MMT

Blake Lovewell | The machinations of monetary theory are murky, but we must get a grasp of what is going on before we’re sold down the river.

American Institute for Economic Research, July 7, 2021 Can Mass Subjugation Save American Democracy? James Bovard Beatings will continue until morale improves” has morphed from an old joke to the latest prescription for national salvation. “Compulsory National Service Could Unite America,” whooped a New York Times Op-ed headline last week. Prominent media outlets, think tanks, […]

The big news Sunday was Trump's executive orders after he sabotaged the negotiations with Congress for a pandemic relief bill. No doubt, his zombie followers will eat it up. No one else will.

The most recent candidate endorsed by Blue America, Nabilah Islam, sometimes stands out from the crowd because of her name, which for old people, doesn't sound like a name from the Georgia suburbs. Others (men) remark not on her name but on her physical appearance. What people don't realize-- at least not until they get to know her is that Nabilah, despite how she looks and what he name is, is both an All-American girl and a policy wonk.

Although the repo market is little known to most people, it is a $1-trillion-a-day credit machine, in which not just banks but hedge funds and other “shadow banks” borrow to finance their trades. Under the Federal Reserve Act, the central bank’s lending window is open only to licensed depository banks; but the Fed is now […]

Submitted by Steve Brown…
“The few who understand the system, will either be so interested in its profits, or so dependent upon its favours, that there will be no opposition from that class; while, on the other hand, the great body of the people, mentally incapable of comprehending the tremendous advantages, will bear its burden without complaint, and perhaps without suspecting that the system itself is inimical to their interests.”

On Friday Dr. Delman Coates, senior pastor of Mt. Ennon Baptist Church in Clinton, Maryland wrote a post for Sojourners on the economic issues facing African-American voters struggling with a decision about who to back in the Democratic primary. Dr.

What federal deficits do increase is the federal debt; and while the debt itself can be rolled over from year to year (as it virtually always is), the exponentially growing interest tab is one of those mandatory budget items that taxpayers must pay. Predictions are that in the next decade, interest alone could add $1 trillion to the annual bill, an unsustainable tax burden.

As alarm bells sound over the advancing destruction of the environment, a variety of Green New Deal proposals have appeared in the US and Europe, along with some interesting academic debates about how to fund them. Monetary policy, normally relegated to obscure academic tomes and bureaucratic meetings behind closed doors, has suddenly taken center stage. […]

If the budget is a statement of values, the Democrats' presumed inability to unite behind one, speaks volumes about a party whose tent is too big to be functional. Trump's DOA budget will never get a vote but his intention of a high increase for the Pentagon and paying for his vanity wall by cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid is all anyone needs to know about his values and his party's values.