Barrons — Can Trillion-Dollar Coins Cover the Coronavirus Relief Tab? It’s Not a Bad Idea by Matthew C. Klein

The article is behind a paywall, but all you really need to see is the headline — in Barrons! An idea whose time has arrived.

Barrons
Can Trillion-Dollar Coins Cover the Coronavirus Relief Tab? It’s Not a Bad Idea.
Matthew C. Klein

See also

Axios
The plan to fight coronavirus with trillion-dollar platinum coins
Dion Rabouin

Tlaib proposes minting two $1 trillion platinum coins to finance monthly coronavirus debit cards — Joseph Lawler

Rep. Rashida Tlaib has proposed sending everyone in the United States $2,000 immediately and then $1,000 per month to counter the economic fallout of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Michigan Democrat's plan would be financed by having the Federal Reserve create new money on behalf of the Treasury. To skirt the federal debt limit, the U.S. Mint would create two $1 trillion coins, and the Treasury would deposit them in its account at the Fed.

Tlaib, a member of the small group of left-wing freshman House Democrats known as "The Squad," described the plan as a "truly universal relief proposal."...

Washington Examiner
Tlaib proposes minting two $1 trillion platinum coins to finance monthly coronavirus debit cards

Joseph Lawler

Rohan Grey — Administering Money: Coinage, Debt Crises, and the Future of Fiscal Policy

Abstract

The power to coin money is a fundamental constitutional power and central element of fiscal policymaking, along with spending, taxing, and borrowing. However, it remains neglected in constitutional and administrative law, despite the fact that money creation has been central to the United States’ fiscal capacities and constraints since at least1973, when it abandoned convertibility of the dollar into gold. This neglect is particularly prevalent in the context of debt ceiling crises, which emerge when Congress fails to grant the executive sufficient borrowing authority to finance spending in excess of taxes. In such instances, prominent legal and economic scholars have argued that the President should choose the “least unconstitutional option” of breaching the debt ceiling, rather than impeding on Congress’s even more fundamental powers to tax and spend. However, this view fails to consider a fourth, arguably more constitutional option: minting a high value coin under an obscure provision of the Coinage Act, and using the proceeds to circumvent the debt ceiling entirely. Reintroducing coinage into our fiscal discourse raises novel and interesting questions about the broader nature of, and relationship between “money” and “debt.” It also underscores how legal debates over fiscal policy implicate broader social myths about money. As we enter the era of digital currency, creative legal solutions like high value coinage have the potential to serve as imaginative catalysts that enable us to collectively develop new monetary myths that better fit our modern context and needs.

The platinum coin redux.

Rohan Grey
Administering Money: Coinage, Debt Crises, and the Future of Fiscal Policy

Tim Fernholz — Does the Republican tax cut mean deficits don’t matter?

MMT.

Quartz
Does the Republican tax cut mean deficits don’t matter?
Tim Fernholz

Ellen Brown — Can Jill Carry Bernie’s Baton? A Look at the Green Candidate’s Radical Funding Solution

The platinum coin resurfaces as Plan B.

Counterpunch
Can Jill Carry Bernie’s Baton? A Look at the Green Candidate’s Radical Funding Solution

Ellen Brown

New podcast: My interview with Joe Firestone.

My interview with Joe Firestone.

Joe Firestone — Return of the Coin?

The last few weeks have seen at least two posts calling attention to the potential use of the platinum coin in America's political economy. The first to appear was Rob Urie's piece in Counterpunch provocatively titled: “The Trillion Dollar Catshit Coin” And the second was Mike Sandler's post in The Huffington Post called “Greece and the U.S. Senate: Economics for the 99%.…

Coronet
Return of the Coin?
letsgetitdone (Joe Firestone)

Ryan J. Reilly — House Republicans Demand DOJ Platinum Coin Option Memo

Republicans on the House Financial Services Committee have asked the Justice Department to turn over a memo that spells out the Obama administration's view of whether the so-called platinum coin option could avert a congressional fight over the debt ceiling limit.

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) and Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) wrote a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder on Dec. 20, asking DOJ to turn over "all records within the custody and control of DOJ which relate to the coin issuance proposal," as first reported by The Hill.

The Huffington Post reported last month that the Justice Department has acknowledged the existence of an official Office of Legal Counsel memo on the platinum coin option. Supporters say the option would allow the Treasury Department to mint a platinum coin in any denomination, which then could be used to meet government obligations without the need for Congress to grant any additional spending powers. While DOJ acknowledged in a response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request that such a memo or memos existed, it also said the material was withheld because it was protected by attorney-client and deliberative process privileges and "not appropriate for discretionary release."

The Huffington Post
House Republicans Demand DOJ Platinum Coin Option Memo
Ryan J. Reilly

Arun DuBois — A Trillion Dollar Coin for Canada?

