[Steve_American]

When the world was on the gold standard it made sense to worry about “money”, or the national debt because money was something real, i.e. gold.
However, the world went off the gold standard back in 1971, and it will only get back into the gold standard after a major crisis like the meteor strike that killed the dinosaurs. This is because, there is not enough gold in the world. Also because, the (functionally) fixed amount of gold in the world didn't allow the “money supply” to grow. Well, it could if promissory notes issued by banks were included. However, such notes (aka bank notes) were not backed by gold and so in a bank panic, many of them became worthless when the issuing bank went out of business. Needing to use bank notes to grow the money supply was a huge flaw in the economic system back before 1913, and the creation of the Fed. Res. Bank.

Today, “money” is totally a human imaginary creation. You can see this more clearly if you imagine a cash-less system, where everyone has a debit card and all “money” is just numbers in the computers that keep track of everyone's money. IMO, such a system makes it clear that money is imaginary.

Decades ago I suggested that money be seen as “Status Points”. I said this because gold was the universal status symbol across most cultures, and all advanced cultures. Humans are social Primates and so humans are very conscious of their and everyone else's status.

If you see that money is status points, then you may be able to see that such points can be created out of thin air. For example, the winner of a Nobel Prize gains status, and this status cost nobody any of their preexisting status. It was created out of thin air. In the same way, a Gov. can create status points without taking them from someone.

In our current system the Gov. of most nations is the issuer of the status points called money, for example US dollars. In the case of the EU & EZ the issuer is the European Central Bank, aka ECB. When the US deficit spends, it is net creating more dollars. If it also sells bonds of equal value, all of the deficit spending goes into buying the bonds (indirectly, at least, but at the macro level it's true). Because it is saved, such deficit spending doesn't cause high inflation.
. . . Because the Gov. issues the status points, it doesn't need status points from the people before it can create more status points. This is just like points on the scoreboard at a sporting event. The person changing the scoreboard doesn't need points (from someone) to change the scoreboard when a team scores 1 or more points.
. . . Because of that, the so-called national debt is not a debt at all. It is status points that previous Govs. have gifted to the people to keep and use later, i.e. it is much of their savings. In fact if you graph US net savings and US Gov. deficit spending, they track exactly. As one goes up the other goes down. The Gov. deficit *is* the private sector's surplus. This is simply the result of the accounting process, although there is some leakage, like the trade deficit.

The Gov. must collect some tax revenues because this is what gives fiat money its value. Also, because otherwise there will be massive inflation. This is because the status points are being used to buy real things, and unlike status points, real things are always finite. Therefore, taxes are one way to avoid inflation from too much Gov. creating of the status points, aka dollars. What matter here is the amount of real stuff & service for sale in the economy. It is flatly impossible to regulate the economy without tracking the amount of real things for sale. All econ. theories that try to do this are on a fool's errand.

When the Gov. buys something like a jet fighter, it uses some status points that it creates, the corp. that makes planes accepts them because it will need to pay taxes and it can use them to pay its workers because they need them to pay their taxes. The workers can also use them to buy food because the owner of the food store needs them to pay their taxes. This is true of everyone, so everyone accepts the Gov. issued status points as if they were gold coins. This will work *totally* fine for everyone in all ways, until the US ceases to exist, when every one of the status points will become without value. This includes all those in Gov. bonds, in paper dollar bills, and in bank accounts. This (the US ceasing to exist) is likely decades or centuries away, though.
. . . Today, the most likely cause for the US ceasing to exist is chaos caused by climate change devastating the grain harvest worldwide.
. . . OTOH, I think that the best way to reduce the chance of the grain harvest failing worldwide, is for the US to deficit spend now like mad. Who cares if there is inflation when all dollars will in months or a year be worthless. To resist this is just a form of climate change denial. It should be seen and treated as such, because that is what it is. All who accept that climate change is real and pretty soon will lead to worldwide failure of the grain harvest need to support deficit spending, now.

