I not sure that recent posters are confused in the way you suggest. ...
Printing money can potentially be a helpful solution to an economic shock if done as a one-off or short term aid to government spending. ...
Although the Fed may not be legally able to decide itself to give new money direct to citizens, it would be perfectly possible for the US government to send checks out without increasing borrowing to balance the budget. That statement is true in a narrow sense, but as I've tried to explain in previous posts any government that tried to use printing money as a regular and significant means of financing spending would be doomed to repeat the errors of the Weimar Republic, Venezuela, Yugoslavia, Zimbabwe, Poland, Brazil and many others.
Yes, you are. You've just made the same error here, imo. It's *not* possible for the US to write checks to its citizens via the Federal Reserve quantitative easing tools.
Again, "printing money" doesn't aid government spending. It is used in the same times as deficit spending, or high social welfare spending, but it's orthogonal to it. So I understand the confusion. Again, "printing money" has nothing to do with increasing government spending. It's about putting more money *in the private lending sector*. There's probably some minor exceptions to this, with some publicly managed lenders existing, but putting those aside, it's not the same thing. And yes, too much quantitative easing can cause inflation, I've never doubted that. But, as you say, there's really no evidence we're close to that, and it's not something that happens all of a sudden. It would be gradual, well-advertised.
Your linked article on Venezuela was indeed good, but it's important to note that it say nothing about the details of "printing money" it merely mentions it. I can't confirm this for sure, I'm almost certain their central bank runs the same way, and was not printing money for the government to then spend, but rather was buying up securities owned by lenders in the private market, thus creating capital for them to be able to lend more. It obviously backfired, but as I said above, the underlying issue is really the limiting reagent here, the collapse of their overwhelming export product.
I'm obviously not making myself as clear as I thought I was - I am not confused about the differences being talked about . Let me try once more to explain the different aspects - that should also help answer @Balrog99's question.
1) The historic norm for countries has been to try and match the amount of government spending with revenue raised by the government through taxes and a wide range of charges. It is common for governments to set various legal targets requiring them to do this.
2) In order to allow for the fact that income and expenditure requirements vary over time, for instance as a result of the economic cycle, all countries allow for the possibility that there will be a budget surplus, i.e. more revenue is raised than spent, or a budget deficit.
3) The main way to fund budget deficits historically has been through borrowing, i.e. a government issues interest bearing securities. Normally those are available for purchase by anyone - both within and outside the country itself.
4) There is though a second way to 'fund' budget deficits and that's to print money, i.e. for the government to issue payments to people without any source for that payment. In the past that would have involved literally printing money, but in the US the main way of doing that now would be either through sending out checks or just directly crediting bank accounts. The point though is that the government is using the new money its created to pay for its own expenditure. It is this use of printing money that @DinoDin has not recognized as a possibility. That's presumably because it is not that common, though the Wikipedia article I linked before refers to quite a number of countries that have had disastrous experiences when trying this during my lifetime (Venezuela being just the latest example).
5) A second type of printing money is the process undertaken by central banks. In the past (and still today) all banks would issue notes and coins in order to ensure that there is a sufficient amount of those to meet the needs of commerce, i.e. that transactions would not be prevented simply because there was an insufficient supply of money. This process is nothing to do with government (except to the extent that the central bank is run directly by the government, as it is in some countries).
If there is an insufficient supply of money that will tend to lead to deflation as people wish to hand over less of a scarce resource to buy goods. If there is an excess supply that will tend to lead to inflation. Milton Friedman made his name as an economist by building up models of how to use this 'monetary policy' effect to steer the economy. Monetarists are not now as influential as they were in Reagan and Thatcher's day, but it's still a significant strand of economic theory.
