[Rancid]

Have we defaulted yet?

[Steve_American]

I am very aware that micro and macro are different.
But the results of macro-bankruptcy are things like civilizational collapse and mass starvation.

There is no magic in macro-economics either. Stop pretending that the lack of transparency of our macro-money-managers means that there are tricks that can be played to pull collective solvency out of a hat.

Sure, the money-managers might survive collective bankruptcy, but none of the posters in this thread will.

Many smart-alecky posters are accusing ME of confounding micro and macro economics. But in reality, it is YOU who are confounding the survival of oligarchs with the survival of the civilizations they leech off of.

QatzelOk, I'm sorry. I don't understand you al all.
On one hand you assert that the US will go bankrupt pretty soon; and here, on the other hand, you assert the you and all of us posters here will die when the US goes bankrupt. Why do you want to believe the experts that still believe a theory that is based on false premises? [All you need to do to end your panic is to accept that MMT is much more correct than mainstream econ. theories. Then you can just join me in my panic over ACC and overshoot.]
. . . Functionally, the main false premise that mainstream econ. uses is that the world is still on the gold standard and the US banking system still gathers depositors' money and lends it out. These are sort of 1 premise in that with a gold standard the fractional reserve banking system is a strangeness. This is not currently the case because on the gold standard the Gov. needs to get gold to spend gold, but with fiat money it spends money so the people can use it to pay their taxes and the supply of fiat money is not fixed like the supply of gold is.

It seems to me (ISTM) that you must be in a panic, because you "know" that you will die soon, because the US will go bankrupt soon. I know that I will die soon because of climate change or just old age. So, I am in a panic, and worse, mine is based on reality, while yours is based on you accepting the predictions of experts with a 98% failure rate for their predictions.

You said above that the US can't conjure money out of thin air.

Actually, everyone can do that. The problem is getting other people to accept your magic money as if it is really money. In the case of the US dollar, people already accept it as money. So, the hard part has been accomplished. The world resists the idea of not accepting dollars as real money, because the world holds dollars as assets that it depends on for the economy to function. Also, insurance comp. and pension plans the world over hold dollars as assets to pay out when the policies they have sold require payouts.

The rich of the US and the world own US bonds and corps. that hold US bonds. A total default by the US would destroy the liquid wealth of the rich. So, they help the US to keep kicking the can down the road.

This is the main reason that I do not think that the US will ever default. The 2nd reason is that I know that the US can always make its payments on its debt, because it is in dollars and the US can create dollars with key strokes on a computer, a special computer somewhere (maybe in the Fed somewhere).

[QatzelOk]

QatzelOk, I'm sorry. I don't understand you al all.
On one hand you assert that the US will go bankrupt pretty soon; and here, on the other hand, you assert the you and all of us posters here will die when the US goes bankrupt. Why do you want to believe the experts that still believe a theory that is based on false premises?

I don't want to believe these "experts" that you refer to, and I don't believe them either.

I have come to the conclusion that our western colonial financial empire is coming to a close via bankruptcy, and that all of us living in the west will suffer tremendously when this occurs.

You "don't understand me" because you are not even trying to understand me. You are trying to introduce modern monetary theory into this thread, whereas MMT is just one of the many fig-leafs that the organized crime syndicates use.

These rich organized crime syndicates who rip off the masses through deception and blackmail of powerful people - they often use propaganda to "explain" how their pickpocketing is based on Physics and the Textile Industries - two gigantically complex institutions that one would need several PhDs to even begin to comprehend.

While you're trying to begin your first PhD, your wallet is already gone and you didn't feel a thing because you were so engulfed in educating yourself to "understand" the pickpocketing ripoff game.

[Steve_American]

Apparently the bond vigilantes are saddling up – on their ride to oblivion.

When I was in London recently, I was repeatedly assailed with the idea that the Liz Truss debacle proves that the financial markets in Britain are more powerful than the government and can force the latter to comply with lower spending and lower taxes. It seems the progressives have a new historical marker which they can use to walk the plank into conservative, sound finance mediocrity. For decades it was the alleged ‘IMF bailout of the Callaghan government in 1976’ when Chancellor Dennis Healey lied to the British people about running out of money and needing IMF loans to stay afloat. They, of course, never needed any loans but Healey and Callaghan knew the people wouldn’t know that and they used the fiction as a vehicle to keep the trade unions in a subjugated position. That lie has resonated for years and has been a principle vehicle for those advocating smaller government, more privatisation, and more handouts to the top-end-of-town while at the same time cutting welfare payments to the poor, killing the national health system, degrading public utilities, transport and education and all the rest of it. Well now that gang, which now rules the Labour Party in Britain has a new fiction – the ‘Truss surrender to the markets’. And the logic is spreading elsewhere with lurid claims emerging that the so-called bond vigilantes are saddling up to force the US government broke.

The Liz Truss debacle – and it was a debacle – told us nothing about the relative capacities of the financial markets and the consolidated government sector (treasury and central bank).

https://billmitchell.org/blog/?p=61604

I know that many of you don't believe the MMTers like Prof. Mitchell.

Here, he explains that in some situations MMTers agree that a nation can be in trouble.
However, none of these situations apply to the US.
He asserts that a Gov. can fold under pressure, but the US doesn't need to, but it could choose to, like PM Truss did in the UK recently.
Dr. Mitchell says that the US debt to GDP ratio is only 97%. It's not even over 100%.
Japan's is over 250% at the last figure I've seen, and it isn't folding.

.

[late]

You are trying to introduce modern monetary theory into this thread, whereas MMT is just one of the many fig-leafs that the organized crime syndicates use.

You likely don't realise this, but you are trying to say macroeconomics and MMT are the same.

