By Dan Kervick
Bill Mitchell has a really great piece up today at his wonderful blog, billyblog. After briefly discussing the Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) emphasis on the operational realities of the monetary system, and asking whether or not it is important to situate those discussions of operations and macroeconomics in broader debates about ethics and morality, Bill lays out his own view:
The “operational reality” is factual and sufficient is one view. Just the massive loss of national income is a sufficient political motivation to do everything possible to avoid mass unemployment.
According to this narrow view, no further discussion about the other personal and societal costs (damage to physical and mental health; family breakdown; increased incidence of alcohol and substance abuse; increase crime rates; skill loss, and the rest of it) is needed and only leads to the accusation that MMT is mired in a contest of values rather than being about the cold, hard operational reality.
