The debt delusion — Michael Roberts [book review]

Michael Roberts reviews and critiques The Debt Delusion by John Weeks.

Michael Roberts Blog — blogging from a marxist economist
The debt delusion
Michael Roberts

A Modern Money Explanation — J. D. Alt

Unfortunately, while there is growing sympathy with the progressive goals themselves, the advocates of those goals still don’t have a convincing explanation or formula for how the federal government will pay for it all. The best they can come up with is that we’ll increase taxes on the super-wealthy and the big corporations—or that it’s simply unacceptable, conceptually, that the world’s richest democracy cannot manage to achieve these goals for a healthy society. So long as these are the progressive narratives—even if they manage to win the upcoming elections—the goals will never be achieved. To create genuine, wide-spread support for undertaking the big-ticket issues we face, it will be necessary to explain to America how its monetary system actually works....

New Economic Perspectives
A Modern Money Explanation
J. D. Alt

Bill Mitchell — When the Left disgraces itself

In Monte Python’s Life of Brian we were introduced to the “People’s Front of Judea”, which was “one of many fractious and bickering independence movements, who spend more time fighting each other than the Romans”. The segments featuring the Front were very amusing. It was humour but redolent of the sort of historical struggles that have divided the Left over the centuries. In Australia, the history of the Communist Party, for example, is one of many factions, splintering into new parties and leaderships after disputes about Bolshevism, then the Communist International and Stalinism, then the so-called “imperialist” war by the Allies against Nazism, then Krushchev’s revelations about the crimes of Stalin, then the Soviet invasion of Hungary, then the split between the Soviet Union and China and the rise of Mao, then the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, and so on. This sort of division is mirrored around the world on the Left side of politics and struggle. I have been reminded of this history in recent weeks as the ‘war’ against Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) has been ramped up from so-called progressives. However, this ‘war’ seems different to the sort of internicine struggles that have historically bedevilled the Left. We now have all manner of strategies emerging, ranging from classic Association fallacies to ridiculous claims that MMTers perpetuate ‘anti semitic tropes’, and on to plain invention, a.k.a. straight out fabrications or lying. There is no real attempt to embrace the body of work we have created over the last 25 years. Quite the opposite – the ‘critics’ haven’t an original thing to say about the substance of MMT. They have instead decided to smear us with increasingly hysterical assertions. Which raises the interesting question for me – what is driving this aberrant behaviour? Fear, a sense of irrelevance, jealousy, Brexit, spite, … what? I have conjectures but no real answers....

I would agree that criticism of MMT is mostly memes and tropes with very little substance, as if the developers and proponents of MMT were simpletons that had not thought things through and were just spouting bromides or selling snake oil. The number of serious critiques of MMT are few and far between and well-informed one are even rarer. In fact, I can't recall even one that demonstrated familiarity with the body of MMT literature. Sad state of affairs.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
When the Left disgraces itself
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Bill Mitchell — Modest (insipid) Green New Deal proposals miss the point – Part 2

This is the second and final part of my recent discussion on the what a Green New Deal requires. All manner of proposals seem to have become part of the GND. The problem is that many of these proposals sell the idea short and will fail to achieve what is really required – a massive transformation of society and the role the government plays within it. The imprecision is exacerbated by progressives who are afraid to go too far outside the neoliberal mould for fear of being shut out of the debate. So we get ‘modest’ proposals, hunkered down in neoliberal framing as if to step up to the plate confidently is a step too far. In Part 1, I argued that the progressive side of the climate debate became entrapped, early on, by ‘free market’ framing, in the sense that the political response to climate action has typically emphasised using the ‘price system’ to create disincentives for polluting activities. In Part 2, I argue that we have to abandon our notion that the role of government in meeting the climate challenge is to make capitalism work better via price incentives. Rather, we have to accept and promote the imperative that governments take a central role in infrastructure provision, rules-based regulation (telling carbon producers to cease operation) and introducing new technologies....

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Modest (insipid) Green New Deal proposals miss the point – Part 2
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Zero Hedge — Barr And State AGs Discuss Big Tech Monopolies As 'Flipped' Facebook Co-Founder Helps Devise Antitrust Action

More anti-trust talk.

