There's no consequences for the politicians and they get to reward their cronies. Why would anything change until it all crashes? This is how the State works. It's not a bug.
I agree that’s a characteristic of the system. I do not have an answer on how to fix it, at least at this time, but just because it is how it works doesn’t mean it isn’t a bug. It is.
What MMT fails to understand when they say that the federal government's debt is the private sector's assets is that WE, the public, hold the debt. It is not as if the government is some separate, standalone entity with no relationship to the public. The government debt is *our* collective debt.
No, we don't. I don't owe shit. I am not a party to the state. I have not signed the consitution, which lays out the bylaws of the state. The state has declared its intention to rob us at gunpoint in future to cover its debts. That is not the same as us owing that money.
Yes but if you have a bank account with $1,000,000 are you really sad and do you say: "DAMN! I am in debt to this huge extent! Since, I am the government figuratively speaking."
@Richest_Person_in_the_World wrong. The cpi only measures certain things. Also they aren't telling what the deflation or inflation WOULD be had they not increased the credit creation.
@@Dan16673 For example let's say taxes due for the year are $100. But you also want to save $50. So now there is a demand for $150 total. Imagine if they only printed 75. The system would be in default, due to insufficient moneyprinting
Just what do you think printing money is? What do you think inflation is People have all sorts of different definitions, so as long as you don't have that defined, what you think are slams against MMT are not actually valid criticisms. You can't even begin to criticize MMT correctly because you are stuck on print money and silly names like Magical monetary theory.
I think the reason "we", the US, personally avoided hyperinflation is solely due to the dollar being the defacto global currency---the petrodollar. The amount of dollars they printed were obscene when compared to the US economy, but compared to the global dollars in circulation we got the "modest" inflation under Biden. Unspoken is the fact that we force the entire world to pay inflation while primarily the US reaps the benefits...and how the MMT strategy will fail when the rest of the world finds ways to move off the dollar. And the US has given them incentives to move off, considering the US throwing its weight around with sanctions. For example: BRICS
I don't think the inflation has been modest, or out of line with other countries, or out of line with the obscene amount of money printed. Price increases have essentially gone up to match the increase in the M2 money supply, petrodollar or not.
One of the reasons that we had more inflations relative to previous years is just that there was a global slowdown with CoVID-19 and that impacted the ability of the world to absorb the dollars. I worry that with the increased debt load, we will have to create more money to finance the government. At the same time we see the US more willing to use the dollar as a weapon in the world. Both things should cause the world to want to move away from the petro-dollar and that makes the whole dollar creation thing be a bigger problem over time. You would think that the world would be willing to have 1-2% inflation as a cost of having the dollar as a reserve currency, but if that number starts to be higher in general, it would push countries away. And fewer countries using the dollar (or using it as much) would mean more inflation for a given level of monetization. And it could snowball pretty easily.
@@utah_koidragon7117 That would make sense to most of us, but it is still incorrect. Our government deletes all tax revenues upon receipt. It is taken from M2. In addition, our government also deletes dollars received from the purchase of government securities upon receipt. Those securities are not included in the money supply because they are not liquid enough to qualify them. Therefore the money supply remained the same after spending because an equal amount of that spending was removed from M2. This is a major reason why our government taxes and borrows.
@@BanBb1 I honestly can't even tell if you're serious or not. There was a time I would have been sure that anyone saying something so utterly and thoroughly foolish was joking. But then some loons started actually believing the earth is flat. Same thing here.
The reason we have such a large national debt is that we import much more than we export. In 2022, the trade deficit was $970 billion dollars more imports than exports. This number decreases GDP by that amount. As it continues to increase every year, the government has used its spending to effectively plug this hole to make overall GDP rise. It has to do this because the economy will go into recession and then depression as GDP falls. THERE ARE ALMOST NO PROUCTS WE NEED TO IMPORT THAT CAN'T BE MADE HERE. While this will cause some inflation, wages will rise faster if immigration is curbed to keep wages up and full employment. THIS IS WHAT TRUMP UNDERSTANDS AND WHY WE NEED TO ELECT HIM.
Great show! MMT is very appealing to big government authoritarians because it says federal debt doesn't matter. It's important to point out that their reasoning is based, in part, on a tautology.
YEP! That is it exactly. And it makes electioneering through bribing the people seem as though we are not being bribed with our own money. One of our own major party candidates is pointing the finger of blame for inflation on "corporate price gougers" hoping that the people won't look at the five trillion of spending, without taxation or productivity increases, and say to that candidate..."no, I think you are doing that"
High taxes are maintained to create the illusion your taxes fund the government, while in reality government is sustained by money printing. If this was widely known it could erode confidence in the currency, potentially causing the dollar to fall and destabilizing the economy.
"You shall have even units and measures" Scripture also clearly demands that Christians support sound money and oppose the usurious central banking system. Gary North wrote 31 volumes of economic commentary on the Bible and founded Christian Economics.
The difference between the government taxing- or borrowing and taxing people in the future- people to fund spending and simply printing money is that the money printing is inflationary, while taxing isn't.
taxes don't go to the budget. You pay taxes to pay for inflation. They take tax money out of circulation and literally put it in a incinerator. They just print money to pay for the budget.
@@utah_koidragon7117 The Federal reserve has 2 types of bank accounts the same way commercial banks have checking and savings accounts. These bank accounts are available mostly to just commercial banks, countries etc and are called reserve accounts and securities accounts but they function the same way. So say China earns $100 billion dollars from selling stuff to the USA. They don't keep a bunch of cash at the vault, they keep it in the Federal reserve checking account. They can buy stuff with that money or they can put it in a savings account that earns interest. This is what buying US treasury bonds is. Banks, people and countries who have dollars and buy US Treasury bonds that earn interest. To pay this back, the US Fed govt just debits the savings account and credits the checking account. So what is the problem? The problem is that this is free money paid by the US Federal govt to bond holders. There is no need to do so and it causes income inequality. That is the real problem.
I watch this show and the Reason Roundtable pretty much weekly as of late. I'm also a member of the LP Mises Caucus and consider myself to be an Austro-libertarian. I'm an advanced student of Austrian economics and cut my libertarian teeth mostly from literature that stems from the Mises Institute. I follow several Mises podcasts including Bob's. The Mises approach to libertarianism is largely based on Austrian economics and therefore, praxeology. The Reason perspective is broader-based. I also think the folks in the Reason Roundtable are sort of hipster libertarians. 🙂
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World I'm not sure what you mean by "Austrianism." Austrian economists (abbreviated Austrians) have a solid explanation of fiat currencies including not only the drawbacks but also the potential benefits they present. Austrians are pretty good at steel manning other schools of thought in order to present very comprehensive arguments.
@@JackVz Imagine thinking that you can print money to pay off debt simply because it's fiat money and not suffer consequences, despite the perfectly clear history of catastrophe when countries have done that.
You point to the frustrating nature of predicting the consequences of government borrowing. In my opinion the value of a $100 bill is something like a bottle of milk. The elasticity of its value over time is connected to the appraisal of the consumer's beliefs... something that may tend to be conservative (presuming they trust the source.) What happens when the source is untrustworthy and their adulturations aren't obvious. Hence, the milk they present gets watered down to the point it seems thin so they apply chalk and search for methods to game the consumer. With C-Notes the bill becomes thin when inflation marrs it, or milk when distaste appears. So, the issue is why doesn't inflation promptly impact C-Notes? Part of the answer is the consumer's conservative inclination to resist a currency's elasticity. In his mind's eye there's a price he's accustomed to, along with an amount he'll refuse to expend. This mental resistance marks the place where those tempted to tamper remain safe. It seems that C-Notes are remarkably stable or in other words resistant to inflation. The place where you need to inquire is into those factors that buffer the C-Note from changing value. I see it's place as the world's Reserve Currency as a significant factor. In the model you presented, levels of government spending doesn't directly apply to the price of something like dairy products. Perhaps not in the same ways or rates as insurance products... and so on. But, whatever the meliue that upsets an American consumer, the affect on an American market is also resisted by foreign demand for C-Notes. If a foreigner is unaware of the antics of irresponsible actions in DC... and essentially trusts American politicians more than those he deals with in his own country, then we have a situation that tends to buffer the C-Note from inflation. The willingness of foreigners to trust DC is a hidden buffer against inflation and similarly a hidden tax that the world is willing to pay against American deficits. I believe this is an important issue that confuses the relationship between the way we print C-Notes and the buffering input to our inflation rates. If this isn't a significant issue, then it behoves us to consider what is because whatever it is there's peripheral issues to be monitored. For example, a some point foreigners are apt to become disgruntled at submitting to hidden American taxes and react... but refusing to comply to the American system (as Putin warned in his interview.)
When she isn’t talking, Liz looks like an elderly person who accidentally opened the front facing camera on her phone and can’t figure out how to turn it off.
One thing that makes me so sympathetic to the Austrian position is the focus (or at least acknowledgement) of capital structure. At 50:30 she says if it's not inflationary it's fine, but obviously she's referring to CPI ONLY. Building a bunch of unnecessary buildings and structures takes land, labor, and capital. Though it might be enough to move the entire basket of CPI goods to "inflationary" that does nothing for anyone trying to purchase/hire those options at the time, and when the job's finished the increased plant/personnel created by the high prices might be at a surplus and that adjustment creates downturns as well. The MMT'ers like the Keynesians think construction workers can "learn to code," if they think of them at all. They turn concrete to cheeseburgers with their math when they aggregate all these things together. The reality is that a lot of these people should be working in manufacturing or building houses--too bad they're building aberrations of the market like skyscrapers and buildings which will be vacant when the cheap money/subsidies/stimulus dries up. Something like 40% of office space is vacant right now. We are ALL poorer as a result of their current usage, the initial building, and their inevitable destruction when they're turned into apartments or retail. How much of that was created on the wave of cheap money over the last decade?
