Twitter: @rodgermitchell; Search #monetarysovereignty
Facebook: Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Mitchell’s laws:
●The more federal budgets are cut and taxes increased, the weaker an economy becomes.
●Austerity is the government’s method for widening the gap between rich and poor, which ultimately leads to civil disorder.
●Until the 99% understand the need for federal deficits, the upper 1% will rule.
●To survive long term, a monetarily non-sovereign government must have a positive balance of payments.
●Those, who do not understand the differences between Monetary Sovereignty and monetary non-sovereignty, do not understand economics.
●The penalty for ignorance is slavery.
●Everything in economics devolves to motive.
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To try to sense how the “man-in-the-street” thinks, I read and comment on various blogs — conservative, liberal and somewhere in between.
The conservative blogs, of late, have been taken over by crazies, and that is a shame. There is a great need for sane discussion from sane perspectives, but when sanity disappears and one side presents absurd arguments, the discussion disintegrates.
I’m not sure where the craziness began. Was it with Sarah Palin? Michele Bachmann? Newt Gingrich? The Tea Party? A good case could be made for any of them. Surely, it was well established by the time Herman Cain and Ted Cruz came to the spotlight.
If you still harbor any doubts that the once proud Republican party is in the hands of the crazies, I offer these examples:
Report: 5.8 Million People Lose Access To Medicaid Due To GOP Obstruction
By Elissa Gomez“A pattern has emerged that reveals that states with the highest rates of uninsured residents are among the least likely to expand Medicaid and to establish state-based exchanges,” Gallup’s Dan Witters noted in the report.
and
Study: States That Refused Medicaid Expansion Will Lose Billions
By Ben FeuerherdThe Affordable Care Act states that the federal government is responsible for paying 100 percent of the cost of expanding Medicaid for the first three years. After that, the federal government covers 90 percent of the cost.
Accepting the expansion is a common-sense economic move by states, according to the study’s authors. They write:
States that choose to participate in the Medicaid expansion will gain considerable new federal funds. States often seek to increase their share of federal funds, lobbying for military bases, procurement contracts, and highway funds. Federal funding provides direct benefits and bolsters local economies.
As the Washington Post notes, Texas will miss out on the most federal funding [$9.2 billion], but all states who refused the expansion will lose funds offered by the federal government. Louisiana, Oklahoma and Wisconsin will pass up more than $1 billion, while bigger states like Georgia, Missouri, North Carolina and Virginia will miss out on more than $2 billion in federal funds.
It’s terrible enough for a state’s governor intentionally to throw away billions, but to do it while denying healthcare to its poorest citizens is beyond unconscionable.
And then, there’s this:
Unprecedented Attack On Evolution ‘Indoctrination’ Mounted In Missouri
DYLAN SCOTT – FEBRUARY 14, 2014A Missouri lawmaker has proposed what ranks among the most anti-evolution legislation in recent years, which would require schools to notify parents if “the theory of evolution by natural selection” was being taught at their child’s school and give them the opportunity to opt out of the class.
State Rep. Rick Brattin (R), who sponsored the bill, told a local TV station last week that teaching only evolution in school was “indoctrination.”
“It’s an absolute infringement on people’s beliefs,” Brattin told the Kansas City Star. “What’s being taught is just as much faith and, you know, just as much pulled out of the air as, say, any religion.”
Finally, if you enjoy reading about crazies, here’s a whole pack of them, for your amusement:
Yes, politicians, the media and the mainstream economists have been bribed by the upper 1%, to widen the gap between the rich and the rest. And the conservatives are more extreme in their desire to suck up to the rich than are the liberals (especially since there are almost no liberals left in government).
But the degree of right-wing craziness seems grown to a remarkable degree, often having nothing to do with economics or with anything else in human experience.
And I don’t know why.
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty
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Nine Steps to Prosperity:
1. Eliminate FICA (Click here)
2. Federally funded Medicare — parts A, B & D plus long term nursing care — for everyone (Click here)
3. Provide an Economic Bonus to every man, woman and child in America, and/or every state a per capita Economic Bonus. (Click here) Or institute a reverse income tax.
