An economics, investment, trading and policy blog with a focus on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). We seek the truth, avoid the mainstream and are virulently anti-neoliberalism.
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Sunday, January 12, 2020
'All deficits are good for someone': Visiting economist shrugs off debt concerns — Andrew Taylor,
Positive article on MMT and Stephanie Kelton, who is in Australia now.
Stephanie Kelton: “All deficits are good for someone” Yes, Someone=Oligarchy Comment on Andrew Taylor/Stephanie Kelton ‘“All deficits are good for someone”: Visiting economist shrugs off debt concerns’*
MMTers never let a crisis go to waste. For burning Australia, Stephanie Kelton has good news: “The good news appears to be that there is recognition that what matters is human outcomes and climate outcomes, not budgetary outcomes.” “She is in Australia for a series of events, including engagements with PricewaterhouseCooper in Sydney and Melbourne this week. Her book The Deficit Myth will be published this year.”
Clearly, Stephanie Kelton is on a promotion tour. What are her unique selling-propositions?
• “ … budget deficits do not matter in a country with its own currency unless they cause inflation …” • “It’s normal and customary for governments to run deficits,” • “The deficit is nothing more than the government’s financial contribution to some other part of the economy.” • “… a Democrat president, if elected, should not work to eliminate the budget deficit, which stands at US$1 trillion.” • “Keep it. There’s no evidence that the deficit is too big,” … The trillion-dollar deficit is perfectly fine and we could probably go higher.”
Stephanie Kelton is the most prominent cheerleader for deficit-spending/money-creation. Deficit-spending/money-creation is advertised as the solution to almost all problems from environmental catastrophes to the Green New Deal to unemployment to inequality to homelessness.#1
So, Stephanie Kelton is the good MMT-angel who fights for WeThePeople, right? Wrong!
As a matter of principle, all the goals Stephanie Kelton mentions can be achieved with a balanced budget. However, budget-balancing is anathema to MMTers.#2 They are hell-bent on deficit-spending/money-creation. Why? Because the macroeconomic Profit Law#3 implies Public Deficit = Private Profit and as a consequence Financial Wealth of the Oligarchy = Public Debt of WeThePeople. Thus, MMT policy produces the extremely unequal distribution of income/wealth that eventually destroys both the economy and society. MMTers are NOT the benefactors of WeThePeople but the PR/Marketing/Sales force of the Oligarchy.
Worse. MMTers corrupt science. MMTers are academics and they camouflage their lethal mission with fake economics. At the core of their scientific fraud stands a misrepresentation of the foundational relationships of macroeconomics. From the MMT balances equation (I−S)+(G−T)+(X−M)=0 MMTers derive the slogan government deficit = Non-government Surplus.#4, #5 The MMT equation is mathematically false, to begin with.
For the three sectors (business, household, government) of a closed economy the Profit Law boils down to Q=(G−T)−S and for two sectors (business, government) to Q=(G−T), that is, to Public Deficit (G−T) = Private Profit Q. And this tells everyone that MMT is a free-lunch program for the Oligarchy and that MMT is not only fake science but complicity in a fraud of gigantic proportions.#6-#9
Stephanie Kelton: “All deficits are good for someone” Yes, Someone=Oligarchy
ReplyDeleteComment on Andrew Taylor/Stephanie Kelton ‘“All deficits are good for someone”: Visiting economist shrugs off debt concerns’*
MMTers never let a crisis go to waste. For burning Australia, Stephanie Kelton has good news: “The good news appears to be that there is recognition that what matters is human outcomes and climate outcomes, not budgetary outcomes.” “She is in Australia for a series of events, including engagements with PricewaterhouseCooper in Sydney and Melbourne this week. Her book The Deficit Myth will be published this year.”
Clearly, Stephanie Kelton is on a promotion tour. What are her unique selling-propositions?
• “ … budget deficits do not matter in a country with its own currency unless they cause inflation …”
• “It’s normal and customary for governments to run deficits,”
• “The deficit is nothing more than the government’s financial contribution to some other part of the economy.”
• “… a Democrat president, if elected, should not work to eliminate the budget deficit, which stands at US$1 trillion.”
• “Keep it. There’s no evidence that the deficit is too big,” … The trillion-dollar deficit is perfectly fine and we could probably go higher.”
Stephanie Kelton is the most prominent cheerleader for deficit-spending/money-creation. Deficit-spending/money-creation is advertised as the solution to almost all problems from environmental catastrophes to the Green New Deal to unemployment to inequality to homelessness.#1
So, Stephanie Kelton is the good MMT-angel who fights for WeThePeople, right? Wrong!
As a matter of principle, all the goals Stephanie Kelton mentions can be achieved with a balanced budget. However, budget-balancing is anathema to MMTers.#2 They are hell-bent on deficit-spending/money-creation. Why? Because the macroeconomic Profit Law#3 implies Public Deficit = Private Profit and as a consequence Financial Wealth of the Oligarchy = Public Debt of WeThePeople. Thus, MMT policy produces the extremely unequal distribution of income/wealth that eventually destroys both the economy and society. MMTers are NOT the benefactors of WeThePeople but the PR/Marketing/Sales force of the Oligarchy.
Worse. MMTers corrupt science. MMTers are academics and they camouflage their lethal mission with fake economics. At the core of their scientific fraud stands a misrepresentation of the foundational relationships of macroeconomics. From the MMT balances equation (I−S)+(G−T)+(X−M)=0 MMTers derive the slogan government deficit = Non-government Surplus.#4, #5 The MMT equation is mathematically false, to begin with.
For the three sectors (business, household, government) of a closed economy the Profit Law boils down to Q=(G−T)−S and for two sectors (business, government) to Q=(G−T), that is, to Public Deficit (G−T) = Private Profit Q. And this tells everyone that MMT is a free-lunch program for the Oligarchy and that MMT is not only fake science but complicity in a fraud of gigantic proportions.#6-#9
Egmont Kakarot-Handtke
References
https://axecorg.blogspot.com/2020/01/stephanie-kelton-all-deficits-are-good.html