If the government spent without borrowing, which is completely within their power. And if that spending was for needed items that idle resources were available to support it resulting in growth to the economy, what is the negative of that. MMT states that it is not how much is spent but rather what it is spent on. It states that the government should spend as much as it takes to keep our economy running at full capacity that is to maintain full employment at all times, no more, no less. If we did do this by definition the business cycle; as we have come to define it, would disappear.
People have underestimated the ability of the housing market in the U.S. to suck up the excess money spending by the government. The 30 year mortgage means that people can park money there for a lot of time. What changed is that people started buying and selling homes more frequently, which means the money started spilling out into the broader economy more. That paired with international speculation drove up home prices much higher and gave sellers even more spending money. The same thing has been happening with the stock market and people's retirement accounts. We are coming towards a huge sell off trend when the boomers start downsizing their homes, cashing in their retirement funds, and also the estate sales that result from when they die. So we'll have insane amounts of liquidity come into the system in the next 20 years. Pair that with less reproduction, and that means labor costs will continue to rise as we have less and less workers to do things. (This could be counteracted by ai and automation, but if prices for everything else are going up, then not allowing wages to rise will create a whole class of people who will get angrier and angrier)
i will debunk climate change in a few short sentances: If you go to the desert it will be around 80 degrees during the day, but at night it can drop below freezing. This is because tehre is no water vapor no moisture in the desert which is a green house gas water has the highest thermal mass of any common material it holds massive amounts of heat. co2 makes up .04% of the atmosphere, under .02% plants do not grow if we went crazy and incresed our co2 by 100x we probably couldnt even increase the co2 concentration a hundreth of a percent, its impossible to know how much co2 we add to the atmosphere because its way to small to measure. co2 is the catalyst for photosynthesis adding more co2 would allow all ecosystems to thrive, help our forests, and increase crop yeilds. to think that a trace amount of man made co2 is going to hold enough levels to heat the oceans of our planet which are many miles deep its absolutely insane. you don't need to be a scientist to understand that this is tottaly impossible, the climate is determined by the tilt of the earth and the wind and ocean currents. to think we need to go back eto the stone age to stop the climate form increasing 1 degree over 100 years. my backyard increases 10 degrees just from 7am to 9am and the world still keeps moving. Is amazing that people can beleive in this, there is absolutely no evidence what so ever that man made co2. is having any measurable effect on the climate let alone the level of co2 in the atmosphere. for that to be true, if we were to stop burning co2 plants would no longer be able to grow and we know that we have had plant life long before we used fossile fuels. climate change can be debunked with that simple thought experiment. The scientific fraud taking place today everywhere and has done extreeme damage to our economy and is starving millions of people who are denied the abiliy to buy gass to cook their food, were making the poor more poor and destroying the eviornment with square miles of solar panels toxic batteries and windmills which dont even output the amount of energy used to construct them over their servive life. The wall of dishonesty is absolutely impenitrible. This lady who thinks deficits are not a problem. The people who get the money first get its full purchasing power, the rest of us get completely desroyed. If we allowed deflation, our savings would actually get is somewhere. Peoples wages would actually increase over time when they got raises they would actually get more disposible income. It would be like the 50s where one person could support a family, what we have now is the reason why the 1% has more than the bottom 80%. its the people who think this is going to help the poor voting for the policies that make it so most americans cannot afford a 400$ expense.
A traditional and historically proven theory about deficits is the "Death Spiral" that occurs when The Deficit exceeds GDP by more than 125%. The maintenance of the debt, especially when combined with rising inflation eats up all the discretionary spending money. This phenomenon is best represented by Japan in the late 70's and early 80's. Everyone thought Japan was going to exceed the US with all kinds of unpleasant fall out in the Pacific Rim. Some "Now-a-day" experts even predicted a war between the US and Japan (which Japan would win in a conventional sense because S. Korea would join in). So, while deficit spending can be a good thing and a great strategy when used properly, it can be that double edges sword that cuts your own throat.
@@jeffcarlon6711 Japan has been digging themselves out of the Deficit to GDP ratio trap for decades and it will be decades from now before they are out of it. The same awaits the US if they don't get a handle of their spending or invent some new cash cow.
33:30 I feel like "deficits are actually surpluses" has to be related to the broken window fallacy somehow, but can't put my finger on how. Yes, now money is going into the economy, but government spending is inherently less effective than the free market (meaning we will only get the benefit of maybe 50% of the increased spending) plus the debt will need to be repaid with additional interest, translating into even worse returns. I'm not actually a "deficit hawk," but for twenty years, the government has been testing the limits of its spending level and going right to the brink. What happens when we have a real downturn? There will be no spending wiggle room to inject money without repercussions. Disaster is certain. I do believe the US government can run a moderate deficit that roughly keeps the debt to GDP at a constant but reasonable level (30-40%?) is sustainable.
MMT is another reason to look askance at most theories that are described by their adherents as "modern". "Forget what experience has shown, we have NEW, and sophisticated, theories based on NEW knowledge". Money, and how it works, has been understood for centuries. Like all things of value, it can be diminished, maintained, or augmented, and government through monetary and fiscal policy, will be the instrument of that. There is asymmetry though. It is easy to cause inflation, just as it's easy to run up a debt, and it's quite a bit harder to tame inflation without pain, just as it's more painful to pay off a debt. Just as there is gravity in the physical world, there is a cost for the use of money over time,.... the interest rate. If we don't charge enough for the "rental' of money from the Fed, there will be the diminishment of value of money, the mispricing of risk, misallocation of resources, and an increase of unaccountability for the use of taxes taken from the people.
I was just thinking of the national debt. For most of my life we have been told Americans couldnt have this or that bc we had to worry about our debt. We had to spend all this money on our military bc it was vital we have a strong defense. We have spent trillions on pointless wars, given trillions to foreign nations. Our quality of life, as a nation, is declining while the wealthy get richer. Our military was worthless in protecting our southern border. We are ruled by kleptocrats and oligarchs concerned with self enrichment. Why should we care anymore? They are intentionally causing our collapse. No one cares about the people.
Probably the best solution to deal with it is to bring in foreign highly skilled workers who will pay taxes and add to social security. Lowering spending isn't enough. Taxing the rich isn't enough. The state can ease the burden on the population by trying to get companies to relocate to areas with cheaper housing and make sure that imported workers teach their skills to American workers and do not displace workers. School vouchers to private schools would save money, as these schools wouldn't need expensive bureaucracy like huge school systems. However, they need to protect teacher pay and benefits. Currently many charter schools pay less and impose 50 or 60 hour work weeks. Schools waste an incredible amount of money. Breaking up monopolies and any financial institutions that hinder competition would help control inflation in the long run. Increasing energy production could help with inflation and debt.
Well, I picked the challenge to put my finances in order. Then I invested in cryptocurrency, stocks, through the assistance of my discretionary fund manager
Trading is difficult, I'd spend the five grand on education for trading. It's not easy. Investing is different, that's easier. Short term or long term gain is the question.
There is a key phrase in the Tedd talk. She says stuff (oil, food, machinery) “available with the fiat currency “ eventually no one will accept the fiat currency (i.e. the US dollar). Then you’ll go back to paying in gold. Then we’re screwed.
The U.S. tax system is divided into federal and local taxes. U.S. laws do not allow the federal government to fund local governments unless it is an emergency. The federal government is financing its large budget deficit by printing money, which local governments cannot do. In 2024, 50 of the 75 core cities in the United States are running a budget deficit and heading toward bankruptcy. They have to raise taxes or they won't be able to pay their firefighters, schools, and police. Rich Americans living in these cities are moving to cities that are not facing bankruptcy. Inflation may have been lowered, but prices remain at inflated levels. The U.S. dollar has devalued over 98% from its original value of $35 per ounce.
Bob Murphy you are a liar. Social security is never going broke never. Taxes are not funding social security Bob and you know this you are a liar as long as the real resources exist that's what matters. Learn mmt Bob
As a percentage of GDP, the federal debt is at WWII levels. It would seem like money would need to be printed to finance such a large debt load. That's exactly what we see with the Federal Reserve balance sheet (to GDP) also at WWII levels: hypothesis confirmed.
It is really, really weird for a "libertarian" to respond to concerns about declining freedom with claims about increased material prosperity. Talk about a category error.
@@MBarberfan4life lol. No. There's no fallacy because I wasn't constructing some argument, but only making an observation about an exchange between two self described libertarians. There is no red herring, either. Maybe you don't know what a red herring is. As described in the segment, the libertarian economist had expressed serious concerns that freedom is in decline, and said he was worried that we're becoming a police state. In response, a different libertarian noted that global poverty has been lessened and that we have great material wealth. First of all, that reply is a non sequitur. But mainly, it's just a really odd response from a libertarian.
@@JackVz I don't disagree, and I don't think the economist in question would, either. Point is that freedom and liberty in the developed world is at grave risk these days. No self-respecting libertarian should respond to that observation by saying, "Yeah, but we have lot of material wealth and comfort."