4. Free education (including post-grad) for everyone. Click here
5. Salary for attending school (Click here)
6. Eliminate corporate taxes (Click here)
7. Increase the standard income tax deduction annually
8. Increase federal spending on the myriad initiatives that benefit America’s 99% (Click here)
9. Federal ownership of all banks (Click here)
—–
10 Steps to Economic Misery: (Click here:)
1. Maintain or increase the FICA tax..
2. Spread the myth Social Security, Medicare and the U.S. government are insolvent.
3. Cut federal employment in the military, post office, other federal agencies.
4. Broaden the income tax base so more lower income people will pay.
5. Cut financial assistance to the states.
6. Spread the myth federal taxes pay for federal spending.
7. Allow banks to trade for their own accounts; save them when their investments go sour.
8. Never prosecute any banker for criminal activity.
9. Nominate arch conservatives to the Supreme Court.
10. Reduce the federal deficit and debt
No nation can tax itself into prosperity, nor grow without money growth. Monetary Sovereignty: Cutting federal deficits to grow the economy is like applying leeches to cure anemia.
Two key equations in economics:
1. Federal Deficits – Net Imports = Net Private Savings
2. Gross Domestic Product = Federal Spending + Private Investment and Consumption – Net Imports
THE RECESSION CLOCK
As the federal deficit growth lines drop, we approach recession, which will be cured only when the lines rise. Federal deficit growth is absolutely, positively necessary for economic growth. Period.
#MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY
#Monetary Sovereignty - Mitchell 
If Palin et al. do indeed know about MMT/MS, and still are proponents of their policy “solutions” and platforms (reduce government!, balance the budget!, etc.) that they are running on, then they are just as bad as what we already have (from both parties).
If they don’t know, and they do get elected, then God help us. Hopefully, some career bureaucrat specialist who does know MMT/MS would calmly explain to them everything, but I’m not optimistic that that would help. I remember hearing from Warren Mosler sometime that there are fed. bureaucrats do know, but they just need better PR I suppose.
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http://www.moneynews.com/LarryKudlow/janet-yellen-federal-reserve-employment-economy/2014/02/14/id/552938
“Yellen’s Rules-Deficient Fed Can’t Control Employment”
@RMM: This doesn’t sound right. Wouldn’t increased spending increase aggregate demand, thereby enabling increase in employment?
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http://www.moneynews.com/StreetTalk/Tom-Perkins-taxation-rich-investor/2014/02/14/id/552964
“Investor Tom Perkins: Govt Seeks ‘Economic Extinction’ of the Wealthy”
Just thought this was funny. The sad thing is, the public, and Tea party people will probably believe him.
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In answer to your question, increased federal spending and/or reduced federal taxation increase the money supply and so increase demand and GDP, just as you said.
If I were President, I would tell the Fed Chairman, “You have one job, and one job only. Prevent inflation above 2%. Forget about stimulating the economy. You can’t do it. You don’t have the tools. Stimulationg the economy is the job of Congress and me.”
Unfortunately, Congress and the President want everyone to believe the Fed should stimulate the economy. It all relates back to the Big Lie.
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im perplexed at how perplexed you are. you stated previosly that you were pushing 80, certainly you were awake during the 60s and 70s, during the civil rights movement, during the spatial deconcentration efforts of the johnson administration, during nixon’s southern strategy, etc., etc.. were you that detached from the people, from the so called minority experience? the crazies, aka racist(also sexist/homophobes), may be running the show, but they have always been there. if anything, it is the gerrymandering efforts (mostly the gop) that gives the crazies power, and allows them to flex their muscle and challenge incumbent republicans…. and it is not a coincidence that the majority of states refusing ACA medicaid expansion also seek ways to make it harder for its populace to vote (state i.d. laws based on nonexistent arguments of voter fraud). both of which effect so called minorities in great numbers.
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Right. As I said, craziness always has been with us, but right wing craziness seems especially — well, crazy — today.
I don’t think the civil rights movement was crazy. Do you?
And spatial deconstruction may have been misguided, but not nearly to the level of crazy we see today.
Nixon’s southern strategy was cynical, yes. Evil, yes. But not at all crazy.
The Southerners still vote anti-black first and anti-brown second. That southern strategy was powerful!
So, my question remains, why are the Republicans so much crazier today?
What’s your answer?
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hate to beat a dead horse, but most of my analysis of what ails this country boils down to the perceived devolution of white supremacy in the eyes of certain segments of the white masses. if anything the heightened craziness is to be expected. you have a depression, a black president, brown people from south of the border “taking your jobs”, evil faceless brown terrorists in far off lands, etc. and one must always have in mind that we live in a fascist state. religion (christianity) and state power are king….. and when i mentioned the 60s and 70s i was documenting hate endemic to this society. the craziness is a natural byproduct when the hate and seeming powerlessness (of economic fortunes) coincide. i mean, just think about it, you have to be at an extreme level of cognitive dissonance to time again vote against your own economic interest. say what you will about black people, they at least align themselves with the folk that will improve their lives (im an independent, a socialist if you will) if only marginally.
