In today’s blog, I continue the discussion that I started last Thursday, and, specifically, focus on the critique that commentators have made about the loss of state control of their economies as a result of globalisation. The thesis advanced by many analysts is that globalisation has reduced the capacity of the nation-state and forced governments to adopt free market policies at the microeconomic level and austerity at the macroeconomic level, for fear that capital flight will destroy their economies. It is a neatly packaged thesis that the political Left has imbibed, and, in doing so, has undermined the progressive basis of these institutions and left voters with little choice between right-wing parties and the social democratic parties who formally represented the interests of workers and acted as mediators in the class conflict between labour and capital. The major distinguishing feature these days between these two types of parties, who were previously poles apart in approach and mandate sought, is that the so-called progressive side of politics now claims it will implement austerity in a fairer way. These austerity-lite parties, buying into the myth that globalisation has undermined the capacity of the state to pursue full employment policies with equitable income distribution, do not challenge the basis of austerity, but just quibble over who should pay for it. The aim of this research which will appear in my next book (with co-author Thomas Fazi) is to outline a manifesto by which progressive activists and political movements can claim back the space the current generation of sham progressives have ceded to the neo-liberals.…Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Globalisation and currency arrangements
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia
27 comments:
The aim of this research which will appear in my next book (with co-author Thomas Fazi) is to outline a manifesto by which progressive activists and political movements can claim back the space the current generation of sham progressives have ceded to the neo-liberals.…
Why do all the MMT poobahs indulge in politics and global warming? They aren't helping themselves. The appeal of Warren Mosler explaining MMT was that he kept politics and and social issues other than public purpose out of it.
The folk at the UMKC site insist on indulging someone I call The Huckster (Michael Hoexter), a thin-skinned pedant with a PhD in semiotics or linguistics who writes overwrought wordy (Oh God!) diatribes about global warming that drive traffic away. Their moderators won't brook any comment about his idiotic pov's. Hoexter's a self-proclaimed freelance marketing consultant on global warming--how do you get there from semiotics?--so everything he produces is a job interview. And he has zero statistics background or understanding, so his ability to read source scientific papers is zilch; he probably thinks p-value is the color of his piss.
I find Bill Mitchell's pleas to "progressives" and his political messages to be a complete turn-off. Maybe that's his relief in his little room where he writes his blogs. These MMT guys should be concentrating on simplifying their message, not gussying it up with convoluted shit that turns the hoi polloi off. Isn't the goal to get people to understand how the monetary system works? They still haven't done it after all these years. Remember those huge Xerox machines that could do everything from print to physically coil-bind books? They were 12 feet long. The instructions secured on top of the machine for operating it were smaller-than-business-card size. They were images that made sense to anyone globally. It took a team of experts at Xerox 13 months to come up with those instructions. That's how hard it was to distill everything down to its basics. Simplicity is really fucking difficult.
"I find Bill Mitchell's pleas to "progressives" and his political messages to be a complete turn-off."
It's a classic problem. In television this is knows as a "broken base." My solution would be to have two blogs, one discussing MMT and the other mostly personal political views. Of course that doesn't mean you can't ever discuss politics or discuss MMT in the respective blogs, it is just mostly focused on that one thing.
"They were images that made sense to anyone globally. It took a team of experts at Xerox 13 months to come up with those instructions. That's how hard it was to distill everything down to its basics."
Something like this? ;)
http://www.3spoken.co.uk/2011/06/worlds-most-simple-national-debt-and.html
TBH I think MNE is the place. As Mike says "think big." So what's the strategy?
Tom , can you open a thread where we just discuss tactics for spreading MMT, list of metaphors etc to which all can contribute.
I would note that blog seems mainly aimed at 'progressive' types in 'fixed exchange' rate thinking.
TBH I think MNE is the place."
Well, that's what I like about Mike Norman. He speaks plainly and simply. Badda-bing. Badda-bang. However, he's the kind of guy that pedants would probably dismiss as not being serious enough, or intellectual enough, when in fact the guy is wicked smart...as well as funny.
I like Bill Mitchell, he's a progressive. I have quite a bit to read tomorrow, though. There's a lot in his blogs.
What the hell does progressive mean?
"he's the kind of guy that pedants would probably dismiss as not being serious enough, or intellectual enough"
BINGO!
MRW...
LOL!! I LOVE that comment! Thank you!!!