They are not.

You have a simple, and childish, way of looking at this. Which means you are damaging your credibility.

[QatzelOk]

You likely don't realise this, but you are trying to say macroeconomics and MMT are the same.

They are not.

You have a simple, and childish, way of looking at this. Which means you are damaging your credibility.

I guess this means that I am dumb, and that the bankruptcy of the West is not really a problem.

It's nice to have smart people like you to come in and "clear things up," wat0n.

[late]

I guess this means that I am dumb, and that the bankruptcy of the West is not really a problem.

It's nice to have smart people like you to come in and "clear things up,"

It means you haven't done your homework.

[QatzelOk]

It means you haven't done your homework.

If I had done my homework, I would realize that the upcoming bankruptcy of the West isn't a problem at all.

I would realize, on the completion of my homework, that the leader of North Korea is a major problem, that the continued existence of the Palestinians is a problem, that NATO being underfunded is a problem... but that the West going bankrupt is no biggie at all.

And it is here that we should realize that our collective stupidity has been created by the thieves that run our system.

The reason that the banksters run our media... is that they have to keep us stupid to continue ruining our societies (milking the 99%) in order to enrich their own criminal gangs.

[Rancid]

Has the default happened?

[QatzelOk]

Has the default happened?

Not yet. But it will happen... unless the banksters blows up the world first.

If they do this, then the default will never happen. And many people will have been wrong.

[Rancid]

Not yet. But it will happen... unless the banksters blows up the world first.

If they do this, then the default will never happen. And many people will have been wrong.

I'm trying to figure out how to make money off this default.

[Steve_American]

I'm trying to figure out how to make money off this default.

To avoid losing money, buy gold.

[Potemkin]

To avoid losing money, buy gold.

He didn’t say he wanted to avoid losing money, he said he wanted to make money. And the best way of making money is, and has always been, to exploit the fuck out of human misery.

[Steve_American]

A really good short, non-technical article by the MMTer, Randal Wray, about how nations like the US and UK can never run out of money and so can never be bankrupt.

For me the definition of 'bankrupt' is that one doesn't have and can't get the money to pay one's large bills. So, I'm wondering what definition you people here who claim that the US will be bankrupt soon are using. I hope you will see this and tell me what your definition is.


https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2019 ... -deficits/

now 552,872 views

[QatzelOk]

I'm trying to figure out how to make money off this default.

One way would be to invest heavily (but discreetly) in Gaza offshore gas supplies.

Once enough people have died of their Covid boosters and the Palestinians have been genocided, the spotlight will turn elsewhere, and you will be able to cash in on your "belief" in the Israeli Natural Gas corporation.

[Rancid]

One way would be to invest heavily (but discreetly) in Gaza offshore gas supplies.

Once enough people have died of their Covid boosters and the Palestinians have been genocided, the spotlight will turn elsewhere, and you will be able to cash in on your "belief" in the Israeli Natural Gas corporation.

I was hoping to exploit Americans. Gazans have had enough trauma.

[Steve_American]

Claims that mainstream economics is changing radically are far-fetched || Bill Mitchell's blog.


Another great article on MMT vs mainstream econ.
The changes being proposed are not going after the heart of the problem of false stuff being spouted by mainstream economists. None of the central errors is being corrected.

I have received several E-mails over the last few weeks that suggest that the economics discipline is finally changing course to redress the major flaws in the curricula that is taught around the world and that perhaps Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) can take some credit for some of that. There has been a tendency for some time for those who are attracted to MMT to become somewhat celebratory, even to the point of declaring ‘victory’. This tendency is not limited to the MMT public who comment on social media and the like. My response is that we are probably further away from seeing fundamental change in the economics profession than perhaps where we were some years ago – after the GFC and in the early years of the pandemic (which continues). My answer reflects the incontestable fact that the make up of faculties within our higher education systems has not changed much, if at all, and the dominant publishing and grant awarding bodies still reflect that mainstream dominance. There is still a lot of work to be done and a lot of ‘funerals’ to attend (à la Max Planck).


The recent March 2024 edition of the IMF’s – Finance and Development Magazine – provides some useful evidence to substantiate my view."

...snip...

https://billmitchell.org/blog/?p=61636

now 593899 views
.

[QatzelOk]

...The changes being proposed re not going after the heart of the problem of false stuff being spouted by mainstream economists. None of the central errors is being corrected...

One way to drive a society to bankruptcy is to distract it with entertainment media while you racketeer the shit out of the central bank and all that printed fiat money.

You will need a loyal mobster gang to do this, as OMERTA is required.

Westerners have been entertained by OMERTA-media since WW2. Before that, many countries in Europe protected their medias against bankster lies and bankster media manipulation.

Being MK-Ultraed by mass media is what will cause 400 million people to allow their own society to go down the toilette, while the people who ripped them off will simply drive their yachts full of gold and bitcoin and stock buybacks... to somewhere else. Somewhere dumb and safe.

[Steve_American]

Steve Keen on how Modern Monetary Theory addresses economic dilemmas || Academic Influence. . . 40 min. long.

In this video Dr. Keen uses his system dynamics program, he calls Minsky, (that you can download from him for free) to explain how the economy really works, showing how MMT is a far better theory of economics. I had to watch the parts with Minsky at least twice to understand it because I'm not that versed in accounting.

610565 views now.

[QatzelOk]

There have been a lot of changes in "number of lifeboat theory" in the last few years. While our ship only has enough lifeboats to shuttle a few people at a time, in the 1880s... glub... glub...glub.."

Our upcoming drowning is too urgent and dominant to be hiding in the attic and reading book after book on Lifeboat Theory from the 1880s, SA.