No.1399083[Last 50 Posts]
Thread for the discussion of Modern Monetary Theory and Post-Keynesian Economics
## FAQ
Q: What is Modern Monetary Theory
A: MMT is a macroeconomic theory that explains how modern monetary systems work, and argues that governments with sovereign, fiat currencies can never run out of money. It also argues that deficits are not inherently bad, and that government spending can be used to achieve full employment and other public goods.
Q: What is Post-Keynesian Economics?
A: Post-Keynesian Economics is a school of economic thought that is critical of mainstream, neoclassical economics. It builds on the ideas of John Maynard Keynes and argues that the economy is inherently unstable, and that government intervention is necessary to stabilize it. It challenges the beliefs of neoclassical economics that markets are rational and self-regulating, and attempts to bring back sanity (empiricism) into a discourse that has become voodoo
Q: Why should I as a leftist care about these things?
A: Two reasons. Firstly, it undermines the right-wing narrative of barter economics as the historical basis for economics, whereas in fact the state has always been the monopoly issuer of goods. Secondly, governments and politicians are constantly attempting to gaslight the populace that we cannot 'afford' certain things, and we have some of the most economically illiterate people on the planet running the economy.
Q: But it's not SOCIALIST
A: Look, it's just a description of how the economy as it is currently works, not prescriptive. There are plenty radical leftists who believe in these ideas, it can enrich discourse. Just think of it as another tool in your toolbox when it comes to debunking right wing nonsense.
## Helpful Resources
The Lectures of Steve Keen -
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtrHkFxMLfxz6qkxRghK4m5U-wDsenhKzThe MMT Podcast -
https://www.youtube.com/@mmtpodcastwithpatriciapino1218John Harvey on the Economics of Michal Kalecki -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73gWjTXd-tsPaul Cockshott (ugh) on the Accumulation Cycle of Capitalism -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rp9ClsIywdoI've specifically chosen not to link books but instead lectures since I know you boys have zero attention span :)
No.1399097
>>1399083Anon, you didn't create a distinction between the difference of Keynesianism and neo-Keynesianism. At least do that if we're gonna have this discussion.
No.1399110
>>1399097>Neo KeynesianismCucks who conceded everything to the neoliberals in order to stay mainstream. Absolute trash. See: Paul Krugman who refused to concede that free trade hurt workers when anyone who actually read Keynes's essay on National Self Sufficiency instead of fellating DSGE trade models would have known this already.
No.1399111
>>1399097Fair enough, I'll add it to the script for next time.
>>1399110Yeah Krugman is an absolute crook.
No.1399136
Is Michael Hudson MMT?
No.1399156
>>1399110The best and easiest way I think I differentiate between the two Keynesianisms is that the original one is a collaborationist "equal development" form of economic system where the welfare of the worker is equal to that of the welfare of business. And I guess neo-Keynesian economics is the supremacy of the welfare of business against the worker.
No.1399161
>>1399156neo keynesian was the combination of keynesianism with neoclassical economics made by Paul Samuelson in the 1940s which distorted keynesianism and forms the basis of "mainstream" economic theory today, what any undergraduate learns in micro/macro-economics classes.
No.1399231
>>1399161which note, samuelson took back this interpretation but it was too late
No.1399251
>>1399136based on this article
https://michael-hudson.com/2020/04/the-use-and-abuse-of-mmt/it would seem that he agrees with the core principles
No.1399252
>>1399083> MMT is a macroeconomic theory that explains how modern monetary systems work, and argues that governments with sovereign, fiat currencies can never run out of money. It also argues that deficits are not inherently bad, There is a book called The Lost Science of Money that delves into the topic early on about the historical dilema of money being essentially sovereign, or the creation of civic law (what Aristotle called Nomisma) and the continual problem of merchants using money(primarily gold and silver) as a commodity, and how that latter eventually evolved into modern usury.
>>1399136Yeah but there are different schools of MMT
No.1399265
>>1399264
no… it's when the government does stuff….
No.1399274
>>1399265It's just a theory about how the monetary system works really. The political corollaries are up to you.
No.1399283
>>1399276
I'm not saying it's apolitical. I'm just trying to educate people.
No.1399289
>>1399286
It's a descriptive theory about how the monetary system works. It has political ramifications. But it itself is not prescriptive. What's hard to understand about this?
No.1399292
>>1399264
The biggest failure of modern economics both liberal and Marxist is that it ignores history and fails to create a model of how we got here. Even Adam Smith gave us a bit of historical economic history that explains how we got to the point of economics in the late 18th century. Economists have completely abandoned historical process for the sake of doctrines without any foundations. You know what I want to read? A historical economy book that covers from 1789 to 2023 and explains the evolution of economics to MMT.
