Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
The National Debt will never be paid off. Quite different than personal or business debt.
What are you saying or asking about foreign investors and retirement funds?
Some of current inflation has to be due to all the new money creation by the Fed. Most post Covid was due to supply/demand dysfunction and inequalities.
QE's did not cause inflation post 2008 crash, but it did with Covid related QE as intended to prevent recession.
Increased interest rates have provided over $200B to the private sector this past year, which has to tend inflationary.
Any discussion of inflation without the discussion of the war on fossil fuels is disingenuous. And without gettin political, you can look at a chart of when inflation spiked and it literally began around Feb 1, 2021.
Any discussion of inflation without the discussion of the war on fossil fuels is disingenuous. And without gettin political, you can look at a chart of when inflation spiked and it literally began around Feb 1, 2021.
'70's inflation was very much oil dependent. But not nearly so much influence today. I suspect because of energy diversification and we do so much of our own oil now.
Cheap Chinese EV's with solid state batteries would most likely help us with disinflation. Neither Biden nor Trump want that.
Yes I understand that MMT is non-mainstream. However, it is a great temptation for politicians to not worry about spending or debt. And the new documentary might convince and confuse people, especially progressives.
Confusing double-talk by a university professor is all some progressives need to feel a theory is valid. Especially if it's what they want to hear. Free healthcare! Ending climate change! Yay!
Our Congress adopted MMT principles a long time ago, borrowing and spending, then someone invented a term for what they were doing and tried to sell as an economic theory. Congress isn't doing it because they have adopted a theory, they're doing it because they discovered that they needed to spend more to get reelected and they lacked the courage to raise taxes to pay for their spending.
Our Congress adopted MMT principles a long time ago, borrowing and spending, then someone invented a term for what they were doing and tried to sell as an economic theory. Congress isn't doing it because they have adopted a theory, they're doing it because they discovered that they needed to spend more to get reelected and they lacked the courage to raise taxes to pay for their spending.
Our Congress adopted MMT principles a long time ago, borrowing and spending, then someone invented a term for what they were doing and tried to sell as an economic theory. Congress isn't doing it because they have adopted a theory, they're doing it because they discovered that they needed to spend more to get reelected and they lacked the courage to raise taxes to pay for their spending.
So let me get this straight. In your OP you wrote that MMT sounds like BS and then here you agree with a guy claiming congress has adopted MMT....what gives?
So let me get this straight. In your OP you wrote that MMT sounds like BS and then here you agree with a guy claiming congress has adopted MMT....what gives?
Well, obviously, a theory can be BS and yet it can be practiced. What congress is doing -- running up unlimited debt -- will have consequences. MMT says there are no consequences.
And MMT is actually different because it only advocates for progressive agendas like stopping climate change.
I don't think that is clear. The oil price shock and supply shock from the Arab Oil Embargo, as it permeated goods and services based on how much energy was involved in manufacture & distribution, resulted in a relative change in prices based on energy rather than an increase in the general price level of all goods and services.
Another school of thought is in the early 1970s, the US government pursued highly expansionary fiscal policies with large deficits to finance the Vietnam War and new social programs such Medicare and Medicaid. This raised rational expectations that future taxes would be insufficient to repay the growing debt burden.
At the same time, the Federal Reserve did not have an explicit inflation target or commitment to controlling inflation expectations. Instead, it attempted to maintain low unemployment through loose monetary policy.
According to the fiscal theory of the price level, with no credible plan to raise future surpluses or rein in debt through monetary tightening, the public rationally expected higher future inflation as the only way for the real value of government debt to align with the present value of future surpluses. This caused a de-anchoring of inflation expectations, leading to a wage-price spiral that pushed inflation up further. The fiscal theory states that the high inflation of the 1970s was the equilibrium adjustment to make the real value of debt consistent with unsustainable fiscal policies at the time.
So in essence, the lack of fiscal and monetary discipline to ensure debt sustainability allowed inflation expectations to become unanchored, which the fiscal theory argues was the key driver behind the great inflation episode of the 1970s in the US.
Well, obviously, a theory can be BS and yet it can be practiced. What congress is doing -- running up unlimited debt -- will have consequences. MMT says there are no consequences.
And MMT is actually different because it only advocates for progressive agendas like stopping climate change.
OK good. The fact is congress has done virtually nothing that MMTers would agree with. No job guarantees, no wage controls, no specific use of taxes to control inflation, no de-linking spending to debt or tax collections, no green Manhattan Projects and so on.
I don't think that is clear. The oil price shock and supply shock from the Arab Oil Embargo, as it permeated goods and services based on how much energy was involved in manufacture & distribution, resulted in a relative change in prices based on energy rather than an increase in the general price level of all goods and services.
Another school of thought is in the early 1970s, the US government pursued highly expansionary fiscal policies with large deficits to finance the Vietnam War and new social programs such Medicare and Medicaid. This raised rational expectations that future taxes would be insufficient to repay the growing debt burden.
At the same time, the Federal Reserve did not have an explicit inflation target or commitment to controlling inflation expectations. Instead, it attempted to maintain low unemployment through loose monetary policy.
According to the fiscal theory of the price level, with no credible plan to raise future surpluses or rein in debt through monetary tightening, the public rationally expected higher future inflation as the only way for the real value of government debt to align with the present value of future surpluses. This caused a de-anchoring of inflation expectations, leading to a wage-price spiral that pushed inflation up further. The fiscal theory states that the high inflation of the 1970s was the equilibrium adjustment to make the real value of debt consistent with unsustainable fiscal policies at the time.
So in essence, the lack of fiscal and monetary discipline to ensure debt sustainability allowed inflation expectations to become unanchored, which the fiscal theory argues was the key driver behind the great inflation episode of the 1970s in the US.
I think it was due to a few bits so commingled it's tough to order them.
1. Two oil and gas shocks.
2. Your points above with a little added detail..........Arthur Burns (chair from '70-78) was the worst long serving modern era Fed. Res. Chair by a lot. The guy's early tenure decisions were overtly political and showed little understanding per how tough inflation is to slow let alone stop. There's something of a money and banking economics joke that Nixon, Kissinger or maybe Liddy must have had compromising pictures of Burns as his policy actions were almost pro-inflation in effect but short term politically helpful to Nixon.
3. Lots of short term FX/currency chop from delinking our currency and medium term and significant dollar depreciation across most of the '70s.
4. Aggregated tax burdens were way too high in 1970s. It's in the weeds a little but beginning in the very late 1970s into the '80 virtually every first world nation, not only the US, rolled back tax rates/tax burdens.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
