Macro N Cheese

This week we’re bringing you all three sessions of the Real Progressives Book Club on L. Randall Wray’s Making Money Work for Us.RP Book Club is run by our volunteers with guest experts leading the discussion and taking questions from attendees.  This is much longer than our usual episodes of Macro N Cheese, so we’ve included the time codes for each session. [1:43] — Session One Guest economist Eric Tymoigne  Chapter 1, What is Money? Chapter 2, Where Does Money Come From? [1:14:35] — Session Two Guest economist Yeva Nersisyan  Chapter 3, Can We Have Too Much Money?  Chapter 4, Balances Balance  Chapter 5, Life is Full of Trade-Offs [2:43:33] — Session Three Guest economist Randy Wray Chapter 6, The MMT Alternative Framework for Policy  Chapter 7, MMT and Policy Use this link to order the book: Making Money Work for Us: How MMT Can Save America by L. Randall WrayEric Tymoigne is an Associate Professor of Economics at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon; and Research Associate at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College. @tymoignee on Twitter. Yeva Nersisyan is an Associate Professor of economics at Franklin and Marshall College and a Research Scholar at the Levy Economics Institute. L. Randall Wray is a Professor of Economics at Bard College and Senior Scholar at the Levy Economics Institute. 

“People talk about campaign finance being the problem as to why ‘progressive’ politicians can't get elected. But that's more of an effect of this rather than the cause, because let's say, Citizens United, the court ruling which now allows corporations to pretty much give unlimited donations to candidates. That's just the most recent evolution of a system which precludes all possibility for radical change.”Our guest this week is 1Dime, a content creator on YouTube and the podcast, 1Dime Radio, and a graduate student in political science. The interview is another stop on Steve’s journey to find the intersection of Modern Monetary Theory and Marxism. 1Dime is one of the few socialists – or democratic socialists – who accept MMT.Our audience understands that capitalism is antithetical to democracy. 1Dime suggests that the US is unique in that it is very liberal in what it allows its citizens to do in the private sphere, or civil society, without allowing for real political power, which he defines as the ability of a social class to actualize its interests. Steve and 1Dime compare the political history of the US with parliamentary democracies, discussing what that means for the working class. Agreeing that elections have limited value for American socialists, they look to alternatives. Tony brings up the idea of dual power: establishing power within the state while engaging in revolutionary actions outside it, building media institutions as well as organizations that can reach out to labor. Tony runs the YouTube channel "1Dime" and the podcast 1Dime Radio. On his main channel, 1Dime does video essays and mini-documentaries that involve the political economy, history, geopolitics, leftist theory, and various socio-political topics. 1Dime is known most for his videos involving MMT and Marxian thought, such as "The Problem With Taxing The Rich" and "Why Billionaires Prefer Democrats." His most recent video series was on the History of Post-Soviet Russia and the Putin regime. Each video serves as both an educational analysis of a different topic and a unique artistic experiment. Check out his YouTube channel, 1Dime and his podcast, 1Dime Radio, on Apple, Spotify, and most podcast platforms. @1DimeOfficial on Twitter

Is the US a failed state? Well, with a paralyzed economy, debt deflation, and a ruling elite waging class warfare on labor, what else should we call it?Economist Michael Hudson often writes and talks about the US role as a global force bending the rest of the world to its will. Or trying to. This week he and Steve bring the focus home, looking at the state of affairs in the US; breaking down the causes and devastating effects of the massive transfer of income and wealth from the working class to the 1% — specifically the finance, insurance, and real estate (FIRE) sectors.Michael slices through false promises of re-industrialization after half a century of brutal policies by both Democrat and Republican administrations.“America cannot re-industrialize without reversing this whole philosophy of post-industrial society as a class war against labor. You can't have both. You can't have a class war against labor and re-industrialization, with the labor unionization that goes with it. That's the conundrum.”It’s well known that the people want public spending on healthcare, student loan forgiveness, and other social programs. The episode looks at the complementary roles of both parties in opposition.“The pretense is that the government has to borrow from bond holders. Because the bond holders decide what is economically worthwhile. Well, what does this ignore? That the bond holders are the 1%, and what they find economically worthwhile isn't using the government to benefit living standards, benefit labor, and to provide social services.”Should either party feign to support a policy and pass legislation benefiting the people, the Supreme Court is there to stop it in its tracks, citing the original intent of the Constitution.“Because the Constitution was drafted by authors who feared democracy. Who said that we have to make sure that we have enough checks and blocks, so that the mob cannot rule and take away the power of we, the bond holders, and landlords, and slave owners.”There are certain themes Michael Hudson visits again and again, strengthening connections and adding nuance to a comprehensive class analysis and global political economy. If you’re lucky, he’ll pepper it with a few snarky observations as well.Michael Hudson is President of The Institute for the Study of Long-Term Economic Trends (ISLET), a Wall Street Financial Analyst, Distinguished Research Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. Support him at patreon.com/michaelhudsonFind his work at michael-hudson.com