It is an illusion of material prosperity. Americans have lots of plastic crap but little real wealth like gold/silver, farmland, home ownership, business ownership etc.) Almost everyone is far worse off than people 70+ years ago.
Listening to the Ted Talk almost sent me into a panic. How can someone say that “just printing more money” to pay for something is a feasible outcome? She’s an advisor to members of our federal government and has no concept of how fiat currency works or she’s purposefully deceiving people.
On the topic of Analogizing Alarmism, as a big L type I find it personally confusing how the Dems have unwavering faith in the "full faith and credit" part of the US while also being the first to scream from on high that the US is a terrible no good racist terrible place. When trying to mentally rectify this I can't help but dwell on other contradictions like insisting on living on the coast while screeching that climate change is going to cause flooding(obviously if that's your cause, why not flock to high ground instead?). Or am I just not taking them on face value enough to see the debt interest rate growth used as the fulcrum for Cloward-Piven Strategy to strike a blow against the "evils" of capitalism? The guest mentioned Glenn Beck being called a chicken little during his fox days so felt obligated to poke a bit.
US debt is not an issue at all Americans....just keep giving free amnesty to credit card/volleyball tuition drinks for foreigners/minorities. Won't backfire at a l l. MORE DEBT MORE DEBT/MORE MONEY to UKRAINE! We need to *cough* PROTECT democracy aka Zelensky's real estate portfolio in London/Italy and New York/Florida.
This makes no sense at all to me. Why doesn't the government just give everybody everything and have free health care? And just go into debt more? We run a terrible risk by not getting our spending under control. Increasing the money supply automatically causes inflation, doesn't it?
Yes it does. MMTers make a generally correct observation about reality that in a fiat currency system the issuer of the currency can issue as much as they want, and pay for whatever they can buy with that currency. They even make a correct observation that hyperinflation is the only theoretical limit, and thus inflation is the thing to look out for. But they just can't seem to make the connection between issuing currency and inflation. And it's quite simple, actually: Printing money either creates value, or does not. If it does create value, then you should be able to print massive amounts of currency and buy out everything for the good of the people, without costing them anything. Even if there is a cost to getting that positive value, you still end up with a net benefit, which should cover any costs - this is baked into the assumption that you do in fact create value. If it does not create value, then that means every dollar printed and every penny minted takes away something from someone else. That "something" being purchasing power (the real value, which money is supposed to be a vessel for), and that "someone" being everyone. When you print currency, you do not create new building materials, new infrastructure, new technology, new software, new food, new anything. You're just printing the paper - or in the modern times, flicking a digital number up. As this new money is dispersed into the economy and starts circulating, you end up in a situation where MORE MONEY represents THE SAME GOODS AND SERVICES in the economy. Simple laws of mathematics - value per dollar is now reduced. That's inflation. There is no way to introduce new money into the economy without causing inflation - the best you can do is take other limited actions to reduce it at the same time, resulting in obfuscation, as has been done a lot in history (and as MMTers love to use as a trump card argument, which is why I'm mentioning it). Printing money is, and always will be, inflationary.
@@abcdef-ms9mb Good explanation. I have a question: What if the money printed was used to invest in projects that actually "were" investments? That is, we printed money to fund projects that were actually productive, and not consumptive? For instance, what if we want to build nuclear power plants in every state, but we don't have the money in the budget and we can't or don't want to borrow. So we print the money, and ultimately the amount of wealth in the economy- goods and services produced- is dramatically increased because of the additional energy available to people and companies. Given that the value of money is a ration of the amount of money and the amount of goods and services in the economy, would that ultimately be inflationary?
@@utah_koidragon7117 You're both printing money and producing value, therefore at the very least it's less inflationary than otherwise. That doesn't mean it's good, however. The government is not bound by laws of supply and demand, only scarcity itself, which means they have no way of knowing whether and how much their projects are actually wanted by the people whom they will impact. The best they got is votes... collected every couple of years... where somehow everyone that wins happens to be extremely unpopular. So you can guess how good an approximation that is. And there is obviously a hidden alternative cost: Every unit of purchasing power sapped away from the people's savings is purchasing power not spent on things these people want. What the people want is actual demand - by definition. If you are a participant in an economy and wield the purchasing power you earned, whatever you choose to purchase or not purchase with it is a single datapoint towards the greater demand curve. To put it simply - printing money to invest in the people is not as bad as printing money to give to yourself (obviously), and is less inflationary depending on how well it matches demand, but is still not the best possible outcome, and usually far from it. It erodes the financial freedom and independence of the population to centrally plan their resources for them, which suffers from the Knowledge Problem, and will still in the best realistic case scenario leak resources, and be necessarily more inflationary than supply and demand based economics. And even that assumes that there is no corruption within that immense power structure, good luck.
The United States is a low-tax country Compared with other nations in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the United States ranks 32nd out of 38 in revenue as a percentage of GDP.20 But it’s not just that the United States is near the bottom end of revenue; it is nowhere close even to the average. Over the CBO’s 10-year budget window, the United States will collect $26 trillion less in revenues than it would if its revenue as a percentage of GDP were as high as the average OECD nation. When compared to EU nations, that number rises to $36 trillion. (see Figure 2) In contrast, the $289 billion projected revenue increase in the Inflation Reduction Act21 still leaves the United States ranking 32nd out of 38 OECD countries.
You can see climate change with your eyes. Take a cruise Hinton Greenland or Antarctica. They are melting. And an accosted it you can’t seem they then. You bare terrain Al that. White icendeflectsnhear back into deaden nornwnukoren the more we lose the bitterness
There’s a have your cake and eat it too problem here. On one hand we need to be able/ready to solve problems and invest where necessary, ie Katrina, GWOT, Pearl Harbor, Genocide, global trade routes, etc. On the other hand though it’s hard to draw a line where this so called money printing machine can’t be used. That is where I think politics and the voter’s expectation of the debt/spending has friction. With this level of debt today, albeit stated as an investment by politicians, it appears we are taking from the future prosperity of our children. That’s where it gets hard to justify and no self respecting parent wishes to do that. Buy them a car, help pay for college, but for goodness sakes don’t enable their cocaine habit if you want the grandkids to visit during the holidays one day.
I think the biggest flaw in MMT is that it works on the assumption that some how every other country's will devalue their currency if another country decides to devalue theirs. If America took it to the printing presses (or the electronic presses, I guess) and decided to make $1 worth $100, it doesn't mean China or Iran or the U.K. or or whomever will follow suit. Right now, for example, 1 Yuan is worth $0.14 USD. If 1 Yuan is suddenly worth, hypothetically, $100 USD than China could buy up way more U.S. debt than they already own. The U.S. government only owns about 1/3 of its debt, iirc. Deficit, no matter how you go about it, increases debt. Someone owns that debt. I don't know why MMT believers think that other countries will look at America diluting its dollar and think to themselves "Whelp, we can't use this more favourable exchange rate to our advantage." MMT is firmly planted on the "just pay your credit card bill with another credit card with a higher interest rate" branch of economics. Over-all, I enjoyed the interview, but I did kinda feel like Mr.Murphy started teetering on the edge of the Q-spiracy deep end toward the end there. Also, Zach is never allowed to say "no cap" again. Just on principle. CORRECTION: 1/3 of the American debt is held by foreign entities (public and private combined). 2/3 is owned by domestic entities (public and private), but I'm not sure how the public vs. private numbers break down.
Families are the key. My wife and voting age children are voting for Trump this time. The one holdout is a daughter who is a teacher. Her daily indoctrination from work has her on the wrong side. But! The high cost of living is starting to cure that.
On Social Security, much of the past solvency was owed to the fact that more people died sooner. It was set at 65 for a reason. You weren't expected to make it to retirement. Need to push out the retirement age before it is too late. If SS becomes insolvent, 100% of $0 is $0. When the opt-out that was on the table in the early 2000s, Gen X was told to suck one. At that point, they were OK with pushing back retirement. Twenty years later, nothing. Additionally, Gen X, in particular, also lost out on pensions afforded earlier generations and many retirement investment vehicles that are around today that later generations have had full opportunity to employ. They'll likely never have a say because they are sandwiched.
Gen X as a whole did absolutely NOTHING about Social Security, or the national debt, just like their parents. Gen X SHOULD have been the Ross Perot generation, come out in droves and spearheaded a push for a balanced budget and SS privatization, but instead they chose to play the same old Uniparty political games their grandparents and parents did. They will get no SS now, or what they get will be nearly worthless due to inflation. Many Gen X have little to no retirement savings either.
What is a "mainstream economist?" Is that the type of economist that claimed as late as the early 1980's that Soviet Union would soon overtake the U.S. economy?
The interest payments go to the buyers of the bonds correct? So does that 14% in interest the government pays to it's bond holders a stimulus to the economy?
People think Christianity is a stupid religion. We believe in Christ and also the wisdom of the Word of God. The evil force at war with human kind is relentless, but if you don't know you are at war you will be caught with your pants down not ready to defend the truth. Lord have mercy on us sinners.
