Cautionary Inflation Tale

July 4, Letters from an American, Prof. Heather Cox-Richardson (written July 3) And on July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, declaring: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”For all the fact that the congressmen got around...

Jayati Ghosh speaks about the growing debt crisis in the global south, the IMF’s never-ending affinity for austerity and the need to confront the power of financial capital.Jayati Ghosh has already teamed up with Michael Hudson on this. Financial capitalism interfaces with neoliberalism, neo-imperialism, and neocolonialism by gaining control using investment and debt, enforced by the "rules-based order" to the advantage of financial capital, which the Global North/West uses to dominate the...

Keynes and the casino According to Keynes, financial crises are a recurring feature of our economy and are linked to its fundamental financial instability: It is of the nature of organised investment markets, under the influence of purchasers largely ignorant of what they are buying and of speculators who are more concerned with forecasting the next shift of market sentiment than with a reasonable estimate of the future yield of capital-assets, that, when...

The Kakhovka dam was a massive two-mile-long structure that dammed the Dnieper River which bisects Ukraine. It was built by the Soviet Union in 1956 and raised the Dnieper by 16 meters (52 feet), creating the Kakhovka Reservoir. The dam was destroyed on 6 June 2023, resulting in massive flooding downstream on both sides of […]

Please click here to support this journal and the WEA RWER Issue no. 104download whole issue The Dead Parrot of Mainstream EconomicsSteve Keen 2 Why Hedge Funds Matter: An interview with Jan FichtnerJan Fichtner and Jamie Morgan 17 ETF shares as shadow moneyAlexandru-Stefan Goghie 49 The Dollar Centric Financial System and the Conflict in UkraineMarcello Spanò 67 A Note on Teaching Economic InequalityJunaid B. Jahangir 75 Book Review: Muhammad Ali Nasir, Off the Target: The Stagnating...

Jesper Jespersen reviewing my latest book Having read Syll’s book, one cannot avoid wondering how it is that modern mathematical economics still holds such a dominant position in terms of textbooks and economic practice. This is especially so if you consider two things: First, if one peruses the shelves of economic literature of any major bookstore (in London or even Copenhagen), it is clearly books written by dissenting economists which dominate the...

Manufacturing and construction sectors continue downward pull on economy  – by New Deal democrat As usual, we start the month with new manufacturing and construction data. The ISM manufacturing index goes all the way back to the 1940s, and has been a very good short leading indicator of recession throughout that time (although nothing’s perfect!). However, since the “China shock” started 20 years ago, with so much offshoring of...

There appears to be confusion among those interested in Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) as to what the implications for a green transition that will fasttrack the transition to renewable energy will require by way of government. I regularly see statements that government deficits will have to be ‘massive’ for extended periods because the private (for profit) market entities will not move fast enough to deal with the climate emergency in any effective way. The confusion inherent in these claims...

Revealing the Hidden Force of Credit on Aggregate Demand