I find it utterly insane that economists have abandoned history entirely, especially when they are trying to explain some modern economic theory.
No.1399297
>>1399292the lack of empiricism of modern economics as a whole is pretty disturbing. They believe that if the data doesn't fit their assumptions, then it's the data's fault.
No.1399317
>>1399297>the lack of empiricism of modern economics as a whole is pretty disturbingHence we're back to pure idealism where any modern economic theory was literally born out of some person's brain and not based on material economic development. Just like there are tons of books that explains the necessity of abandoning the gold standard because it was a fetter on economic development at that time. Even bourgeois economists back then were part historians as well that explains the changing nature of the economy. Instead the fucking premise of economics today is: "the economy just does things".
No.1399319
>>1399292Marxism includes primitive accumulation theory which is history. Furthermore all econometrics is history because it's backwards looking by defintion
No.1399324
MMT is fun because it realizes money is fake and we can print and spend it on things instead of taxing workers. if this spending benefits workers then it has the result of increasing the wage rate which makes porky very mad
TL;DR: critical support for MMT
No.1399325
>>1399319I didn't mean to imply that Marxism doesn't look back in history. What I meant is that modern Marxists sometimes stop looking at history to examine how economics has developed in the 21st century.
No.1399329
doesn't MMT only work because of the petrodollar hegemony and imperialism? it doesn't apply to currencies that can't be printed by a sovereign? i feel like it is mostly useful as a rhetorical tool to expose imperialism and secondarily as a method of taxing the one percent by proxy through intentional inflation
No.1399340
>>1399335
>Petrodollar is a social construct
so what?
No.1399342
>>1399341
social constructs are real. read marx
No.1399349
>>1399346
money is a social construct yet without it you starve. "petrodollar is a myth" is imperialism apologia and liberal propaganda
No.1399351
>>1399334
your brain is so small. I mean really. please stop talking.
No.1399352
>>1399342What is up with you people today? Not being able to read plain english, making claims no one disagrees with and then acting like you're disagreeing with everyone
No.1399358
>>1399355
Please read what I wrote you look REALLY stupid and that you're just gunning for a semantic fight.
No.1399362
>>1399359
>MMT is a descriptive theory about how the monetary system works, it has political ramifications
>HOW DARE YOU SAY DOING A MONEY IS APOLITICAL
No.1399371
>>1399368
>MMT is a descriptive theory about how the monetary system works, it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>it has political ramifications
>HOW DARE YOU SAY DOING A MONEY IS APOLITICAL
No.1399372
>>1399368
MMT is not saying the government SHOULD issue FIAT currency. MMT says the government DOES issue FIAT currency. It's a *modern* monetary theory. It talks about how the modern monetary system WORKS.
it has POLITICAL RAMIFICATIONS. How are you so stupid that you can take 'it has political ramifications' and extract 'it is apolitical'?
No.1399375
MMT is obviously political the entire point of it is to center labor as the limiting factor in production. Republicans argue that we can't put more money into infrastructure or healthcare "because we dont have enough money" they cry about the deficit because they "run the economy like a household. MMT suggests that you can just print more money and put the reserve army of labor to work, because building things in the real world costs labor and resources not money, and it therefore shows that money is a control mechanism for a states monopoly on directing labor at the whim of the bourgeoisie over democratic control of society.
No.1399378
>>1399376
you have an autism score of about 4.
No.1399380
>>1399376
it is tho
the government already does stuff, it just does stuff that benefits corporations, eg bank bailouts
No.1399387
>>1399289I mean we can certainly grab the portions that are descriptive of how the current economic system works, but I see a lots of calls for "minting the coin" and "the Fed should do this instead of that!" from MMTers for it to not be prescriptive.
No.1399392
>>1399387What MMTers do with the knowledge of MMT is a different matter entirely. I believe it empowers us to be much more radical and gives us tools to undermine false beliefs in monetary supremacy.
No.1399393
>>1399387also I think it provides good arguments against decentralised currency which is kind of a threat right now to monetary sovereignty (which is necessary to maintain sovereignty in general especially for third world countries against US economic imperialism)
No.1399398
>>1399334
>Wrong again, monetary policy is not a apolitical activity,
Nobody said otherwise. I hate you.
No.1399401
>>1399396
cryptocurrencies and whatnot. fake money.
