04 | October | 2013 | New Economic Perspectives

Daily Archives: October 4, 2013

Stop “the Great Betrayal:” Kabuki Update

Posted on October 4, 2013 by Joe Firestone | 23 comments

It now looks like the big media and leaders in both parties are no longer focusing on the Government Shutdown crisis, but are now moving on to the notion that the shutdown is melding with the upcoming probable breaching of the debt limit to create a combined mother of all fiscal crises. Along with this, the media and many politicians, encouraged by the President’s standing “strong, strong, strong,” are now directing attention away from whether ObamaCare will be delayed or compromised, to other types of ransom the Administration might pay in return for both re-opening the Government and also providing an increase of an undetermined amount in the debt limit. Meanwhile there are reports that under increasing Wall Street pressure John Boehner is preparing to negotiate with House Democrats and allow a vote to pass a CR and a clean debt limit increase bill, in return for concessions he can take back to his caucus.

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Posted in Joe Firestone

Tagged #PCS, $60 Trillion Coin, 14th Amendment, austerity, bill black, debt ceiling, debt limit, debt limit crisis options, debt-subject-to-the-limit, default, deficit spending, Ezra Klein, grand bargain, great betrayal, High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage, jamie galbraith, kabuki, Mark Patterson, MMT, modern money theory, President Obama, public debt, Richard J. Eskow, WaPo, Yves Smith

The “Hyper-meritocracy” – an Oxymoron Led by Criminal Morons

Posted on October 4, 2013 by Devin Smith | 34 comments

By William K. Black

This column was prompted by William Galston’s review of Tyler Cowen’s new book Average is Over. Galston’s column worries about the huge, permanent underclass that Cowen envisions will grow in the United States. I write to challenge Cowen’s assumption that winners will prevail through a process of “hyper-meritocracy.” Cowen’s embrace of Social Darwinism assumes that the winners have a selective advantage that arises from “merit” – which Cowen conflates with the ability to create wealth. This is passing strange as we are still suffering from an orgy of wealth destruction led by the “winners.” The people who grew wealthiest were often the people must responsible for the largest destruction of wealth in history. In this first column I show that it is the most anti-meritocratic system. We do not live in a “winner-take-all” Nation. We increasingly live in a “cheater-take-all” system.

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