In a widely debated 2020 essay, venture capitalist Marc Andreesen argued that the coronavirus pandemic had exposed a systemic failure in American—in western—institutions. “Part of the problem is clearly foresight, a failure of imagination,” Andreesen wrote. “But the other part of the problem is what we didn’t *do* in advance, and what we’re failing to do now. And that is a failure of action, and specifically our widespread inability to *build*.”
This was true, Andreesen maintained, across a variety of domains. Pandemic preparedness, yes, but also in education, in energy production, in transportation, in housing. “Our nation and our civilization were built on production, on building,” Andreesen wrote. “Our forefathers and foremothers built roads and trains, farms and factories, then the computer, the microchip, the smartphone, and uncounted thousands of other things that we now take for granted, that are all around us, that define our lives and provide for our well-being. There is only one way to honor their legacy and to create the future we want for our own children and grandchildren, and that’s to build.”
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