In this episode, David Correia and Tyler Wall, co-authors of Police: A Field Guide, lead a webinar about policing in the US.The common narrative about the police is intentionally misleading. Without a class analysis and an understanding of history, it will remain a problem with no solution. Policing isn’t a side-show to capitalist political economy. It’s part of the main stage. Far from engaging in enforcing the law and fighting crime, the police are a coercive force, with origins as slave patrols, colonial militia, and strike-breakers.Addressing possibilities of reform or abolition, the point is made that attempts at reform only serve to further maintain the legitimacy of the police. Reform does not address the monopoly on violence — a violence that is non-negotiable and non-reciprocal. Reform feeds into the myth that we hold the police accountable. Abolition, on the other hand, does not mean absence; it looks at possibilities for a different kind of world. Can this be done within the capitalist system?David Correia is a professor of American studies at the University of New Mexico. He writes about violence, law, and race under capitalism.Tyler Wall is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. His areas of interest include critical police studies; state violence and racial capitalism; law & society, race and class.Correia and Wall are co-authors of Police: A Field Guide (Verso)

If you’ve recently chatted with a well-informed liberal – the kind who reads the NY Times or watches PBS NewsHour – you’ve heard encouraging things about the economy. You’ve heard that Biden’s doing a good job. Unemployment has gone down, wages have gone up. Why can’t you be happy about it all?To celebrate all this good news, we brought back our friend, Yeva Nersisyan, associate professor of economics at Franklin and Marshall College, research scholar at the Levy Institute, and frequent collaborator with MMT OG Randy Wray.Yes, unemployment rates are lower, but we know those numbers don’t tell the true story. Or have you already forgotten our episode with Pavlina, just two short weeks ago? Yes, wages have gone up. But so has inflation. And in the race between inflation and wages, inflation is winning. Speaking of which, our Macro N Cheese family knows that one thing worse than inflation is the Fed’s cure for it.In this episode, Steve and Yeva look at the disconnect between the ongoing immiseration of the working class and the rosy scenario painted by politicians, pundits, and economists. At least one of those groups should know better. They discuss the looming student debt crisis, and the effect of the Fed’s interest rate hikes on student loans.When discussing MMT-informed solutions, Yeva warns:“You have to be consistent — whether it's the Trump tax cuts, whether it's the social security question. And you have to consistently say: the question of taxes and government spending, it should not be about deficits, should not be about debt, it should be about: is this the right thing for the economy? Is this what the people want? Is this what the people need? That's what you need to start with. And just because you want to raise taxes on the wealthy, which I do too, but I don't want to tie it to things like social security, because I think that's just a losing argument, and that's just not true.”MMT points toward answers, if anyone is asking.Yeva Nersisyan is an associate professor of economics at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, PA, and a research scholar at the Levy Economics Institute of Bard College.

It’s always interesting to get the insights of someone whose job places them near the beating heart of the imperial behemoth. Especially when they’ve begun to pull back the curtain and take a hard look at reality. Paul Gambles lives in Thailand where he specializes in emerging markets with MBMG Group.Paul and Steve talk about the clarity that MMT provides. The public is kept intentionally misinformed by a mainstream narrative purposely obscuring the power relations of the capital order.Paul describes capital flight in developing nations and how the US gains and maintains economic control through dollar hegemony, international institutions like IMF, and military aggression. The western system imposes itself on emerging markets as if drawing them into a warm pool of water, a step at a time. Once they are in the system, they find it is shark infested.The discussion covers conditions that led to the banding together of BRICS to create an alternative pathway to the US-dominated system. Paul warns that western hegemony is not going to surrender easily and is practicing economic terrorism against emerging markets trying to disentangle themselves from dollar hegemony.“I don't believe that anybody can hand on heart say that there's no connection whatsoever with the BRICS attempts to disentangle themselves from Western commercial, economic, and currency hegemony and the actions that we've seen in terms of American geopolitics in and around the Ukraine and in and around the South China Sea ... I think we're seeing it move into a geopolitical and into a military sphere, and I think that's terrifying.”Just like old-fashioned colonialism, the US is engaging in a form of value extraction and will use all the means at its disposal to continue the plunder.Paul Gambles is the Co-Founder of MBMG GROUP and a Director and Chief Investment Officer of MBMG Investment Advisory, a SEC regulated investment advisor. Find Paul’s articles on https://mbmg.substack.com/@PaulGambles2 on Twitter