Zach is confused. There are several ways to create money. When the federal government wants a war, they use debt. Thats when they pass a bill for spending, and the treasury sells more bonds, and after the sale of the bonds, the government has more money to spend on war. This happened during Rona. the government sold bonds and created at least 2 TRN for Rona spending, i believe only one of those was project lightspeed. This pumps money into the bond market and screws up bond prices, but it doesn't always result in inflation. The other "legitimate" way the government wants to spend is when the federal reserve (no, this is what actually happens) opens up a new bank account at the federal reserve. from this new bank account, the federal reserve borrows 7 trillion dollars. During Rona, the USA government spent 7 trillion to prop up the bond market, and actually 2 trn for actually addressing rona expenses. 7 Trillion came from the federal reserve balance sheet, where they literally opened a bank account and "borrowed" 7 trillion dollars from it. This is allegedly public information, and is called the "federal reserve balance sheet". There are two other tools the government uses, and they are organizations like fannie mae and freddie macc, and Federal housing administration, not private companies, but not public companies. The government can go to them and tell them to do things, and not super tell everyone what they are doing. The debt may appear on Fannie mae's balance sheet which is public, but i don't believe their numbers any more than i believe china. Lastly, there are organizations that the federal reserve controls, but doesn't necessarily control. For instance, the federal reserve can straight call banks and tell them what to do. During financial crashes, this is apparent. After Fukushima, Japanese people canceled all their carry trades out of defensiveness, and it started screwing up the currency exchange. The federal reserve literally called all the major USA banks, and told them we are about to announce a stimulus program for the Japanese yen. We don't want you to be on the wrong side of this currency problem, because it will introduce a lot of volatility and could hurt USA banks. Like so the federal reserve can straight tell USA bankers to do shtt, and warn them about shtt thats coming, and control and manipulate currencies and liquidity, and markets that way.
when the government sells bonds to pay for stuff they didnt tax, to fund the deficit, that isn't super inflationary. Its not nearly as inflationary as when the federal reserve creates 7 trillion of debt out of thin air, and goes and spends that 7 trillion in the debt markets. Thats why inflation lags so long. When the federal reserve creates 7 trillion of debt, and pumps 7 trillion into the bond market, companies have more money on their balance sheets. Then the companies start spending more money, then the extra money starts showing its ugly face when 10 major grocery chains are expanding, they all need more trucks at the same time, and they have to pay higher prices to get those trucks from the truck manufacturer, because he only has one trucking line, and only makes so many trucks. So the grocery stores have to pay more for the same product.... This is how printing more money, then blowing it in the bond market, boils down to everyday transactions. A more simple way to view it is that the exact same goods and services are being sold, because the manufacturer has the one production line, but now there is more money chasing the same amount of goods. A price spike in one commodity such as trucking is called a bubble, but a price spike in a majority of the goods that are available to purchase is basically the main idea of "inflation". And just like when the government lies about the GDP and being in a recession, the government lies about inflation
It's silly to blame the behaviour of "generations". Millenials aren't having children because of the indictrination of women in the workplace as a source of taxation has been pushed, making motherhood look like opting out. Gen X have been disenfranchised by the decline in the ability of the state to fund its obligations, combined with the millenial's rush to mortgages as a more secure retirement fund than state pension. Each era has been a rational respinse to the circumstances they find themselves in. The real ussue is how do future generations support themselves in their unoroductive years. I think we are entering an era of communal living, Where people learn to pool their capital to achieve greater security. Building societies were originally small community saving schemes where many households invested in a property development corporation. As the corporation grew so the members ability to move into their cooperative home grew. The problem with Building Societies is they are pyblucally owned and as rhey become more sucessful they are more about making profit than making homes. It would be interesting to look into "intentional communities" to see if they are sustainable over time.
Please forgive me here, because I find MMT foolish as well. However, without addressing the arguments completely, you leave holes in the argument. I believe where we fail in comparing MMT to personal finance is avoiding a legitimate piece of that argument. That is the component in which we base spending on future incomes. For example, if you were looking to buy a new home, you would likely base your budget on a significant raise that you knew was coming soon. The minute you realize you’re about to get a promotion, you might want to move into an area with better, safer schools and lower crime. The money is not there yet but it will be. MMT considers future GDP. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that GDP will continue to rise. There is only the track record indicating that is likely. Not to mention we also pay the debt with a future less valuable dollar. The problem becomes that there is NOT responsible spending and we are spending too far into the future
What if tax for 2024 equals $2 trillion and in actuality citizens want to not only pay $2T but also save an additional $1T. That means $3T needs spent this year, and if it's less (than tax+saving) it's not enough
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World can you quote where I said that MMT said that? or did I say it would work if... I didn't say they say that. your reading comprehension is absolutely ass bucko
@@justinjtv4089A common lazy way of countering MMT, is to say "Oh oh So North korea can become richest country in the world by running the printing press. Your (sic) so stuped!"
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World can you quote where I said that MMT'ers said that? I said it would work if... not that they claim that rather that they are ignorant to that being a factor.
As usual, absolutely no reference to our Fiat system where our government can spend as much as it takes to keep our economy running at full capacity at all times, no more no less. Murphy insists on comparing government finance under Fiat wit our personal finance. There can be no comparison because we do not have the power to create money. That is it case closed.
1984 needs an addition to the Ingsoc slogan “War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength, deficit is surplus.”
Debt is surplus
You have simply failed to understand MMT
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World do you understand it? If so, then can you explain it to me?
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World buy bitcoin.
@@_datapoint MMT also explains why bitcoin is worthless
There's no consequences for the politicians and they get to reward their cronies. Why would anything change until it all crashes? This is how the State works. It's not a bug.
indeed! well said
I agree that’s a characteristic of the system. I do not have an answer on how to fix it, at least at this time, but just because it is how it works doesn’t mean it isn’t a bug. It is.
Glad to see Bob on this show.
What MMT fails to understand when they say that the federal government's debt is the private sector's assets is that WE, the public, hold the debt. It is not as if the government is some separate, standalone entity with no relationship to the public. The government debt is *our* collective debt.
No, we don't. I don't owe shit. I am not a party to the state. I have not signed the consitution, which lays out the bylaws of the state. The state has declared its intention to rob us at gunpoint in future to cover its debts. That is not the same as us owing that money.
Much of the debt is held by foreigners. Others are top 1%, so it diverts tax revenue from working people to foreigners and fat cats.
So basically the govt will pay back this collective debt with freshly printed money.
@@darkgalaxy5548 that we will all then pay for through higher prices due to the inflation
Yes but if you have a bank account with $1,000,000 are you really sad and do you say: "DAMN! I am in debt to this huge extent! Since, I am the government figuratively speaking."
We can print money, creating inflation, as long as it doesn't create inflation? Magical Monetary Theory.
It could be that an insufficient amount has been printed. That is most commonly the case
@Richest_Person_in_the_World wrong. The cpi only measures certain things. Also they aren't telling what the deflation or inflation WOULD be had they not increased the credit creation.
@@Dan16673 For example let's say taxes due for the year are $100. But you also want to save $50. So now there is a demand for $150 total. Imagine if they only printed 75. The system would be in default, due to insufficient moneyprinting
Just what do you think printing money is?
What do you think inflation is
People have all sorts of different definitions, so as long as you don't have that defined, what you think are slams against MMT are not actually valid criticisms. You can't even begin to criticize MMT correctly because you are stuck on print money and silly names like Magical monetary theory.
print ...lol...what fucking century are you in ...money isnt paper thats printed ....its fiat not gold standard
I think the reason "we", the US, personally avoided hyperinflation is solely due to the dollar being the defacto global currency---the petrodollar. The amount of dollars they printed were obscene when compared to the US economy, but compared to the global dollars in circulation we got the "modest" inflation under Biden.
Unspoken is the fact that we force the entire world to pay inflation while primarily the US reaps the benefits...and how the MMT strategy will fail when the rest of the world finds ways to move off the dollar. And the US has given them incentives to move off, considering the US throwing its weight around with sanctions. For example: BRICS
I don't think the inflation has been modest, or out of line with other countries, or out of line with the obscene amount of money printed. Price increases have essentially gone up to match the increase in the M2 money supply, petrodollar or not.
One of the reasons that we had more inflations relative to previous years is just that there was a global slowdown with CoVID-19 and that impacted the ability of the world to absorb the dollars. I worry that with the increased debt load, we will have to create more money to finance the government. At the same time we see the US more willing to use the dollar as a weapon in the world. Both things should cause the world to want to move away from the petro-dollar and that makes the whole dollar creation thing be a bigger problem over time. You would think that the world would be willing to have 1-2% inflation as a cost of having the dollar as a reserve currency, but if that number starts to be higher in general, it would push countries away. And fewer countries using the dollar (or using it as much) would mean more inflation for a given level of monetization. And it could snowball pretty easily.
There is no such thing as "petrodollar," Warren Mosler explains that thing as well.
@@utah_koidragon7117 That would make sense to most of us, but it is still incorrect. Our government deletes all tax revenues upon receipt. It is taken from M2. In addition, our government also deletes dollars received from the purchase of government securities upon receipt. Those securities are not included in the money supply because they are not liquid enough to qualify them. Therefore the money supply remained the same after spending because an equal amount of that spending was removed from M2. This is a major reason why our government taxes and borrows.
@@BanBb1 I honestly can't even tell if you're serious or not. There was a time I would have been sure that anyone saying something so utterly and thoroughly foolish was joking. But then some loons started actually believing the earth is flat. Same thing here.