No.1399417
>>1399414
it's not real money unless it's backed by the government in my onion
No.1399419
>>1399414
we're literally telling you directly that we aren't disagreeing with you and you're going "no that's false". did your parents drop you on your head as a child?
No.1399420
>>1399414
>>1399334
>>1399286
>>1399276
you are an actual dunce.
No.1399425
>>1399412
This is a great post!
No.1399433
>>1399423
Do you actually understand the difference between "descriptive" and "prescriptive"
No.1399442
>>1399433no but what diference does it make
No.1399452
MMT describes what the government does in bourgeois economics terms. It's advantages lie on the fact that it describes shit that actually happens, instead of the bullshit nonsense neoclassicals pull out of their asses, so you can actually see what was actually done after 2008 in a way that isn't complete bullshit.
Of course, it's weaknesses lie on the fact it's still bourgeois economics, so it takes for granted all the premises that capitalism believes about itself, namely that the source of all value is not labor, but instead demand or some other inherent mechanism. As such, MMTers argue for reforms, for avoiding financial crises and the like (they usually are essentially left-keynesians, with some added spice via Minsky) but they cannot and do not wish for revolution. Still, it's the best framework within bourgeois economics and it's useful when discussing events such as the Silicon Valley Bank collapse.
No.1399456
>>1399452>Of course, it's weaknesses lie on the fact it's still bourgeois economics, so it takes for granted all the premises that capitalism believes about itself, namely that the source of all value is not labor, but instead demand or some other inherent mechanism.Please justify/elaborate as I don't really follow where demand (or in fact theories of value at all) really come into the equation
No.1399460
>>1399456I was just trying to point out to anons that don't really know what MMT is that it's still bourgeois economics so it's not capable of accurately describing the system as a whole, such as in marxism, because it's still wedded to it's core concepts (such as value formation). Afaik MMT doesn't really argue about value at all, only about government money mechanisms in fiat economies.
No.1399466
>>1399460i mean it's
modern
>monetarytheory
an attempt to empirically explain the movement of money, not the entire economy as a whole.
No.1399468
>>1399460Well, value discussions are very much metaphysical, moreover I think there's something to be said for the fact that MMT rightly places labour and material resources above the money supply
No.1399470
>>1399452is MMT really the "best" bourgeois economic theory? what about behavioural economics?
No.1399473
>>1399470I don't know anything about behavioural economics, but I do like behavioural finance.
No.1399481
>>1399452Wait I need clarification, do socialists acknowledge that demand plays some role in value in terms of justifying the expansion of further labor
Or does value mean something else
No.1399482
>>1399470There's developmental economics cough ha joon chang
No.1399503
>>1399470I think it's best when talking about money flows. As for other aspects, you can probably point out to better schools of thought.
>>1399468>>1399466True enough. I guess I kind of said a bit much
>>1399481Socialists accept that within a market supply and demand influence price, but supply and demand do not influence value, which is based on the socially necessary labor time. This, as the comrade pointed above, ends up a tad metaphysical, but it's important so not as to lose perspective. Steve Keen in Debunking Economics (never checked the actual neoclassical books to confirm, but it seems very plausible) argues that neoclassical economics is based upon the notion of utility, which is quantified in "utils", and is essentially a psychological category (something which is valuable to me might not be valueable to you, so I would be willing to pay more for it) which is nonsense because you can't quantify "utility" as a discrete measurement, so there's a lot of handwaving to make it work. For the purposes of the discussion this isn't strictly relevant, though.
No.1399518
>>1399503i think the definition of value is what im confused about, what exactly is the best definition of the marxist view of value
No.1399525
>>1399518(edit because it kinda became a wall of text)
I hope some comrades can complete or correct any missing or wrong information I say; I'm not a master at theory or anything. But to put it in simple terms for Marx there are two kinds of value: use-value (i.e an object's utility) and exchange-value (essentially price). Nature by itself produces free use-values: water, food (as seen in the form of hunter-gatherer resources) etc. But humans are uniquely positioned as to be capable of converting stuff (i.e. non-use values) into use-values by their exertion of labor. By this I mean: human beings can transform useless things into useful things by working.
This is the basis of all value for Marx: the iron ore only becomes a useful shovel after someone mined it, smelted it, and formed into a shovel-shape, which is then made useful by someone digging with it. All objects either have or do no have use-values; but only commodities have exchange-values. Exchange-values are essentially human relations which are mediated by objects. The objects by themselves cannot do anything; they simply are. Only in social forms that have commodities (note: this is not restricted to capitalism; feudalism had commodities as well, but they were subordinated to socio-politico-cultural insititutions. Only in capitalism the commodity is made unfettered).