6) These days (at least in the US) a more important way of creating new money than increasing the physical stock of notes and coins is the transactions central banks undertake with digital money. The process of quantitative easing that's been referred to relates to banks buying up existing government securities. This can be quite an indirect way to put new money into the economy, so the effects can be hard to track. For instance securities could be purchased from a pension fund. The fund would be unlikely to want to hold the new money it now had in the form of cash, so would buy new shares or securities. Although all that has appeared to happen in this instance is that one form of security has been replaced with another, in the process you've changed the balance of the market for securities - both by reducing the supply of securities available for purchase and stimulating the demand for them. This therefore helps drive up the price (this is one way governments try and influence the financial markets). As prices increase, people feel wealthier and are more likely to spend money, which stimulates more activity in the economy to create a multiplier effect.
7) It's not been addressed above, but I thought I should also mention that money has never been as strictly controlled by governments as they would like. A few examples off the top of my head of ways other people can increase the effective money supply include:
- forgery
- alternative physical forms of 'money' (such as stamps and vouchers of various kinds)
- banks issuing increased credit. Western governments try to control this by dictating the amount of assets banks have to hold in relation to the amount of credit offered, but constant games are played to find ways round the limitations (that was one of the root causes of the 2008 financial crash).
- mutual schemes allowing groups of people to get together and pool their resources to secure loans to each other (I don't know if that's a feature in the US though).
- alternative digital currencies such as Bitcoins. There are a whole host of these and they offer a real trap for the unwary because the potential instability in perceived value of any type of money is hugely magnified in these digital currencies. The mechanisms supposedly intended to match supply and demand (like data mining for Bitcoins) are ineffective and the currencies represent the 'Wild West' for types of money.
8) As I mentioned before, it is technically true that there is no link between government revenue and government spending (except to the extent countries have legislated to create one). Therefore it is certainly possible for governments to spend far more money than they receive - and doing this may not even be harmful if it is done as a one-off exercise. However, once you've stuck your paw in the honey jar it's very difficult not to go back for another helping and doing this can very quickly get you into an inflationary spiral. The problem is that governments tend to believe their own propaganda that they set the value of money - it's in fact the people who use the money that set its value.
In most circumstances that difference does not become too apparent because people are consciously happy to accept the government valuation, even though there will be some unconscious influences acting on them (such as the monetary theory outlined above). However, as soon as it becomes clear that the government does not in fact believe its own statements about the value of money, that unconscious acceptance becomes a conscious rejection of the stated value. That's a similar sort of position to the one a bank can face. Banks always have less cash available than the amount deposited with them, but in normal circumstances that's not a problem. Even if, in the natural course of variation, more money is asked to be withdrawn than they have available they can always borrow short-term supplies from elsewhere. However, if actions by the bank or information spread about them morphs that natural variation into a focused intention by depositors to get their money back you've got a bank run ...
Perhaps it would make it clearer why printing new money to pay for additional government expenditure is so likely to be a problem to consider an analogous situation at a smaller scale. Think about a corporation which started small, but is expanding and has found the way its shares have been allocated too confining. It wants the ability to be able to increase the number of shareholders. It could just issue more shares in a new market placement, but let's assume it doesn't need the money and only wants to increase the physical number of shares (which is not a particularly uncommon situation). It therefore decides to issue 10 new shares to replace each existing share. Now it could well say that each of those shares had the same notional value as the existing ones, i.e. each shareholder has just hugely increased the value of their notional holdings. However, we're well accustomed to the idea that when dealing with shares it's the market that determines their true value and not the issuer. In this instance the market value of each share would instantly drop to roughly 10% of the earlier price (could be a bit more or less depending upon the market's view of whether the restructuring would be good for the company or not).
We're less used to the idea that the value of currencies are determined by the market (at least within countries, where foreign exchange rates are not relevant), but exactly the same principles do apply. If a government is seen to be diluting the value of a currency by multiplying the amount issued without regard to the actual need for money supply, this will have a far stronger effect on inflation than quantitative easing. If a government keeps doing that an inflationary spiral is inevitable.