I do want to tax the rich, though. IMHO, the way to have equilibrium in the economy is for the Gov. to tax away almost all the excess money that floats up to the top of the income spread. All income levels in the economy must gain equal shares of the increased income to have the economy be in equilibrium. To not do this, is unstable because in the long run, too much money ends up being saved by the rich who can't find a way to spend it. In ancient Rome, the rich got status by building public works, some examples are --- aqueducts and the Colosseum itself. The rich can choose, for example (for the good of the nation) to gain status by bragging about how much they pay in taxes. In any case, they should not compete because of climate change by buying more & more expensive status symbols, like yachts, private jets, or summer homes in 5 locations.

[colliric]

If you see that money is status points, then you may be able to see that such points can be created out of thin air. For example, the winner of a Nobel Prize gains status, and this status cost nobody any of their preexisting status. It was created out of thin air. In the same way, a Gov. can create status points without taking them from someone.

Bingo......

That's why I'm buying it....

You know what. It is the future.

I foresee that it will put pressure on governments to slow inflation down due to increased competition, making the AUD itself more valuable.

Kinda like what happened when ALDI came to Australia forcing Coles and Woolworths to get competitive with their prices again.

[Puffer Fish]

I'll just say this: If you start treating money like worthless imaginary play money, eventually it will become that.
It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

If you want more money, raise taxes.

Printing money doesn't benefit government any more than raising taxes does, so why print money to pay for things?
It's illogical and stupid, based on a flawed theory.

[Steve_American]

I'll just say this: If you start treating money like worthless imaginary play money, eventually it will become that.
It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

If you want more money, raise taxes.

Printing money doesn't benefit government any more than raising taxes does, so why print money to pay for things?
It's illogical and stupid, based on a flawed theory.

First, the theory is not flawed, and you, sir, have provided zero evidence to indicate (let alone prove) that it is flawed. All you do is make unsupported assertions.
Second, the reason the Gov. must "print money" is to satisfy the private sector's desire to save. If this is not done the economy will stagnate. All the money that leaves the nation with the trade deficit is lost to the nation (until it returnesto buy something (like homes). Money that buys a bond is saved. And, money put in a savings account is saved until it is taken out and spent.
. . . All these savings reduce the nation's gross income, because if the money had been spent it would be someone's income. Gross income is the GDP.
Bank loans also increase the money supply, but they also have the contract/note that exactly off-sets the increase in the money supply. These repayment contracts are what causes most recessions. When people slow down their borrowing (because they just can't make a bigger payment), this reduces the gross national income. This is seen as a bad thing by banks and they start lending even less. This starts the downward spiral that is a recession.
.

[Rancid]

Money is just an intermediate vehicle for exchange. Everything else, is just attempts to manage the vehicle for exchange. Maybe the thing that is odd, is that there are people who wish to horde as much of that vehicle for exchange as possible.

[late]

I'll just say this: If you start treating money like worthless imaginary play money, eventually it will become that.
It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

If you want more money, raise taxes.

Printing money doesn't benefit government any more than raising taxes does, so why print money to pay for things?
It's illogical and stupid, based on a flawed theory.

You haven't a clue, but I agree with you; however that needs a bit of explaining. But don't worry, you won't like it, it will cost 20 or 30 TRILLION at a minimum...

In a recent survey of economists, not one thought we should go back to the gold standard. Partly because it's impossible. It's the kind of impossible of me saying I can leap to the Moon, leap back to Earth for a late lunch with some Hollywood starlets and then jump them all nite long.

But we can go back to a gold standard. There is tons of gold in the asteroid belt, and because there is no tectonic action, stuff doesn't get blended. We're not sure, but if you find an asteroid with gold, it could be mostly gold. Makes mining super easy, just blow off the dirt, melt into bricks (you can worry about purity later) and shoot them at the Moon, just not too fast.

So, easy, right?