The reason we have such a large national debt is that we import much more than we export. In 2022, the trade deficit was $970 billion dollars more imports than exports. This number decreases GDP by that amount. As it continues to increase every year, the government has used its spending to effectively plug this hole to make overall GDP rise. It has to do this because the economy will go into recession and then depression as GDP falls. THERE ARE ALMOST NO PROUCTS WE NEED TO IMPORT THAT CAN'T BE MADE HERE. While this will cause some inflation, wages will rise faster if immigration is curbed to keep wages up and full employment. THIS IS WHAT TRUMP UNDERSTANDS AND WHY WE NEED TO ELECT HIM.
Bring Back ContraKrugman!
Krugman sucks.
Great show! MMT is very appealing to big government authoritarians because it says federal debt doesn't matter. It's important to point out that their reasoning is based, in part, on a tautology.
it doesn't matter. It doesn't even exist. We're not on the gold standard anymore
YEP! That is it exactly. And it makes electioneering through bribing the people seem as though we are not being bribed with our own money. One of our own major party candidates is pointing the finger of blame for inflation on "corporate price gougers" hoping that the people won't look at the five trillion of spending, without taxation or productivity increases, and say to that candidate..."no, I think you are doing that"
If the government can print money with no down side... THEN WHY AM I PAYING TAXES???
High taxes are maintained to create the illusion your taxes fund the government, while in reality government is sustained by money printing. If this was widely known it could erode confidence in the currency, potentially causing the dollar to fall and destabilizing the economy.
Exactly. I don't get what the MMT zealots are excited about when this, like any other theory involves a burdensome tax slug.
@@chrisruss9861They're excited to spend because it justified socialist spending. They don't care about the future, just themselves.
To control inflation. FFS please learn something about economics
@@Shei-vei you need to pay tax to reduce your spending. Too much spending leads to inflation.
Bob rocks!
"Are they stoned out of their minds?"
"I don't know, are they fans of reason?"
😂😂😂😂
Bob Murphy is BASED
Bob on Reason? I Click. I Subscribe.
"You shall have even units and measures" Scripture also clearly demands that Christians support sound money and oppose the usurious central banking system.
Gary North wrote 31 volumes of economic commentary on the Bible and founded Christian Economics.
Sure but Christianity is false
You are not allowed to complain when your Christian sharia is getting rid of the debt limit. Your order is to praise the great leader 😂
No perverse incentives in allowing a centralized authority the ability to create the rate of exchange, what could go wrong.
The difference between the government taxing- or borrowing and taxing people in the future- people to fund spending and simply printing money is that the money printing is inflationary, while taxing isn't.
taxes don't go to the budget. You pay taxes to pay for inflation. They take tax money out of circulation and literally put it in a incinerator. They just print money to pay for the budget.
@@JackVz this is me rolling my eyes at that juvenile nonsense.
@@utah_koidragon7117 that's literally what they do. Everything i just said is a fact
@@JackVzis this the case on the municipal level?
@@rhomboidq7001 No just the federal
Nice podcast, I did enjoy it, though I am not so sure I got Professor Murphy's opinion on how grave the debt situation actually is in his opinion?
Agreed. Interesting discussion, but they didn't really address the question of whether our debt is a real problem or not, and why or why not.
@@utah_koidragon7117 The Federal reserve has 2 types of bank accounts the same way commercial banks have checking and savings accounts. These bank accounts are available mostly to just commercial banks, countries etc and are called reserve accounts and securities accounts but they function the same way.
So say China earns $100 billion dollars from selling stuff to the USA. They don't keep a bunch of cash at the vault, they keep it in the Federal reserve checking account. They can buy stuff with that money or they can put it in a savings account that earns interest. This is what buying US treasury bonds is. Banks, people and countries who have dollars and buy US Treasury bonds that earn interest. To pay this back, the US Fed govt just debits the savings account and credits the checking account.
So what is the problem? The problem is that this is free money paid by the US Federal govt to bond holders. There is no need to do so and it causes income inequality. That is the real problem.
Wow. Hundreds of likes. Reason sure is doing great. Must be all the relatable, timely content. 😅
Better question would be why is the National debt bad?
I watch this show and the Reason Roundtable pretty much weekly as of late. I'm also a member of the LP Mises Caucus and consider myself to be an Austro-libertarian. I'm an advanced student of Austrian economics and cut my libertarian teeth mostly from literature that stems from the Mises Institute. I follow several Mises podcasts including Bob's. The Mises approach to libertarianism is largely based on Austrian economics and therefore, praxeology. The Reason perspective is broader-based. I also think the folks in the Reason Roundtable are sort of hipster libertarians. 🙂
🗿based
Well, Austrianism is true but doesn't explain the fiat floating system we live under
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World I'm not sure what you mean by "Austrianism." Austrian economists (abbreviated Austrians) have a solid explanation of fiat currencies including not only the drawbacks but also the potential benefits they present. Austrians are pretty good at steel manning other schools of thought in order to present very comprehensive arguments.
I'd love to have you interview Warren Mosler to discuss this topic.
Maybe a second Mosler Murphy debate
There is no sentiment to reduce the debt or preserve the currency .
Imagine paying off fiat debt or trying to preserve fiat currency. People act like we're still on gold or something
@@JackVz Imagine thinking that you can print money to pay off debt simply because it's fiat money and not suffer consequences, despite the perfectly clear history of catastrophe when countries have done that.
@@utah_koidragon7117 when did i say that? i wouldnt pay off the debt at all. It's impossible to pay off. Ied just make a new currency.
@@utah_koidragon7117 Imagine wringing your hands about Debt for 20 years meanwhile nothing happens
Sentiment is derived from incentive, and those who write the budget have no incentive to do anything other than make it worse.
You point to the frustrating nature of predicting the consequences of government borrowing. In my opinion the value of a $100 bill is something like a bottle of milk. The elasticity of its value over time is connected to the appraisal of the consumer's beliefs... something that may tend to be conservative (presuming they trust the source.) What happens when the source is untrustworthy and their adulturations aren't obvious. Hence, the milk they present gets watered down to the point it seems thin so they apply chalk and search for methods to game the consumer. With C-Notes the bill becomes thin when inflation marrs it, or milk when distaste appears. So, the issue is why doesn't inflation promptly impact C-Notes? Part of the answer is the consumer's conservative inclination to resist a currency's elasticity. In his mind's eye there's a price he's accustomed to, along with an amount he'll refuse to expend. This mental resistance marks the place where those tempted to tamper remain safe. It seems that C-Notes are remarkably stable or in other words resistant to inflation. The place where you need to inquire is into those factors that buffer the C-Note from changing value. I see it's place as the world's Reserve Currency as a significant factor. In the model you presented, levels of government spending doesn't directly apply to the price of something like dairy products. Perhaps not in the same ways or rates as insurance products... and so on. But, whatever the meliue that upsets an American consumer, the affect on an American market is also resisted by foreign demand for C-Notes. If a foreigner is unaware of the antics of irresponsible actions in DC... and essentially trusts American politicians more than those he deals with in his own country, then we have a situation that tends to buffer the C-Note from inflation. The willingness of foreigners to trust DC is a hidden buffer against inflation and similarly a hidden tax that the world is willing to pay against American deficits. I believe this is an important issue that confuses the relationship between the way we print C-Notes and the buffering input to our inflation rates. If this isn't a significant issue, then it behoves us to consider what is because whatever it is there's peripheral issues to be monitored. For example, a some point foreigners are apt to become disgruntled at submitting to hidden American taxes and react... but refusing to comply to the American system (as Putin warned in his interview.)
When she isn’t talking, Liz looks like an elderly person who accidentally opened the front facing camera on her phone and can’t figure out how to turn it off.
And her economicz skills aren't that different than your garden variety Old Man High Pants
We needed more pro-natalists, 40 years ago.
One thing that makes me so sympathetic to the Austrian position is the focus (or at least acknowledgement) of capital structure. At 50:30 she says if it's not inflationary it's fine, but obviously she's referring to CPI ONLY. Building a bunch of unnecessary buildings and structures takes land, labor, and capital. Though it might be enough to move the entire basket of CPI goods to "inflationary" that does nothing for anyone trying to purchase/hire those options at the time, and when the job's finished the increased plant/personnel created by the high prices might be at a surplus and that adjustment creates downturns as well.
The MMT'ers like the Keynesians think construction workers can "learn to code," if they think of them at all. They turn concrete to cheeseburgers with their math when they aggregate all these things together. The reality is that a lot of these people should be working in manufacturing or building houses--too bad they're building aberrations of the market like skyscrapers and buildings which will be vacant when the cheap money/subsidies/stimulus dries up. Something like 40% of office space is vacant right now. We are ALL poorer as a result of their current usage, the initial building, and their inevitable destruction when they're turned into apartments or retail. How much of that was created on the wave of cheap money over the last decade?
Cpi = inflation apologetics
@@Dan16673Actually just your cope for inflation not existing after you people Went Gray annoucing that it would hyperinflate
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World you people? I'm not w repubs or any other group of a88holes. I just want to separate state and money
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World you people? I'm not w repubs or any other group of a88holes. I just want to separate state and money
@@Dan16673Well you can't. People want their fiat currency. Probably gold bugs are under 1%
If the government spent without borrowing, which is completely within their power. And if that spending was for needed items that idle resources were available to support it resulting in growth to the economy, what is the negative of that. MMT states that it is not how much is spent but rather what it is spent on. It states that the government should spend as much as it takes to keep our economy running at full capacity that is to maintain full employment at all times, no more, no less. If we did do this by definition the business cycle; as we have come to define it, would disappear.
