[Steve_American]

I'm posting this short essay by Newton F. that I saw on another site. I think it is a great idea.

MMT allows nations with their own fiat currency (and either a trade surplus or the dollar being the world's reserve currency; and maybe nations like Australia too) to mobilize *all* the available resources and all the *labor* of the nation to improve Mother Earth and the lives of the mass of its people. A populist Gov. anywhere can cut out the plutocrats and get on with what must be done to save civilization and, maybe, humanity.

MMTers assert (and economic history supports them) that TINA (there is no alternative) was always a lie since it was first uttered. There was always 1 or more alternatives. The world had used one alternative from the 30s to about 1980. [Then things were great until the OPEC Oil Crisis caused inflation.] MMT is a better alternative because it mobilizes the power that being off the gold standard gives to nations, and it uses its Job Guarantee Program to avoid inflation.

Until he has the time for more detailed analysis, Bill offers this one-word assessment of Australia’s latest economic plans and policies: “pathetic.” Certainly the same word would apply to the plans and policies of the American government, to the extent that it can be said to have any at all. Isn’t it time for MMT advocates to move beyond further attempts to reason with such governments, hoping to convince them to look through the MMT lens? Indeed, I would argue that, despite the propaganda these governments feed their plebes, they are already peering though that lens and thus using ample amounts of fiat money to enhance the security and power of the plutocrats they serve. So if this is as true as it appears, why don’t MMT advocates shed their sedate academic garb and go populist and prophetic in the biblical sense? Why don’t they lay out in all their glory, in their full breadth and depth, comprehensive visions of what life could be like (at least in currency-sovereign nations) for both average and underprivileged people, were the scope of governmental agency revealed by MMT (constrained only by available resources) to be used on their behalf and that of the planet? Why not lay out complete, vividly-colored packages of what could be done for the people by their governments–actually, what the people could do for themselves through their governments–and how we already have the knowledge and wherewithal to do these things without the risk of hyper-inflation? In the first Gilded Age, Edward Bellamy wrote two utopian novels about a radically egalitarian society, books that shook the world and rivaled “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in popularity and political impact. Why don’t 21st Century MMT advocates follow Bellamy’s lead and set forth sublime descriptions of MMT-guided societies devoted to the flourishing of the human spirit, the amelioration of the suffering of all living things, and the restoration of the imperiled health of Mother Earth? Seeing how things are going, why the hell not throw caution to the winds and go for it, paint the big, bold, beautiful pictures that lurk behind all the dry economic theory and endless data crunching? The Hebrew prophets painted such pictures, so did Thomas Paine, so did Edward Bellamy, so have many others, and they gripped and moved the men and women of their times, made a difference although often only briefly. Maybe this time around such visions would be more lasting, even more impactful, given our triple existential threats of potential nuclear war, impending ecocide, and now global Covid panic/disruption/depression. If at this point we’re not dying for someone to come along and grip and move us, lift us out of the dystopian mire which has been sucking us down for decades, then I fear we’re already dead. It’s long overdue, I submit and implore, for MMT advocates to up their game, REALLY up their game, and Bill would seem to be a natural, despite his expressed reticence to plunge into populist causes, to blaze this trail of producing MMT-inspired portraits of new and better ways of life. I pray he’s already doing this in the coming sequel to “Reclaiming the State,” and we ALL need to do it, each in our own way, every time we engage with our understandably confused, desperate, and demoralized brothers and sisters.

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