After my series on the Nazi economy, I discovered the work of independent scholar Rainer Zitelmann. He’s had an amazing career in Germany doing two things I greatly admire: making lots of money in real estate, and judiciously assessing the Nazis’ degree of commitment to socialism. In this interview, Zitelmann weighs in on “What Hitler really thought about economics,” carefully distinguishing Hitler’s somewhat protean public persona from his sincere long-run vision for the German economy.
During the interview, I discovered that Zitelmann is also the world’s leading expert on not only public perceptions of the superrich, but the psychology of the superrich. I’m eager to learn what he’s discovered, and perhaps I’ll do a second interview on that.
As is often the case with foreigners apologizing for their English, Zitelmann was perfectly articulate.