"Isn't the goal to get people to understand how the monetary system works?"
No.
This idea that you can divorce the 'science' and the politics is just wrong. If you try and do that what you are actually doing is imbibing your politics in the process. You don't want a light shone on the corporatism and private company subsidies that the mainstream thinking 'requires'. All of which just pander to the 1%.
Actually ordinary people don't give a monkey's chuff about how the monetary system works. They want to know what's in it for them - a guaranteed job, a guaranteed pension, decent housing, public healthcare and great education for their kids.
MRW,
All you've done is adopt a political position you claim to be more pure and attack the political opinions of those with which you disagree.
If you haven't yet looked at the banner here:
We seek the truth, avoid the mainstream and are virulently anti-neoliberalism.
That is a political statement.
There is a mistaken notion called commonsense realism that the mind is a mirror of reality and therefore science can be done that free of "priors." That is a false assumption.
What we call "reality" is socially constructed in various ways that are only beginning to be understood. I won't get into that here.
This implies that there is no absolute objectivity and no absolute criteria.
Knowledge always has a metaphysical and epistemological underpinning and there is no way to show logically or scientifically (empirically) that any metaphysical or epistemological system is either logically necessary or empirically grounded in a way that obviates other possibilities.
So to claim that a positive approach in economics when the field is dominated by a particular foundational framework is to gift the opposition with a normative and prescriptive advantage that masquerades as being objective, positive, and scientific. Because "naturalism."
As I have pointed out previously, "naturalism" was the 18 century answer to "supernaturalism," and it simply substitutes "Nature" for "God." There is no more scientific or objective basis for this than for the previous theology based on "revelation."
"Natural" and "self-evident" are well-recognized weasel word in philosophy and they generally flag an illogical and unsubstantiated jump.
Don't fall for it.
To be truthful I started using the word progressive because it is so defuse. Use the word socialist, or left, and some people might interpret that as meaning 'commie', especially in the US. Progressive can cover moderate centre to moderate left, and also the moderate right too.
Generally speaking, "progressive" in the context of politics signifies those proponents of reform within the current system that are on the left in the sense of favoring a communitarian approach instead of an individualists one.
In the US, progressives are generally associated with Democratic politics opposed to Third Way Clintonite triangulation.
General concepts like this are usually fuzzy at the edges but they serve a purpose as shorthand and can be unpacked as needed for clarity.
In addition, progressivism has a history .
Actually ordinary people don't give a monkey's chuff about how the monetary system works. They want to know what's in it for them - a guaranteed job, a guaranteed pension, decent housing, public healthcare and great education for their kids.
Couldn't agree more, Neil. I call that an economy in service of public purpose, not a bunch of financial indices (and for those those who live or prosper by them).
But every redneck in this country should know how the monetary system works at its most basic level. I'm not talking a Scott Fullwiler level of knowledge. Just basic stuff. We can start with the major kicker: federal taxes don't pay for anything. You live in England, don't you? Here in the US, every argument I hear why people don't want A, B, or C, ranging from race to immigration, hinges on "I do/do not want my tax dollars paying for X." So, as a society here, there are no moral arguments being made. No thoughtful debates beyond the simplistic, pecuniary, and WRONG monetary angle. The common folk in Eccles' time understood waaay more about fiat currency and taxes than the common folk of today know about the matter; that's why Marriner Eccles was a rockstar when he appeared before the Senate starting in 1932. He was wildly popular, according to that Brazilian economist (can't remember name right now), his de facto biographer.
@Ben Johannson,
All you've done is adopt a political position you claim to be more pure and attack the political opinions of those with which you disagree.
I claim nothing of the sort. I'm saying, and perhaps inartfully, that MMT has not got the traction that it should have because it's been buried under a bunch of social and political blankets that are suffocating the plain truth of it. No one can tell what Stephanie Kelton's politics are; neither could anyone tell from her talks that she ran an alternative energy company. She sticks to the fucking point. And this country is so polarized politically right now that the moment a fresh recruit hears anything that represents 'the other side', he flees or discounts the info.
I want the guy at the pub to know what I know about the monetary system. Especially in a country (inside the two coasts) that spouts government of the people, by the people, and for the people all the time. Or that other tiresome cry for 'smaller government', usually in the same breath. The nincompoops can't equate a burgeoning population with a burgeoning government, so they think privatizing every public service is just dandy. It's been utterly destructive on the Millennial generation; look at their school debt...and prospects. Shattered. Or the privacy issue from outsourced government security work to private-can't-be-regulated-contractors placing lives in peril over time at a slow crawl. Or the horror of what has happened to race relations in this country; fucking cops picking off people and kids because their skin is black and FOX News will exonerate them in the name of keeping us safe?
