not because private healthcare is more efficient, but because it transfers public assets to private profit.
The sleight of hand here is remarkable. Public healthcare is actually more economically efficient than private systems, providing better outcomes at lower cost. Countries with robust public health systems consistently outperform more privatised models on both health outcomes and cost-effectiveness. Yet the "unsustainability" narrative has become so pervasive that many people now accept privatisation as inevitable.
This matters for inclusive economics because healthcare is infrastructure for economic participation. When people can't access healthcare without financial stress, their economic choices become constrained. They stay in jobs they hate for health insurance, avoid entrepreneurial risks, or simply get sicker and less productive. Strong public healthcare is economically optimal for everyone except those profiting from healthcare scarcity.
The housing "affordability" crisis
When young people can't afford housing, media narratives often focus on avocado toast and coffee purchases rather than the structural forces making homes unaffordable. This deflection serves property speculators and financial institutions that profit from housing scarcity.
The numbers tell the real story: housing costs have outpaced wage growth by enormous margins due to property being treated as an investment commodity rather than a human necessity. In 1997, the average house price was 3.6 times average earnings. By 2021, it was 9.1 times average earnings. No amount of skipped coffee can bridge that gap.
Blaming individual spending habits masks the need for policies like community land trusts, cooperative housing, and speculation taxes that could make housing affordable again. The irony is particularly stark when Housing secretary, Angela Rayner, faced questions (that led to her resignation last week) about tax arrangements on her own second home whilst overseeing policies meant to address housing affordability, demonstrating how even those meant to solve the housing crisis are embedded within the very systems that created it.
More importantly, it prevents us from questioning why we allow basic human needs to become vehicles for wealth extraction rather than foundations for economic participation.
The "gig economy" freedom myth
Platform companies like Uber and Deliveroo rebranded precarious work as "being your own boss" and "flexible employment." This narrative masks how these companies circumvent employment protections whilst extracting profit from workers' labour and communities' infrastructure.
The question inclusive economics asks is: flexible for whom? These platforms create flexibility for capital to avoid responsibilities like sick pay, pensions, and worker protections, whilst creating insecurity for workers who bear all the risks. Workers get the "freedom" to work without guaranteed income, benefits, or workplace protections, which isn't freedom at all.
True economic inclusion would mean workers having genuine ownership stakes in the platforms they make profitable. Instead of extracting wealth from drivers and delivery workers, these platforms could be co-owned with those creating the value.
The infrastructure of economic storytelling
These narratives don't spread by accident. There's a sophisticated infrastructure for amplifying corporate-friendly stories: think tanks funded by interested industries, media outlets owned by corporate conglomerates, and academic departments supported by private donations. The economic incentives are clear, fund the research and messaging that supports your business model.
Understanding this infrastructure is crucial because it reveals why certain economic ideas seem "common sense" whilst others appear radical or unrealistic. When corporate-funded research dominates policy discussions, alternatives that threaten corporate interests get marginalised regardless of their evidence base or effectiveness.
The cost of these manufactured beliefs extends far beyond individual choices. When societies accept artificial constraints on public investment, individual responsibility for systemic problems, and corporate definitions of economic necessity, we block pathways to inclusive prosperity. We end up with economic systems designed to concentrate wealth rather than distribute it, solving problems for capital rather than communities.
Developing economic literacy
Understanding this pattern is essential for building inclusive economies. Every time we hear "we can't afford" public goods, "individual responsibility" for systemic issues, or "there's no alternative" to current arrangements, we can ask: who benefits from this story, and what alternatives does it prevent us from imagining?
Developing immunity to manufactured economic narratives requires asking better questions. When confronted with any economic claim, try these:
Follow the money: Whose economic interests does this story serve? Who profits if people believe this narrative, and who loses out?
Check the timeline: When did this idea first appear in public discourse? Was it promoted by researchers, communities, or corporate marketing departments?
Look internationally: How do other societies organise these systems? If something is presented as economically inevitable, why do other countries manage it differently?
Assess community impact: Does this narrative support community wealth building or wealth extraction? Does it strengthen local economies or weaken them?
These questions help us distinguish between genuine economic insights and corporate messaging designed to serve private interests at public expense.
The inclusive economics alternative
The exciting news is that communities worldwide are already writing new economic stories. They're working examples of inclusive economics in action, proving that alternatives to wealth-concentrating systems aren't just possible, they're often more effective.
Worker cooperatives that share ownership and decision-making show how businesses can distribute wealth rather than concentrate it.
Community land trusts remove housing from speculation whilst maintaining affordability permanently.
Public banks keep local wealth circulating locally.
These models succeed because they're based on different stories about human nature and economic possibility. Instead of assuming scarcity and competition, they start from abundance and cooperation. Instead of accepting that some must lose for others to win, they design systems where everyone's success supports everyone else's.
Policy through new stories
The narrative shift from individual responsibility to shared stewardship opens space for policies that seemed impossible under the old stories. When we stop treating public investment as a burden, universal basic services become not just affordable but economically optimal. When we focus on corporate accountability rather than individual guilt, climate action becomes achievable. When we treat housing as infrastructure rather than commodity, affordability becomes a design choice rather than an impossible dream.
Consider how different economic policies look through an inclusive lens:
Universal basic services: Instead of means-tested welfare that creates bureaucracy and stigma, provide healthcare, education, transport, and housing as public goods available to everyone. This reduces costs through economies of scale whilst eliminating the poverty trap created by conditional benefits.
Participatory budgeting: Instead of technocratic spending decisions, involve communities in deciding how public money gets invested locally. This ensures public investment serves community needs whilst building civic engagement and economic literacy.
Maximum pay ratios: Instead of accepting unlimited executive compensation, cap the ratio between highest and lowest paid workers in any organisation. This ensures prosperity gets shared with those creating the value whilst maintaining incentives for innovation and leadership.
Building Generation Hope's economy
Questioning corporate myths isn't just intellectual exercise, it's the foundation for building economic systems designed for collective flourishing rather than wealth concentration. When we stop accepting manufactured constraints on public investment, individual blame for systemic problems, and corporate definitions of economic necessity, we create space for the inclusive economic policies that could help everyone thrive.
The ripple effects extend far beyond individual awareness. As more people recognise these patterns, political space opens for candidates promoting inclusive economic policies. Communities gain confidence to experiment with cooperative economic models. Young people stop accepting that housing unaffordability, climate breakdown, and economic insecurity are inevitable features of modern life.
This is the foundation that Generation Hope builds upon: the understanding that our economic systems are human creations, not natural laws. They can be redesigned to serve everyone's needs rather than concentrating wealth and power. The stories we tell ourselves about economics become the economies we create.
The choice facing us is clear: continue accepting corporate narratives that block inclusive prosperity, or become active authors of economic stories designed for everyone's thriving. Generation Hope is already writing those new stories in community land trusts, worker cooperatives, and public banks around the world.
The question is whether we'll scale these models fast enough to address the crises facing our communities and planet. That depends on our willingness to reject the corporate myths holding us back and embrace the economic possibilities that Generation Hope represents.
The future isn't predetermined. It's a story we're writing together, and it's time to make sure it's a story where everyone gets to thrive.
With gratitude,
Arunjay.
For deeper exploration of inclusive economic models and practical steps toward implementation, Check out Generation Hope: How Inclusive Economics Can Help Us All Thrive.