Zero Hedge
Barr And State AGs Discuss Big Tech Monopolies As 'Flipped' Facebook Co-Founder Helps Devise Antitrust Action
Tyler Durden

Michael Roberts — Modern monetary theory – part 1: Chartalism and Marx

Modern monetary theory (MMT) has become flavour of the time among many leftist economic views in recent years. The new left-wing Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is apparently a supporter; and a leading MMT exponent recently discussed the theory and its policy implications with UK Labour’s left-wing economics and finance leader, John McDonnell.

MMT has some traction in the left as it appears to offer theoretical support for policies of fiscal spending funded by central bank money and running up budget deficits and public debt without fear of crises – and thus backing policies of government spending on infrastructure projects, job creation and industry in direct contrast to neoliberal mainstream policies of austerity and minimal government intervention.

So, in this post and in other posts to follow, I shall offer my view on the worth of MMT and its policy implications for the labour movement. First, I’ll try and give broad outline to bring out the similarities and difference with Marx’s monetary theory....

Can the Chartalist/Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and Marxist theory of money be made compatible or complementary or is one of them wrong? My short answers would be: 1) money predates capitalism but not because of the state; 2) yes, the state can create money but it does not control its price. So confidence in its money can disappear; and 3) a strict Chartalist position is not compatible with Marxist money theory, but MMT has complementary features.

Let me now try to expand those arguments....

If you are already interested in MMT and Marx, this is obviously a should read. But if you are just getting interested, I can recommend London based Marxist economist Michael Roberts as a good entry point. He works in finance, so "money" is his thing. However, one also needs to be aware that there are different interpretations of what Marx actually said and that no one speaks for Marx. Be aware that Michael Roberts is not an expert in MMT. For an economist that is deeply familiar with both MMT and Marx, and sympathetic to both, see the work of Peter Cooper at heteconomist.com. If you are seriously interested in MMT and Marx, Peter is the go-to guy in my view.

Michael Roberts Blog
Modern monetary theory – part 1: Chartalism and Marx
Michael Roberts

Bill Mitchell — Why progressive values align more closely with our basic needs

Thomas Fazi and I have been discussing the shape of our next book and I think it will be an interesting and worthwhile followup to Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World (Pluto Books, 2017). We hope it will be published some time late in 2019. One of the angles that will be delved into is the way in which neoliberal narratives and constructs have permeated individual consciousness. Yes, sounds a bit psychological doesn’t it. But there is a strong literature going back to well before the recent period of neoliberalism that allows us to draw some fairly strong conclusions on how the process has worked. It also allows us to make some coherent statements about the dis-junctures that are going on across the world between the people and their polities, which have spawned the support for Brexit, the election of Donald Trump, the popularity of far-right movements, the electoral demolition of the traditional social democratic political parties, the election of the new Italian government, and the on-going trouble that the Gilets Jaunes are causing the mainstream political processes in France (and Brussels). The literature also provides a guide as to how the Left might break out of their current malaise based on their tepid yearning for cosmopolitanism, identity and their fear of financial markets to reestablish themselves as the progressive voice of the people. That is what I am writing about at present and here is a snippet....

Bill goes "there," where "there" is philosophy in the best sense as "the study of the wholes in terms of wholes," that is, in terms of systems and subsystems. Economics cannot be approached on than on a simplistic basis without considering its relationship to society. Society is a network of networks, and these networks are dynamic rather than static. That implies that history counts, which includes culture, traditions, and institutional arrangements that are fluid.

Without taking into consideration the considerable knowledge that has been developed in the various disciplines, the social sciences in particular, economics doesn't have much to say about society that is of any worth practically. And the world is looking for practical solutions to pressing challenges.

In other words the mechanistic models based on physics that assumes that human being are like atoms obeying laws of nature and that assume ergodicity are barren with respect to practical application. Reality is not like that idealized world, which is mathematically tractable but non-representational. The social world is non-ergodic; uncertainty and asymmetries are facts of life.

