Monday, February 4, 2019

Tom Holland — Even in China, there's no magic money tree. Modern monetary theory is an illusion

Tom Holland is a geologist by training and journalist by profession. Although he has written on business for 25 years, he displays little knowledge of finance, economics or MMT in this article. Why do people that are not qualified to speak on an important subject get a platform to criticize for reasons that are patently wrong.

In the first place, the author doesn't realize that China is not sovereign in its currency since it pegs the renminbi to the dollar. (The Chinese currency is the renminbi (RMB) and the unit of account is the yuan (CNY). The US dollar (USD) is used to denote both the currency and the unit of account.) So from the start the assumption that the currencies are the same is wrong on MMT terms.

It heads downhill from there.
It’s not much of a choice is it? Venezuela or the Soviet Union? But that’s what the proponents of MMT are offering....
South China Morning Post
Even in China, there's no magic money tree. Modern monetary theory is an illusion
Tom Holland

2 comments:

Konrad said...

“Why do people that are not qualified to speak on an important subject get a platform to criticize for reasons that are patently wrong?”

For the corporate media outlets (owned by the rich) anyone who supports neoliberal lies is an “expert.” If you defend Big Pharma’s price gouging, then you are a “medical expert.” If you defend war and weapons makers, you are a “military expert.” If you demand cuts in social programs, you are a government “expert.

By contrast, if you question neoliberal lies, then you are a “wacko conspiracy theorist.”

“In the first place, the author doesn't realize that China is not sovereign in its currency since it pegs the renminbi to the dollar.” ~ Tom

The Chinese renminbi was pegged to the US dollar until 2005. Since then, the Chinese government has let its currency float, and therefore the government has full monetary sovereignty.

The Chinese government does what the US government does. Therefore the US claims that China “cheats” and “undervalues its currency.”

As for the word renminbi, it is used interchangeably with yuan, in international communication. Each renminbi or yuan is divided into ten jiao or one hundred fen, just as US dollars are divided into 100 cents, and UK pounds into 100 pence. (Guineas, shillings, etc are no longer used.)

I scanned the article. Its argument is “Zimbabwe!”

The important thing is that more and more oligarchs and their toadies are becoming nervous as the truth of MMT continues to spread.

Ryan Harris said...

It's interesting to me that MMT views criticism as "trolling" when MMT broke through by trolling other economists because the other economists were blind to their own errors. The reason people keep coming back to these arguments that MMT "put to bed" is because MMT answers aren't adequate and only topically address the issues that seem obvious to everyone who isn't stuck in the MMT world view. I've seen all the MMT responses ad nauseum too, and I too find it lacking. I realize, in the MMT accounting identities and logic, it's all worked out and proven. Unfortunately that doesn't cut the mustard. When arguments are the weakest, MMT goes after the people because they aren't persuaded by the flawed thinking and arguments.