This is important because if you accept the neoclassical view of value, your goal is to make people who have goods reach people who want those goods, in the most maximal way possible, i.e. through markets. It postulates that the goal of economics is simply to allocate goods (and working capacity is a good to be allocated to a capitalist, who then gives you money in exchange, in a relationship which is advantageous for both). This, of course, is nonsense, because if value is derived from labor, the only thing the capitalist is doing is forcing you to aggregate your labor into commodities, therefore making them valuable, whilst keeping said commodities for himself to sell. He then makes a profit through the difference in the value-equivalent money he gives you (your salary) and what he gets for the product in the market, which is called surplus-value. I hope this answers a bit.
No.1399526
>>1399470All economics is developmental economics. Behavior has nothing to do with it and it's purely a superfluous thing to look into beyond just trying to understand trends. But economics itself is developmental pure and simple. The question at the end is who does this development benefit (class).
No.1399527
>>1399525ah yes i think i understand, thanks for the good definition
No.1399528
>>1399525I should add the bit about socially necessary labor time:
Marx wasn't stupid, which is why he immediately forsaw that porky economists would argue that "well akshually then if youre shit at work at take a lot effort then the product would be more valuable". Which is why a commodity's value is based on the socially necessary labor time, that is, the amount of effort which is necessary on average to produce a particular good.
No.1399779
>>1399481obviously demand has an AFFECT on value, we just don't think it DETERMINES value. The effects of demand on value are so wide empirically that it is a niche tool rather than the rule or anything like that. Often when the price increases, demand also increases. Keen says more on this, but more or less it's just not sensible to say it's the root of value. (That's my two cents, but I don't care much for value theories)
No.1399781
>>1399525This is more or less my problem with Marx. His idea of what constitutes labour only makes sense if you interpret it *very charitably*.
No.1399784
>>1399779note by this i mean exchange value before anyone pounces on that
No.1399788
>>1399779t. has not read Capital
No.1399813
Just a reminder to everyone that there is zero empirical evidence for the widely-accepted belief that interest rate hikes reduce inflation, whereas tax increases directly suck liquidity out of the economy and thus reduce inflation a lot more reliably, faster, and more progressively.
The only reason they increase interest rates is to 1. avoid tax 2. they get more income on the assets they loan out
No.1399819
>>1399781I don't agree at all. I feel like his grounding is as solid as it gets for an economic science: it puts humans before objects. There is nothing charitable needed to recognize the transformation of the world by means of human effort, and it is a far more logical approach than the other forms proposed by bourgeois economics (which is why it was shared by all the classical economists, who rightly recognized that the economy wasn't about "goods moving around", but about the social transformation of nature). Marx, of course, has a highly dialectical approach, and in his definition of a commodity he borders on the Hegelian simply because such conceptual grounding is necessary to establish the parameters of what constitutes "political economy".
This does not mean it is a perfect approach, but it is the best one that does not need to just invent "utility" or some such nonsense out of whole cloth. Or just to ignore the problem altogether, which is what most economists do, without recognizing that this has profound ramifications for what is an "economy" in the first place. This can clearly be seen in the GDP metric: using solely it the United States in a productive powerhouse on par with China; of course, as Ukraine has shown, the US' productive capacities are hollow, since a good chunk of "GDP" is in fact just money moving around in the FIRE sector, or just barely value-aggregating work in the services sector.
>>1399813The goal of interest rates isn't exactly to curb inflation (that is its ostensive purpose), but to wage a class war against the proletariat by means of wrecking the economy whilst safekeeping the bourgeois' capital. It eventually achieves inflation reduction by the simple means of destroying demand by induced poverty, but this is a byproduct of the cycle evening out, not it's actual immediate outcome. You are correct in pointing out, and in one of his most recent articles Michael Roberts shows exactly that:
https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2023/03/13/monetary-tightening-inflation-and-bank-failures/>Well, even so, can it be argued that tighter monetary policy ie raising interest rates to increase the cost of borrowing and reducing money supply by selling central banks’ stock of bonds can still get inflation down? Well, not according to the ECB’s own analysis. In a study, the ECB found that an interest-rate hike by 1 percentage point only reduces inflation by about 0.1 to 0.2 percentage points. The ECB also estimates that the largest negative year-on-year effect of rate hikes on GDP will materialise only after nine quarters! No.1399827
>>1399819Well this is not the marxian economics thread, so let's not get too off topic
No.1399831
>>1399827Pardon me, I got a bit too enthusiastic. As for MMT, it's good. More lefties should look a bit into it. James Galbraith has a very good interview on the subject in This is Hell!, which might be worth checking out for comrades who don't want to do any sort of reading:
https://thisishell.com/interviews/1327-james-k-galbraith No.1399834
>>1399831Thanks, I'll check it out
No.1400251
Thanks for this thread and the well written OP, I do some light reading on MMT and Post-Keynesianism from time to time, and I think these subjects deserve more discussion among leftists, because they can explain some dynamics of capitalism in a way that isn't addressed in classic Marxist texts.
