Tag Archives: MMT critics

File under "behind the times."Another nutty rant "argument" against MMT for the record.Banyan HillWhy Modern Money Theory is Bad for the Economy Michael Carr, CMT, CFTe | Editor, Peak Velocity TraderHere's a few more that don't understand the operational reality.Hellenic Shipping NewsWorry About Debt? Not So Fast, Some Economists Say New American“Modern Monetary Theory” Will Pay for AOC's Green New Deal Bob Adelmann

I have read the articles that The Economist published on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) in the current edition of the liberal-leaning magazine (hereand there). I am not happy with the reporting, which includes false statements in general and also misrepresentations of what MMT is.... The Economist just put the UK debate on progressive economic policy on a slippery slope, claiming that a particular school of economics science constitutes “doctrine” and then misrepresenting that school’s...

In this article, I draw attention to the similarities between the current economic situation and that of 1929, and the threat to today's unbacked currencies.There is the coincidence of trade protectionism with the top of the credit cycle, and there are the inflationary events that preceded it. The principal difference today is in modern macroeconomic delusions, which hold that regulating inflation of money and credit is the solution to all ills. I conclude that economic salvation can only...

Dean Baker looks at offsets. He doesn't see "taxing the rich" as a good offset. I don't think MMT economists do either, and as far as I know, they have not pushed this proposal. "Taxing the rich" through progressive taxation has another reason. That is, limiting the political power of wealth and reducing inequality. There are good reasons for this – social, political and economic.Some MMT economists have recommend preemption of rent extraction first, with the residual to be addressed...

Michael Liebowitz makes up his own theory of inflation to criticize MMT and the inflation constraint. See It Market Modern Monetary Theory and its Fictional Discipline Michael Lebowitz

This article goes into the controversial Green New Deal package put out by U.S. freshman Congress member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (known on Twitter as AOC) and veteran lawmaker Senator Edward Markey. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell moved to bring the legislation to a vote in the U.S. Senate. However, the probability of such legislation passing would require a Democrat figure in the White House, but it outlines what key party members feel about capitalism, Modern Monetary Theory (MMT),...

"Socialism."While Iain Murray presents an ideologically biased argument agains the GND and MMT, he brings up points that need to be addressed for popular consumption, since it is likely that many people think this way. The GND is not a proposal but an idea for a proposal. A lot of things need to be spelled out that aren't yet. In fact, it is probably not possible to do so at this point, at least comprehensively, since significant pieces are lacking and need to be modeled, developed,...

Paul Krugman has piled onto the "MMT explained by non-MMTers" bandwagon, with a critique of Functional Finance. Functional Finance is largely associated with the Old Keynesian Abba Lerner, and is one of the key intellectual roots of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). In my view, the most interesting part of the article is that it contradicts the commonly made assertion that there is very little new in MMT (which Krugman hints at in the article as well). In presenting his summary of Functional...

The backers of Ocasio-Cortez’s bill released and then withdrew an FAQwhich seemed to suggest the investment would be paid for using the methods advocated by Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). MMT rightly argues, as against free-market economics, that a state with a sovereign currency cannot go bust. The state can create growth, and thus the means to pay back money borrowed; and it can create money, via the central bank, which can be used to lend to government.For many people on the radical left,...

I don't link to the NYT since it stopped being a newspaper. Alex Douglas explains Paul Krugman's criticism there of MMT based on r > g.This is not a new criticism. It is a neoclassically based argument. It was raised when Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century made r > g famous.The expression r > g itself was criticized at the time, and I won't repeat it. Suffice it to say that that is a monetarist view that suffers from the insufficiency of neoclassical assumptions about...