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@blacksocialist, I support and appreciate your perspective in this “probably-otherwise-all-white” forum, though I may not thoroughly understand all of your points. My own white perspective is one of historical “elitism”, by which I mean the propensity to dehumanizing those outside their “tribe (club)”. European white cultures have arguably been the biggest perpetrators, but numerous other examples exist throughout history, including the Aztecs, the Songhay Empire et al.
I perceive the issue in today’s economic quandary to not only continue the practice of dehumanizing non-white races, but to extend their elitist philosophies, practices, and power to dehumanize what is now considered the 99% (as if they already haven’t been thinking and trying to do this).
Perhaps, if I understand one of your points, the white “underclass” is feeling some of the pain that minorities have been experiencing for a long time. In that regard, I hope all of the economically depressed can work together to claim our human right to a sustainable existence in a world now operating according to the rules of the game of Monopoly, where the financial elite are the bankers.
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jeff – if by underclass you mean working class, aka the 90-95%, then yes you understand my point. my overall points shouldn’t be that hard to understand if one has a cursory understanding of this nation’s history. what didn’t you understand? your middle paragraph clearly articulates my main point, that the oligarchs have used race and the fear of the “other” to distract from the main issues, and the white masses, having been led to believe that they are special and above the fray, have realized that maybe they aren’t that special, and maybe they do have more in common with the so called minorities. remains to be seen whether they take the next logical step….
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I believe we are on the same page here. I haven’t thought of it in terms of white masses being led to believe they are special, but clearly that has been, and probably still is, the case. Maybe that’s because I never considered myself “special” in relationship with any class of people, but then again…
I hope that one of the benefits of this financial debacle is to more closely bond our common humanity. Thanks for your input.
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“Why are Republicans so mud crazier today?” My answer: Economic ignorance and people (the rich and politicians) seeking to benefit by taking advantage of people’s ignorance of MMT and MS. We weren’t really Monetarily Sovereign back then. The 60’s obviously occurred before 1971, before we became essentially fully Monetary Sovereign. The apparent political and economic policy warfare by the super rich in promoting the gap between the 1% vs. 99% is just an added enhancement in furthering their increase in wealth.
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This comment responds not to the “crazies” (which are good entertainment and clear evidence of ignorance and wrong-doing) but to the CHARTS that accompany this and all new posts. The obvious implication of current data is we are headed for recession. I have no problem with the assertion or evidence, but the obvious question is “WHEN”?
The 1950-present data does not seem predictive, as small falls in Federal debt are followed by immediate recession, and at other times, much deeper declines require much longer to trigger recession. I’m not really qualified to do this (Chem E here, not Economist), but it would seem that knowledge of the data for the variables in the “2 Key Equations” and perhaps a little regression &/or calculus, would allow us to make predictions of “how close” we are to recession. After all, recession is a simple state of a fall in GDP for two quarters. Right?
Did I miss discussion of this, or attempts to solve for time, somewhere else???
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If I could answer the “when,” I’d be the richest man on the planet.
As you now know, GDP = Federal Spending + Non-federal Spending + Net Exports. Simple enough? Maybe not, because the devil is in the details:
1. We don’t know what Federal Spending will be in the future.
2. Not knowing #1, we don’t know how much it will affect Non-federal Spending
3. We also don’t know the future of inflation, which affects Net Exports
4. We don’t know the future of oil prices, which affects inflation.
5. So not knowing the future of #1, #2, #3 and #4, we don’t understand employment, unemployment, salaries, and on and on.
There are many, many more things we cannot predict, which is why sometimes only a few years of insufficient Federal Spending growth is enough to result in recession, and sometimes more years are needed.
You might wish to read: “The economics of chaos. What we know for sure,” which is a post written a few days ago on this blog.
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One complicating factor is that figures from the Fed and the US government are less trustworthy than ever. For example, does anyone believe the US government’s unemployment figures?
Consider the massive and ever-growing gap between the real economy and the financial economy (i.e. Wall Street and the rigged “markets”).
The financial economy is great, and is setting records, but the real economy is in a depression. Everywhere you look, small business are failing, and small stores and restaurants are shutting down. The number of applicants keeps growing for every remaining job opening.
