Ep 304 - Facing Uncomfortable Truths with Yeva Nersisyan

In a stunning reversal, the Democrat Party has announced plans to reconnect with its New Deal roots in hopes of regaining the trust of the working class. Haha just kidding! This week, Yeva Nersisyan joins Steve to cut through the cacophony of phony punditry trying to explain the 2024 election results. Spoiler alert: it’s economics. It’s always economics. 

Yeva points to the stark realities of inflation, highlighting the persistent rise in food and housing costs. She points out that while inflation is often cited as a primary concern, the real issue lies in how US economic policies have consistently failed to address the needs of the people, especially those at the lower end of the income scale. Voters are not dazzled by Wall Street’s success. 

The conversation goes into the failures of past administrations and takes a look at mistakes made during and after the height of the Covid pandemic. Promising policies were on the table, yet the monies were often spent in ways least helpful to the majority. 

As an MMT economist, Yeva has worked on comprehensive economic proposals that demonstrate the affordability of providing a green new deal, healthcare, and a job guarantee.

The episode continually reinforces the necessity of a class perspective when looking at the failure of neoliberalism. 

Yeva Nersisyan is an associate professor of economics at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, PA. She received her B.A. in economics from Yerevan State University in Armenia, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in economics and mathematics from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. She is a macroeconomist working in the Modern Money Theory, Post-Keynesian, and Institutionalist traditions. Her research interests include banking and financial instability, and fiscal and monetary theory and policy. She has published a number of papers on the topics of shadow banking, fiscal policy, government deficits and debt, and the Green New Deal. Nersisyan is currently coediting the Elgar Companion to Modern Money Theory with L. Randall Wray. 

Find her work at levyinstitute.org/publications/yeva-nersisyan