After early speculation that President Peña Nieto would unveil his much anticipated tax reform during the 2013 spring congressional session (February 1st – April 30th), Finance Minister Luis Videgaray recently confirmed that the comprehensive tax and expenditure package would not be unveiled until the second half of this year. According to Videgaray and other PRI … Read more
Here’s an unintentionally hilarious piece by Tim Worstall at Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2015/01/12/watch-out-mmts-about-as-bernie-sanders-hires-stephanie-kelton/2/ Watch out, he warns, MMT has come to Washington! Our nation’s capital! No doubt ruin and wastage will follow. Why? Well. Nothing wrong with the theory of Modern Money Theory, he admits. “It’s not actually that I disagree very much with the economics that … Read more
Some of you will remember that MMT got its first huge mainstream exposure through a Washington Post article written by Dylan Matthews: http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/modern-monetary-theory-is-an-unconventional-take-on-economic-strategy/2012/02/15/gIQAR8uPMR_story.html He’s just written another excellent story, this time about Stephanie Kelton going to Washington: http://www.vox.com/2015/1/10/7521819/sanders-mmt-kelton?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=vox&utm_content=share:article:top Finally, there might be an alternative to the deficit hawk and timid deficit dove lovefest! As Dylan … Read more
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today that the unemployment rate dropped to 5.6 percent in December, a new low for the recovery. For the first time in years, the unemployment rate has fallen to the range of 5.25-5.75 percent that the Fed considers consistent with its mandate to maintain full employment. In the same … Read more
UPDATE: Videos of the dinner are available here: http://vimeo.com/album/3204041 My presentation is in the middle of this one: http://vimeo.com/116271370 I just returned from the annual ASSA meetings in Boston. This is largely a front for the American Economics Association to produce an appearance of pluralism. The ASSA is actually run by the AEA, which allocates … Read more
First posted Jan. 6, updated Jan 26. Updates in italics Yesterday Greek voters overwhelmingly rejected the policies of extreme austerity favored by its Eurozone partners. Yes, Greece’s problems are, at least in part homemade. No outside powers forced it to run the excessive deficits that fed an overheated boom in the years leading up to … Read more
My remarks proved as prophetic as I’d feared. The crisis I predicted then is still casting shockwaves through the world economy, and may do so for generations to come.At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland that year, I said that imbalances in the Eurozone would come to a climax — which might lead to … Read more
OK, it is now official. The Owl has Flown. Stephanie Kelton is on her way to Washington. Here’s a clip from the press. Sanders names ‘deficit owl’ his chief economist BY: Joseph LawlerDecember 26, 2014 http://m.washingtonexaminer.com/sanders-names-deficit-owl-his-chief-economist/article/2557903 A prominent advocate of bigger deficits and unconventional economics will be Sen. Bernie Sanders’ chief economist when he becomes … Read more
1.Debt restructuring options for Greece It is generally agreed that public debt continues to pose a major problem for Greece. The IMF expects debt to decline to 124% of GDP by 2020, while annual rates of growth are projected at a little less than 3%. To achieve this target Greece has been forced to adopt … Read more
Russia’s economy is in trouble. Growth has come to a halt. A recession looms in 2015. Inflation, interest rates, and capital flight are up. The government’s budget is under strain. More than any of these, what makes the headlines is the plunge of the ruble, which, at one point in mid-December, had lost half of … Read more