We seek the truth, avoid the mainstream and are virulently anti-neoliberalism.
I don't consider that a political statement. I call it concentrating on how things work.
Neil and Ben,
I want to hear MMT on Glenn Beck, and oozing out of Hannity's ass. That's the people MMT should be going after. Instead, everyone preaches to the choir. Every MMT poobah should read Dale Carnegie's classic on winning friends and influencing people. Instead, the poobahs like to circle jerk.
I want to hear MMT on Glenn Beck, and oozing out of Hannity's ass. That's the people MMT should be going after.
If you wish to devote yourself to pleasing retrograde conservatives it's your perogative. Don't expect others to follow. Sean Hannity is a worshipper of power and will never, ever come round to the behaviors you want to see.
@Ben Johannson,
I think you're one of the most intelligent commenters on nakedcapitalism (don't know where else you comment other than than the MMT regulars), and I respect the hell out of your clarity and insight. I really do. (Ditto Neil.) But i think you're wrong about the target audience. So we disagree.
I have a brother-in-law who makes Beck and Hannity sound like Bernie Sanders. I managed to get him to stop screaming the 'we borrow from China' mantra by shouting (and sneering) in frustration one night to name the factory in downtown China manufacturing USD that we borrow. "Name the counterfeiter, motherfucker. Name that factory." It stopped him in his tracks. It broke through. And he admitted it, later.
But you know what his current wall is to anything I say? "How come you're the only one who knows these things? How come Hannity doesn't know this? Why don't US presidents know this? Or the Secretary of the Treasury?" [He's not the sharpest knife in the drawer, reading beyond a FOXABCNBCMSNBCCBS article is above his IQ grade.] In addition, he resents anyone who appears to have more knowledge than he's gleaned (since he's now a rich guy courtesy of my side of the family which he denies). BIG psychological tell. Major. No one wants to be displayed to be a fool. Or laughed at, shamed. So I've been studying him with my mouth shut. Keeping an ice cream cone from melting in the heat is easier than keeping my mouth shut. Warren has been trying to explain to the world how this works--at the basic level--for 20 years. He was a lone wolf.
But cracking this nut is the key. Talking TO these people instead of deigning to inform them FROM our lofty perches is the way to go.
MRW most of my (close) family is conservative, through basic constant pounding I got some information through
But os very hard when people gets 24h a day bombarded by contrarian info by supposed experts.
Would like to write more but I'm on mobile phone, but you get the picture: The groupthink is too strong.
You hace to target the people who is able to frame the issues and has issues with the current power structure. Powerless people hardly change things ever, this is romanticism, USA was born by an elite, social change in the 30s was driven by an elite etc etc etc. Apart of that is a matter of co-opting the enablers (around 20%) of the population(the ones supporting the status quo).
the 30s was driven by an elite
No, it wasn't, Ignacio. Marriner Eccles was a high-school educated Republican Mormon who became a millionaire when he was 22 after he completed his Mormon mission, his Dad died, and he inherited his father's businesses and grew the family's fortune. The ideas he presented to Congress in 1932/33 predated Keynes' General Theory--which no one in the US really understands--by three years, BASED ON HIS OBSERVATIONS OF HOW THINGS WORKED. He saw it in its banks. He saw it in how his clients were affected horribly by Hoover's and Andrew Mellon's ideas. Eccles was more popular than Mylie Cyrus.
It caused FDR, who didn't understand diddly about what Eccles was saying, to surmise that Eccles was right. That's why FDR made him the first Chairman of the Fed in 1935. Go back and read the Congressional record from around that time. Eccles spoke plainly and simply. He didn't embellish, or obfuscate like that lying smug tribal king Greenspan. Eccles knew the purpose of the economy of the US was public purpose--ergo, the people listened to him--and to secure what's in the preamble to the constitution: the general welfare of the people.
This may sound too oom-pah-pah and patriotic to you, but I say ride that surfboard. Because that wave can wash over this country.
And yet he was attacked routinely by the conservative elements you think "we" should target who were much against his policies...
