My project on Transfinancial Economics was once called a "cult" by an economist on a blog I put a comment on..I found that rather amusing... RS. ----- Forwarded Message ----- From: Michel Bauwens <[email protected]> To: P2P Foundation mailing list <[email protected]> Sent: Sunday, 16 October 2011, 18:40 Subject: Re: [P2P-F] Regarding MMT being a cult Interesting debate, for me to the heart of the matter nevertheless, given strong social movements and a better balance of power, there have been periods of history with much better social policies, and in this context, a reconstructed social movement could take up the recommendations of MMT ... Irrespective of the relative hostility of the institution in charge of collective services, it will always need policies? whether we have power now or not, one day, we may, and thus, we are obliged to think of the policies that would be implemented were that the case, Michel On Tue, Sep 27, 2011 at 10:36 AM, Sandwichman <[email protected]> wrote: I woruld define "a context in which the state is not inherently hostile" as one in which the state faces a popular uprising that it cannot placate or dissipate by manoeuvrings. This requires the fostering and maturation of independent parallel structures -- non-state, non-market institutions with broad popular participation.
Traditionally, trade unions, churches, civic organizations and political parties have played these roles. But those associations have relied principally on a moralistic rhetoric while states and corporations have employed the quantitative rhetoric of accounting. It hardly matters that the books have been cooked. The bottom line is that corporations and the state have ruled from the bottom line. Nothing short of a counter-accounting can challenge that hegemony. That means transforming trade unions, transforming civic associations (such as environmental organizations and consumer co-ops) rather than a top-down technocratic transformation of the government.
Obviously the task of such transformation appears, on its face, daunting -- an extraordinarily long and arduous march through the institutions. That's what makes the technocratic fix so enticing -- it looks easier to accomplish. But it's not. It's only easier to imagine. Imaginary MMT is indeed easier than real ground-up commons institution building. But it's only imaginary. Actually implementing MMT would be no easier than establishing "socialism" or a "perfectly competitive free market" for that matter.
The nice part is that developing a counter-accounting mentality and vocabulary is worth doing anyway. It can help achieve transitional objectives in everyday life -- like negotiating collective agreements or structuring community resource sharing enterprises.
On Mon, Sep 26, 2011 at 7:00 PM, <[email protected]> wrote:
A very reasonable observation. One of the standards of MMT is that its
principles are based upon what actually happens in the way of outcomes. It might be a very radical concept to have people actually hold economists responsible for the results of their recommendations, as contrasted with a gaggle of econo wonks babbling about tweaking and adjustments, and then nothing happens or something significant fails to happen. Placing labor as important participant in the economic commons, rather than labor being treated as solely a commodity, would be a vast improvement in itself.
Part of the functional finance side of the process basically would eliminate welfare as it has been used as a threat to labor through a guaranteed minimum wage jobs program which is engaged in a counter cyclical fashion. Treating various social support services as infrastructure, such as medical coverage and higher education would establish new domains of employment to boost coverage of the existing systems. This would be beyond physical infrastructure projects which would also be at a skilled level, could end up providing mass transit systems where none exist now. Setting standards in this way would at least elevate expectations.
And... the truth is that every possible fiscal and economic policy would have the capacity of being subverted or turned to anti-democratic ends. Still if the citizenry is ignorant and passive lots of nefarious stuff can and would happen. No process can deliver a benign outcome without alert and engaged voters. So the choice seems to be keep the current system and expect change to magically happen, or work to elevate the economic literacy of the population and remove the parasites. The deficit terrorism which has had a recent resurgence in the wake of the big whoops, is guaranteed to make things much, much worse and it cannot be be perpetuated indefinitely. or people will simply explode into a long bloody rage, often minus any viable alternatives other than crime. Does your cynicism extend to nihilism? What about a body of theory and policy which has had a much higher degree of success that has been provided otherwise
Faith based economics and willing ignorance hasn't served us very well. And ye ole trickle down bait and switch scheming and scamming hasn't produced much other than chaos. Yes, the usual courtier crooks, frauds, and thieves will still be there. Is it even imaginable that the appropriate regulatory processes can be re-established?
MMT is based upon what is essentially a authentic scientific discourse which would a major shift all by iteslf. What would a commons centered economics look like for the unwilling and the hardened skeptics?
I'm listening, if you have something better in mind. My guess is that it is possible to develop a context in which the state is not inherently hostile.
Tadit
On Mon, 26 Sep 2011 21:04:45 -0400, Sandwichman <[email protected]> wrote:
I don't know about "cult" but everything I've read by MMT advocates assumes either that governments serve the public interest or that, if they don't they *should* serve the public interest. Yeah? Well, I agree they "should" but what is going to make them? That's what I find distressing. A political disconnect. Marx at least posited a revolutionary subject, the proletariat. The big question for me is not would MMT work but who is going to implement it?
I continue to operate on the premise that the State is inherently hostile or at best is passive and will only reluctantly pursue a progressive program, however it may be couched technically, if compelled to by a mobilized civil society.
On Mon, Sep 26, 2011 at 2:05 PM, <[email protected]> wrote:
From Stephanie Kelton at the UMKC economics department
Date: Mon, 26 Sep 2011 16:15:13 -0400
Have these folks look at our Twitter following. Journalists, progressive groups, reporters (Reuters and such, not crackpots), MPs (two of them, actually, one a Labor MP from Wales and one from Netherlands (socialist party). Randy and I are now recognized as "contributors" at Truthdig. Anything we write for them (as our New New Deal piece of 2 weeks ago) will be picked up by scores of other progressive sites (Counterpunch ran our latest after it appeared in Truthdig), as well as less progressive places like Global Economic Intersection (which also ran it). Roughly half of MMT blogs are run by traders -- not economists (Pragmatic Capitalism, Center of the Universe, Naked Capitalism, CreditWritedowns (and Ed Harris was an Austrian before he discovered, and then wrestled with, MMT). We are becoming the mainstream in economics, and history will not be kind to the holdouts. We have been right about every major economic event (both forecasting it and then explaining why the policy response would fail to bring about the desired results). Krugman didn't say that QE wouldn't work. We did. Dean Baker is moving toward OUR position. His latest piece on SocSec is a clear indication. In it, he says that there is no reason that SocSec can't be funded out of general revenue FOREVER. That IS MMT. Affordability is not the issue. Why do you think he said that? We know Dean. We like him as a person. But he is NOT a macro economist, and he does not understand the monetary system/government finance. Same goes for Krugman. Not a macro person. Ellen Brown has gotten much better. Why? Because behind the scenes, she is sending e-mails like crazy, seeking input from Randy, Marshall and other MMTers!!! It's nuts. They love these guys, and they are getting their material from us.
snip
Stephanie
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