One of the big events that led to deep uncertainty among Social Democratic politicians and their advisers, which arguably, was a key driver in the shift of these parties to the Right, was the Stagflation of the 1970s. The phenomenon of the simultaneous coincidence of accelerating inflation and rising unemployment had not previously been witnessed in the period following the Second World War. It needs a careful analysis because much of the popular understanding of this period and the claims that it demonstrated a failure of Keynesian policy approaches are incorrect and provide no basis for rejecting fiscal intervention to maintain full employment.Bill Mitchell – billy blog
On the trail of inflation and the fears of the same …
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia
7 comments:
the whole concept of "inflation" is monetarist ie false....
they assume it "debases the munnie!" which the wording there is revealing it comes from a metallic type of munnie where you could mix in second rate metals to "debase" the higher order metals which are the 3 solely found in column 11 of the periodic table and have very unique electrical characteristics...
Then this is where the whole "real vs. nominal" alternative reality economists dream up comes in... what in fact happens they call "nominal" then the fictitious thing they dream up they call "real"... after they adjust for their "inflation"....
These are some sick people....
The currency unit IS the CONTROL VARIABLE:
"The control variable (or scientific constant) in scientific experimentation is the experimental element which is constant and unchanged throughout the course of the investigation. The control variable strongly influences experimental results, and it is held constant during the experiment in order to test the relative relationship of the dependent and independent variables. The control variable itself is not of primary interest to the experimenter."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Control_variable
You DON"T change it... at least QUALIFIED and COMPETENT people don't change it...
Here: "control variable itself is not of primary interest to the experimenter"
LOL the munnie IS of primary interest to these munnietarist idiots... that's the whole f-ing problem with these deranged morons...
Engineer: "How many amperes will that motor draw?"
Monetarist Moron: "In what year amperes?"
Engineer: "Whaaaaatttt??????"
Monetarist Moron: "Well the amperes are continually debased!"
They are literally insane....
Put in a starting capacitor. Draw those amperes from the Farad Savings Bank.
some good points here
I think it actually would help to discuss currency units as control-units, in engineering training programs
there are 2 limits* to this comparison, of course, but we might as well have engineers be aware of both of them, so that they can keep their perspective about state-issued currency within a dynamic operating range, instead of tethered to one (monetarist) side
http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2015/12/bill-mitchell-on-trail-of-inflation-and.html
*
1-limit: a control unit in a static engine (fixed design, fixed load, fixed context)
2nd-limit: a quasi-control unit in a dynamically evolving "engine" facing unpredictably varying "loads" & contexts
Matt I think we have to distinguish between what economists say, and how the general public is impacted and the information is presented to them...
The problem is not so much that ideas are wrong, but that you can present a 'plausible explanation' to the layman (the politician!) so they will end up backing those ideas because it suits their circumstances.
Ideology (which is what economics mostly is) is context-dependant. IMO, the same person could be left-leaning, or right-leaning, "gold bug" or pro-inflation depending on: 1) their own personal context, and 2) how and what information they are exposed to.
It takes a lot of cognitive effort to transcend your own personal circumstance and analyse a system objectively, we are talking that probably no more than 5% of the general population can do that.
If you are in a period of time where inflation is sky-rocketing (due to someone rigging an strategical commodity market and holding the world hostage) and then some opportunist idiot come with an stupid explanatory idea that TPTB can use, and someone can capitalize on, it will be market and sold, as it was with all the monetarists uprising and reactionary revolution of the 80's.
If you are not ready to offer a compelling and better explanation to your fellow tribal primates partners you will lose. Truth is not really important in this context, the tribe leadership creates truth through manipulating perception.
So it all comes down to how strong and pro-people your institutions are, so they cannot be assaulted by whatever idiot passed by in that moment to capitalize on the problem in that moment. And this is a very important point, because when/if real problems happen, society collapses if it lacks those strong foundations, which I'm afraid are too feeble after decades of assault on all sort of institutions (government, social and family nets being destroyed by the barbarian ideology of radical individualism and the corresponding backing economic ideology, neoliberalism).
I don't think any amount of speculation about units of account will change that, the change has to come from society itself challenging and rebuilding those networks that have been (and continue to be) under permanent attack by the myopic elites.
Good start Ignacio!
"Ideology (which is what economics mostly is) is context-dependant. "
Yes. We can add another flavor to Walter Shewhart's maxim ("Data is meaningless w/o context.")
Namely, that ideology is meaningless without context! :) Ya think? Most people don't, at least not often enough.
"It takes a lot of cognitive effort to transcend your own personal circumstance and analyse a system objectively"
Not really. No more cognitive effort than riding a bicycle. It's clumsy at first, but smooth after adequate practice. The human CNS has incredible plastic ability to automate its ability to perform nearly any task ... if that task is practiced enough. This is a question of basic education. Our schools used to teach thinking ... but have gotten away from providing much practice in that arena. That's why so many voters and politicians alike are falling off cognitive bicycles. It's their first attempt at parsing the blur of real, constantly changing contexts, and it shows.
"... we are talking that probably no more than 5% of the general population can do that."
Hogwash. 95% can ride a bike (to some degree), 95% can think ... in both cases, it's largely a question of prior practice.
"If you are in a period of time where inflation is sky-rocketing (due to someone rigging an strategical commodity market and holding [a clueless] world hostage) and then some opportunist[ic] idiot [presents a] stupid [supposedly] explanatory idea that TPTB can use, and someone can capitalize on, [then] it will be market[ed] and sold, as it was with all the monetarists uprising and reactionary revolution of the 80's."
Yes. In a nutshell, "People will do anything in their power to avoid thinking .... until they absolutely have to."
It just so happens that now, we as an aggregate, finally have to get up off the couch and do so.
"If you are not ready to offer a compelling and better explanation to your fellow tribal primates partners you will lose. Truth is not really important in this context, the tribe leadership creates truth through manipulating perception."
It's worse than that. If you let your neighbors grow up to be knuckle-draggers, you can't bother explaining things to them. Instead, you have to manipulate their unpracticed intellects with tricks & kabuki, same was as training a monkey or dog.
"So it all comes down to how strong and pro-people your institutions are, so they cannot be assaulted by whatever idiot passed by in that moment to capitalize on the problem in that moment."
Exactly. And that in itself comes down to "asking WHY J&J Sixpack can't think" 5 times over. The origin of our dilemma goes back at least 5 layers deep in the causality chain. No amount of band-aids will solve this issue, until we prevent new rounds of harm from occurring. We need cheap prevention, not costly repair.
"I don't think any amount of speculation about units of account will change that, the change has to come from society itself challenging and rebuilding those networks that have been (and continue to be) under permanent attack by the myopic elites."
Correct. Change won't spring from this un-educated, un-trained, un-prepared & cognitively un-washed electorate. Change will have to come from their kids & grandkids ... IF we change how the next generations are educated, and how much practice at actual thinking we allow them to get.
Are we gonna prevent evolution of Aggregate Intelligence, or prevent Aggregate Stupidity?
here's some poetic statements on this topic
"Venimus, Vidimus, Perfecimus Eventus Accommodatos" [WE came, WE saw, WE made a more perfect union.]
"People will do anything within their power to avoid thinking [until absolutely necessary]."
[anonymous, 18th century Naturalist]
"Populations will do even more to avoid systems thinking ... until entire systems are undeniably threatened."
Yet there's no way to stop progress. "When a nation [finally] begins to think, it is impossible to hold it back." Voltaire
"The glory goes to those who make a more scalable union."
"Process owners all have to answer to full-scale operations feedback, or it isn't an adaptive operation."
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