Sure, spend a couple trillion (prob more) on a Moon base to use to build a permanent Space station at L5. Then build the station at a cost of a few trillion.Then a trillion or ten developing a robotic mining system that can mine the Asteroid Belt. And then some more trillions deploying the robots and a repair station and smelting facility in the Belt.

Eventually you'll have enough gold to use it as money. Not that anyone would do that, there's so many uses for it that are actually useful.

But we'd have mining in the Belt, and that would provide the Earth with a quadrillion or two of wealth, when all is said and done.

[Puffer Fish]

Second, the reason the Gov. must "print money" is to satisfy the private sector's desire to save. If this is not done the economy will stagnate.

That does not seem to make sense to me.
If they stopped more printing money, prices would go down or not increase. If prices go up, it's going to take more money to satisfy the private sector's desire to save.
This ends up being totally circular logic and we need to step back and see the bigger picture.

"More money" isn't going to make people better off. I don't know why you think that would.

(Fallacy of composition, what's true for an individual is not necessarily true for the group)

[Puffer Fish]

All the money that leaves the nation with the trade deficit is lost to the nation

You're missing the point. It's not the money they have. It's what they will do with it after they get it.

Take money out of the picture and the overall trade that is happening is disposable consumer items for assets/capital.

Inflation doesn't help your side. If there is inflation, the other party will simply demand higher prices to compensate for that expected future inflation. You seem to naively imagine there is some free lunch here, that you'll somehow be able to trick people and then make the money you just gave them worth less.


It seems like you're focusing in piecemeal logic and unable to see the bigger overall picture.

All the money that leaves the nation with the trade deficit is lost to the nation (until it returnesto buy something (like homes).

Yes, it's kind of complicated, but I'll help create a picture. First, for this hypothetical, let's imagine there is no money in banks, and that the money was pure fiat currency not backed by any bank assets. That is to simplify things and make it less complicated, something called a "thought experiment".
If the government doubles the money supply, that will end up having the same effect as if they taxed half of the money back.
Assuming we all expected the government to do that, it would have no effects on trade deficits.
There's no reason it would. The most basic math shows that.

How about we use this simplified hypothetical as a base to have a discussion? (Because I'm not wasting time with the more complicated stuff)

[Puffer Fish]

And, money put in a savings account is saved until it is taken out and spent.

Except it's worth less due to inflation.
Which comes back to the discussion about the link between printing money and inflation.

My claim is the math indicates the gain would exactly match the cost. There would be no net benefit.

Can you explain how moving paper around can create wealth?

[JohnRawls]

Except it's worth less due to inflation.
Which comes back to the discussion about the link between printing money and inflation.

My claim is the math indicates the gain would exactly match the cost. There would be no net benefit.

Can you explain how moving paper around can create wealth?

MMTers won, that is just the reality of things. So apparently running a deficit and printing money as long as you can manage the payments with low interest rates is the best way to go. The reason Europe had a 2nd crysis and stagnated a bit because it didn't do it. It actually took your route and started austerity with raising taxes which failed big time. The benefits of higher gdp growth and so on far outweight moderate inflation which is anyways under check due to heavy trust in US and EU economies.

[Crantag]

Steve, I think you are a cool guy, who knows a lot about history, but you veered into economics; but you became dogmatic about this MMT stuff.

MMT is a theoretical platform. They probably contrive some useful theories and insights, but at the end of the day, it strikes me as "America, as the dominant dog on the block, can just print as much money as they want, and it doesn't matter."

It seems like an imperialist ideology.

I didn't read your full essay, but you are not an economist.

I don't like when you identify yourself with MMT theorists as "we".

You are just trying, and failing to place yourself in an 'in group', but the trouble is for you, you are not actually an economist.

I did 11 years of high level training as an economist.

Yeah, I washed out, and now I more often shovel gravel for daily bread; not meaning it as throwing rank; but, you, sir, are not an economist, as is plain to see by anyone.

The MMT school might have a few ideas ('might'), but a lot of it just comes off as nonsense, to anyone with an understanding of economics.