As managers of our lives and environment, we humans need appropriate models to approach human problems efficiently and effectively, and devise workable solutions to pressing issues of the day. The paraphrase management guru Peter F. Drucker, "Efficiency is doing things right; effectiveness is doing the right things." Business people figured out long ago that conventional economic theory is of little usefulness in management. Go figure.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Why progressive values align more closely with our basic needs
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

John Wight — Either the EU ditches neoliberalism or its people will ditch the EU

In 1948 US State Department mandarin George Kennan – the man credited with devising the policy of containment vis-à-vis the Soviet Union at the end of WWII, – laid bare the focus of US foreign policy in the postwar period:

“We have about 50 percent of the world’s wealth, but only 6.3 percent of its population…Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern or relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity. To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreamings…We are going to have to deal in straight power concepts.”

The “pattern of relationships” advocated by Kennan is embodied in the panoply of international institutions that have governed our world and dominated the planet’s economic, geopolitical, and military architecture in the seven decades since.

Dynamite article.

RT
Either the EU ditches neoliberalism or its people will ditch the EU
John Wight

See also

Radical Philosophy
Starting again from Marx
Antonio Negri

Also

Economics of Imperialism
Liberals, the Populist Right & the Politics of Imperialism

Tony Norfield

What is "neoliberalism"? Neo-imperialism and neocolonialism, along with elite rule domestically that colonizes the population. Currently, the political aspect of capitalism is neoliberalism. The political aspect of socialism is progressivism, and the political aspect of authoritarianism is nationalist populism.

Philip Giraldi — The War Against Globalism

There have been windows in history when the people have had enough abuse and so rise up in revolt. The American and French revolutions come to mind as does 1848. Perhaps we are experiencing something like that at the present time, a revolt against the pressure to conform to globalist values that have been embraced to their benefit by the elites and the establishment in much of the world. It could well become a hard fought and sometimes bloody conflict but its outcome will shape the next century. Will the people really have power in the increasingly globalized world or will it be the 1% with its government and media backing that emerges triumphant?

Western elites are gearing up for war against Russia and China while facing domestic revolutions at the same time. The historical dialectic in action.

Strategic Culture Foundation
The War Against Globalism
Philip Giraldi, former CIA counter-terrorism specialist and military intelligence officer, now Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest and founding member of the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity

UK Labour’s Fiscal Credibility Rule: Neoliberal Orthodoxy Dies Hard — Joe Emersberger interviews Bill Mitchell

MMT!

The problem is that when you just define these fiscal aggregates within their own financial terms you’re really losing the purpose and meaning of fiscal policy. The purpose of fiscal policy isn’t to achieve any particular fiscal outcome whether it be a balanced fiscal position, or a deficit of whatever percent or even a surplus of whatever percent. The purpose of fiscal policy as a tool is to advance wellbeing in the economy, to engage in government spending programs which are consistent with its electoral remit, and taxation to manage total expenditure in the non-government sector so that there is space – and what I mean by “space” is real resource space – for the government to basically buy those resources and conduct its programs. Taxation creates that space by depriving the non-government sector of the use of resources...

This is the purpose of fiscal policy. In a cyclical sense – in other words in the variation of economic activity – fiscal policy should play a very important role in being able to offset any fluctuations in non-government spending that would either cause unemployment if it were not offset, or would drive inflation if it were not offset. Fiscal policy has to be flexible enough to allow the government to meet that purpose. If you start imposing rules that are independent of purpose then you are likely to end up not meeting that purpose but also failing to meet your rules....

Excellent!

Counterpunch
UK Labour’s Fiscal Credibility Rule: Neoliberal Orthodoxy Dies Hard

Joe Emersberger interviews economics professor Bill Mitchell about the British Labour party’s fiscal credibility rule

See also

More MMT.

Arcade
The Unheard-of Center: Critique after Modern Monetary Theory

Scott Ferguson | Associate Professor and co-director of the Film & New Media Studies Track in the Department of Humanities & Cultural Studies at the University of South Florida. a Research Scholar at the Global Institute for Sustainable Prosperity), co-founder of the Modern Money Network: Humanities Division), and co-host of the Money on the Left podcast

Yanis Varoufakis — The Progressive International has been launched. Read the Open Call. See the video. Join us!

