Debunking MMT

Moderate Right · Apr 26, 2016

JohnfrmClevelan said:
I'm with Absentglare on this - I really think that English isn't your first language.

Maybe that's why you are unable to learn the subject and formulate your own opinion on it. Reading comprehension problems.

Again with the insults. That's the only way you can counter the truth, by turning the tables and trying to intimidate the other without posting anything with substance yourself.

Moderate Right · Apr 26, 2016

Absentglare said:
You keep accusing me of making assertions about limits.

You made the assertion, and you've been running from it ever since.

You continually make the point that there are no limits and then try saying that there are limits, just not hard limits and not limits you can identify or define, but there are limits - followed by yet another post saying that there are no limits. I'm getting dizzy.

James972 · Apr 26, 2016

jaeger19 said:
Normally I am a live and let live.. freedom of speech kind of guy. but these posts need to stop. If you won't stop these types of attacks..., then I will be complaining to the moderators. There need to be some controls on this.

A liberal feels in his little liberal heart that the the economy grows when bureaucrats in Washington shuffle papers and print money when the reality is that the economy grew from the stone age to here thanks to numerous new inventions. So, new inventions are what we need to encourage to make the economy grow!! Now do you understand?

PS: no matter how something is worded you will have to find an excuse to change the subject. This is because liberalism is based in pure ignorance and so unsupportable. If you could defend what you assert you would love to do so and demonstrate that i am mistaken!! Ever see a libertarian or conservative who has to run from a debate. Do you know why that is? And it was not an attack, it was an opportunity for you to refute the argument which you would have loved to do if you were capable of it.

Absentglare · Apr 26, 2016

jaeger19 said:
And when is that?

We are already pretty close to what many consider to be full employment. Our unemployment numbers are close to historical norms.

As far as education.. almost every child has access to public education including highschool. and most college equivalent students have access to college.

By the way... how does government simply deficit spending.. help people acquire education. How does the government giving a subsidy to wealthy farm owners..thus increasing the deficit, help people acquire education.

Almost every child has access to some education, and then we can pull the arithmetic mean $ per student to dishonestly claim that we are already spending too much on education.

The problem isn't that we spend too little on the average student, it's that we spend too little on some students and far more on others. Finland focused on educational equality and across the board excellence was the result. We can and should learn from their example.

And i don't care about historical norms and numbers for unemployment. Saying "it's the same as it used to be," doesn't mean it's good.

There is an obvious solution to this problem: pull more of the slack out of the bottom end of the labor pool. Wages will rise across the board. It's not like we plan to let the low end starve to death, we may as well get something tangible produced out of public assistance.

The government can deficit spend such that educational access is increased (my claim), that doesn't mean that every possible expenditure meets that goal (your strawman). However, it is true that even programs like food stamps help young children in poor families leave the nest, get a loan, and go to college without having to worry about how poor mom and dad are going to feed themselves.

Absentglare · Apr 26, 2016

Moderate Right said:
Again with the insults. That's the only way you can counter the truth, by turning the tables and trying to intimidate the other without posting anything with substance yourself.

You're implicitly offering up such explanations by blatantly and dishonestly misrepresenting what is actually being said.

Absentglare · Apr 26, 2016

Moderate Right said:
You continually make the point that there are no limits and then try saying that there are limits, just not hard limits and not limits you can identify or define, but there are limits - followed by yet another post saying that there are no limits. I'm getting dizzy.

Well then you should go see your doctor.

JohnfrmClevelan · Apr 26, 2016

Moderate Right said:
Again with the insults. That's the only way you can counter the truth, by turning the tables and trying to intimidate the other without posting anything with substance yourself.

I tried debating you with substance. You came back with nothing. The best you can muster up in the way of debate is pointing at somebody else's argument and claiming it for your own.

Now with Absentglare, you are resorting to this "limit - no limit" silliness. He explained his position already. If you are unable to comprehend what he said, that is your shortcoming, not his.

One more time, so MAYBE you can understand. The government IS ABLE to create unlimited numbers of dollars. We never said or implied that they should.

The LIMIT is real resources, like labor, energy, or raw materials. Once you run short of these, prices go up.

Got that? Now, move on to your next non-argument, or go away.

James972 · Apr 26, 2016

JohnfrmClevelan said:
The LIMIT is real resources,

of course thats absurd irrelevent and illiterate!! The Fed creates dollars and the entire limit for them is inflation!!!Inflation is so destructive to growth that it is the central issue of all central banks all around the world especially in countries where they have had significant inflation. Now do you understand?

Moderate Right · Apr 26, 2016

Absentglare said:
You're implicitly offering up such explanations by blatantly and dishonestly misrepresenting what is actually being said.

Yep. Yet another post with no substance. Admit it, that's the best you can do.

Moderate Right · Apr 26, 2016

JohnfrmClevelan said:
I tried debating you with substance. You came back with nothing. The best you can muster up in the way of debate is pointing at somebody else's argument and claiming it for your own.

Now with Absentglare, you are resorting to this "limit - no limit" silliness. He explained his position already. If you are unable to comprehend what he said, that is your shortcoming, not his.

One more time, so MAYBE you can understand. The government IS ABLE to create unlimited numbers of dollars. We never said or implied that they should.

The LIMIT is real resources, like labor, energy, or raw materials. Once you run short of these, prices go up.

Got that? Now, move on to your next non-argument, or go away.

The thing is you cannot come up with an argument to those who truly are economic experts, not any of us here on DP. And, you have absolutely zero credentials to debate the economic experts. That's why you would rather debate someone here on DP such as me, because you feel more empowered to debate those with lesser knowledge than those economic experts. But, that doesn't stop YOU from presenting your links, graphs, stats, etc from someone else to do your talking. You have still never presented a reasonable argument as to why not one country in the entire world, out of roughly 200, uses MMT as an economic policy. Oh that's right, I forgot, MMT is not a economic policy but merely an explanation of how things work - the liberal explanation of how things work. Apparently these 200 countries, including many liberal ones, do not believe that MMT is how things work.

pdog · Apr 26, 2016

Moderate Right said:
You made that up out of nowhere. I actually do not support progressive taxes. However, taxes do need to be fair and almost everyone needs to pay something, not zero. To some extent, every tax has elements of progressiveness in it. It's just a question of degree.

You had an entire paragraph dedicated to how policy not only attacks the "filthy rich" but the "little guy" too. I gave you a very easy and normal bit of policy to address all of your concerns.

Critter7r · Apr 27, 2016

James972 said:
of course thats absurd irrelevent and illiterate!! The Fed creates dollars and the entire limit for them is inflation!!! Inflation is so destructive to growth that it is the central issue of all central banks all around the world especially in countries where they have had significant inflation. Now do you understand?

And real, demand-pull inflation happens when there is more demand for those resources than there is access to those resources (think: 1970s oil embargo).

Now do YOU understand?

jaeger19 · Apr 27, 2016

Absentglare said:
Almost every child has access to some education, and then we can pull the arithmetic mean $ per student to dishonestly claim that we are already spending too much on education.

The problem isn't that we spend too little on the average student, it's that we spend too little on some students and far more on others. Finland focused on educational equality and across the board excellence was the result. We can and should learn from their example.

And i don't care about historical norms and numbers for unemployment. Saying "it's the same as it used to be," doesn't mean it's good.

There is an obvious solution to this problem: pull more of the slack out of the bottom end of the labor pool. Wages will rise across the board. It's not like we plan to let the low end starve to death, we may as well get something tangible produced out of public assistance.

The government can deficit spend such that educational access is increased (my claim), that doesn't mean that every possible expenditure meets that goal (your strawman). However, it is true that even programs like food stamps help young children in poor families leave the nest, get a loan, and go to college without having to worry about how poor mom and dad are going to feed themselves.

Well... number one.. never made the argument that we spend to much on education.

Number two: you just stated:

The problem isn't that we spend too little on the average student

Obviously then.. the issue is not needing more deficit spending.. the issue is what we do with current spending.

There is an obvious solution to this problem: pull more of the slack out of the bottom end of the labor pool. Wages will rise across the board. It's not like we plan to let the low end starve to death, we may as well get something tangible produced out of public assistance.

Right.. okay.. so exactly how does that translate to needing more deficit spending? You are making the case that we need to spend wisely.. not that we need to increase deficit spending

As far as

And i don't care about historical norms and numbers for unemployment. Saying "it's the same as it used to be," doesn't mean it's good.

that historical norm was when the economy was growing and the middle class was growing. We are at 5%.

You can see that at times median income was growing gangbusters with a rate HIGHER than 5%. In fact there is little time using your own graph when the rate was under 4.8.

So what do you think increase deficit spending is going to do?

James972 · Apr 27, 2016

Critter7r said:
And real, demand-pull inflation happens when there is more demand for those resources than there is access to those resources (think: 1970s oil embargo).

Now do YOU understand?

do I understand what exactly??? all the demand in the world cant create inflation unless the Fed prints more money to allow prices to inflate. Get it??

James972 · Apr 27, 2016

jaeger19 said:
So what do you think increase deficit spending is going to do?

a liberal believes if govt spends money, and so someone else doesn't, it magically stimulates the economy. Its pure and a perfect ignorance but its what liberals have been brainwashed to parrot.

Critter7r · Apr 27, 2016

James972 said:
do I understand what exactly??? all the demand in the world cant create inflation unless the Fed prints more money to allow prices to inflate. Get it??

Demand in excess of real resources creates inflation whether or not the Fed prints money.

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Critter7r · Apr 27, 2016

James972 said:
a liberal believes if govt spends money, and so someone else doesn't, it magically stimulates the economy. Its pure and a perfect ignorance but its what liberals have been brainwashed to parrot.

In a situation where "someone else" already wasn't planning to spend that money (i.e. times of low demand), gov't spending does stimulate the economy.

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Absentglare · Apr 27, 2016

jaeger19 said:
Well... number one.. never made the argument that we spend to much on education.

Number two: you just stated:

Obviously then.. the issue is not needing more deficit spending.. the issue is what we do with current spending.

I never made the argument that you made the argument that we spend too much on education. Other people have made that argument, and they can make a pretty good case on the basis of average dollar per student. I outlined my problem with that argument. I think we do need to spend more to bring the minimum up. I don't think it would really cost that much.

jaeger19 said:
Right.. okay.. so exactly how does that translate to needing more deficit spending? You are making the case that we need to spend wisely.. not that we need to increase deficit spending

I'm specifically arguing in favor of committing ourselves to a higher level of deficit spending to put downward pressure on unemployment (by employing people to do things like build roads).

You have a point that we could pay for more employment by, say, taxing the rich more, but that's not what i'm arguing about. I'm arguing in favor of spending and not trying to complicate matters beyond that because there is no need to. We can do it with deficit spending and whatever wealth might be theoretically lost due to inflation (which probably wouldn't happen) is similar to higher taxes on the rich anyway.

jaeger19 said:
As far as

that historical norm was when the economy was growing and the middle class was growing. We are at 5%.

You can see that at times median income was growing gangbusters with a rate HIGHER than 5%. In fact there is little time using your own graph when the rate was under 4.8.

So what do you think increase deficit spending is going to do?

We don't just make sure median income goes up slightly and then conclude that our job is done. We've had decades of missed growth.

It seems obvious that we can apply more downward pressure on unemployment and that would correspond to more upward pressure on median income.

jaeger19 · Apr 28, 2016

Absentglare said:
I never made the argument that you made the argument that we spend too much on education. Other people have made that argument, and they can make a pretty good case on the basis of average dollar per student. I outlined my problem with that argument. I think we do need to spend more to bring the minimum up. I don't think it would really cost that much.I'm specifically arguing in favor of committing ourselves to a higher level of deficit spending to put downward pressure on unemployment (by employing people to do things like build roads).

You have a point that we could pay for more employment by, say, taxing the rich more, but that's not what i'm arguing about. I'm arguing in favor of spending and not trying to complicate matters beyond that because there is no need to. We can do it with deficit spending and whatever wealth might be theoretically lost due to inflation (which probably wouldn't happen) is similar to higher taxes on the rich anyway.

We don't just make sure median income goes up slightly and then conclude that our job is done. We've had decades of missed growth.

It seems obvious that we can apply more downward pressure on unemployment and that would correspond to more upward pressure on median income.

Well again.. when it comes to education.. you are not making the argument that we need to spend more.. simply that we need to spend wisely.

Again.. you state to put downward pressure on unemployment but why? We are already pretty much at a level of unemployment that's considered by many to be full employment. We are pretty much at the level of unemployment where we have in the past seen increases in the middle class.

Its obvious that the issue of the last two decades has not been unemployment rates nor deficit spending since that has increased as well for that 13 years of that time.

When you talk about "building roads".. you are not making the case of taxing the rich more, nor of more deficit spending. You are making the case of spending money more wisely on things that have multiplier effects in the economy.

We don't just make sure median income goes up slightly and then conclude that our job is done. We've had decades of missed growth. It seems obvious that we can apply more downward pressure on unemployment and that would correspond to more upward pressure on median income

And those statements are the grand irony of this post.. and expose your disconnect. Yep wages have been stagnate. The middle class has not grown. And guess what? During that time.. unemployment has been mostly at our historical norm, or even lower. Deficit spending during most of that time? Increasing..

Yet.. you continue to think that dropping unemployment (which is already low) and increasing deficit spending (which has been relatively high) is going to work to improve the plight of the middle class.

If low unemployment and deficit spending was the key.. wages would not have been stagnate and there would more social mobility etc.

You want to double down on a policy that has not been working and during that time inequity has increased.

James972 · Apr 28, 2016

Critter7r said:
In a situation where "someone else" already wasn't planning to spend that money (i.e. times of low demand), gov't spending does stimulate the economy.

nice try for a liberal. People always plan to spend their money or to put it in a bank where it is then invested. In econ 101 you learn S=I( saving equals investment). Do you understand??

James972 · Apr 28, 2016

Absentglare said:
It seems obvious that we can apply more downward pressure on unemployment and that would correspond to more upward pressure on median income.

not really Democrats want the immigrant vote so have thrown open the borders to 20 million illegals who drive down wages. Democrats screw their own constituency but that constituency is too stupid to know it so it works

Absentglare · Apr 28, 2016

jaeger19 said:
Well again.. when it comes to education.. you are not making the argument that we need to spend more.. simply that we need to spend wisely.

My argument is that we should be spending more on instruction for schools that are deficient. Whether that comes out of deficit spending, costly sports programs in schools, or spending cuts in rich neighborhoods doesn't matter to me.

jaeger19 said:
Again.. you state to put downward pressure on unemployment but why?

Because i believe it will help to increase median household income which is one of my primary goals.

Note that i think the more interesting question is how: by buying things like road repairs !! These don't have to be cash handouts that are given away without the recipients having to work for it. These don't have to guarantee employment, they just increase demand.

jaeger19 said:
We are already pretty much at a level of unemployment that's considered by many to be full employment. We are pretty much at the level of unemployment where we have in the past seen increases in the middle class.

And yet our unemployment would signal economic disaster in Japan. We can and should consider that we can do even better on unemployment. Part of the problem is a skill mismatch between available laborers and open jobs- that sounds like a problem that is ripe for a public policy solution like trade schools.

jaeger19 said:
Its obvious that the issue of the last two decades has not been unemployment rates nor deficit spending since that has increased as well for that 13 years of that time.

I don't know why you think that's obvious. The observation is that the average American hasn't seen their income increase even though the average American is far more productive. That's a problem where the market forces are not working like they are supposed to. The likely explanation for why employers are underpaying employees is because they can. If unemployment is decreased, they will be forced to raise wages if they expect to keep workers.

The basic problem is that the supply side of the equation has been the recipient of wave after wave of public policies that incrementally tip the scales in their own favor, while demand has been waning in response. With less demand comes less employment. Every piece of the jigsaw puzzle fits together remarkably well to paint the picture that competition has worked well to cut laborers wages as low as possible but has completely failed to enact a corresponding balance on owners profits.

jaeger19 said:
When you talk about "building roads".. you are not making the case of taxing the rich more, nor of more deficit spending. You are making the case of spending money more wisely on things that have multiplier effects in the economy.

It depends on how i want to pay for it. In this case, i am suggesting that we deficit spend because then we don't have to take the money from something else first.

jaeger19 said:
And those statements are the grand irony of this post.. and expose your disconnect. Yep wages have been stagnate. The middle class has not grown. And guess what? During that time.. unemployment has been mostly at our historical norm, or even lower. Deficit spending during most of that time? Increasing..

Not really. Again, i don't care about historical norms. Saying "it's always been like this," isn't a strong reason to keep a system the way it is.

Unemployment doesn't capture all discouraged workers or underemployed workers. It's not a comprehensive labor market indicator. It's one number so it only shows us one dimension.

Deficit spending doesn't always help us. I'm going to depart from what some MMTers might say and claim that not all deficits are created equal. When we go into deficits to fund a tax cut on the wealthy, that doesn't help the economy. Some super guy who sits on most of his cash isn't going to change his behavior with another $billion from Uncle Sam. He's not going to work any harder and he might not even spend half of it. So yes, we can increase deficits without really addressing the problems that i see.

jaeger19 said:
Yet.. you continue to think that dropping unemployment (which is already low) and increasing deficit spending (which has been relatively high) is going to work to improve the plight of the middle class.

If low unemployment and deficit spending was the key.. wages would not have been stagnate and there would more social mobility etc.

You want to double down on a policy that has not been working and during that time inequity has increased.

No, i'm talking about changing policy, not trying the same SSE policies that have been attempted.

Absentglare · Apr 28, 2016

James972 said:
not really Democrats want the immigrant vote so have thrown open the borders to 20 million illegals who drive down wages. Democrats screw their own constituency but that constituency is too stupid to know it so it works

Republicans want illegals too, they just want them to stay technically illegal so they can use their status as illegals to leverage for lower wages.

jaeger19 · Apr 28, 2016

My argument is that we should be spending more on instruction for schools that are deficient. Whether that comes out of deficit spending, costly sports programs in schools, or spending cuts in rich neighborhoods doesn't matter to me.

Exactly my point. Its about where we spend and not about deficit spending.

Because i believe it will help to increase median household income which is one of my primary goals.

Right and I point out that belief is somewhat illogical. We have unemployment at our norm.. in fact at what is considered by many to be full employment unemployment, so where do we go from there? And even so.. even with low unemployment wages have been stagnant and the middle class has shrunk.

an aside.. you have to be careful as to whether the median income is really the MEAN household income.

And yet our unemployment would signal economic disaster in Japan. We can and should consider that we can do even better on unemployment. Part of the problem is a skill mismatch between available laborers and open jobs- that sounds like a problem that is ripe for a public policy solution like trade schools.

Again.. that's not based on reality. Our current unemployment rate is at about where we have had increasing wages and a large middle class. In fact its hard to find much times when the unemployment was significantly lower that it is now.

The observation is that the average American hasn't seen their income increase even though the average American is far more productive. That's a problem where the market forces are not working like they are supposed to. The likely explanation for why employers are underpaying employees is because they can. If unemployment is decreased, they will be forced to raise wages if they expect to keep workers

.

Except for that fact that during that period when wages have not increased WE HAVE HAD LOW UNEMPLOYMENT.

When wages were increasing.. and the middle class was booming.. in the 1950's unemployment ranged as high as 7.4%. it averaged just about what we are at now.

For all those years of wage stagnation.. unemployment has not been about our historical average.

The basic problem is that the supply side of the equation has been the recipient of wave after wave of public policies that incrementally tip the scales in their own favor, while demand has been waning in response. With less demand comes less employment.

that simply is not true. If you look at our historical unemployment.. over the last three decades unemployment as not been a long term problem. In fact our current unemployment is about at our historical average.
Unemployment simply is not the cause for the wage stagnation.

Not really. Again, i don't care about historical norms. Saying "it's always been like this," isn't a strong reason to keep a system the way it is.

Well that's illogical.

You are saying.. "the problem is this unemployment we have that's why wages have been stagnant".

And I am pointing out "well when wages were increasing and the middle class was increasing unemployment was where it is now"

Obviously.. its then not unemployment that's causing wages to be stagnant.

You are focusing on "fixing" something that's not a part of the problem and expecting results. AND not only that.. you are proposing fixing it in the same way as has been done in the past.. more deficit spending.

Unemployment doesn't capture all discouraged workers or underemployed workers. It's not a comprehensive labor market indicator. It's one number so it only shows us one dimension.

Here is the irony.. you just claim that its not a comprehensive labor market indicator.. BUT THATS WHAT YOU WANT TO FOCUS ON.

Do you get the disconnect here? You just state it doesn't show us all dimensions.. but THATS WHAT YOU WANT TO FIX.

I just pointed out the fallacy of that. Obviously the issue is not unemployment. Its the other labor indicators that are the issue. And THATS what we need to work on.

I'm going to depart from what some MMTers might say and claim that not all deficits are created equal. When we go into deficits to fund a tax cut on the wealthy, that doesn't help the economy. Some super guy who sits on most of his cash isn't going to change his behavior with another $billion from Uncle Sam. He's not going to work any harder and he might not even spend half of it. So yes, we can increase deficits without really addressing the problems that i see.

Well hallelujah!

No, i'm talking about changing policy, not trying the same SSE policies that have been attempted

Not when you call for deficit spending and lowering unemployment.