I'm honestly not knowledgeable enough about the details of the period to know how popular he was compared to FDR or others, and to solve the 'egg or chicken' situation. However, it was ultimately the political machine at the time which allowed those policies to be implemented and to put that people at positions of authority. It was FDR and the party who put him there, and I doubt they were forced. So there was participation from a part of the elites (both economic and political), and there was enabling by part of the population backing those elites (so yes, 'spreading the word' is important). The enablers with biggest share of political power right now are much more aligned with corporatists interests (hence establishment political parties) than those of nation-states (that's why they push for things like TTP). You can't dissociate politics from economics because they are exactly the same thing(economics are politics).
I agree with you though that the lack of education regarding the system functioning nowadays is widely spread, can be traced back to the origin of those institutions and whether they are focus of public attention or not. Nowadays people takes central banks and their functioning for granted, but late XIX and early XX century is when there was a push for those institutions and they were born. Since then society has moved on and the institutional protection due to momentum and ideology, and how ingrained those institutions are within the bureaucratic machine, makes them obscure to the public.
I can guarantee you though, that things get worse questions will be asked, and indeed they have been and are being asked, there is a lot of activity, from "auditing the FED" to "People QE" to the obvious unaccountability of the ECB being questioned. Some are askign the wrong questions, some are asking the right questions, but is this process the space for asking questions and coming with changes and solutions open.
There wouldn't haven't been an Eccles the FED chairman w/o a 1929, a FDR and all thr problems that came before.
It's all politics.
There wouldn't haven't been an Eccles the FED chairman w/o a 1929, a FDR and all thr problems that came before.
It's all politics.
No, no, no, no, no. It's not all politics. It's understanding the underlying--in this case, financial, or monetary--operations. Claiming a political umbrella lets you off the hook. It absolves the average person from examining the issue logically. I am firmly against throwing everything into one basket. Separate the non-political--the actual A-B-C--from what people at a certain time do with it, the political wind.
Don't fall for it.
January 12, 2016 at 10:57 AM
And the way you don't fall it is by delineating procedures when they are A-B-C and knowable.
so, the 20th century seems to be a sweet spot in history for the nation state.
US gov as the monopoly currency issuer seems to be almost accidentally included in the Constitution. Did ppl understand the full implications? It seems they were just tired of dealing with currency headaches.
Income tax was another change that people didn't really understand.
I know income taxes don't fund federal spending, but they certainly automatically stabilize monetary value during monetary expansion and they also make the federal government much more accoutable for the macroeconomic health of the nation.
Organizing in large groups is hard. If ppl understand MMT it can work, but otherwise it's hard to feel represented by something so large.
If ppl don't relate to federal purpose, the whole process degrades politically and socially.
If that happens tax and monetary relationships can break down as well.
I don't think federal government will die, but it can become this awkward unrepresentative mess. This may already be happening to a degree.
Problem is, in this situation, federal money and policy still has a huge influence over people but it's not adaquetely maintained so ppl are like "What is this crap? let's get rid of it."
Why should federal be monetary sovereign anyway? Are there good answers besides tradition? Does a large group statistically average to be more moral than small groups?
Can we have governmental pluralism with many different political and social communities overlapping? Does one government and currency need to have final authority?
I'm in Utah and mormon influence(im exmormon) is weirdly pervasive in state and local econ and other policies. Some of it I like, they do care about infrastructure and understand strong community, but tend to be conservative and like federal less. Mormon community could go pseudo nation state if it wanted, especially if nation faced crises, otherwise, i don't think it would have enough momentum.
so, the 20th century seems to be a sweet spot in history for the nation state.
Two world wars and various conflicts that in total killed, maimed and dispossessed millions of people.
This is a reason that there is a negative reaction to the nation state and the search for something better to replace the Westphalian "peace."
The UN was supposed to be a step in that direction, as well as American hegemony and the "Pax Americana." Both have failed and the great power sphere of influence world is re-emerging.
Thew neoliberal assumption (belief) is that economics can do what national and international politics cannot by creating a transnational global economy based on economic liberalism. The result of that has been a transnational elite in competition among themselves for the global surplus.
@ Derek
Marriner Eccles was a Utah Mormon.
The Secret Life of Marriner Eccles
The result of that has been a transnational elite in competition among themselves for the global surplus.
You got it. Bingo. Their legal system is the TPP, TTIP and that TT-Whatever-Services agreement. At least that's the start of their legal system.
Post a Comment