Arun here…breaking radio silence to share with you a thought-provoking piece by Larry Kazdan, a graduate of York University in sociology and history, and currently a Council Member with the World Federalist Movement-Canada, an organization that monitors developments at the United Nations and advocates for more effective global governance.

Our friend and fellow blogger Keith Newman recently wrote some words that set up Larry’s piece nicely so rather than trying to reinvent the wheel, I will let Keith introduce Larry’s work and then urge readers to read the piece in full.

The Progressive Economics Forum
A Trillion Dollar Coin for Canada?
Arun DuBois

(h/t Clonal in the comments)

See also MMT in Canada

Krugman predicts Obama overrides debt limit

In this blog today Krugman said this:

"My bet now is that we actually do go over the line for a day or two. And what ends the immediate crisis is not Republican action but a decision by Obama to declare himself not bound by the debt ceiling. He can’t even hint at this possibility until the thing actually happens, because he has to keep the focus on the Republicans, and he has to make them demonstrate their utter irresponsibility before he can take any extraordinary action."

So it seems like he's expecting Obama to either invoke the 14th Amendment and see how that flies or, mint the $1 trillion platinum coin. (And see how that flies.)

But Krugman did add this ominous caveat:

"But maybe I’m wrong; maybe Obama’s lawyers have concluded that there’s really nothing he can do. If so, God help us all."

Not good.

Seems Some Key WSJ Advertisers Are Concerned About The Coin Act ...

Commentary by Roger Erickson

Enough to try to head this baby off at the Platinum pass?

Only makes you wonder what outcome they're so worried about, and determined to avoid.

To Make Sense of the Coins Act, Follow the Money

"Proposed legislation to abolish the dollar bill and replace it with a dollar coin is government at its worst."

Methinks he doth protest too much? What's Wall St's interest in bills and TT&L accounts* over coins? :)

The WSJ's suggested solution is to further privatize control of national fiat. No one could have predicted THAT, of course.


* why won't the mythical money multiplier effect die a commutative death?

ps: The other admissions here - in the Wikipedia page on taxes, TT&L accounts & interest rates - should make the writers think ... but they don't. How curious.

Carlos (beowulf) Mucha — The Coin

Beowulf makes the Times! Congratulations are in order.

The New York Times | Opinion — Room for Debate
The Coin
Carlos Mucha
(h/t Michael Sankowski at Monetary Realism)

The White House Embraces and will soon service, the Austerity Gods

The platinum coin solution to the debt ceiling has been rejected by the White House(link). Even Paul Krugman is beginning to despair(link). Was there ever any doubt that the banksters would be denied? And when the austerity bomb detonates, it will be Obama and the democrats who are to blame. What better way to bring to power the Cavemen-Rode-Dinosaurs crowd? Fascist state here we come.

Moron Metaphor Alert: The Platinum Coin is "the first cousin of default"

Now WaPos Ezra Klein joins in the continuous MSM barrage of false metaphors, this is getting tedious and pathetic.

But there’s nothing benign about the platinum coin. It is a breakdown in the American system of governance, a symbol that we have become a banana republic. And perhaps we have. But the platinum coin is not the first cousin of cleanly raising the debt ceiling. It is the first cousin of defaulting on our debts. As with true default, it proves to the financial markets that we can no longer be trusted to manage our economic affairs predictably and rationally.

Would these people just give up already they are embarrassing themselves.  TIP:  Do yourselves a favor and salvage any reputations you have left.

I can't add a thing to what Joe Firestone writes up in response to Klein's diatribe at NEP; other than to say that perhaps Klein is running interference for Bob Woodward who is also 110% invested in debt doomsday... and now may be intellectually exposed as incompetent on economic matters concerning the federal government ... and Klein  is trying to desperately spin the historically common practice of coin seignorage by the monetary authority of a civil government into a very in fact radical Austrian view as "default".

Yes you heard that right, "default", even though the USD balances credited to the Treasury's account by deposit of the coin would actually allow the Treasury to redeem ANY US Treasury security dollar for dollar.

This imaginary "default by redemption" assertion is usually only made by the typical anarcho-libertarian Rothbardian nutjobs we often encounter here at MNE, but Klein here is at the Post, what a disgrace.

Let's learn a big lesson from this at least.  I think we can see by now that in any situation we may face, when someone can only respond to a serious inquiry with metaphor and NO FACTS, our internal anti-fraud detectors should be going off at high decibels.

TPC makes The Economist

The coin that heard around the world.

The Economist | Free Exchange

America going platinum

R. A. | Washington

The consensus other than on the right is that two negatives make a positive.