I see Bob, I click on video
People have underestimated the ability of the housing market in the U.S. to suck up the excess money spending by the government. The 30 year mortgage means that people can park money there for a lot of time. What changed is that people started buying and selling homes more frequently, which means the money started spilling out into the broader economy more. That paired with international speculation drove up home prices much higher and gave sellers even more spending money.
The same thing has been happening with the stock market and people's retirement accounts. We are coming towards a huge sell off trend when the boomers start downsizing their homes, cashing in their retirement funds, and also the estate sales that result from when they die.
So we'll have insane amounts of liquidity come into the system in the next 20 years.
Pair that with less reproduction, and that means labor costs will continue to rise as we have less and less workers to do things. (This could be counteracted by ai and automation, but if prices for everything else are going up, then not allowing wages to rise will create a whole class of people who will get angrier and angrier)
i will debunk climate change in a few short sentances:
If you go to the desert it will be around 80 degrees during the day, but at night it can drop below freezing. This is because tehre is no water vapor no moisture in the desert which is a green house gas water has the highest thermal mass of any common material it holds massive amounts of heat. co2 makes up .04% of the atmosphere, under .02% plants do not grow if we went crazy and incresed our co2 by 100x we probably couldnt even increase the co2 concentration a hundreth of a percent, its impossible to know how much co2 we add to the atmosphere because its way to small to measure. co2 is the catalyst for photosynthesis adding more co2 would allow all ecosystems to thrive, help our forests, and increase crop yeilds. to think that a trace amount of man made co2 is going to hold enough levels to heat the oceans of our planet which are many miles deep its absolutely insane. you don't need to be a scientist to understand that this is tottaly impossible, the climate is determined by the tilt of the earth and the wind and ocean currents. to think we need to go back eto the stone age to stop the climate form increasing 1 degree over 100 years. my backyard increases 10 degrees just from 7am to 9am and the world still keeps moving. Is amazing that people can beleive in this, there is absolutely no evidence what so ever that man made co2. is having any measurable effect on the climate let alone the level of co2 in the atmosphere. for that to be true, if we were to stop burning co2 plants would no longer be able to grow and we know that we have had plant life long before we used fossile fuels.
climate change can be debunked with that simple thought experiment. The scientific fraud taking place today everywhere and has done extreeme damage to our economy and is starving millions of people who are denied the abiliy to buy gass to cook their food, were making the poor more poor and destroying the eviornment with square miles of solar panels toxic batteries and windmills which dont even output the amount of energy used to construct them over their servive life. The wall of dishonesty is absolutely impenitrible.
This lady who thinks deficits are not a problem. The people who get the money first get its full purchasing power, the rest of us get completely desroyed. If we allowed deflation, our savings would actually get is somewhere. Peoples wages would actually increase over time when they got raises they would actually get more disposible income. It would be like the 50s where one person could support a family, what we have now is the reason why the 1% has more than the bottom 80%. its the people who think this is going to help the poor voting for the policies that make it so most americans cannot afford a 400$ expense.
A traditional and historically proven theory about deficits is the "Death Spiral" that occurs when The Deficit exceeds GDP by more than 125%. The maintenance of the debt, especially when combined with rising inflation eats up all the discretionary spending money. This phenomenon is best represented by Japan in the late 70's and early 80's. Everyone thought Japan was going to exceed the US with all kinds of unpleasant fall out in the Pacific Rim. Some "Now-a-day" experts even predicted a war between the US and Japan (which Japan would win in a conventional sense because S. Korea would join in). So, while deficit spending can be a good thing and a great strategy when used properly, it can be that double edges sword that cuts your own throat.
Japan’s debt to GDP ratio is over 200% and they’re still around last time I checked.
@@jeffcarlon6711 Japan has been digging themselves out of the Deficit to GDP ratio trap for decades and it will be decades from now before they are out of it. The same awaits the US if they don't get a handle of their spending or invent some new cash cow.
33:30 I feel like "deficits are actually surpluses" has to be related to the broken window fallacy somehow, but can't put my finger on how. Yes, now money is going into the economy, but government spending is inherently less effective than the free market (meaning we will only get the benefit of maybe 50% of the increased spending) plus the debt will need to be repaid with additional interest, translating into even worse returns.
I'm not actually a "deficit hawk," but for twenty years, the government has been testing the limits of its spending level and going right to the brink. What happens when we have a real downturn? There will be no spending wiggle room to inject money without repercussions. Disaster is certain.
I do believe the US government can run a moderate deficit that roughly keeps the debt to GDP at a constant but reasonable level (30-40%?) is sustainable.
If there is a certain demand for dollars, then they must be issued. There is no second provider
In good faith, I write opposing macroeconomic comments and they are deleted, I wonder why.
I guess according to the MMT theory if $9 for a dozen eggs is great then $12 a dozen would even be better
MMT is another reason to look askance at most theories that are described by their adherents as "modern". "Forget what experience has shown, we have NEW, and sophisticated, theories based on NEW knowledge". Money, and how it works, has been understood for centuries. Like all things of value, it can be diminished, maintained, or augmented, and government through monetary and fiscal policy, will be the instrument of that.
There is asymmetry though. It is easy to cause inflation, just as it's easy to run up a debt, and it's quite a bit harder to tame inflation without pain, just as it's more painful to pay off a debt.
Just as there is gravity in the physical world, there is a cost for the use of money over time,.... the interest rate. If we don't charge enough for the "rental' of money from the Fed, there will be the diminishment of value of money, the mispricing of risk, misallocation of resources, and an increase of unaccountability for the use of taxes taken from the people.
This isn't that kind of debt. It never has to be repaid, it's always there
"You can't thonk of the cuontry like a household tho. Austerity doesn't werk." - quote from Fred (my pet chimpanzee)
Interview was great, but uh oh man it really went off the rails in those last like 2mins.
1:04:48 Wow, Liz is something 😂
I was just thinking of the national debt. For most of my life we have been told Americans couldnt have this or that bc we had to worry about our debt. We had to spend all this money on our military bc it was vital we have a strong defense.
We have spent trillions on pointless wars, given trillions to foreign nations. Our quality of life, as a nation, is declining while the wealthy get richer. Our military was worthless in protecting our southern border. We are ruled by kleptocrats and oligarchs concerned with self enrichment. Why should we care anymore? They are intentionally causing our collapse. No one cares about the people.
The politicians of this country labour just make me angrier and angrier everyday
Probably the best solution to deal with it is to bring in foreign highly skilled workers who will pay taxes and add to social security. Lowering spending isn't enough. Taxing the rich isn't enough. The state can ease the burden on the population by trying to get companies to relocate to areas with cheaper housing and make sure that imported workers teach their skills to American workers and do not displace workers. School vouchers to private schools would save money, as these schools wouldn't need expensive bureaucracy like huge school systems. However, they need to protect teacher pay and benefits. Currently many charter schools pay less and impose 50 or 60 hour work weeks. Schools waste an incredible amount of money. Breaking up monopolies and any financial institutions that hinder competition would help control inflation in the long run. Increasing energy production could help with inflation and debt.
How do most of you guys still make profit, even with the downturn of the economy and ever increasing life standards
Well, I picked the challenge to put my finances in order. Then I invested in cryptocurrency, stocks, through the assistance of my discretionary fund manager
Someone like expert Nancy Williams Laplace
Omg! Nancy's strategy has made winning trades a regular occurrence for me as well! It's a huge milestone when I think back on how it all started.
Amazing! I'm so surprised to see Ms. Nancy being mentioned here under this comment!
Trading is difficult, I'd spend the five grand on education for trading. It's not easy. Investing is different, that's easier. Short term or long term gain is the question.
There is a key phrase in the Tedd talk. She says stuff (oil, food, machinery) “available with the fiat currency “ eventually no one will accept the fiat currency (i.e. the US dollar). Then you’ll go back to paying in gold. Then we’re screwed.
The U.S. tax system is divided into federal and local taxes. U.S. laws do not allow the federal government to fund local governments unless it is an emergency. The federal government is financing its large budget deficit by printing money, which local governments cannot do. In 2024, 50 of the 75 core cities in the United States are running a budget deficit and heading toward bankruptcy. They have to raise taxes or they won't be able to pay their firefighters, schools, and police. Rich Americans living in these cities are moving to cities that are not facing bankruptcy. Inflation may have been lowered, but prices remain at inflated levels. The U.S. dollar has devalued over 98% from its original value of $35 per ounce.
But all dollars viewed together, are at their highest value of all time
Bob Murphy you are a liar. Social security is never going broke never. Taxes are not funding social security Bob and you know this you are a liar as long as the real resources exist that's what matters. Learn mmt Bob
As a percentage of GDP, the federal debt is at WWII levels. It would seem like money would need to be printed to finance such a large debt load. That's exactly what we see with the Federal Reserve balance sheet (to GDP) also at WWII levels: hypothesis confirmed.
I want to know what the deflation or inflation would have been has they not created much more credit
Yeah there woulda been violent deflation it seems
Now match that debt chart to high IQ population growth.
Honestly did Murphy answer any of the questions raised by MMT? If you think he did, I would like to be enlightened.
Mmt doesn't have questions, just really simple statements that aren't of use
@@Dan16673 Please elaborate.
This was an amazing amazing interview
This was an amazing interview
It is really, really weird for a "libertarian" to respond to concerns about declining freedom with claims about increased material prosperity. Talk about a category error.
Red herring fallacy.