However, the Fed and the corporate media pretend that the financial economy and the real economy are one and the same thing. Hence they claim that despite our growing poverty and inequality, we are all enjoying a perpetual and ever-growing “recovery.”
They also claim that we are enjoying a rising per capita GDP.
(As I noted before, if one person gets a trillion dollars, and 999 people get only one dollar each, the the per capita gain for the 1,000 people is one billion dollars each, even though 999 of them are in poverty.)
You might wonder how we can be in a “recovery” if the US government is supposedly “broke,” and has a “debt crisis.”
But that’s the Big Lie for you. Not only does the Big Lie conceal reality; it deactivates most people’s brains, rendering them semi-comatose.
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The religious right just keeps topping itself.
Kansas also is the state that doesn’t want evolution to be taught.
When they get rid of all the intelligent people, gay people, compassionate people, pregnant women and poor people, who will be left in Kansas?
Oops sorry. There is no “left” in Kansas
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I have often remarked on Kansas’ amazing shift from a hotbed of leftist populism to a bastion of right-wing madness. In the mid-1850s, Kansas had its own mini-civil-war over slavery, and the abolitionists won.
The issue was not freedom for slaves, but equality for average whites. The “Free State” people (i.e. Kansas abolitionists) feared that rich landowners who owned slaves would be able to make so much profits that they could buy and control all of Kansas.
While the “Free Staters” were not racially benevolent, they were hyper-sensitive to economic inequality and corporate greed.
Over time, rich conservatives eliminated that sensitivity by having average Kansans focus on issues like abortion, gay marriage, the teaching of evolution in schools, and so on. Today Kansas bickers over these issues while the gap between the rch and the rest keeps growing.
North Carolina went through the same process. The Raleigh-Durham area used to be liberal, and very well-read (judging by the sales of books and magazines). Today NC is ultra-right wing.
(Some people in NC join the “Moral Monday” marches and protests, but these are basically rallies to support Democrats, who are as dedicated to widening the wealth gap as are Republicans.)
Parts of Vermont have likewise shifted from the far left to the far right.
Texas has shifted from the ultra-hyper-extreme far right to the EVEN FARTHER right. Texas and Kansas play a game of one-upmanship. If Texas outlaws abortion, Kansas responds, “I’ll call you and raise you. We just legalized the lynching of homosexuals.”
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The entire spectrum has drifted right these last 30 or so years.
The Democrats are where the Republicans were 20-30 years ago, and the Republicans have moved right so there is a difference between them.
When I was a kid, a guy like Bernie Sanders would have stood in the center of Democratic thought. Now, he’s a fringe character, and is an Independent. .
It used to be Republicans would be willing to spend money if there was some benefit, and expected return, for business . Now, that’s a Democratic point, and the GOP has moved to “there shouldn’t be government spending”.
I’m waiting for the rubber band to snap, and there to be some kind of left in this country again.
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—Off topic—
For amusement…
DEFICIT HAWKS GO BROKE
The archaic phrase “Hoist with his own petard” (from Shakespeare’s play “Hamlet”) refers to an evil person who is foiled by his own greed and arrogance.
The phrase applies to “The Can Kicks Back” group, which is dedicated to privatizing entitlements so that billions in FICA tax revenue will flow to Wall Street. Come April the group will be flat broke. So says their communications director Nick Troiano.
“The Can Kicks Back” started in November 2012 with a donation from Pete Peterson’s group, the “Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.” Peterson soon decided that“The Can Kicks Back” was useless, as were its main spokesmen, Erskine Bowles and former Sen. Alan Simpson.
(Back in Aug 2010 when austerity mania officially became a global plague, Simpson called Social Security a, “Milk cow with 310 million tits,” and Social Security recipients, “Useless geezers.”)
The “Can Kicks Back” clowns were on the verge of bankruptcy, but in June 2013 they were given $250,000 by hedge fund manager Stan Druckenmiller, who wants to start a “generational war” between young people and their retired parents. Druckenmiller (who is one of the “Fix the Debt” clowns) hoped that his “generational war” would finally bring about the privatization of Social Security.
That was six months ago. Today, no one will give any money to “The Can Kicks Back.”
What went wrong? Why did the campaign flop so horribly? Ironically, because right-wing billionaires succeeded in their goal to impoverish the masses. Since young Americans have no jobs, and no way to pay off their massive and compounding student loan debt (and no way to discharge that debt through bankruptcy), they don’t care about the “deficit crisis” or the “national debt crisis.” They only care about finding enough money to pay for food and rent.
