Tuesday, January 13, 2015

Jonathan Larson — Wray on MMT

Modern Monetary Theory is a concept that makes me a tad nervous because I find that most monetary ideas have been around for at least a century and likely more. In fact, it is pretty damn hard to top the monetary ideas of Lincoln and his Greenbacks, or for that matter, Peter Cooper and the Greenback Party of the 1870s. 
But since MMT seems to be the preferred description of the current monetary position of progressives, I am trying to get myself up to speed. First up is a positive explanation of MMT by L. Randall Wray of U Missouri Kansas City followed by a really thoughtful discussion of progressive monetary ideas by Bill Mitchell. All I can say is that if this is what they are calling MMT, it is certainly something that would have made old Peter Cooper happy.
Real Economics
Wray on MMTJonathan Larson

7 comments:

Matt Franko said...

I thought Peter Cooper was a famous economist in the 21st century? ???

Jonathan Larson said...

He probably is. I was talking about the Peter Cooper who ran for President on the Greenback Party Ticket in 1876, was a famous inventor, and founded the Cooper Union.

Now there was a man who understood the nature and arguments about money.

Tom Hickey said...

Matt, I think that Peter self-identifies as a musician that happens to have an economics PhD, rather than as an economist. But he is indeed a great economist.

Jonathan, I am going to have to put some attention on 19th century Peter Cooper. Sounds like an interesting fellow. What do you recommend beginning with?

Jonathan Larson said...

The essential Peter Cooper was his collection of ideas about money called "Ideas For a Science of Good Government: In Addresses, Letters and Articles on a Strictly National Currency, Tariff and Civil Service (1883)" (republished 2009 and available at Amazon)

When giants walked the earth!

Tom Hickey said...

Thanks for the reference.

Tom Hickey said...

I see it is available for free download at archive.org. too

https://archive.org/details/ideasforscienceo00cooprich

Like Henry Wallace, he also ran for the presidency — when he was 85!

Jonathan Larson said...

Enjoy your Cooper. You will quickly see why folks like me believes that there is damn little new on the subject of monetary policy. And just remember, he was defending the Greenback—an idea that had been successfully implemented during the Civil War.