Power to the People! ✊

In conjunction with the Sanders Institute.

Yanis Varoufakis
The Progressive International has been launched. Read the Open Call. See the video. Join us!

See also

Is trade a promoter of peace? Adam Smith, one of the earliest defenders of trade, worries that commerce may instigate some perverse incentives, encouraging wars. The wealth that commerce generates decreases the relative cost of wars, increases the ability to finance wars through debts, which decreases their perceived cost, and increases the willingness of commercial interests to use wars to extend their markets, increasing the number and prolonging the length of wars. Smith, therefore, cannot assume that trade would yield a peaceful world. While defending and promoting trade, Smith warns us not to take peace for granted. We unpack Smith’s ideas and their relevance for contemporary times in our recent article in the Cambridge Journal of Economics.

Imperial wars are about who controls commerce and resources.

Developing Economics
Do not take peace for granted: Adam Smith’s warning on the relation between commerce and war

Maria Pia Paganelli and Reinhard Schumacher

See also

Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Book IV,  On Systems of Political Economy

Chapter III (part II):
On the extraordinary Restraints upon the Importation of Goods of almost all kinds from those Countries with which the Balance is supposed to be disadvantageous

Part II: On the Unreasonableness of those extraordinary Restraints upon other Principles

By such maxims as these, however, nations have been taught that their interest consisted in beggaring all their neighbours. Each nation has been made to look with an invidious eye upon the prosperity of all the nations with which it trades, and to consider their gain as its own loss. Commerce, which ought naturally to be, among nations, as among individuals, a bond of union and friendship, has become the most fertile source of discord and animosity. The capricious ambition of kings and ministers has not, during the present and the preceding century, been more fatal to the repose of Europe than the impertinent jealousy of merchants and manufacturers. The violence and injustice of the rulers of mankind is an ancient evil, for which, I am afraid, the nature of human affairs can scarce admit of a remedy. But the mean rapacity, the monopolizing spirit of merchants and manufacturers, who neither are, nor ought to be, the rulers of mankind, though it cannot perhaps be corrected may very easily be prevented from disturbing the tranquillity of anybody but themselves....

See also

Workers are not taking it lying down. Paris under siege.

Fort Russ News
VIDEO: MAYHEM IN PARIS, FRENCH POLICE USE TEAR-GAS AND WATER-CANNONS ON YELLOW VEST PROTESTERS

Joaquin Flores

Bill Mitchell — Progressive political leadership is absent but required

One of the themes that has emerged in the discussions of the British Labour Party Fiscal Credibility Rule (which should be renamed the Fiscal Incredulous Rule) is when is the right time for a political party to show leadership and start educating the public on new ideas. The Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) project has been, in part, about educating people even if our ideas have been strongly resisted by the mainstream. The mainstream (New Keynesian) paradigm in economics is degenerative (meaning it has little empirical validation) and eventually it will fade into historical obscurity. For many of us that cannot come quickly enough.

The defenders of the Rule argue that progressive politicians have to tread carefully or else the amorphous financial markets will turn on them and destroy their initiatives. The problem is that by kowtowing to the City or Wall Street, the progressive political forces become captured and redundant. Witness the electoral demise of social democratic parties over the last several decades.

The conditions are ripe (see below) for a courageous head-on attack on these financial market elites and educate the public so that they allow elected governments to legislate for all rather than serving the interests of the elites, which has become the norm over the last several decades. The problem is that progressive political forces are also taking advice from mainstream economists who use the tools of neoliberalism. The upshot is that progressive political leadership is absent but desperately required....

