Do You Think We Should Have Budget Balance Now?

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Do you think, ideally we should have budget balance now? A, yes. This is the kind of time you should be doing it, right? How useful is ito have this liquid, safe asset known as treasury securities which perform many functions collateral? For instance, don't you want a deficit of some % of g d p if you're the united states? Well, we have a huge stock off these treasury assets out there. So that that stock would still be there if we were running budget balance right now. Germany's close to budget balance by summetrics. Shouldn't they be borrowing more? A, they can borrow at very low rates, sometimes negative nominaly That

Why is Garett Jones willing to write books about risky topics like the case for reducing democratic accountability? Is it the iconoclastic Mason econ culture? Supportive colleagues like Tyler? Those help, but what ultimately gives Garett peace of mind is that he’ll never have to go hungry because he has a broad and deep knowledge of econometric tools. It’s a skillset he recommends to all research economists precisely so they can take bigger risks in their careers—or at least be well-prepared to shape policy in an unelected position at a central bank.

Garett joined Tyler to discuss his book 10% Less Democracy, including why America shouldn’t be run by bondholders, what single reform would most effectively achieve more limited democracy, how markets shape cognitive skills, the three important P’s of the repeated prisoner’s dilemma, why French cuisine is still underrated, Buchanan vs. Tullock, Larry David vs. Seinfeld, the biggest mistake in Twitter macroeconomics, the biggest challenges facing the Mormon church, what studying to be a sommelier taught him about economics, the Garett Jones vision of America, and more.

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Recorded January 10th, 2020 Other ways to connect

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