When economist Pavlina Tcherneva was last on this podcast, we were a few months into the pandemic. She and Steve talked about nationalizing payroll and the heightened need for a federal job guarantee during a time of crisis.In this episode, the neoliberal approach to unemployment comes under scrutiny. Pavlina explains the inadequacy of official unemployment data. She looks at the problem from several angles, including geography, demographics, and of course, economics.Pavlina and Steve discuss MMT, the politics of NAIRU, and the debt ceiling. They look at a job guarantee as an automatic stabilizer, similar to entitlements like social security and unemployment insurance, possibly shielding it from shifting political tides.Pavlina tells Steve about her collaboration with the Democratizing Work Initiative, a group of academics who are organizing around the principles of democratizing work, decommodifying labor, and decarbonizing the planet.Pavlina Tcherneva is an Associate Professor of Economics at Bard College, the Director of OSUN’s Economic Democracy Initiative, and a Research Scholar at the Levy Economics Institute, NY.  She specializes in modern money and public policy. Find her work at pavlina-tcherneva.net@ptcherneva on Twitter

“We've all got that cop in our head that wants us to see a world full of threats and emergencies.”Steve’s guest, David Correia, is co-author (with Tyler Wall) of Police: A Field Guide. Listeners to the podcast probably understand the role of police is to protect capital, not ensure the safety of the citizens.“...from the railroad strikes of 1877 to the anthracite strike of 1902, it was just this unruly world of labor asserting itself, demanding higher wages, refusing to go back to work, and progressives were among the most effective political force in developing a new order. And that new order required a different cop.”Despite occasional protests and demands for reform, we always end up with more police and more police brutality. Police reformists prioritize law and order over justice, which is why they fear abolition. David asks us to define what order and disorder is. “Because usually cops produce the disorder that they then resolve.” The very language of reform legitimizes the police.David Correia is a writer and professor of American studies at the University of New Mexico. He is the author of a number of books, and co-author, along with Tyler Wall, of "Police: A Field Guide." He is the recipient of a Ford Fellowship, a Henry Belin du Pont Fellowship, and a Lannan Residency Fellowship.

Dr. Yan Liang joins Steve to talk about China’s role in the global economy and the concept of “de-dollarization.” It’s refreshing to hear a discussion of these issues without hyperbole, but you know that already; that’s why you come to Macro N Cheese.Countries of the global south have suffered chronic debt and financial crises due to the neoliberal regime of the US and its allies. After the 2008 financial crisis, China has been diversifying its foreign exchange reserves and establishing currency swaps with more trading partners. The goal is to dilute the power of the dollar and temper US hegemony with a more stable and development-friendly system.Yan and Steve consider the loss of jobs in the US – a consequence of perpetual trade deficits. She maintains that the competition is not between domestic and foreign production, but between high financial returns and real productive capacity.The episode looks at China’s future role in global trade and finance, and how it might provide support and relief to developing nations. The conversation also touches on the flaws of the Western-led multilateral lending system and the need for alternatives.Dr. Yan Liang of Willamette University specializes in Post Keynesian-Institutionalist approach to international trade and finance, financial macroeconomics, and economic development with a regional focus on China.@YanLian31677392

Dr. Lin Zhang talks with Steve about her book "The Labor of Reinvention: Entrepreneurship in the New Chinese Digital Economy."Her book includes stories of individuals who transformed themselves and their lives to take advantage of this new global economy. She tells of Min, a former prisoner...“I think Min's story in a way captures the sort of imperative of entrepreneurialism in which we are all still living. The contemporary capitalist economy. The need to kind of keep reinventing oneself to adapt to the constant changes, but also the kind of contradiction generated on personal and collective level. So, the coexistence of opportunities, risk and frustrations. So this is, I think, what I try to document in the book, the everyday labor of entrepreneurial reinvention.”Dr. Zhang and Steve discuss the support provided by the state, which is no small matter. It makes entrepreneurism in China different from that of the US, or from India or developing countries of the global South.Zhang also talks about the roots of Chinese nationalism in China's socialist anti-imperialist history, which are reinforced by recent American sanctions and containment of China.Zhang argues that the US tends to view China through a simplistic lens of authoritarianism versus democracy, while the majority of Chinese people do not see their relationship with the party state in such terms. She provides a more nuanced picture of the Chinese state, discussing the competing demands of the central government to maintain economic development, social equity, and national security, as well as the discrepancies between central and local states.Dr. Lin Zhang is an assistant professor of communication and media studies at the University of New Hampshire. She graduated from the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, University of Southern California, with a PhD in Communication, and MA from NYU’s Department of Media, Culture, and Communication. She is the author of The Labor of Reinvention: Entrepreneurship in the New Chinese Digital Economy, one of the first multi-sited ethnographic accounts of the rising entrepreneurial labor in urban, rural, and transnational China since tech innovation had accelerated in the country after 2008.https://linzhangweb.org