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Progressive political leadership is absent but requiredBill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Bill Mitchell — Exploring the effectiveness of social media – Part 2

Strategy and tactics. Important for MMT activists.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Exploring the effectiveness of social media – Part 2
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Bill Mitchell — The conservative polity is fracturing – an opportunity for the Left

Regular readers will know that I have spent a lot of time writing about the demise of the Left political parties as they became subsumed with neoliberal economic ideology, which blurred the political landscape as the ‘centre’ moved to the Right. That topic was the focus of our current book – Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World (Pluto Books, September 2017). The neoliberal infestation has left these parties with declining electoral support, fractured internal organisations and cultures, and a seeming inability to abandon their flawed economic narratives. But there is a mirror image to this demise and that is playing out on the conservative side of politics. In Australia in the last week (but building for years) the far right conservative elements from within the government have brought down their own leader and our Prime Minister in a spiteful clash of ideologies between the more moderate elements in their party and the extremes out on the right. The internal tensions that drove this suicidal mission is being played out around the world. Think about the way that Trump is compromising the Republican party. Think about how Brexit is splitting Tory ranks in Britain. And so on. The problem for the conservatives is that citizens are realising that the neoliberal economic approach has failed to deliver on its promises. And that economic model is ‘owned’ by the conservatives. The adoption of neoliberal economics by social democratic parties is not part of their DNA. It is largely because their ranks have been infested by careerists who have come from the ‘elites’ and have little resonance with workers. The gaps in the policy space that these fractures have created is being occupied by extremist groups. It will be much easier for progressive parties to reclaim that space than it will be for the conservatives who are in the process of a death spiral. But to do that, the social democratic movements has to abandon every vestige of neoliberal economics – the concepts, policies and language and framing. That is the challenge.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
The conservative polity is fracturing – an opportunity for the Left
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

John Queally — 'This Is Massive': Landslide Victory for Progressive Reform as DNC Cuts Superdelegates Down to Size

Norman Solomon, national coordinator for the progressive advocacy group RootsAction.org, which had lobbied on behalf of superdelegate reform, said he was skeptical that the power structure of the party would actually move on the issue.

"But it moved in a big way today — because of grassroots power," Solomon told Common Dreams in an emailed statement just after the measure passed. "The sustained groundswell of progressive outrage, agitation, activism and organizing since 2016 forced corporate forces at the top of the party to confront a tough choice — either surrender on the superdelegate issue or deepen the justified distrust among people who believe in the principle of one person, one vote."

The DNC leadership has realized, he added, "that it won't be possible to defeat Republicans unless progressives are strongly on board. Faced with the choice and undergoing such sustained pressure from the grassroots, the corporate forces of the party have retreated about superdelegates. Of course there will be huge battles ahead for progressives. We have got to keep the pressure up and keep moving to make the party and the country live up to the democratic rhetoric that so routinely rings hollow."...

MMT not far behind. Look for Stephanie Kelton to be playing a much more influential role in advising candidate and office holders.

Common Dreams
'This Is Massive': Landslide Victory for Progressive Reform as DNC Cuts Superdelegates Down to Size

John Queally

Bill Mitchell — Reclaiming our sense of collective and community – Part 1

My home town (where I was born and still spend a lot of time) is Melbourne, Victoria. It is a glorious place, at least the inner suburbs within about 3-4 kms of the city centre where I hang out mostly. It recently ‘lost’ its top place in the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Global Liveability Index (most pleasant place to live) to Vienna (Source). One wag thought it might have been because the Economist got confused between Australia and Austria. Economists are easily confused! But the reason I mentioned this is because it is symptomatic of how neoliberalism has reconstructed our realities and degraded our sense of community. The ‘competitive’ narrative, even though firms go all out to use power and deception to fix and rig markets in their favour, now dominates our perception. While I identify with Melbourne and would think a significant part of my identity is linked to that identification, the neoliberal narrative with its distinctive language, aims to reconstruct the community and communities of Melbourne, not as social and cultural artifacts, but as ‘products’ competing with other cities of the world for supremacy. I was thinking about this as I scope out the structure of the next book that Thomas Fazi and I will publish next year as a follow-up to our current book – Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World (Pluto Books, 2017). Thomas and I have advanced our ideas and we will, in part, be focusing on how communities and the nation state work together to advance progressive outcomes. In our first book together, we set out how nation states can operate from a technical perspective and what they should do to provide for a progressive future. In the next book, we will dig deeper into the ways people and their communities have to re-empower themselves. Language, construction, vocabulary, and framing are all significant in this regard.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Reclaiming our sense of collective and community – Part 1
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Robert Waldmann — Polling the Left Agenda — Finally

Click this link. Data For Progress decided to ask people about policy proposals which very serious centrists consider way too far left for America. American voters respond differently.

