In this week’s episode we hear from Thomas Levenson, author and Professor of Science Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), about his most recent book Money for Nothing: The South Sea Bubble and the Invention of Modern Capitalism, a Financial Times Economics Best Book of 2020. Levenson explains how the "world's first great stock market boom, fraud and bust" is not just the story of a huge scam but is also the story of the birth of modern financial capitalism: the idea that you can invest in future prosperity and that governments can borrow money to make things happen.