Furthermore the parent group (“Fix the Debt”) had an image problem. Today’s young Americans are the most racially diverse in US history, and anyone who checked the “Fix the Debt” web site with its member photos (mainly CEOs, hedge fund managers, etc) saw that the members were 75% male and 100% white. This created an image of rich and greedy “old white guys.” That image doesn’t play well in a multi-racial American society that the “greedy white guys” are crushing via a gratuitous depression. (The youth target for “Can Kicks Back” propaganda was “millennials,” or “Generation Y,” meaning people born between 1980 and 2000.)
Finally, Pete Peterson’s name is so hated (like the Koch brothers) that all the lies about the “deficit crisis” and “national debt crisis” can be shut down with a simple question: “Did you know that the Can-Kicks-Back thing was started by Pete Peterson?” Even college kids know that whenever Peterson is involved, it’s a scam to make rich people richer at the expense of everyone else.
(Now if only the college kids would stop believing the Big Lie.)
Source: http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=A4B74432-6450-4EDE-9C68-BB7DE5880BC4
By the way, Pete Peterson, who will be 88 in June, says, “The idea of trying to make the money grow feels empty to me.”
http://www.newsweek.com/my-turn-pete-peterson-giving-away-1-billion-80225
Evidently Peterson’s only remaining thrill is to impoverish others by pushing the Big Lie.
In 2008 he used $1 billion to create the Pete Peterson Foundation, which is dedicated to “focusing on America’s key fiscal-sustainability challenges” (i.e. dedicated to widening the gap between the rich and the rest).
Peterson is also one of 40 billionaires who agreed to give at least half their wealth to “charity,” meaning projects to widen the wealth gap worldwide. Petersons “charity” was his own foundation. It is part of “The Giving Pledge,” a project started in 2010 by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates to address the image problem of inequality.
It’s the same with all rich philanthropists: they generously give to whatever will increase their fortune and / or increase the gap between the rich and the rest.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Giving_Pledge
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This article,from today’s NY Times is a tribute to the 1%. A quote from the next to last paragraph:
“[The 1%] contribute many millions in federal taxes, and other millions in state taxes. And those millions help fund schools, police departments and national defense for the rest of us.”.
The article was written by Harvard Economics Professor, N Gregory Mankiw. He makes no distinction between federal and state taxes in that comment. Aside from Mr. Mankiw’s ignorance of the effects of the gap, he has no clue about monetary sovereignty. Sigh.
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Mankiw is a well-paid university professor and lecturer — well paid to disseminate the Big Lie.
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By the way, Mankiw has been economist slime for many years. See: https://mythfighter.com/2010/04/27/the-federal-debt-is-unsustainable/
Also see:http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2014/02/stay-classy-greg-mankiw-rich-deserve-deserve.html
Greg Mankiw is an perfect example of what is wrong with economics today. An overly compensated mouthpiece for the rich, masquerading as a scientist.
Truly disgusting.
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Disgusting is an accurate word. In Mankiw’s rebuttal to Krugman, he used Dick Fuld as an example of what happened when risk takers fail.
Here is what I pulled off the web about Dick Fuld:
“He has a mansion in Greenwich, Conn., a 40-plus-acre ranch in Sun Valley, Idaho, as well as a five-bedroom home in Jupiter Island, Fla. He no longer has a place in Manhattan, since he sold his Park Avenue apartment in 2009 for $25.87 million.”
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2014/02/on-iron-men-of-wall-street.html
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/ceo-behind-lehman-collapse-isn-t-sorry-dick-131017662.html
This isn’t about jealousy. This is about Mankiw’s example about what happens when the risks the bankers take go wrong. What happens is that you lose the Manhattan apartment.
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I watched this film on Netflix: “Death by China.” It complains about China being the cause of America’s unemployment, poor economy, etc.. I was wondering how much of it was true. Is it China’s or the 1%’s fault that America is being deindustrialized? So what if China makes more stuff than us, if we both benefit (for example, American’s are better for designing, China is better for actual manufacturing)?
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See: https://mythfighter.com/2012/04/16/a-think-piece-what-if-the-u-s-passed-a-law-against-exporting/
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http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/mitch-mcconnell-i-protect-nation/2014/02/16/id/553034
“Mitch McConnell: I Protected Nation from Default.”
Thank God America has Mitch McConnell to protect us and keep us safe. /Sarcasm Off/.
The malevolence of some of these politicians is amazing.
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