MMT and racial equality

No More Economic Malpractice: African-American Faith Leaders Take on the Establishment

As African-American faith leaders committed to the social justice tradition of the Black Church, we would like to raise our voices to point out that it is not lost on us that Larry Summers and the establishment economists have done immense damage to the communities we serve, as well as to the broader American public, via their influence on economic policymaking. We recognize in the new school of economic thought, called Modern Monetary Theory (MMT), a credible, highly impressive, and genuinely public-spirited alternative to the disastrous economic stewardship offered by the old guard. MMT also offers a powerful theoretical defense of the Federal Job Guarantee, a proposal that was pioneered by America’s first black economist, Sadie Alexander, and a centerpiece of the activism of civil rights icon, Coretta Scott King.

Modern Monetary Stupidity

Greg Curtis gives us burning stupidity in not just one but two parts! Modern Monetary Madness and A Closer Look at the “Panacea”. From the first article:

When I think about MMT — Modern Monetary Theory — I visualize an odious miscreation squatting in its squalid swamp for decades, waiting only for an opportunity to erupt from the scum and devour the world’s economies.

Okay, maybe I should be taking my meds…

Or perhaps your employer should be taking a look at your (lack of) basic journalistic integrity.

From the second:

And MMT’s main tenets most certainly qualify as magical thinking. We can reach that conclusion by coming at it in two ways.

First, let’s set aside the True Believers in MMT, most of whom are advising the Progressive Democratic candidates. After all, they obviously believe their own hype. Instead, let’s look to serious economists who reside on the political left and who would be inclined to favor the Democratic policies if there were any way to pay for them.

If MMT made any sense at all, these economists would certainly be embracing it. But, to a man and woman, they aren’t. In fact, they mostly ridicule MMT.

Does Curtis understand the difference between reaching a conclusion and justifying a preconceived opinion? Apparently not. Neither does Curtis understand a basic tenet of intellectual honesty and journalistic integrity, that one must read and analyze the proponents of a claim, and not "set aside" the proponents and examining only the opponents.

A dead giveaway that Curtis has abandoned any pretense of journalistic integrity is his inclusion of completely bogus "evidence". From the first article:

Alas, into this sensible economic theorizing strode an obscure fellow named Abba Lerner, who said to himself, “Wait a minute! If high government spending during recessions is a good idea, then even higher government spending all the time must be a great idea!”

Never mind that MMT does not rely on Lerner, and we all understand that Curtis is not literally quoting Lerner, but if one actually reads Functional Finance and the Federal Debt — or even just the Wikipedia entry on functional finance (unlike Curtis, I actually, you know, cite my sources) — they would quickly discover that Lerner does not say, imply, or endorse any such thing. Curtis's assertion is not just an uncharitable interpretation; it's a flat-out lie.

Curtis also invokes the preposterous Chicago Booth survey. (There I go again, citing my sources. It's really not that hard.)

Fortunately for us, the University of Chicago surveyed hundreds of mainstream economists, asking whether they agreed with MMT’s main ideas (i.e., “spending doesn’t matter.”) Not a single economist agreed, not one. There is probably not another statement you could present to that group and not find at least one person to agree with it.

The problem, naturally, is that literally no MMT scholar ever has endorsed the idea that "spending doesn't matter"; more precisely, no MMT scholar would agree with the questions from the actual survey: "Countries that borrow in their own currency should not worry about government deficits because they can always create money to finance their debt," and, "Countries that borrow in their own currency can finance as much real government spending as they want by creating money." Both questions are appallingly stupid; attributing the underlying attitudes to MMT scholars is again not just an uncharitable interpretation but completely dishonest.

If I had the resources of the University of Chicago, and if I had completely abandoned any academic or ethical standards (but I repeat myself), I could just as well poll a hundred academic economists, asking if they agree that "Governments should never interfere in a market economy, because markets are always correctly self-regulating." Almost all (even the conservative economists, well, at least the three left who cling to a shred of intellectual honesty) would disagree. Wow! I proved that economists think capitalism is ridiculous!

Curtis is doubly lying here. Krugman, Summers, etc. agree with MMT proponents on the very point Curtis wants to rebut, that the government can and should spend more than it receives in taxes when the private economy is not at full employment. I know: I actually teach Principles of Macro from Krugman's textbook. "Left wing" (ha!) economists disagree with MMT theorists primarily on the effectiveness of monetary policy (central bank management of the banking system) on the real economy: MMT proponents consider monetary policy rather ineffective in aligning output and capacity (except at intentionally causing recessions); mainstream economists consider it more effective. We should, of course, settle this dispute by appealing to the data, not to the opinions of "experts".

