In recent days the international policy-making elite has tried to distance itself from MMT, often going to hysterical extremes to dismiss the approach as crazy. No one does this better than the Japanese.
As MMT began to gather momentum, its developers began to receive a flood of calls from reporters around the world enquiring whether Japan serves as the premier example of a country that follows MMT policy recommendations.
My answer is always the same: No. Japan is the perfect case to demonstrate that all of mainstream theory and policy is wrong. And that it is the best example of a country that always chooses the anti-MMT policy response to every ill that ails the country.
Reporters find that shocking. Biggest government fiscal deficits in the developed country world? Check. Highest government debt ratios in the developed country world? Check.
Isn’t that what MMT advises? No....
From the MMT perspective, what Japan needs is a good fiscal stimulus, albeit one that is targeted....Add the Wray Curve to the Laffer Curve, the Phillips Curve, the Kelton See-Saw and the Krugman Cross.
New Economic Perspectives
JAPAN DOES MMT?
L. Randall Wray | Professor of Economics, Bard College
4 comments:
Strikes me the mere fact of Japan having a very large national debt and stock of base money ("Private Sector Net Financial Assets" in MMT parlance) shows that Japan has actually been behaving in an MMT manner for several years. However, the Japanese are as schizophrenic as anyone else, and mix that with clearly anti-MMT stuff.
Controlled demolition of MMT ― an exercise in elementary logic
Comment on Randall Wray on ‘JAPAN DOES MMT?’*
Randall Wray analyses the current situation in Japan: “From the MMT perspective, what Japan needs is a good fiscal stimulus, albeit one that is targeted. Japan has three ‘injections’ into the economy: the fiscal deficit (which has fallen from 7% of GDP to about 5% over the past few years ― still a substantial injection), the current account surplus, and private investment. But what it needs is stronger growth of domestic consumer demand ― which would also stimulate investment directed to home consumption.”
This recommendation is based on the “sectoral balance perspective”. This perspective is clearly defined by the sectoral balances equation which is given by (I−S)+(G−T)+(X−M)=0. The very characteristic of the MMT balances equation is that it does not contain the balance of the business sector, i.e. profit/loss. Accordingly, the word profit does not appear once in Randall Wray’s post. An economic model without profit, though, is like Hamlet without the prince or physics without the concept of energy.
The question is why does macroeconomic profit not appear in the sectoral balances equation? The short answer is because economists in general, and MMTers, in particular, are scientifically incompetent.
What MMT policy guidance lacks is the underlying true macroeconomic theory. Here it is.#1, #2
The elementary production-consumption economy is defined with this set of macroeconomic axioms: (A0) The economy consists of the household and the business sector which, in turn, consists initially of one giant fully integrated firm. (A1) Yw=WL wage income Yw is equal to wage rate W times working hours. L, (A2) O=RL output O is equal to productivity R times working hours L, (A3) C=PX consumption expenditure C is equal to price P times quantity bought/sold X.
Under the conditions of market clearing X=O and budget balancing C=Yw in each period, the price as the dependent variable is given by P=W/R. The elementary production-consumption economy is shown on Wikimedia.#3
The focus is here on the nominal/monetary balances. For the time being, real balances are excluded, i.e. it holds X=O. The condition of budget balancing, i.e. C=Yw, is now skipped. The monetary saving/dissaving of the household sector is defined as S≡Yw−C. The monetary profit/loss of the business sector is defined as Q≡C−Yw. Ergo Q+S=0 or Q=−S.
The balances add up to zero. The mirror image of household sector saving S is business sector loss −Q. The mirror image of household sector dissaving (-S) is business sector profit Q. Q=−S is the elementary version of the macroeconomic Profit Law.
It is the definition of macroeconomic profit, i.e. Q≡C−Yw, where the logical blunder of MMT sneaks in. A definition ≡ is a one-way operator: a new variable (= definiendum) is introduced as a relationship of variables that are given by the axioms (= definiens).#4 While in an equation y=x−z it is possible to bring z to the left side, i.e. y+z=x, this is NOT admitted in a definition. The case is analogous to the prohibition of division through 0.
The operator ≡ defines a one-way relationship, the operator = defines a two-way relationship. The methodological failure of economists consists of not keeping these logical relationships properly apart.
Macroeconomic profit has above been defined as a relationship of axiomatic variables, i.e. Q≡C−Yw. Now, the representative economist comes along and performs the inadmissible operation Q+Yw≡C and introduces one more definition, i.e. Q+Yw≡national income≡NI. This reduces to NI≡C which is an improper definition because it applies TWO terms for the same thing, i.e. the terms “national income NI” and “consumption expenditures C” are interchangeable. This is like saying the words “apple” and “orange” apply to the same thing. So, the definition of “national income NI” is redundant, leads to economic gobbledygook, and therefore has to be cut off with Occam’s Razor.
See part 2
Part 2
The same holds for the investment economy. Profits for the two sectors are given by Qc≡C−Ywc and Qi≡I−Ywc. Total profit Q is defined as the sum of sub-sectoral profits, i.e. Q≡Qc+Qi≡C+I−Ywc. GDP is defined as GDP≡C+I, so Q≡GDP−Yw. The definition of GDP is admissible but the definition of national income NI≡Q+Yw is inadmissible. By consequence, NI≡GDP, or Keynes’ Income = value of output (GT p. 63), is economic gobbledygook. It leads to I=S and IS-LM and all the other falsehoods of After-Keynesian macroeconomics.
The axiomatically correct sectoral balances equation reads (I−S)+(G−T)+(X−M)−(Q−Yd)=0.#5, #6
Ramifications: The Wray Curve, the Kelton See-Saw#7, the Krugman Cross#8, and the rest of MMT is proto-scientific garbage.
Egmont Kakarot-Handtke
* New Economic Perspectives
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2019/06/japan-does-mmt.html
#1 True macrofoundations: the reset of economics
https://axecorg.blogspot.com/2017/05/true-macrofoundations-reset-of-economics.html
#2 MMT and the canonical macroeconomic model
https://axecorg.blogspot.com/2019/04/mmt-and-canonical-macroeconomic-model.html
#3 Wikimedia AXEC31 Elementary production-consumption economy
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AXEC31.png
#4 Wikipedia Definition
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definition
#5 Wikipedia and the promotion of economists’ idiotism (I)
https://axecorg.blogspot.com/2016/11/wikipedia-and-promotion-of-economists.html
#6 Wikipedia and the promotion of economists’ idiotism (II)
https://axecorg.blogspot.com/2018/07/wikipedia-and-promotion-of-economists.html
#7 Stephanie Kelton What Happens When the Government Tightens its Belt?
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2011/05/what-happens-when-government-tightens-2.html
#8 Scott Fullwiler The Sector Financial Balances Model of Aggregate Demand
http://neweconomicperspectives.org/2009/07/sector-financial-balances-model-of-aggregate-demand.html
Correction of indices
The same holds for the investment economy. Profits for the two sub-sectors are given by Qc≡C−Ywc and Qi≡I−Ywi. Total profit Q is defined as the sum of sub-sectoral profits, i.e. Q≡Qc+Qi≡C+I−Yw.
Apologies
EKH
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