For example, in Capital Vol.1, Marx says that money is a commodity embodying SNLT, like gold for example. The thing is, it's not the case anymore since the Nixon shock of 1971 when the convertibility of the US dollar to gold was cancelled, money is now pure fiat based on credit.
There are interesting debates about how fiat money fit in a Marxist framework, if it still does represent value and so on, but they are also confusing and nit-picky, and I'm not sure if these theories can truly explain why states around the world could print trillions worth of US dollars out of nowhere during COVID-19 lockdowns, and the resulting dynamics of it.
In contrast, MMT has an easier time explaining what's currently happening, because it completely rejects metallism in favor of chartalism, and is purely concerned about how credit-based money function.
I'm not saying that we need to abandon Marx and throw his books into the trash bin, just that MMT is a nice complement to Marxist theory to better understand modern-day capitalism.
———-
Here are two good articles about the history of MMT and Chartalism:
https://strangematters.coop/history-of-chartalism-modern-monetary-theory-mmt-part-one/https://strangematters.coop/history-of-chartalism-modern-monetary-theory-mmt-part-two/When it comes to Post-Keynesianism, some good economists to follow are Branko Milanović, Mariana Mazzucato, Adam Tooze, Michael Pettis and Isabella M. Weber (the latter two spent a lot of time analyzing the Chinese economy).
https://braveneweurope.com/branko-milanovic-a-short-essay-on-the-differences-between-marx-and-keynes———-
My problem with Keynesians is that they want to save capitalism from itself, they want to create more jobs with economic stimulus (i.e. Tcherneva's Job Guarantee program) instead of reducing labor time, they are mostly focused on short-term problems and don't really have a critique of labor AFAIK.
They don't reason in terms of class struggle but in terms of "inequality", and this is an obvious problem for a Marxist, because the truth is, even if they have the best plans to stabilize capitalism, why would the liberal bureaucrats in charge listen to them? Is full employment really desirable for the bourgeoisie? I think not, the threat of unemployment is a great way to discipline labor, every competent manager knows this. The bourgeoisie want more corporate welfare, not paying more taxes, even if it would make sense when considering MMT.
Being personally pretty pessimistic about the prospect of a socialist revolution happening in my lifetime, I absolutely wouldn't mind benefiting from Keynesian measures which would lead overall to better labor conditions, but as Aaron Benanav said in a review of a book about trade wars:
>Like other members of today’s Keynesian revival, [Pettis & Klein] want to convince the elites to submit voluntarily to rational state direction, altruistically surrendering their accumulated wealth and power. This position can only end in confusion. As their own account amply demonstrates, no country—whether Germany, China, Japan or the imperial United Kingdom—has voluntarily made adjustments that cut deeply against the interests of elites, whether because the state is composed of members of the elite class or because it cannot act against elite interests without inviting the economic catastrophe it is trying to prevent.>As they admit in their conclusion, America’s position within the global order entails major benefits for its elite—but this is to concede that there is little chance for change from the top. The alternative—which promises at least coherence, if not a substantially more optimistic outlook—would be to accept that hope lies not in the emergence of an enlightened elite, but rather, in an evening-up of class struggle—that is, from the side of the working class.>To think class politics, you need not only Hobson and Keynes but also Marx and Engels.>>1399292I believe economists more or less abandoned historical analysis due to Lucas critique of macroeconomics.
No.1400553
>>1399325maybe you just haven't read enough, there are plenty of marxists writing on modern topics, just because leftypol reading groups like to rehash capital over and over…
No.1400557
>>1400553I for one would be really happy to hear some recs
>>14002511. that meme is hilarious
2. thank you for the contributions! I should add these next time I write the thread
3. As for Keynesianism you're absolutely right and the neo-keynesians are obviously based off a bastard offpspring that Keynes never intended. However certain post-keynesian economists (and I include Kalecki in this) are interested in class analysis. I don't necessarily think you *need* Marx or Engels to make proper class analysis. Kalecki wrote some really great stuff about class dynamics, without really ever referencing Marx (though I believe he was also a Marxist by his own considerations)
No.1400597
>>1400584>neoclassicalstopped reading there
No.1400599
>>1400587
How is MMT socialist? Its authors are describing capitalism. They only mention socialism as a possible system for the future.