(And I know you won't accept this. And before you call me delusional mainstreamer, let me restate, all of my graduate training was in Marxist economics, which is the least mainstream economics school; much less mainstream than 'MMT'.)

[Steve_American]

Except it's worth less due to inflation.
Which comes back to the discussion about the link between printing money and inflation.

My claim is the math indicates the gain would exactly match the cost. There would be no net benefit.

Can you explain how moving paper around can create wealth?

I don't think I clamed that printing money creates wealth. However, maybe it does.
We are wealther now than we were 100 years ago. Surely you can see that. Mostly this is because 90% of the fossil fuels humnans have ever used have been used since 1943 ( I just saw this claim in a video). All that fossil fuel is why we are wealther now. However, maybe some of it is because we used deficit spending to add money to the economy that let people have more income to buy the things the economy was creating.

There are a lot of men who work on Wall St. making $100M a year, moving paper around. Are you saying they are getting $100M while never creating any wealth at all? Is Jeff Bezos of Amazon creating wealth? It seems like he just moves things from here to there. Is that a form of weath?

Sir, it doesn't matter if saving money is a net loss. There are corps. that must save by law, insurance comp. and pemtion plan comp. People are told they must save at least some. They will need it for retirement and in case there is a crisis like covid. So, people and corps. do save. This saving reduces the income of the corps. and people who make whatever the saver would have bought if they hadn't saved it. This lack of income redices the GDP. This saving over time grows until it reduces the GDP enough to hurt the economy. Having the Gov. deficit spend replaces this saving with new money that doesn't ever need to be paid back. [The US has had a national debt since about 1845 or so. It has rarely had a surplau and so paid it down only a little before it started spending again. It reached $1 B by 1981, since then mostly Repuds have added about $25 T to the total. In the last year a few $T have been added, maybe half of which was bought back by the Fed., which I see as the only form of modern money printing.

There are no signs of inflation. The yields demanded by buyers of US bonds in the secondary market are trending down.!! This is clear evidence that the market doesn't predict inflation. Also, the dollar is strong. I live in Thailand and we change dollars into bhat every month. This month it cost us the lowest amount of dollars to get 10,000 bhat that it ever has in the last 7.5 years. We got 10,000 more bhat this month than we did last month for the same humber of dollars. And last mo. was more than most months in the last 7.5 years.
.

[Steve_American]

That does not seem to make sense to me.
If they stopped more printing money, prices would go down or not increase. If prices go up, it's going to take more money to satisfy the private sector's desire to save.
This ends up being totally circular logic and we need to step back and see the bigger picture.

"More money" isn't going to make people better off. I don't know why you think that would.

(Fallacy of composition, what's true for an individual is not necessarily true for the group)

Sir, Prof. Steve Keen is not an MMTer. He has a little program you can download for free. He uses it to teach students to see how the economy really works. I think you ought to download it and try it. You might learn something.

Sir, almost all economists agree that 2% inflation is best, and that any amount of prices going down is a pretty *bad* thing. Are you claiming to know more than almost all economists?

The Gov. doesn't deficit spend to create wealth. It deficit spends NOW because it can't raise taxrs on the rich. I agree that it should tax all or almost all the new income each year of the *rich* away and spend it. However, the rich will not allow this. But, the economy is not in "equibrium" if the rich are getting richer at the expence of the poor. This is just like a steaming cup of coffee is not in equlibrium because water vapor is leaving the surface into the air. The cup is losing both energy, which cools it; and loosing mass which we don't see because it is so little.
. . . MS economists claim the economy is in "equlibrium" but it clearly isn't.

HOWEVER, even if the Gov. did tax all the new income away from the rich, the Gov. would still need to deficit spend a little to replace the money being saved by insurance comp., etc. (also the trade deficit).

OTOH, why would the rich invest to make more money if the Gov. intended to tax it away? It seems like there would be no reason for the rich to invest in this situation.
.

[Steve_American]

Steve, I think you are a cool guy, who knows a lot about history, but you veered into economics; but you became dogmatic about this MMT stuff.