Don't get me wrong: I'm not mad at Greg Curtis's shenanigans. I find it encouraging that the only critiques of MMT I can find anywhere — in both the popular and academic literature — have to rely on the most transparent of lies and bullshit.

A Marxist "critique" of MMT

I'm both a Marxist and a professional economist, and I very much like MMT. I think there are good Marxist arguments to be made against it, but in Marxism vs Modern Monetary Theory (MMT), Adam Booth does not offer one. Instead, Booth just repeats every American Enterprise Institute canard against MMT. It's no surprise that neoliberals and reactionaries just offer lies and bullshit to "critique" Modern Monetary Theory, but I expect a lot more — more perspicacious analysis and especially more basic intellectual honesty — from people who call themselves Marxists. Sadly, this expectation is honored yet again in the breach than the observance.

Headline MMT scholars (Kelton, Tcherneva, Wray, Mosler, Mitchell, etc.) are capitalists, not Marxists; of course they're not going to take a completely Marxist line. But Marxism, at least to me, is not about the "correct" ideological line; it's about a ruthless critique of everything existing. And MMT scholars are at least ruthlessly critiquing a central element of 21st century capitalist ideology, the private ownership of the financial system; they argue that we should socialize not just the losses but the gains from this central element. Does the MMT critique go far enough? Of course not. Does it go in the direction a good Marxist would think it should go? I say it does.

Booth uncritically reproduces the neoliberal critique of MMT, which relies almost entirely on outright lies about what MMT scholars actually say. The theme of this critique is that if we do not subject the production of money to market discipline, which requires private ownership of the production of money, then the economy will crash and burn. To reproduce and approve of the neoliberal critique first relies on outright falsehood. All truth is in favor of communism, or so I've been told; even if a lie seems convenient to the Marxist agenda, we should not use it. But the neoliberal critique is not even convenient to the Marxist agenda: if socializing the production of money is a Bad Idea, then why whould more socialization be a Better Idea?

Marx wrote on economics in the middle of the 19th century, when the gold standard was close to absolute canon in capitalist economics. It took repeated financial crises and the near-complete collapse of the Western international economy, but capitalists were finally forced by circumstances to abandon the gold standard partially with Bretton Woods and completely when Nixon ended convertibility in 1971. The core features of capitalism — exploitation, alienation, the falling rate of profit — are still there, but important technical details of how these features work today is almost, but not completely, unlike how they worked in the 1860s, when Marx was writing Capital. Marx understands the gold standard, but it is too much to expect even a person of his genius to anticipate how money would work a century after his death.

One of the persistent tropes of modern Marxist scholars is that because the gold standard was central to capitalism in Marx's era, it therefore must be an ineluctable essence of capitalism. Because we still do have a capitalist international economy, therefore there must be a gold standard lurking under there somewhere. I completely disagree with this trope. Money has a radically different character in 2019 than it did in 1867.

MMT theorists, I think, understand how money actually works today. And if we want to understand capitalism, we have to understand how money actually works, which means, I think, that honest, sincere, and curious Marxists should study MMT, and incorporate it, somehow, into the theoretical basis of action today. Make an honest critique of its truth and applicability. Argue that no matter how we slice and dice it, using money, be it commodity money, or fiat money, whether or not we pretend is a creature entirely of the market, to motivate economic behavior is not and never will be enough to deliver justice and prosperity.

But please, don't use lies intended to undermine the principle of socialism.

Rigged stupidity

The New York Times again achieves burning stupidity, publishing the appalling article, The Shallow Cynicism of ‘Everything Is Rigged’ by Greg Weiner.

William K. Black delivers the righteous smackdown.

Does anyone have the right to sex?

Does anyone have the right to sex? [pdf]

The article raises a lot of what I think are good questions, without offering answers. Sex is weird! Just a snippet:

Yet it would be disingenuous to make nothing of the convergence, however unintentional,between sex positivity and liberalism in their shared reluctance to interrogate the formation of our desires. Third and fourth-wave feminists are right to say, for example, that sex work is work, and can be better work than the menial labour undertaken by most women. And they are right to say that what sex workers need are legal and material protections, safety and security, not rescue or rehabilitation. But to understand what sort of work sex work is – just what physical and psychical acts are being bought and sold, and why it is overwhelmingly women who do it, and overwhelmingly men who pay for it – surely we have to say something about the political formation of male desire. And surely there will be similar things to say about other forms of women’s work: teaching, nursing, caring, mothering. To say that sex work is "just work" is to forget that all work – men’s work, women’s work – is never just work: it is also sexed.

h/t to Crooked Timber

Young men and guns

How about we treat every young man who wants to buy a gun like every woman who wants to get an abortion — mandatory 48-hour waiting period, parental permission, a note from his doctor proving he understands what he's about to do, a video he has to watch about the effects of gun violence, an ultrasound wand up the ass (just because). Let's close down all but one gun shop in every state and make him travel hundreds of miles, take time off work, and stay overnight in a strange town to get a gun. Make him walk through a gauntlet of people holding photos of loved ones who were shot to death, people who call him a murderer and beg him not to buy a gun.