No.1400617
>>1400599i think its the same person as before, they're clearly not the sharpest tool in the shed so I'd recommend ignoring them
No.1400619
>>1400584I'll read it at some point but I'm not in the mood RIGHT now to read neoclassical cope
No.1400631
>>1400623
you realise we all can tell you're the exact same person who's been making these dumbass posts for days? It's really obvious because you can't hold down a coherent thought.
No.1400642
>>1400619Don't worry it's just 9 pages
No.1400648
>>1400636
fuck off the thread already you're like 14 you shouldn't be on the internet anyway
No.1400656
>>1400587
indeed japan is state socialist.
No.1400661
>>1400657
It's clear that your massive illiterate ego is more important to you than the quality of discussion on the board. Shame on you.
No.1400668
>>1400661do you actually have any examples sabo, or is this one big cope.
No.1400672
>Great thread
>gets utterly derailed
every time
No.1400674
>>1400672just accept it at this point
No.1400758
>>1400668for you, sure. I just don't see a point in talking to the other guy because he's clearly acting in bad faith
>>1400587"MMT is state socialist"
>>1400599"How is it, it's describing capitalism"
>>1400615"no it's not just a description, we already discussed it"
here's that "other discussion"
>>1399420other anon calls him a dunce (we'll get to why in a moment)
>>1399423"why am i a dunce"
>>1399433"do you actually know what you are talking about?"
>>1399442"no, why does that matter?"
and here's the previous convo that led to that anon calling him a dunce
>>1399267"MMT is just government doing stuff" (him)
>>1399274"It's just a theory about how the current monetary system works, the political corollaries are up to you"
>>1399276posts a wiki link and then says it's apolitical (which is somethign I never claimed btw)
>>1399283>im not saying its apolitical>>1399286"so how can it just be a theory of how it works?" (doesnt understand difference between political and prescriptive)
>>1399283>IM NOT SAYING ITS APOLITICAL>>1399334"so how is it just a descriptive theory if its not apolitical?"
>>1399289"It's a descriptive theory about how the monetary system works. It has political ramifications. But it itself is not prescriptive. What's hard to understand about this?"
>>1399334"nooo its not apolitical, its prescriptive!!!, it says the government should do stuff!" (it doesnt)
>>1399362>IM NOT SAYING ITS APOLITICAL IM SAYING ITS A DESCRIPTIVE THEORY ABOUT HOW THINGS WORK>>1399368"you're wrong its political"
>>1399371
>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>it has political ramifications>>1399376"MMT is not descriptive, it's in fact government doing market socialism+ stuff"
>>1399398another anon points out this guy is an idiot
and then he laughably responds
>>1399414"thats false also crypto is money"
it's stupid that I have to convince you that he's trolling when you can just read the thread.
No.1400759
>>1400682I think edgar has a great intro to post-keynesian econ
No.1400761
>>1400758actual examples, good
No.1400786
>>1400761you could have just scrolled it was a waste of my time to give you these. idk it feels like you people are more interested in internet drama sometimes than the OP which im trying to get rid of that guy so we can actually go back to talking about econ
No.1400787
>>1400786this is the shitty thing about imageboards. a good thing can be happening and then be utterly derailed by one illiterate moid
No.1400791
>>1400786>idk it feels like you people are more interested in internet drama sometimesthat\s all the site has degenerated to since bunkerchan burned down.
No.1400802
>>1400791well it was like that in the old leftypol days too on 8chan, i remember there was a TONNE of drama around e-personalities
No.1400832
Modern Money Theory (MMT) economists acknowledge a number of empirical and institutional limitations on the applicability of MMT to macroeconomic policy, but they have not attempted to explore these empirically nor have they adequately addressed their implications for MMT’s main macroeconomic policy proposals. This paper identifies some of these important limitations, including those stemming from modern international financial markets, and argues that they are much more binding on the policy applicability of MMT than many of MMT’s advocates appear to recognize. To address these limitations, MMT analysts would have to enter the messy institutional, policy and empirical realms that undermine their simplistic policy conclusions that might be appealing to some policy-oriented followers of MMT. My conclusion is that, in light of these limitations, MMT’s major macroeconomic policy suggestions are of little practical relevance today for progressive politicians and activists, much less to macroeconomic policy formulation in general.
https://peri.umass.edu/economists/gerald-epstein/item/1159-the-institutional-empirical-and-policy-limits-of-modern-money-theory No.1401060
MMT died without even getting pushed into the mainstream, lmao
No.1401085
Neoclassical economists resisted MMT because it reveals the social origin and possibilities of money. When you realize money is created by the government, then you will demand that money is used for the greater good.
