Naked Keynesianism

A good paper by Karina Patricio and Chris Marsh that deserves a wider readership, in particular if you are interested on the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and it's policies. The paper argues that the IMF agreement is legally void, and might lend support (the authors do not say so) to a more radical view, suggesting that Argentina should not pay. From the abstract:The 36-month exceptional access Stand-By Arrangement (SBA) with the Republic of Argentina approved by the International...

 By Thomas Palley (guest blogger)Every week my e-mail box receives a steady stream of articles aimed at cultivating public animus to Russia. The articles are always wrapped in a narrative in which Russia is a threat to democracy in Ukraine, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere. The effect is to create public support for hardline action (economic and/or military) against Russia.The insidious underside of this campaign is it paves the way for a scenario in which Ukraine provokes Russia, thereby...

By David Fields (guest Blogger)One of the defining features of classical political economy, particularly Marx, is the schema of a class system based on those who control the means of production, capitalists, and those who do not, wage labor. Yet, the intricacies of capitalist reality are more complex. As such, is it possible to formulate a model that better captures integrated social processes? Below is my attempt to do just that. This model, in my view, allows for greater attention to be...

[embedded content]My initial comments at the seminar on the legacy of Pierangelo Garegnani's contributions to economics organized by the Italian Post Keynesian Network. The full seminar here.

More on the same issues, with a discussion of Piero Sraffa and the surplus approach (this week there will be an event on the legacy of Pierangelo Garegnani). In Spanish again.

Interview in Spanish to Radio UNAL with Óscar Morillo. We discuss the the origins of political economy and their importance and the continuous relevance for the understanding of modern capitalism. Link here.

This event organized by the Italian Post Keynesian Network. I wrote about Garegnani's contributions when he passed away here in the blog. We will discuss some of the issues he raised, but also the new directions of Sraffian economics. 

Volume 9, Issue 4 of the Review of Keynesian Economics is now available. The issue is devoted to the twin topics of “financialization” and the “macroeconomics of international finance”. The first paper by Michael Hudson analyzes the impact on distributional outcomes of adding capital gains to and subtracting rent seeking activity from GDP. The second paper examines financialization’s rolling sector dynamics whereby it loads the economy with debt. The third paper by Esteban Pérez Caldentey...

New paper by Thomas Palley. From the abstract:This paper explores the economics and political economy of financialization using Matt Taibbi’s vampire squid metaphor to characterize it. The paper makes five innovations. First, it focuses on the mechanics of the “vampire squid” process whereby financialization rotates through the economy loading sector balance sheets with debt. Second, it identifies the critical role of government budget deficits for the financialization process. Third, it...

The administration run excessive budget deficits, and accumulated too much debt in the face of successive economic crises. As a result, it was forced to compromise politically in order to avoid a catastrophic default, and the subsequent political crisis brought about chaos, and the collapse of the established institutions. Of course, this is not a cautionary tale about the United States. It is a description of the economic crisis that led to the French Revolution.But in spite of the...