As should already be clear from existing polls (click and search for “fair”), there is strong support for egalitarian populist redistributive public policy. At Data For Progress, they chose to emphasize the positive — four proposals with overwhelming support, but I think it is just as striking that opinion is almost equally split on a top marginal income tax rate of 90% (2% more oppose than support) and universal basic income (2% more oppose than support)....

Angry Bear

Polling the Left Agenda — Finally

Robert Waldmann | Professor of Economics at University of Rome

Bill Mitchell — Build it in Britain is just sensible logic

After my day in the sun as a poet, I am back to being an economist. I have been researching operational issues relating to how a society can take back control and Reclaim the State, as part of the work I am doing for our follow up book (with Thomas Fazi) that I hope to get out next year sometime. The current book Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World (Pluto Books, 2017) is very conceptual. The Part 2 follow up will be conceptual in part but also operational. How to do it rather than what needs to be done. More specifically, I have been examining public procurement policies and how they have been captured by neoliberal interests to benefit capital at the expense of broader objectives (regional development, skill development, productivity growth, investment, employment, wages growth, etc). Over the last 3-4 decades, the way governments spend their money (contracting etc) has changed dramatically and governments have been bullied into acting as if they are ‘profit-maximising’ firms with no other agenda when making multi-billion dollar market purchases. However, in Britain this might change if British Labour are elected. Jeremy Corbyn announced this week that he was going to dramatically change the way the British government spends if he is elected. His ‘Build it in Britain’ strategy will scrap the narrow, neoliberal approaches to public procurement policies and instead use the spending capacity of government to advance broader goals. So while it might end up that a contract to a local firm requires higher government outlays, if that contract also delivers other benefits to the nation (as above) then the local firm would not be disadvantaged. Under the current ‘value for money’ hype local firms cannot ‘compete’ in many cases and these broader benefits are thus not generated. I see the ‘Build it in Britain’ strategy as an exercise in sensible logic and a major statement that the neoliberal command on British Labour is in retreat – for now anyway.

Dynamic efficiency instead of static efficiency. "Grow the pie" rather than "save money."

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Build it in Britain is just sensible logic
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Tony Wikrent — How are you going to pay for it? Why Understanding Monetary Theory and Policy Is Critical For the Left

Getting the word out.

Favorite line:

Gar Alperovitz: Let me just say one thing. I’m from Racine, Wisconsin. I had an aunt who ran a little tiny Jewish bakery. She used to say, “You know, during the Depression there wasn’t any money around. Then they decided to run a war, and there was all kinds of money around. Why can’t we do that when we want to do that?”

real economics
How are you going to pay for it? Why Understanding Monetary Theory and Policy Is Critical For the Left

Tony Wikrent

See also

At a time of mounting uncertainty in Europe, the country has defied critics who insisted on austerity as the answer to the Continent’s economic and financial crisis.

Rigged Game
Portugal Dared to Cast Aside Austerity. It’s Having a Major Revival.
Liz Alderman 

cross-posted from The New York Times

Bill Mitchell — The neoliberal ‘progressives’ and their bankster mates are becoming rattled

You know, an Italian won the British Open golf championship yesterday (the first Italian to ever win a golf major) because of the uncertainty surrounding Brexit negotiations. The causality is impeccable. I am sure about that, although it might take me a while to work it out. But if a British golfer cannot win their Open Championship (Rose tied for second, two shots back) then it must be because of Brexit. Everything else that goes wrong is, so why not the golf? It is the same when three former US policy makers, central bankers, Wall Street-types, claim that the US no longer “have to tools to counter the next financial crisis”. They know full well that that statement is a blatant lie. But they say it. To remain relevant as their stars dim? To do service to their conservative mates? All of the above and more. But the media grab the headline and the American public and the public in general is dealt another piece of neoliberal misinformation that helps entrench the hold on power by the elites. But things are changing, and these entrenched elites and the vested interests they serve don’t like it a bit....

Fabricated causes and scapegoating.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
The neoliberal ‘progressives’ and their bankster mates are becoming rattled
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia