‘New Captains of Industry’ Hosts Economic Roundtable with Mosler, Wray, and Norman
Posted by WARREN MOSLER on January 4th, 2011
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January 4th, 2011 at 7:53 pm
Who is smarter – mosler or jefferson?
When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe.
Thomas Jefferson
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
Thomas Jefferson
It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half
the wars of the world.
John F. Kennedy held a dinner in the white House for a group of the brightest minds in the nation at that time. He made this statement:”This is perhaps the assembly of the most
intelligence ever to gather at one time in the White House with the exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
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Gary Goodman Reply:
February 18th, 2012 at 4:45 pm
@strawberry picker, doesn’t comprehend the difference between public sector “debt” and private sector “debt”.
Public sector “debt” obligations to pay back those who saved their money in Treasury Bonds (like your bank when you open a passbook savings account), vs. our aggregate private sector debt we owe to creditor banks, which is weighing down our economy.
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January 4th, 2011 at 9:46 pm
I enjoyed listening to the round-table discussion and think that each of the participants offered enlightening advice (with which I was already familiar). However, I doubt that this type of radio show will find a limited audience of people who already are familiar with MMT ideas/procedures, etc. While Wray, Mosler, and Norman know what is needed to get the economy going, MMT really needs a more charismatic leader who understands not only what these guys know, but is able to explain why the messages being propagated by the ‘deficit terrorist’ factions are nonsensical; such a person should be able to communicate with the non-specialist so that that group could communicate to others ideas which will reveal that the messages offered by ‘deficit terrorist’ are based upon false assumptions, ignorance, or cunning. If the host of the blogtalkradio.com (George Jarkesy) is unfamiliar with modern money concepts, one can rest assured that such a state of ignorance is rather wide-spread.
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Kristjan Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 5:12 pm
It was great.
(((While Wray, Mosler, and Norman know what is needed to get the economy going, MMT really needs a more charismatic leader)))
Norman is charismatic and well known.:)
I wander why Galbraith doesn’t participate in discussions like this. He’s got all the reputation in the world.
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mike norman Reply:
January 6th, 2011 at 10:21 am
Kristjan,
I asked Galbraith, but he said he was traveling and would not be available until mid January. Maybe we’ll do another one with him in it this time.
-Mike Norman
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January 4th, 2011 at 9:49 pm
in the above, the second sentence should read:
However, I suspect ………….
By the way, this type of oversight might be avoided if a preview step were available/included.
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January 5th, 2011 at 3:17 am
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2010/12/anecdotes-on-payroll-tax-cut.html
SO much for the payroll tax holiday, with the medical increases eating up all the savings, nobody is gonna feel all that extra income you promised Warren – ooops! The oracle didn’t see that one coming did he? ;)
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Matt Franko Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 7:58 am
Strawb,
2% is not a ‘holiday’. this payroll tax cut of 2% is about a wash for the fiscal stance as along with it they deleted the Making work Pay tax credit that was part of the 2009 ‘stimulus’ act.
Status quo.
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strawberry picker Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 12:46 pm
You are right Matt, a full payroll tax holiday will put more money in people’s pockets. But as mish says with new taxes/fees coming around the corner from governments, and mosler says with oil price rises, it is all ultimately going to go up in smoke. Matt down here in the real world away from the ivory towers there are LOTS of company/government workers whose only purpose on this planet is to figure out ways to extract more money from me and every other common man. Let me offer a couple realworld anecdotes. The local traffic light has had a camera installed and they have shortened the yellow light to allow only 1 fast car through the light. I have to drive my strawberry truck loaded with strawberries very slow or they will fall out, I can’t make it through this light in time, 125 dollar ticket each time (it has gotten me 3 times now) Also just before Xmas at Sam’s Club I was parked over the lines in the parking spaces by maybe 1/2 an inch, 2 citizen enforcers working for the sheriff’s dept (2 old guys) wrote me a ticket that cost 250 dollars, and they wrote a lot of other people tickets too who weren’t parked perfectly in the lines (I was in a handicap space with my handicap sticker but they didn’t care) Through new fines, taxes, fees, rising food prices, oil prices, education price rises, medical price rises, good lord the treadmill they got me running on never stops. People with babies, oh my god they have it even worse. It’s like jefferson said above, too much population growth and game over dude. You big brained economists haven’t done anything with our legislators regarding population limit laws and jefferson said 200 years ago you better watch out, all you guys are so silly, pennywise, but poundfoolish, or missing the forest for the trees. You talk about legislation for one small little monetary reform, where population control reform would have brought the big gains.
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beowulf Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 11:46 pm
“down here in the real world away from the ivory towers there are LOTS of company/government workers whose only purpose on this planet is to figure out ways to extract more money from me and every other common man.”
Glad you mentioned that (especially the government workers part). In recent years, many local governments have gotten rather… entrepreneurial in their revenue generation. That’s made people even more anti-government (even against Uncle Sam) than they’d otherwise be. Matt Taibbi has written about this,
Tea Party rhetoric, which cleverly exploits Main Street frustrations over genuinely intrusive state and local governments that are constantly in the pockets of small businesses for fees and fines and permits.
http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/148855/taibbi%3A_the_tea_party_moron_complex
One way to tackle this demand for revenue it is to give a federal tax credit for all state and local taxes paid on land portion of property taxes. Local politicians aren’t stupid, they’d quickly put as much of their revenue needs on land as possible, otherwise their constituents would be paying federal taxes they didn’t have to.
January 5th, 2011 at 4:45 am
Wm Wilson, Mike Norman seems to be doing a good job of leading the MMT charge on Fox.
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January 5th, 2011 at 9:02 am
Senexx, I agree that Mike is doing a good job on both Fox and on the blogtalkradio.com segment; in fact, I think that each of the MMT proponents did an excellent job of explaining things on G Jarkesy’s round-table. Each of these individuals have other time-obligations and can devote only a limited portion of their efforts to this sort of activity.
By the way, Warren Mosley mentioned that the people at Goldman Sachs have a comprehensive understanding of the modern money processes/relationships; however, they apparently haven’t gotten around to explaining to Ben Bernake or to Tim Geithner how to utilize such knowledge to facilitate a reduction in unemployment. Of course, Goldman Sachs’ mandate is to profiteer in any way they see fit and they have no mandate to solve the unemployment dilemma facing this country; on the other hand, G S might inform their agents in the Executive Branch and at the Fed Reserve regarding their ostensible obligations to take advantage of that insight to explain to the President how to deal with the unemployment problems. If Mike Norman had such access, I suspect that he would be more than happy to inform the President how a jobs program could benefit the country with respect to rebuilding the infrastructure and any number of other problems which need to be dealth with. Mike might also explain the nonsensical nature of the programs endorsed by the ‘deficit hawks’ and their acolytes.
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January 5th, 2011 at 5:05 pm
I listened to the radio show. I ordered Warren’s book. I AGREE with the position that promotion of austerity is akin to promotion of increased suffering. I am TRYING to understand how (beyond operationally, which I get) our government can increase “spending” without, somewhere down the road, a whole sale and catastrophic (herd based) lack of trust in currency exploding in our faces.
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dan w Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 5:12 pm
A question:
Soooooo…….If the “herd” changed its collective perception about fiat money, and if that perception remained sanguine (for lack of a batter word), than we would never ever ever have another economic crisis?
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WARREN MOSLER Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 9:03 pm
there will still be shocks of various kinds, business failures where business fails to successfully compete for consumer dollars, but the policy response would likely limit damage to the real macro economy and real output and employment
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WARREN MOSLER Reply:
January 5th, 2011 at 9:01 pm
‘lack of trust’ in the currency isn’t an issue.
it’s all driven by the enforcement of tax liabilities, not faith.
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strawberry picker Reply:
January 6th, 2011 at 12:35 am
Enforcement of tax liabilities, punishing tax cheats, yah I hear you Warren. But tax cheat timmy got a raise and a promotion, while Wesley Snipes, who has entertained BILLIONS of people all over the globe with demolition man and blade and other movies rots in prison right now. The jesse jackson’s and maxine waters of the world, along with the Dr. Malveaux know this aint right, and there is going to be a reckoning of biblical proportions.
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dan w Reply:
January 6th, 2011 at 1:16 pm
@ Warren
RE: Tax Liabilities vs. Faith
I understand your argument vis-a-vis operational and accounting realities. But what about from an “economic” (aka, herding behavior) standpoint? And yes, my point is more normative and political than accounting-based and operational. At what point does “faith” in a currency regime falter, regardless of operational truths? My contention is that THIS is one of MMT’s biggest challenges: getting folks to truly grok the distinction between operational/accounting truths and our normative predisposition toward reactive thought and action.
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WARREN MOSLER Reply:
January 8th, 2011 at 9:14 am
not sure it ever matters all that much?
in 1998, for example, the russian cb officials simply walked out, and didn’t come back for several months.
there was pretty much no functioning ruble payment system
there was no faith in the currency at all, or in much else over there
but the ruble just went from 6.45 per dollar to about 30 per dollar, where it’s pretty much been ever since.
and arguably where it ‘should’ have been if they had’t been pegging it to the dollar.
yes, it dropped by maybe 75% in value, but it didn’t go to 0
nor did it fall continuously after the initial drop, so in that sense there was no inflation (a continuous fall in the currency) but instead a one time adjustment
and the entire gdp of russia continues to be bought and sold in rubles
Same in Mexico in the mid 90′s when the peso dropped from maybe 3.5 to the dollar to about 10 to the dollar when that regime blew up.
It too has pretty much been there after that one time adjustment, again even with absolutely no faith in the currency.
So I see no evidence it’s ever actually been about faith.
Best I can tell, those faith based theories come from people who haven’t thought about tax liabilities as creating the nominal demand for a currency
January 6th, 2011 at 6:58 am
http://www.321gold.com/editorials/casey/casey033009.html
This bud’s for you Tom Hickey. 2 CIA guys telling you how to survive. Way before you came here Tom, back on the old BBS board, mosler was telling me all of society rests on the willingness of a thug with a gun to blow your brains out and do violence(IRS man). And here Mosler is again re-iterating, it all rests on the ability of the STATE to be able to FORCE you to pay taxes, that is all that ultimately creates the demand for the currency. That force ultimately manifests itself at the end of a gun and even in his business card example Mosler has to have a gun to blow your brains out if you want out of the room but don’t have his business cards – see what a violent barbaric thug he really is deep down in his core (unlike the star trek memes I grew up with – I never heard about taxes on the enterprise once Mr. Sulu!)
Look at how out of control “the machine” is http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12124830
Look at our government agents like our secretary of state, hillary clinton is more worried about her personal holy mission of taking down roman polanski because he got a little sex 30 years ago instead of dealing with all the REAL issues raised with wikileaks and such. (I think it is her way of getting back at clinton for the cigar stuff, and obama for beating her as president – etc etc – lot of gender hate in that woman)
The system is out of control, it is beyond the governments ability to enforce tax law, and many other laws, this new fatca and other offshore stuff to try and get the mosler’s who are doing all kinds of offshore tax shenanagins is not going to ultimately work. The thug in the room with the gun is being overrun by too many citizens and he just doesn’t have enough bullets to shoot them all – game over dude. Or to use warren’s bowling alley analogy, the bums have overrun the alley, peeing on the pins, and the one security guard just can’t police the 5000 bums in the small bowling alley. As Borf said to Space Ace – You cannot win. I find it HILARIOUS warren sitting up on his super yacht paying 3% taxes IF THAT MUCH talking about tax enforcement on the rest of us in the 30% or higher category – BWAHAHA! LOL! Not me dude, warren mosler and tax cheat timmy have shown me the way – FREEDOM!
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Tom Hickey Reply:
January 6th, 2011 at 1:22 pm
I wouldn’t know much about this sort of thing. I operate in terms of the gift economy.
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January 6th, 2011 at 1:00 pm
So Strawpicker, I guess the answer is to NOT give the payroll tax holiday and have to spend an even higher percentage of current income on health care and gasoline. Surely you dont think that the healthcare costs and oil prices will rise BECAUSE of the tax holidays do you?
What do you propose as a population control measure? Incinerators, banishment to Antarctica, sterilization?
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strawberry picker Reply:
January 6th, 2011 at 3:30 pm
Greg says: Surely you dont think that the healthcare costs and oil prices will rise BECAUSE of the tax holidays do you?
Au contrare mon frere, that is EXACTLY what I think is going to happen. As mish pointed out in another piece that has been posted here, healthcare cost rises have offset the 2% payroll cut in some places. Look lotsa folks out there in the world have large computers with excellent demographic data connected with experian and such to know exactly how much income you get down to the last penny. They have no other purpose in life than to figure out how to get that last penny out of your wallet, by hook or by crook, they will! Mosler is telling you those saud boys are rising oil prices with no good reasons for doing so other that what seems pure GREED, and mish is telling you states and governments are going to find every trick in the book to get that extra money from you because they are starving to death. I already told you they have put a traffic light camera up and they intentionally shortened the yellow light to screw over the citizens, it serves NO PUBLIC PURPOSE what so ever and in fact has increased traffic accidents at that light from people slamming on breaks afraid of getting snapped. Here is what makes me sick and sad for US citizens though, if something like that had been done in thomas jeffersons day – 100 people would have immediately gotten thier guns and shot that traffic light camera out of existence, but today we have so many BEAT DOWN mules not one person even thinks about shooting down that VILE EVIL camera, much less doing it.
Greag says: What do you propose as a population control measure? Incinerators, banishment to Antarctica, sterilization?
Dude, I saw the leader of china on TV about 10 years ago saying we would be idiots in the USA to wait until we got so CROWDED to start adopting measures like they already had to adopt to deal with thier problems, that he was advising us to be smart and look to the future and plan appropriately. Thomas Jefferson said 200 years ago keep a handle on population problems or we would become as corrupt as europe, nobody listened. I think warren is wondering if we need another 2 billion shopping machines clogging up the system. Let me give you a real world example though, sara palin has talked about death squads, and they killed my dad in a grossly negligent way that the chief of staff said he cannot believe happened – the number of people that should have caught the error and didn’t was staggering to him. So maybe as sara palin says, that is already one solution your friendly government is implementing. What would I propose – easy – warren and crew want a managed economy – controlled by the government and its policies – well supply and demand are simple things – why should crackhead parents get to have 4 babies, free food, free housing, babies addicted to crack at birth? Thomas jefferson talked about that too in his quotes I posted. Now who do you want to listen too, Jefferson who founded a country, or mosler and crew who can’t even run a successful senatorial campaign and failed in getting the MMT word out to the masses?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tb8rSmsBRZ4
Look they just demolished this guys house by mistake, the system is out of control.
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strawberry picker Reply:
January 6th, 2011 at 3:42 pm
Greg there was a water conference over at my local university, blue gold – water wars – check it out. I asked the dudes giving the talks about the films why do the governments allow unabated population expansion if we have already run out of cheap fresh water to keep the masses happy, thriving and productive. He said you can’t tell a woman what she can do with her own body! My former fiance got pregnant, I wanted the baby, her dad did not want her to have the baby because I was not the right religion, my baby got murdered and I had no say in the matter, even though I helped create it, my baby had no rights, and I just recently went to Honduras and slept with an 18 year old and have now found out I possible violated some laws that say I can’t sleep with a woman under 21 when I am overseas. So the state really confuses me, I have relatives who got married at 14 in the USA legally, but if they go to honduras and sleep with an 18 year old they committ international felonies, but we can’t tell a woman what to do with her own body, even if that means killing the baby you want. It is all so messed up, mother nature is going to fix this for us, the violent ugly animal way it looks like.
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Greg Reply:
January 7th, 2011 at 8:55 am
This over crowding/overpopulation tripe is a myth.
Do you realize that we could give every family of four in the world a 40yd x 40yd piece of land and fit them ALL within the borders of the state of Texas?
Theres plenty of land, resources, energy potential to provide everyone with their basic needs. What we lack is the political/economic system to accomplish this. Our earth is not the limit our own empathy is.
Greg Reply:
January 7th, 2011 at 9:02 am
Actually, I need to revise my math from above. It would be a 20yd x 20yd piece of property for a family of four or about 33ft x 33ft per person.
Matt Franko Reply:
January 7th, 2011 at 9:36 am
Greg,
Can you run the numbers here: Global Pop/4, Land area of TX divided by that #, converted to sq ft, etc… this is interesting…
Resp,
January 7th, 2011 at 12:31 pm
Well, there is 268,820 sq miles in Texas which is 7,494,271,488,000 sqft or about 7.5 trillion sqft
There was 6,908,688,000 people on earth in 2010 or about 7 billion
Divide 7.5 trillion by 7 billion and you get a little over 1000 sqft per person (33×33)
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