@@MBarberfan4life lol. No. There's no fallacy because I wasn't constructing some argument, but only making an observation about an exchange between two self described libertarians. There is no red herring, either. Maybe you don't know what a red herring is.
As described in the segment, the libertarian economist had expressed serious concerns that freedom is in decline, and said he was worried that we're becoming a police state. In response, a different libertarian noted that global poverty has been lessened and that we have great material wealth. First of all, that reply is a non sequitur. But mainly, it's just a really odd response from a libertarian.
@@utah_koidragon7117 what economist dont tell you is that the developed world has stagnated.
@@JackVz I don't disagree, and I don't think the economist in question would, either. Point is that freedom and liberty in the developed world is at grave risk these days. No self-respecting libertarian should respond to that observation by saying, "Yeah, but we have lot of material wealth and comfort."
It is an illusion of material prosperity. Americans have lots of plastic crap but little real wealth like gold/silver, farmland, home ownership, business ownership etc.) Almost everyone is far worse off than people 70+ years ago.
Listening to the Ted Talk almost sent me into a panic. How can someone say that “just printing more money” to pay for something is a feasible outcome? She’s an advisor to members of our federal government and has no concept of how fiat currency works or she’s purposefully deceiving people.
Maybe you were scared by inflation myths all your life
On the topic of Analogizing Alarmism, as a big L type I find it personally confusing how the Dems have unwavering faith in the "full faith and credit" part of the US while also being the first to scream from on high that the US is a terrible no good racist terrible place. When trying to mentally rectify this I can't help but dwell on other contradictions like insisting on living on the coast while screeching that climate change is going to cause flooding(obviously if that's your cause, why not flock to high ground instead?). Or am I just not taking them on face value enough to see the debt interest rate growth used as the fulcrum for Cloward-Piven Strategy to strike a blow against the "evils" of capitalism? The guest mentioned Glenn Beck being called a chicken little during his fox days so felt obligated to poke a bit.
What Trump did was unconstitutiional whether some fool thinks otherwise.
Wow Bob Murphy looks different (in a good way)
If good is a new word for bad
There is no war in Bah Sing Se!
Good interview.
Bob Murphy on Reason?! What is this a libertarian podcast now?
US debt is not an issue at all Americans....just keep giving free amnesty to credit card/volleyball tuition drinks for foreigners/minorities. Won't backfire at a l l. MORE DEBT MORE DEBT/MORE MONEY to UKRAINE! We need to *cough* PROTECT democracy aka Zelensky's real estate portfolio in London/Italy and New York/Florida.
Your native Russia is dying.
This makes no sense at all to me. Why doesn't the government just give everybody everything and have free health care? And just go into debt more? We run a terrible risk by not getting our spending under control.
Increasing the money supply automatically causes inflation, doesn't it?
Yes it does. MMTers make a generally correct observation about reality that in a fiat currency system the issuer of the currency can issue as much as they want, and pay for whatever they can buy with that currency. They even make a correct observation that hyperinflation is the only theoretical limit, and thus inflation is the thing to look out for. But they just can't seem to make the connection between issuing currency and inflation.
And it's quite simple, actually: Printing money either creates value, or does not.
If it does create value, then you should be able to print massive amounts of currency and buy out everything for the good of the people, without costing them anything. Even if there is a cost to getting that positive value, you still end up with a net benefit, which should cover any costs - this is baked into the assumption that you do in fact create value.
If it does not create value, then that means every dollar printed and every penny minted takes away something from someone else.
That "something" being purchasing power (the real value, which money is supposed to be a vessel for), and that "someone" being everyone.
When you print currency, you do not create new building materials, new infrastructure, new technology, new software, new food, new anything. You're just printing the paper - or in the modern times, flicking a digital number up. As this new money is dispersed into the economy and starts circulating, you end up in a situation where MORE MONEY represents THE SAME GOODS AND SERVICES in the economy. Simple laws of mathematics - value per dollar is now reduced. That's inflation.
There is no way to introduce new money into the economy without causing inflation - the best you can do is take other limited actions to reduce it at the same time, resulting in obfuscation, as has been done a lot in history (and as MMTers love to use as a trump card argument, which is why I'm mentioning it). Printing money is, and always will be, inflationary.
They do give people free stuff and free healthcare... but just certain people. by design.
@@abcdef-ms9mb Good explanation.
I have a question: What if the money printed was used to invest in projects that actually "were" investments? That is, we printed money to fund projects that were actually productive, and not consumptive?
For instance, what if we want to build nuclear power plants in every state, but we don't have the money in the budget and we can't or don't want to borrow. So we print the money, and ultimately the amount of wealth in the economy- goods and services produced- is dramatically increased because of the additional energy available to people and companies. Given that the value of money is a ration of the amount of money and the amount of goods and services in the economy, would that ultimately be inflationary?
@@johnathin0061892 not free - you're still paying for it with your savings and present earnings. No overt, openly practiced taxation necessary.
@@utah_koidragon7117 You're both printing money and producing value, therefore at the very least it's less inflationary than otherwise.
That doesn't mean it's good, however. The government is not bound by laws of supply and demand, only scarcity itself, which means they have no way of knowing whether and how much their projects are actually wanted by the people whom they will impact. The best they got is votes... collected every couple of years... where somehow everyone that wins happens to be extremely unpopular. So you can guess how good an approximation that is.
And there is obviously a hidden alternative cost: Every unit of purchasing power sapped away from the people's savings is purchasing power not spent on things these people want. What the people want is actual demand - by definition. If you are a participant in an economy and wield the purchasing power you earned, whatever you choose to purchase or not purchase with it is a single datapoint towards the greater demand curve.
To put it simply - printing money to invest in the people is not as bad as printing money to give to yourself (obviously), and is less inflationary depending on how well it matches demand, but is still not the best possible outcome, and usually far from it.
It erodes the financial freedom and independence of the population to centrally plan their resources for them, which suffers from the Knowledge Problem, and will still in the best realistic case scenario leak resources, and be necessarily more inflationary than supply and demand based economics.
And even that assumes that there is no corruption within that immense power structure, good luck.
The United States is a low-tax country
Compared with other nations in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the United States ranks 32nd out of 38 in revenue as a percentage of GDP.20 But it’s not just that the United States is near the bottom end of revenue; it is nowhere close even to the average. Over the CBO’s 10-year budget window, the United States will collect $26 trillion less in revenues than it would if its revenue as a percentage of GDP were as high as the average OECD nation. When compared to EU nations, that number rises to $36 trillion. (see Figure 2) In contrast, the $289 billion projected revenue increase in the Inflation Reduction Act21 still leaves the United States ranking 32nd out of 38 OECD countries.
Obviously not low enough, there's a shortage of dollars in the population
we have to bail out everyone when they are losing money. Unless its some abstract problem like Office real estate.
That TED talk... just insane. Bob is 100% correct.
Liz is the spirit animal we need
That 13% for Medicare Coleen be dress tickling. Lowered any time their price ananrnit lower
You can see climate change with your eyes. Take a cruise Hinton Greenland or Antarctica. They are melting. And an accosted it you can’t seem they then. You bare terrain Al that. White icendeflectsnhear back into deaden nornwnukoren the more we lose the bitterness
There’s a have your cake and eat it too problem here. On one hand we need to be able/ready to solve problems and invest where necessary, ie Katrina, GWOT, Pearl Harbor, Genocide, global trade routes, etc. On the other hand though it’s hard to draw a line where this so called money printing machine can’t be used. That is where I think politics and the voter’s expectation of the debt/spending has friction.
With this level of debt today, albeit stated as an investment by politicians, it appears we are taking from the future prosperity of our children. That’s where it gets hard to justify and no self respecting parent wishes to do that.
Buy them a car, help pay for college, but for goodness sakes don’t enable their cocaine habit if you want the grandkids to visit during the holidays one day.
11:48 It wasn’t the ability to borrow money that was the issue-but the other end of it.
Bob Murphy vs mmt. Bob doesn't stand a chance because mmt accurately describe how the system works.
I think the biggest flaw in MMT is that it works on the assumption that some how every other country's will devalue their currency if another country decides to devalue theirs. If America took it to the printing presses (or the electronic presses, I guess) and decided to make $1 worth $100, it doesn't mean China or Iran or the U.K. or or whomever will follow suit. Right now, for example, 1 Yuan is worth $0.14 USD. If 1 Yuan is suddenly worth, hypothetically, $100 USD than China could buy up way more U.S. debt than they already own. The U.S. government only owns about 1/3 of its debt, iirc. Deficit, no matter how you go about it, increases debt. Someone owns that debt. I don't know why MMT believers think that other countries will look at America diluting its dollar and think to themselves "Whelp, we can't use this more favourable exchange rate to our advantage."
MMT is firmly planted on the "just pay your credit card bill with another credit card with a higher interest rate" branch of economics.
Over-all, I enjoyed the interview, but I did kinda feel like Mr.Murphy started teetering on the edge of the Q-spiracy deep end toward the end there.
Also, Zach is never allowed to say "no cap" again. Just on principle.
CORRECTION: 1/3 of the American debt is held by foreign entities (public and private combined). 2/3 is owned by domestic entities (public and private), but I'm not sure how the public vs. private numbers break down.
No, I can tell you haven't understood MMT enough
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World Hi AOC. Your burner profile is wild.
Ouch!
Families are the key. My wife and voting age children are voting for Trump this time. The one holdout is a daughter who is a teacher. Her daily indoctrination from work has her on the wrong side. But! The high cost of living is starting to cure that.