MMT was founded by Warren Mosler and Bill Mitchell. The ideas in MMT are not new, but the packaging is. Bill Mitchell is hardcore Marxist and he brings up Marx in his blog all the time. He has to turn down his power levels to get published in academia.
https://billmitchell.org/blog/?p=15854>>1400251Marx and MMT have different definitions of money. To Marx, money is what you can use to purchase abstract labor. To MMT, money is debt. What that money is, whether gold or fiat currency, is irrelevant to Marx's theories. He was writing in the gold standard, so of course that's how he worded his theories.
This article goes into more detail. This website has lots on Marx and MMT.
http://heteconomist.com/money-in-marx-and-mmt-and-social-implications/ No.1401158
>>1401085this is true- I think MMT, Post-Keynesianism and Marx are complementary rather than opposed (at the basic level, of course there are some fundamental disagreements and specific disagreements but I feel as though a lot of the disagreements between the two especially pertaining to 'value theories' and the 'nature of money' are a lot of hot air.
No.1401163
>>1401158In the same way, you can absolutely agree with an Austrian that the value of a good to an individual may be subjective but that doesn't change the historical material facts of how that value came to be, which is something they ignore entirely in their analyses (and often get completely wrong what with their ahistorical beliefs about the anthropological origins of money).
No.1401168
>>1400832thanks for the contribution, im compiling these resources into a group and I'll read them later.
Maybe we can create some kind of master-doc of resources on PK and MMT (both for and against, from a leftist perspective)
No.1404167
checking into this thread
>>1404157i see the succdems have arrived
Are you unironically posting Keynes' "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren"?
you realize he got a ton of shit wrong, right? Like where he claims capitalism and productivity will rise so high that people will only have 15 hour workweeks (lol)
>The strenuous purposeful money-makers may carry all of us along with them into the lap of economic abundance. But it will be those peoples, who can keep alive, and cultivate into a fuller perfection, the art of life itself and do not sell themselves for the means of life, who will be able to enjoy the abundance when it comes.The whole thing was written as a cope by Keynes to try and market capitalism to people during the great depression when people were turning to radicalism and Marxism.
mitigating the periodic crises of capitalism using counter cyclical government spending won't work in the long run. Only replacing capitalism with socialism will.
MMT is really just keynesianism on roids, and we know where that leads.
Plus I've read some really stupid and misguided critiques of Marxism by people like Steve Keen
No.1404196
>>1404167>MMT is really just keynesianism on roids, and we know where that leadsRead the OP, especially the
>Q: Why should I as a leftist care about these things?part of it
No.1404650
>>1404167>you realize he got a ton of shit wrong, right? Like where he claims capitalism and productivity will rise so high that people will only have 15 hour workweeks (lol)You mean like claiming that capitalism was a great thing for humanity that has/has the potential to increase human productivity and give us the means to live better lives and then we should move past it? That would be crazy wouldn't it (Marx)
>The whole thing was written as a cope by Keynes to try and market capitalism to people during the great depression when people were turning to radicalism and Marxism.You don't know much about Keynes evidently, he was very much sympathetic towards Marxism. And hey if you don't want to read Keynes, you can always go to Kalecki who says the exact same things but far more easy to digest for a marxist like yourself. If you think Keynes was wrong, what is wrong with Kalecki exactly?
>mitigating the periodic crises of capitalism using counter cyclical government spending won't work in the long run. Only replacing capitalism with socialism will.It's not meant to work in the long run to 'save' capitalism. You have a shitty reading of Keynes. Keynes was not interested in 'saving' capitalism, but in improving the economic system in which he lived tangibly, which had the side effect of saving capitalism (which again is not a BAD thing inherently because it is a continuation of a positive transformational dialectic, the death of capitalism is deferred and capitalism was shown to be more complex
and resilient than Marx initially assumed- this is not a bad thing and I'm sure Marx would agree, it's something to celebrate)
>MMT is really just keynesianism on roids, and we know where that leads.I notice you don't understand the difference between Neo-Keynesianism and Post-Keynesianism
>Plus I've read some really stupid and misguided critiques of Marxism by people like Steve KeenThis reeks of resentment rather than critique.