1] MMT is a theoretical platform. They probably contrive some useful theories and insights, but at the end of the day, it strikes me as "America, as the dominant dog on the block, can just print as much money as they want, and it doesn't matter."

It seems like an imperialist ideology.

2] I didn't read your full essay, but you are not an economist.

I don't like when you identify yourself with MMT theorists as "we".

You are just trying, and failing to place yourself in an 'in group', but the trouble is for you, you are not actually an economist.

I did 11 years of high level training as an economist.

Yeah, I washed out, and now I more often shovel gravel for daily bread; not meaning it as throwing rank; but, you, sir, are not an economist, as is plain to see by anyone.

3] The MMT school might have a few ideas ('might'), but a lot of it just comes off as nonsense, to anyone with an understanding of economics.

(And I know you won't accept this. And before you call me delusional mainstreamer, let me restate, all of my graduate training was in Marxist economics, which is the least mainstream economics school; much less mainstream than 'MMT'.)

To point 1]
MMT is not intended just for the US. DR. Bill Mitchell (who's blog I link to is Australian). H has done much work with developing nations and published peer reviewed papers on that subject.

To point 2]
ISTM, that you suffer cognative disodencre when reading MMT. It clashes with you education in economics.
Yes, I'm not an economist, and proud of it, because I see MS economics as being EXACTLY like a religion. One must be brainwashed into it before one is exposed to other economic theories.
MMTers have told me (in threads and blogs) that MS econ. doesn't teach the history of econ., because it has redefined the words dead economists used in new ways. Like Adam Smith defined the 'free market' as a market free of a rentier class.
MMTers have told me (in threads and blogs) have told me most of what I know about econ.
I always saw that the Great Depression was caused by a lack of demand that cause factories to shut down and layoff the workers because the owners had filled all their warehouses with product and didn't want to make more. But, with all the workers laidoff, the product in the warehouses could not be sold fast enough. The stock market crash was caused by the above lack of deemand and fallling profits.

Because I had not been brainwashed by univ. MS econ., I don't suffer cognative disodence whan I read MMT. Apparently, you do.

To point 3]
MMTers claim that the only policy point they demand is the National Job Guarantee Program. They claim that all the rest is just a description of how nations now do their financial books. [Except nations without theiir own fiat currenct, and nations in the EU who must obey its rules.]

It is clear to me that you can't grok MMT because of your cognative disodence. You can't read it and understand it. So, you stop reading it.

In another thread I posted a link to a talk about ACC and economics. In it the guy explains why people reject ACC. It is because they were brainwashed by MS econ. to believe that the earth is functionally not finite. And that it is OK to ignore the dumping of waste into the air and ocean. that it is OK to have 7.8 B people when the carrying capacity is just 2 B people. Because the world is infinite.
Please, go watch the 1st 20 min. of that video to see what I mean.
.

[Crantag]

To point 1]
MMT is not intended just for the US. DR. Bill Mitchell (who's blog I link to is Australian). H has done much work with developing nations and published peer reviewed papers on that subject.

To point 2]
ISTM, that you suffer cognative disodencre when reading MMT. It clashes with you education in economics.
Yes, I'm not an economist, and proud of it, because I see MS economics as being EXACTLY like a religion. One must be brainwashed into it before one is exposed to other economic theories.
MMTers have told me (in threads and blogs) that MS econ. doesn't teach the history of econ., because it has redefined the words dead economists used in new ways. Like Adam Smith defined the 'free market' as a market free of a rentier class.
MMTers have told me (in threads and blogs) have told me most of what I know about econ.
I always saw that the Great Depression was caused by a lack of demand that cause factories to shut down and layoff the workers because the owners had filled all their warehouses with product and didn't want to make more. But, with all the workers laidoff, the product in the warehouses could not be sold fast enough. The stock market crash was caused by the above lack of deemand and fallling profits.