It makes more sense to do this with young men and guns than with women and health care, right? I mean, no woman getting an abortion has killed a room full of people in seconds, right?

— Anonymous

This passage has been incorrectly attributed to Gloria Steinem.

This version
Slightly edited version

Math limericks

\[{12+144+20+3√{4}}/7+5×11=9^2+0\]
and
\[∫_1^{√^3{3}}{z^2dz}+\cos{{3\pi}/9}=\ln{\√^3{e}}\]

Baker's dozen

A Baker’s Dozen of Reasons Not to Worry about Government Debt

Real-economy arguments for more public borrowing:

1. The economy generally operates below potential
2. There are long run forces pushing down demand
3. Potential output is mismeasured; we are still well below it
4. Recessions and jobless recoveries have occurred repeatedly in past, will occur again in the future
5. Monetary policy is not effective at maintaining full employment
6. It’s hard to ramp up public spending quickly in recession
7. The costs of getting demand wrong are not symmetrical
8. Weak demand may have permanent effects on potential output

Financial arguments for more public borrowing:

9. With low interest rates, debt does not snowball
10. There is good reason to think interest rates will remain low
11. With hysteresis, higher public borrowing can pay for itself
12. Federal debt is an important asset for financial markets
13. Federal debt is an important asset for the rest of the world

The Fed and inflation

I want to single out a statement in Dean Baker's recent article, The Dangerously Irresponsible Arguments of the “Responsible” Budget Gang: " I have some differences [with MMT]. In particular, I am not willing to give up having the Fed as a check on inflation."

This statement is false in part and true in part. MMT does not ask us to "give up" the Fed's role in checking inflation; instead, MMT scholars present considerable evidence that under ordinary circumstances, the Fed (or any central bank) cannot control inflation. According to MMT (and other theories), bank money is endogenous. The quantity of money in an economy is determined not exogenously by the Fed but endogenously by profit-seeking banks and firms creating loans.

Moreover, firms' investment spending is inelastic with regard to interest rates: if a firm believes they can make a profit by expanding, they will borrow at the prevailing interest rate. As long as banks believe firms can invest productively, they will provide the loans that firms want, and why not? Banks are profit maximizing entities. The Fed has very little choice but to provide the reserves that banks need: the alternative is to allow some banks to simply fail. Having the Fed's thumb on banks' self-destruct buttons is a kind of control, but it is not the same as sitting behind the wheel.

Similarly, as we have seen in Japan since the 1990s and the rest of the developed world since the global financial crisis, central banks can do very little to increase inflation. The Fed can shovel reserves to the banks, but regardless of the amount of banks' reserves, they can't lend if firms don't want to borrow, i.e. if firms believe investment will not be profitable, and banks won't lend if they don't believe investment will be profitable.

The Fed can check inflation. However, the only tool they have is to abruptly raise the Fed Funds rate high enough to choke off investment spending and cause a recession; the resulting unemployment will eventually bring inflation down. But we should find ways other than massive unemployment and suffering to fix systemic economic problems such as inflation. It is not MMT per se but ordinary morality that asks us to give up this tool.

The "danger" of MMT

The Dangerously Irresponsible Arguments of the “Responsible” Budget Gang According to Dean Baker, deficit hawks

are pushing propaganda, not serious analysis.

I got a taste of this propaganda effort first hand earlier this year when I was asked by an editor at the Washington Post to write a piece on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). . . . [After several edits,] [t]he editor wanted me to include a needlessly snide remark from a MMT critic and had me referring to the theory as “dangerous.”

That comment left little doubt that they wanted a different column than the one I had written. MMT is dangerous? . . .

Just like the millions who mindlessly pledge allegiance to Donald Trump, [the Post's editors] will push the austerity line they have always pushed regardless of the evidence.

This really undermines the integrity of the mainstream liberal, mainstream Democratic-party economic narrative. When is criticism of MMT honest economic opinion, and when is it at best selection bias and at worst individual dishonesty?