Ryan Grim — Harry Reid Would Back Obama If He Bucks GOP On Debt Ceiling: Source

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has privately told other Democrats, including President Obama, that if the administration used its constitutional and executive authority to continue paying its debts in the face of House Republican opposition, he would support the approach, according to a source familiar with Reid's message to the president 

The simplest escape route out of the debt ceiling impasse is for the president to direct the Treasury to find a legal way to pay its debts. The Treasury then has a variety of options. One gaining particular attention relies on a law that allows the Treasury to mint a coin of unspecified value and deposit it with the Federal Reserve. Those funds could then be used legally to pay debts.

"Reid has not dismissed any option," said the source close to Reid.

The 14th Amendment states that "the validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law ... shall not be questioned." Last month, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters that "[t]his administration does not believe that the 14th Amendment gives the president the power to ignore the debt ceiling -- period."

It would be possible, however, for that statement to be true and for the president to pay the debts by citing 14th Amendment powers. If the president went the route of the so-called "platinum coin," he could use the 14th Amendment to tell Congress that the constitution gives him no choice but to find all legal ways to honor the "validity of the public debt." The Treasury could legally mint a coin worth enough to cover debts for several years and deposit that coin with the Federal Reserve. The funds would not be used for spending that isn't authorized and appropriated by Congress, but only to pay debts. The president, therefore, would not be ignoring the debt ceiling, because there would be no new debt subject to the limit.

The Huffington Post
Harry Reid Would Back Obama If He Bucks GOP On Debt Ceiling: Source
Ryan Grim

The simplest escape route out of the debt ceiling impasse is for the president to direct the Treasury to find a legal way to pay its debts. The Treasury then has a variety of options. One gaining particular attention relies on a law that allows the Treasury to mint a coin of unspecified value and deposit it with the Federal Reserve. Those funds could then be used legally to pay debts.

Exactly as beowulf had proposed when the 14th Amendment was brought wrt to the platinum coin.

Randy Wray — Does Obama Have A Platinum Coin Up His Sleeve?

Platinum coin, Treasury warrants, and other interesting stuff.

Economonitor
Does Obama Have A Platinum Coin Up His Sleeve?
L. Randall Wray | Professor of Economics, UMKC

Dylan Matthews — Michael Castle: Unsuspecting godfather of the $1 trillion coin solution

But wait — how did the Treasury secretary ever get this authority? Who would have thought to give it to him, and why?

The story starts in 1995, when Rep. Michael Castle, then the Republican at-large representative for Delaware, took over as head of the House Financial Services subcommittee on domestic and international monetary policy. Issues of coinage were part of that subcommittee’s jurisdiction, and so Castle — who tells me that he personally has never collected coins or previously hadn’t had much interest in coin issues — started working with coin collectors and others to draft legislation on the topic. 

Castle’s biggest accomplishment in the role was the 50-state quarter program, which involved issuing 50 differently designed quarters in the order the states were admitted to the Union (it isn’t a coincidence that Castle’s home state of Delaware was the first admitted). But he also drafted a bill, the Commemorative Coin Authorization and Reform Act of 1995, that included this provision:

Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary of the Treasury may mint and issue platinum coins in such quantity and of such variety as the Secretary determines to be appropriate.

The logic, Castle tells me, was to enable the Treasury to put out collectable platinum coins of a variety of sizes. At the time, collectors had complained that the smallest platinum coins available were too expensive, a problem the bill was supposed to enable the Treasury to correct. “The investment community wanted flexibility to make fractional coins,” Castle explains. “People couldn’t afford the $600 investment, so they wanted the flexibility to put in smaller coinage so that people could collect them.” 
Presumably, the platinum coins used to get around the debt ceiling would be worth way more than $100. (AP)

Castle’s interest was in producing income from seignorage (that is, the profit collected by the government by minting coins or printing paper money that is worth more than it costs to produce) as a means of reducing the deficit, albeit by a small amount, without raising taxes or cutting spending. “We saw it as an opportunity to make money for the Mint and the Treasury,” he remembers.

The Washington Post | Wonkblog

Michael Castle: Unsuspecting godfather of the $1 trillion coin solution
Dylan Matthews

BTW, Dylan Matthews is the one that researched the MMT post at Wonkblog some time back.

John Carney — Sorry Folks, The $1 Trillion Coin Is Unconstitutional

Opposition rising further. John Carney contributes his lawyerly opinion.

CNBC NetNet
Sorry Folks, The $1 Trillion Coin Is Unconstitutional
John Carney | Senior Editor

John follows up with If The $1 Trillion Coin Is Illegal, Isn't The Fed Illegal Too?

Kevin Drum — No, a $1 Trillion Platinum Coin is Not Legal

Dissent rising.

I am, obviously, not a lawyer. So if someone with actual legal training in the appropriate area of the law says I'm wrong, then I guess I'm wrong. But I'm not much afraid of that happening. This whole notion is the kind of thing that Herman Cain would come up with. It's time to stop treating it seriously.

Mother Jones
No, a $1 Trillion Platinum Coin is Not Legal
Kevin Drum