Who they are
American economic historian, best known for Fragile by Design (2014, with Stephen Haber) — a book arguing that banking crises are not natural disasters but the predictable outcome of political bargains between governments and bankers. Calomiris's work is relevant to founders less for banking specifics and more for its mental model: complex systems that look "broken" are usually working exactly as the incentives dictate. A useful corrective when diagnosing why an industry (support software, feedback tools, etc.) is the way it is.
Core Ideas
- Banking systems as outcomes of political coalitions, not efficiency
- Incentive archaeology — figure out who benefits before blaming incompetence
- Crises are features, not bugs, of fragile institutional designs