Mike Norman Economics

It follows from what has been said that a “shortage” of money with the state is not a technical shortage. Thus, it is never the lack of “money” that causes the state to be unable to spend, but always the lack of resources that causes the state to be unable to get what it wants. Money moves resources. If there are no resources, nothing is moved. However, if resources are the monopolist of money — the government with its central bank — can move it even when the political will is there. This...

Whoa!  October employment report… What about all the MMT free munnie interest income (to people who are already bazillionaires) from the higher rates somehow creating a Democrat regime economic nirvana?  Perhaps not? 🤔This and the initial 1.2% Q4 from the Atlanta Fed has this thesis not looking too good so far I’d say…U.S. hiring slowed to 150,000 jobs in October. The unemployment rate rose to 3.9% https://t.co/7dLb8rYpLg— Real Time Economics (@WSJecon) November 3, 2023

Greetings from the Pearl of Africa!Today, I had a very productive visit to Kampala, Uganda, the Pearl of Africa, with my dear friend Julius Mucunguzi (we were colleagues in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia). I had two long deep-dive conversations with senior government officials, Minister of State for Industry, the Hon David Bahati, and Uganda's Permanent Representative at the United Nations, Ambassador Aadonia Ayebare.…The effects of colonialism in Africa and how to break out of the persistent...

Episode 3 in our new weekly Manga series – The Smith Family and their Adventures with Money – is now available. Have a bit of fun with it and circulate it to those who you think will benefit …William Mitchell — Modern Monetary TheoryThe Smith Family manga continues – Episode 3 is now availableBill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

This month, we speak with Larry Johnson, associate professor in the Social Foundations of Education Program at the University of South Florida, Saint Petersburg. In his pedagogy, Johnson focuses on the complex relationship between education, culture, and society with the goal of exploring policies and practices from historical and contemporary perspectives that address structural inequality, and transforming educational institutions into sites for social justice. Johnson is notably a...

Artist SpotlightEpisode One image: "If the taxpayers fund the government spending and they get the money from businesses who get it from the taxpayers when they buy things, then were do the taxpayers get it from?Episode OneThe Centre of Full Employment and Equity’s MMTed project has recently launched a new manga comic book series entitled “The Smith Family and their Adventures with Money”. A collaboration between Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) pioneer and Economics Professor William Mitchell...

One of the founding concepts of Modern Monetary Theory is sectoral balances. And its power lies in its simplicity. Every economy can be broken down into three sectors: The government sector, the private sector (which includes me and you) and the foreign sector. Assuming a balanced budget, then government spending increases our net-wealth. A government deficit is our surplus.The National (Scotland)Scotonomics: Why the UK Government's fiscal deficit is our surplus

Oops!  Down to 1.2% projected for Q4…. Let’s see if the MMT people repost this one … (Tip: don’t hold your breath waiting doesn’t fit the Democrat narrative).On November 1, the initial #GDPNow model nowcast of real GDP growth in Q4 2023 is 1.2%. https://t.co/OnYxN0CQUF #ATLFedResearch Download our EconomyNow app or go to our website for the latest GDPNow nowcast. https://t.co/ISzNblWfFW pic.twitter.com/u9CweBwBaD— Atlanta Fed (@AtlantaFed) November 1, 2023 Hard to see how a few $100B of...

I ran across a couple lame attempts at blaming the U.S. Treasury for not extending the duration of issuance during the pandemic low in yields. This is entirely typical for market commentary — going after fiscal policymakers and ignoring the major culprit, which is the central bank. To the extent that the United States has put itself into an awkward macro stabilisation situation with respect to interest rate expenditures, it is the result of the brain trust at the Federal Reserve.One could...

It’s Wednesday and I use this space to write about any number of issues or items that have attracted my interest and which I consider do not require a detailed analysis. The issues discussed may be totally unrelated. Today, I provide my response to yesterday’s decision by the Bank of Japan to vary its Yield Curve Control (YCC) policy, which some commentators are frothing about. The change was very minor and is not a sign that the expansionary position of the Bank is shifting significantly. I...