Putin thanks you and other autocrats
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World Putin is backing Kamala because President Trump would stop him.
@@agentl0key891So why is Trump praising Orban of hungary. Let him start by stopping Orban
@Richest_Person_in_the_World Sure, I'll let him know, but we have to get him elected back into office so he has authority.
@@agentl0key891Well if it's the case that he is Autocrats' Favorite, then I don't want him in
On Social Security, much of the past solvency was owed to the fact that more people died sooner. It was set at 65 for a reason. You weren't expected to make it to retirement. Need to push out the retirement age before it is too late. If SS becomes insolvent, 100% of $0 is $0. When the opt-out that was on the table in the early 2000s, Gen X was told to suck one. At that point, they were OK with pushing back retirement. Twenty years later, nothing. Additionally, Gen X, in particular, also lost out on pensions afforded earlier generations and many retirement investment vehicles that are around today that later generations have had full opportunity to employ. They'll likely never have a say because they are sandwiched.
Gen X as a whole did absolutely NOTHING about Social Security, or the national debt, just like their parents. Gen X SHOULD have been the Ross Perot generation, come out in droves and spearheaded a push for a balanced budget and SS privatization, but instead they chose to play the same old Uniparty political games their grandparents and parents did. They will get no SS now, or what they get will be nearly worthless due to inflation. Many Gen X have little to no retirement savings either.
Yes
Guys you need to bring on Lyn Alden for macro stuff. Bob is great but his forte is Misessian Microeconomics (which I'm partial to also)
That crypto guy
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World ?
Is that the best response you have?
@@sgababy1987He is deluded about Bitcoin having value
How did this happen? Obama
Nice clips, I didnt realize mmt was so nutty - that is, before it undresses into ye olde planned economy
MMT is true though
As a motorcycle rider, i like global warming so we can ride more every year.
There's a reason debt/deficit alarmists aren't taken seriously by mainstream economists. Austrian economists are impervious to evidence.
What is a "mainstream economist?" Is that the type of economist that claimed as late as the early 1980's that Soviet Union would soon overtake the U.S. economy?
What's the reason, precisely? What evidence are you referring to?
Trust the experts…
Yea the same group would thought 2000 and 2008 were fine lol
MMT relies on personal wealth in USA. How much do we have in assets?
How does MMT rely on personal wealth?
Our debt is our weapon on the international side of things .
Lady needs to work on her friendly face...
The interest payments go to the buyers of the bonds correct? So does that 14% in interest the government pays to it's bond holders a stimulus to the economy?
Yes MMT explains that government is Net Payer of interest. So in fact whatever the interest rate is, is pretty much also the inflation rate!
The problem with this issue is that no solution exists.
You are all going to STFU when the Great Leader orders the Congress to get the rid of the debt limit in a few weeks 😂
Keynes, MMT, demand side, nobody ever talks about deminishing purchasing power
Why didn't you make more money
No MMT'ers understand how Fiat works and you don't.
People think Christianity is a stupid religion. We believe in Christ and also the wisdom of the Word of God. The evil force at war with human kind is relentless, but if you don't know you are at war you will be caught with your pants down not ready to defend the truth. Lord have mercy on us sinners.
They are right, it is a _______ religion
Such a disingenuous channel.
God. That TEDd talk is 14 minutes of juvenile unicorn and rainbows.
Well your doom and gloom has not panned out
Gonna stop paying bills to get a surplus
How does that follow. Did MMT suggest bond default
As far as i. Concerned that debt is the plutocrates debt. They can pay for there government and they can fight for it.
dosent eixst as a debt because its a tax credit ...the real problem as pointed out by steve keen is private debt
Steve Keen is clueless
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World lol....
Zach is confused. There are several ways to create money. When the federal government wants a war, they use debt. Thats when they pass a bill for spending, and the treasury sells more bonds, and after the sale of the bonds, the government has more money to spend on war. This happened during Rona. the government sold bonds and created at least 2 TRN for Rona spending, i believe only one of those was project lightspeed. This pumps money into the bond market and screws up bond prices, but it doesn't always result in inflation. The other "legitimate" way the government wants to spend is when the federal reserve (no, this is what actually happens) opens up a new bank account at the federal reserve. from this new bank account, the federal reserve borrows 7 trillion dollars. During Rona, the USA government spent 7 trillion to prop up the bond market, and actually 2 trn for actually addressing rona expenses. 7 Trillion came from the federal reserve balance sheet, where they literally opened a bank account and "borrowed" 7 trillion dollars from it. This is allegedly public information, and is called the "federal reserve balance sheet". There are two other tools the government uses, and they are organizations like fannie mae and freddie macc, and Federal housing administration, not private companies, but not public companies. The government can go to them and tell them to do things, and not super tell everyone what they are doing. The debt may appear on Fannie mae's balance sheet which is public, but i don't believe their numbers any more than i believe china. Lastly, there are organizations that the federal reserve controls, but doesn't necessarily control. For instance, the federal reserve can straight call banks and tell them what to do. During financial crashes, this is apparent. After Fukushima, Japanese people canceled all their carry trades out of defensiveness, and it started screwing up the currency exchange. The federal reserve literally called all the major USA banks, and told them we are about to announce a stimulus program for the Japanese yen. We don't want you to be on the wrong side of this currency problem, because it will introduce a lot of volatility and could hurt USA banks. Like so the federal reserve can straight tell USA bankers to do shtt, and warn them about shtt thats coming, and control and manipulate currencies and liquidity, and markets that way.
when the government sells bonds to pay for stuff they didnt tax, to fund the deficit, that isn't super inflationary. Its not nearly as inflationary as when the federal reserve creates 7 trillion of debt out of thin air, and goes and spends that 7 trillion in the debt markets. Thats why inflation lags so long. When the federal reserve creates 7 trillion of debt, and pumps 7 trillion into the bond market, companies have more money on their balance sheets. Then the companies start spending more money, then the extra money starts showing its ugly face when 10 major grocery chains are expanding, they all need more trucks at the same time, and they have to pay higher prices to get those trucks from the truck manufacturer, because he only has one trucking line, and only makes so many trucks. So the grocery stores have to pay more for the same product.... This is how printing more money, then blowing it in the bond market, boils down to everyday transactions. A more simple way to view it is that the exact same goods and services are being sold, because the manufacturer has the one production line, but now there is more money chasing the same amount of goods. A price spike in one commodity such as trucking is called a bubble, but a price spike in a majority of the goods that are available to purchase is basically the main idea of "inflation". And just like when the government lies about the GDP and being in a recession, the government lies about inflation
@@davidanalyst671The Fed is the government, hoss. No need to go technical by claiming the Fed is an alien entity
It's silly to blame the behaviour of "generations". Millenials aren't having children because of the indictrination of women in the workplace as a source of taxation has been pushed, making motherhood look like opting out. Gen X have been disenfranchised by the decline in the ability of the state to fund its obligations, combined with the millenial's rush to mortgages as a more secure retirement fund than state pension. Each era has been a rational respinse to the circumstances they find themselves in.
The real ussue is how do future generations support themselves in their unoroductive years.
I think we are entering an era of communal living, Where people learn to pool their capital to achieve greater security.
Building societies were originally small community saving schemes where many households invested in a property development corporation.
As the corporation grew so the members ability to move into their cooperative home grew.
The problem with Building Societies is they are pyblucally owned and as rhey become more sucessful they are more about making profit than making homes.
It would be interesting to look into "intentional communities" to see if they are sustainable over time.
Please forgive me here, because I find MMT foolish as well. However, without addressing the arguments completely, you leave holes in the argument. I believe where we fail in comparing MMT to personal finance is avoiding a legitimate piece of that argument. That is the component in which we base spending on future incomes. For example, if you were looking to buy a new home, you would likely base your budget on a significant raise that you knew was coming soon. The minute you realize you’re about to get a promotion, you might want to move into an area with better, safer schools and lower crime. The money is not there yet but it will be.
MMT considers future GDP.
Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that GDP will continue to rise. There is only the track record indicating that is likely. Not to mention we also pay the debt with a future less valuable dollar.
The problem becomes that there is NOT responsible spending and we are spending too far into the future
What if tax for 2024 equals $2 trillion and in actuality citizens want to not only pay $2T but also save an additional $1T. That means $3T needs spent this year, and if it's less (than tax+saving) it's not enough
MMT would work...if all resources were unlimited but unfortunately they're not.
MMT does not claim that resources are unlimited. Thanks for inspiring me to write that succinct slogan to refute lazy naysayers
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World can you quote where I said that MMT said that? or did I say it would work if... I didn't say they say that. your reading comprehension is absolutely ass bucko
@@justinjtv4089A common lazy way of countering MMT, is to say "Oh oh So North korea can become richest country in the world by running the printing press. Your (sic) so stuped!"
@@Richest_Person_in_the_World can you quote where I said that MMT'ers said that? I said it would work if... not that they claim that rather that they are ignorant to that being a factor.
@@justinjtv4089They are not ignorant, they explain there could Still be a dollar shortage, even with finite resources
As usual, absolutely no reference to our Fiat system where our government can spend as much as it takes to keep our economy running at full capacity at all times, no more no less. Murphy insists on comparing government finance under Fiat wit our personal finance. There can be no comparison because we do not have the power to create money. That is it case closed.
Ted talk Should be renamed to Ted talk