Because I had not been brainwashed by univ. MS econ., I don't suffer cognative disodence whan I read MMT. Apparently, you do.

To point 3]
MMTers claim that the only policy point they demand is the National Job Guarantee Program. They claim that all the rest is just a description of how nations now do their financial books. [Except nations without theiir own fiat currenct, and nations in the EU who must obey its rules.]

It is clear to me that you can't grok MMT because of your cognative disodence. You can't read it and understand it. So, you stop reading it.

In another thread I posted a link to a talk about ACC and economics. In it the guy explains why people reject ACC. It is because they were brainwashed by MS econ. to believe that the earth is functionally not finite. And that it is OK to ignore the dumping of waste into the air and ocean. that it is OK to have 7.8 B people when the carrying capacity is just 2 B people. Because the world is infinite.
Please, go watch the 1st 20 min. of that video to see what I mean.
.

Oh man,

you will clearly never ever change.

You do seem like a cool guy.

The big irony, is when you call people dogmatic. I guess that is projection, as they call it.

[Steve_American]

Oh man,

you will clearly never ever change.

You do seem like a cool guy.

The big irony, is when you call people dogmatic. I guess that is projection, as they call it.

Crantag, it is not dogmatic to demand soemevidence befroe you cahnge your world view.

You are like many MS econ. people here and elsewhere. You assert that MMT is wrong, but provide no example of one place it is wrong and no evidence to show that it is wrong.

Without evidence why should I change when I have seen the evidence that Dr. Bill Mitchell has shown me. Also, Dr. Stephanie Kelton, Dr. Randal Wray, and Warren Mosler have shown me evidence.

I assert that I'm open to good evidence. Show me some, then we can talk.
.

[Crantag]

Crantag, it is not dogmatic to demand soemevidence befroe you cahnge your world view.

You are like many MS econ. people here and elsewhere. You assert that MMT is wrong, but provide no example of one place it is wrong and no evidence to show that it is wrong.

Without evidence why should I change when I have seen the evidence that Dr. Bill Mitchell has shown me. Also, Dr. Stephanie Kelton, Dr. Randal Wray, and Warren Mosler have shown me evidence.

I assert that I'm open to good evidence. Show me some, then we can talk.
.

We can maybe discuss this further later, but, you are pretty much, just about, the most dogmatic person I have ever been in presence with.

And how many times, do I need to spell it out, that I am a Marxist, and that Marxism is, like, you know, =/= mainstream

[Steve_American]

We can maybe discuss this further later, but, you are pretty much, just about, the most dogmatic person I have ever been in presence with.

And how many times, do I need to spell it out, that I am a Marxist, and that Marxism is, like, you know, =/= mainstream

Sir, I heard you recently when you said you are a Markist.
I didn't intend to lump you in as a mainsteam economist, I intended to lump you in with the people here who refust to discuss (with me) why they think MMT is wrong. I'm sorry I failed to be more clear.

I respect your knowledge, but years ago you refused to discuss MMT with me. In my recent threads the MS econ. types here also are refusing to engage and explain just how MMT is false. They just assert it is wrong, based (I guess) on their 'authority'.
IMO, an argument from authority is not strong evidence to convince people.
.

[Crantag]

Sir, I heard you recently when you said you are a Markist.
You didn't intend to lump you in as a mainsteam economist, I intended to lump you in with the people here who refust to discuss (with me) why they think MMT is wrong. I'm sorry I failed to be more clear.

I respect your knowledge, but years ago you refused to discuss MMT with me. In my recent threads the MS econ. types here also are refusing to engage and explain just how MMT is false. They just assert it is wrong, based (I guess) on their 'authority'.
IMO, an argument from authority is not strong evidence to convince people.
.

No worries from me, nothing personal.

I have checked out some of the MMT stuff you've posted, but there is a 'roll your eye's effect', it's sorta like; skepticism of printing money to solve problems is sorta typical, and sorta like, 'heard that before'.

The main part for me though, relates to the dollar status as the world reserve currency, on the floating exchange rate system.

