Yearly Archives: 2013

Framing Platinum Coin Seigniorage: A Working Document

Posted on February 5, 2013 by Devin Smith | 9 comments

Jack Foster proposed a framing document for High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage, in a recent comment he made on one of my posts. In response, I posted a six-part blog series to accommodate readers who prefer the blog format.

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9 Comments

Posted in Joe Firestone

Tagged #PCS, #TDC, $60 T coin, austerity, debt ceiling, Fiscal Policy, game-changing PCS, High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage, HVPCS, MMT, modern money theory, platinum coin seigniorage, Trillion Dollar Coin

The Dangerous Collapse of Public Enterprise

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Dan Kervick | 45 comments

By Dan Kervick

When economists talk about the role of government in economic recovery, they often focus on the question of whether or not we need more economic stimulus. They ask whether the government should temporarily change its fiscal policies – its taxing and spending decisions – to add some additional publicly financed spending to the economy and help jolt the private sector back to life. Continue reading →

45 Comments

Posted in Dan Kervick

Tagged austerity, unemployment

Austerity: the Political Struggle over Who Controls the Economy’s Liquidity

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Devin Smith | 25 comments

By Michael Hoexter

The austerity campaign, a favorite for the last four years of politicians and financial tycoons, remains a seemingly self-contradictory and baffling phenomenon for those who know that it goes against at least 80 years of economic wisdom regarding management of the economy. The campaign draws on irrational strains and inconsistencies in our economic self-understanding to turn politicians against the welfare of society and the economy as a whole as well as against their own interests as political leaders. Austerity appears to serve the perceived short-term interests of some sectors of the wealthy and the financial industry but the long-term interests of no one.

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25 Comments

Posted in Michael Hoexter

Tagged austerity, liquidity, MMT, Modern Monetary Theory

Framing Platinum Coin Seigniorage: Part Six, More Political/Economic Objections

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Devin Smith | 11 comments

By Joe Firestone

This series provides a framing document for Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS). In the five previous parts of the series, I pointed out that there are three classes of opponents of High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage (HVPCS, $30 T and above). The first and largest group opposes all Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS) of whatever type. The second, opposes HVPCS, but favors using the Trillion Dollar Coin (TDC) for the limited purpose of avoiding the debt ceiling. The third, opposes HVPCS, and doesn’t really favor using the TDC either, except, perhaps, as a last resort to avoid the debt ceiling. It favors an incremental approach to PCS beginning perhaps in the millions or billions in face value, and over a long period of time, after giving people years to adjust to Treasury using platinum coins with unusual, and unprecedented, face values, eventually building up to a TDC. Continue reading →

11 Comments

Posted in Joe Firestone

Tagged #PCS, #TDC, $60 T coin, beowulf, debt ceiling, Fiscal Policy, High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage, HVPCS, MMT, platinum coin seigniorage, Trillion Dollar Coin

Yglesias mimics “Mankiw Morality” and bashes Bastiat

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Devin Smith | 4 comments

By William K. Black
(Cross posted at Benzinga.com)

Roger Erickson brought to my attention a column by Matthew Yglesias that relates to the ethical issues I was discussing in my column yesterday about Yglesias’ ode to GHB (Geithner, Holder, and Breuer’s doctrine of immunity for the largest banks). (In deference to Yves’ endocrinologist, I am renaming it GBH (Brit-speak for “grievous bodily harm”).

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4 Comments

Posted in William K. Black

Tagged banksters, Bastiat, Mankiw morality, Matt Yglesias, MMT, Modern Monetary Theory

Framing Platinum Coin Seigniorage: Part Five, Institutional Objections

Posted on February 3, 2013 by Devin Smith | 8 comments

By Joe Firestone

This series provides a framing document for Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS). In the four previous parts of the series, I pointed out that there are three classes of opponents of High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage (HVPCS, $30 T and above). The first and largest group opposes all Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS) of whatever type. The second, opposes HVPCS, but favors using the Trillion Dollar Coin (TDC) for the limited purpose of avoiding the debt ceiling. The third, opposes HVPCS, and doesn’t really favor using the TDC either, except, perhaps, as a last resort to avoid the debt ceiling. It favors an incremental approach to PCS beginning perhaps in the millions or billions in face value, and over a long period of time, after giving people years to adjust to Treasury using platinum coins with unusual, and unprecedented, face values, eventually building up to a TDC.

Continue reading →

8 Comments

Posted in Joe Firestone

Tagged #PCS, #TDC, $60 T coin, beowulf, debt ceiling, Ezra Klein, Fiscal Policy, High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage, HVPCS, John Lounsbury, MMT, platinum coin seigniorage, Trillion Dollar Coin, warren mosler

The Quiet Coup

Posted on February 3, 2013 by Devin Smith | 10 comments

By Jon Denn*

No Budget No Pay means “Only Rich May Govern.” Could you afford to work for two or six years without pay? I think there’s a name for that. What is it, again? I can’t quite remember.

But if the broken Congress you’re a member of, can’t pass a budget that’s what’s going to happen. A block of rich members can simply filibuster the budget, as they almost always do every bill now. Even silently, which is really cowardly. And you go broke.

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10 Comments

Posted in Guest Blogger

Tagged No Budget No Pay

Framing Platinum Coin Seigniorage: Part Four, Political/Economic Objections

Posted on February 2, 2013 by Devin Smith | 13 comments

By Joe Firestone

This series provides a framing document for Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS). In the three previous parts of the series, I pointed out that there are three classes of opponents of High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage (HVPCS, $30 T and above). The first and largest group opposes all Platinum Coin Seigniorage (PCS) of whatever type. The second, opposes HVPCS, but favors using the Trillion Dollar Coin (TDC) for the limited purpose of avoiding the debt ceiling. The third, opposes HVPCS, and doesn’t really favor using the TDC either, except, perhaps, as a last resort to avoid the debt ceiling. It favors an incremental approach to PCS beginning perhaps in the millions or billions in face value, and over a long period of time, after giving people years to adjust to Treasury using platinum coins with unusual, and unprecedented, face values, eventually building up to a TDC.

Continue reading →

13 Comments

Posted in Joe Firestone

Tagged #PCS, #TDC, $60 T coin, beowulf, Black Swans, debt ceiling, Fiscal Policy, High Value Platinum Coin Seigniorage, HVPCS, MMT, modern money theory, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, platinum coin seigniorage, Trillion Dollar Coin

Fantasy Football, Platinum Futures and the Future of Platinum

Posted on February 2, 2013 by Devin Smith | 29 comments

By Dale Pierce

For the present, all MMT policy advocacy is fantasy football. Everything we talk about is real, and everything we help to prove or explain or demonstrate or clarify is important – and will be much, much more important in the future. And, of course, there’s nothing wrong with fantasy football – it’s a useful exercise for learning about and interpreting the game. Similarly, the extension of theoretical MMT principles to practical problem-solving is a useful – even a vital – exercise. But nothing we advocate today is really going to happen today – at least not in America. I still keep hoping that some high-up political figure in Latin America, or Latvia, or maybe Iceland will come out with an up-front endorsement, along with an explicitly MMT-informed political platform. And I think that’s a worthwhile goal for us as well – provided that we understand just what it is that we are doing.

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