No.1405005
>>1404650“How can I accept the Communist doctrine, which sets up as its bible, above and beyond criticism, an obsolete textbook which I know not only to be scientifically erroneous but without interest or application to the modern world? How can I adopt a creed which, preferring the mud to the fish, exalts the boorish proletariat above the bourgeoisie and the intelligentsia, who with all their faults, are the quality of life and surely carry the seeds of all human achievement? Even if we need a religion, how can we find it in the turbid rubbish of the red bookshop? It is hard for an educated, decent, intelligent son of Western Europe to find his ideals here, unless he has first suffered some strange and horrid process of conversion which has changed all his values.”
― John Maynard Keynes
No.1405007
>>1404650>This reeks of resentment rather than critique.yes anon, why not read these anti communist authors? you don't need socialism lets just have capitalism with state spending.
fuck off rosa killer
No.1405008
>>1405005He was sympathetic, didn't say he accepted it. And criticisng Marx does not make his work obsolete or wrong. Have you considered that maybe Karl Marx wasn't right about absolutely everything (I know, the horror to suggest such a thing)
No.1405014
>>1405011see:
>>1405005 Keynes was a bourgeois intellectual and an anti communist
No.1405016
>>1405014see:
>>1404196Consider reading Keynes because you clearly haven't and your criticism amounts to 'My narrow understanding of what Keynesians are, did bad things'
No.1405050
Stupid pipe dream bullshit. The current state of affairs didn't happen by accident. This MMT bullshit is no more realistic than the country going socialist or anything else.
While you're dreaming, you might as well dream bigger.
No.1405074
>>1405047Again, I don't give a shit about Keynes' lack of understanding of Marxism and what he said. I care about his material analysis of the economy which if you understood anything about it you would see is complementary to Marx. You are a vapid accelerationist who hates reform.
No.1405203
>>1405074why is accelerationism vapid? considering succdem acts like a numbing agent which has successfully prevented the western societies proletariat from rebelling or 200 years
No.1405338
>>1405322>It couldn’t possibly be that this is a logical and necessary step in the dialecticcope
No.1405404
>>1405338You’re the one coping with your fairyland metaphysics…
No.1405424
>>1405409What if it isn’t, you’ve spent years making society worse
No.1405446
>>1405404>You’re the one coping with your fairyland metaphysics…spoken like a true keynesian… why dont you just stfu about dialectics since you obviously don't understand them
No.1405455
>>1405446Why don’t you enlighten me then since you apparently think I know nothing about them. Let’s discuss. What are your opinions on Castoriadis’ critique of Marxian dialectics?
No.1405492
>>1405446Orthodox Marxism,” writes Georg Lukács in his book Geschichte and Klassenbewusstsein (and we think he is right), “does not mean an uncritical acceptance of the results of Marx’s investigations, does not mean a ‘belief’ in this or that thesis, nor the exegesis of a ‘sacred book.’ Orthodoxy in questions of Marxism relates rather exclusively to the method. It is the scientific conviction that it is only in the sense of its founder that this method can be expanded, extended and deepened. And this conviction rests on the observation that all attempts to overcome or ‘improve’ that method have led, and necessarily so, only to triteness, platitudinizing and eclecticism …” But though the results obtained by means of the Marxist method can be quite differently appraised, most of the interpreters rely almost exclusively, as they themselves assert, upon dialectical materialism. The method is often subordinated to the interpretations, just as a tool can be differently employed by different persons for different ends. And thus arises an actual propensity, as illustrated by Herman Simpson, [5] to denote the dialectical method as “a tool for giants,” which can be handled better by one person and worse by another, and this circumstances is taken to indicate its revolutionary greatness. But this “respectful” attitude quite overlooks the fact that the dialectical method is only the real, concrete movement taken up into and partially determined by consciousness. The process going on has been comprehended, and one intervenes in the process as a result of that comprehension.
No.1405497
‘ The stronger these are, the better; but however weak they may be, class consciousness to Marxism is not an ideology but the material life needs of the masses, without regard to their ideological position. Hook’s idea of the revolution as a party matter belongs to a period which is already surpassed, – the period of reformism, for which Marxism had frozen into an ideology and whose position Hook, in spite of all his criticism, after all now approves.’
No.1405725
This thread's OP features a screencap from something animated, therefore less than nothing of value is contained within, everybody is a hyper-retard
No.1405732
The U.S. empire already functions off MMT effectuvely, whiuch is bad, read Jehu
No.1405734
>>1405732stop bumping this fucking retard pseuds thread anon, he just wants attention
No.1405760
>>1405732I agree w this btw
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