The main program seems to be a proposal to print as much money as you want and flood the world with dollars (which is what it is tantamount to, given the dollar status as the world currency); and the world will just keep putting up with it, and it'll all be fine.

I don't think it'll work, in the long run.

It does come off as currency debasement 2.0.

It also comes off as a Keynesian project 2.0.

I have great respect for Keynes, and think he certainly created a big net-positive with the influence of his programs.

Now I will resort to paraphrasing though; the man in my avatar is Paul Sweezy, the founder of American Marxism.

According to Paul Sweezy (not me), Keynsianism did not pull the world out of the Great Depression, WW2 did. (Through the combination of mobilization of resources, but also especially due to the destruction of capital).

Marxists and Keynsians have a somewhat symbiotic relationship, and Sweezy did argue a lot through his writings, you might even say, in favor of Keynsianism (including later writings); basically to the extent that, the government spending directed on things like military, could be instead spent on domestic things (infrastructure, education, health care, the rest), and that it would so be re-channeled, into productive avenues, more or less.

Sweezy had a fairly complex theoretical construct, which is hard to sum up in a short, single, forum post, but it related to, what he termed, the problem of the absorption of 'value', essentially (a somewhat related concept to surplus value, but different).

Capitalism, largely through the problem of surplus capital, leads to superfluous of value, which has to go somewhere; and in practice, it winds up going into inflating assets, advancing the 'sales effort' (basically, a critique of marketing), and other things, including militarism.

Sweezy did come around to a somewhat Keynsian take, that it would be possible to channel this 'excess value', if you will, to social spending programs, and what not.

It is sort of a different play on a common theme perhaps; it isn't really Keynsian; and isn't really MMT; but, there seem to be commonalities to the notion.

MMT tends to seem to come off a bit like "we can print our way to prosperity."

And, America, as the printer of the global reserve currency, this seems tantamount to a plan to be able to exploit the world, basically, as the users of US currency, and spend the money at home in America.

It seems naive, unjust, and impractical.

Moreover, it seems like it'll really just harm Americans the most, really.

The way you present it. It is like you think they suggest, that if everyone around the world (with a sovereign currency), just printed all the money they needed, everything would be great!


On a sidenote, it also seems to have a lot of undertones of Milton Freedmen monetarism. Here, I wish to refer to the notion, which has been mainstream policy in the US since the 70s, that 'monetary policy' is a replacement for 'fiscal policy'. 'Fiscal policy' is spending money on tangible things, where as, 'monetary policy' is using financial levers like interest rates, and indeed, money printing, etc.

In this way, MMT seems like sort of a push against conventional monetarism, to the extent, they call for more 'fiscal policy', but they seem like bedfellows, in a sense.

[Steve_American]

@Crantag
Finally, some details from someone here. THANKS.!!

Let me just start by saying that your take away from my posts on MMT is not correct.
MMTers do not suggest just "print all the money you want". They understand that the constraint is the amount of labor and real goods that the people of the US can buy. To much deficit spending (MMTers all object to calling it printing money) and you get inflation.

As for your thinking that deficit spending at the level MMTers would allow is exploitation of foreigners--- every time a foreigner sells their product to an American in the US, it was their choice. If or whenever, it isn't their free choice it is a very bad thing. MMters strongly object the the policies of the World Bank and the IMF.
Basically, I'm told that the foreign exporter either accepts dollars in payment, or they demand that someone change the dollars into their nation's currency. And this is their choice.
Currently, there are a lot of someones who want US dollars. This may change. OTOH, IMHO it is likely that the world will be seeing ACC crises every week/day by 2030 and many of them will be harvest failures. So, by 2030, the world will be dealing with massive disasters on a daily or weekly basis.

MMTers do not support US Imperalism. Not one does.

OTOH, the only policy MMT requires is its well elaborated Job Guarantee Program.

Can you please elaborate on why you seem to think that deficit spending is not a fiscal process, but is a monetary process?
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