4) There is though a second way to 'fund' budget deficits and that's to print money, i.e. for the government to issue payments to people without any source for that payment. In the past that would have involved literally printing money, but in the US the main way of doing that now would be either through sending out checks or just directly crediting bank accounts. The point though is that the government is using the new money its created to pay for its own expenditure. It is this use of printing money that @DinoDin has not recognized as a possibility. That's presumably because it is not that common, though the Wikipedia article I linked before refers to quite a number of countries that have had disastrous experiences when trying this during my lifetime (Venezuela being just the latest example).
No. This isn't true. Printing money isn't about government deficits. Your linked article did *not* say that.
Venezuela tried to help its *economy* in the printing money process, not its budget.
Edit: So reading more about it, it seems it's possible, but it's a way of erasing deficits/debts. Essentially the fed buys the bonds the government sells when it runs a deficit the same way they buy securities off the private market in normal "printing money" or quantitative easing fashion.
And it seems some central banks did this in the past, including Venezuela, so I was incorrect there. But again, the US isn't doing this. And it's not a way to generate more government spending, which again is done through a separate authority--Congress, the presidency. So again, it's a possibility that no central bank in an advanced economy seems willing to embrace, I guess that's the most factually correct way to put it. And it would, apparently, be a radical overhaul in standing policy at these banks.
But the important thing is that when we're referencing current acts of "printing money" in the context of coronavirus, we're not talking about government deficits.
I not sure that recent posters are confused in the way you suggest. ...
Printing money can potentially be a helpful solution to an economic shock if done as a one-off or short term aid to government spending. ...
Although the Fed may not be legally able to decide itself to give new money direct to citizens, it would be perfectly possible for the US government to send checks out without increasing borrowing to balance the budget. That statement is true in a narrow sense, but as I've tried to explain in previous posts any government that tried to use printing money as a regular and significant means of financing spending would be doomed to repeat the errors of the Weimar Republic, Venezuela, Yugoslavia, Zimbabwe, Poland, Brazil and many others.
Yes, you are. You've just made the same error here, imo. It's *not* possible for the US to write checks to its citizens via the Federal Reserve quantitative easing tools.
Again, "printing money" doesn't aid government spending. It is used in the same times as deficit spending, or high social welfare spending, but it's orthogonal to it. So I understand the confusion. Again, "printing money" has nothing to do with increasing government spending. It's about putting more money *in the private lending sector*. There's probably some minor exceptions to this, with some publicly managed lenders existing, but putting those aside, it's not the same thing. And yes, too much quantitative easing can cause inflation, I've never doubted that. But, as you say, there's really no evidence we're close to that, and it's not something that happens all of a sudden. It would be gradual, well-advertised.
Your linked article on Venezuela was indeed good, but it's important to note that it say nothing about the details of "printing money" it merely mentions it. I can't confirm this for sure, I'm almost certain their central bank runs the same way, and was not printing money for the government to then spend, but rather was buying up securities owned by lenders in the private market, thus creating capital for them to be able to lend more. It obviously backfired, but as I said above, the underlying issue is really the limiting reagent here, the collapse of their overwhelming export product.
I may be in the minority here, but I'm enjoying learning a bit more about how the monetary system works. However, I have one question that perhaps one, or both of you can clarify. When one is talking about 'printing' more money, it no longer means creating more physical coins or paper does it? It more likely means adding more 1's and 0's into some algorithm or ledger unless I'm mistaken?
So yes, the physical printing of money used to be the system they used, from what I've read. And yes they still ordering the physical printing of money when they determine that the supply of paper dollars is needed, apparently during things like peak retail season around Christmas. But that's now something that's not related to economic stimulus term when we now say printing money.
4) There is though a second way to 'fund' budget deficits and that's to print money, i.e. for the government to issue payments to people without any source for that payment. In the past that would have involved literally printing money, but in the US the main way of doing that now would be either through sending out checks or just directly crediting bank accounts. The point though is that the government is using the new money its created to pay for its own expenditure. It is this use of printing money that @DinoDin has not recognized as a possibility. That's presumably because it is not that common, though the Wikipedia article I linked before refers to quite a number of countries that have had disastrous experiences when trying this during my lifetime (Venezuela being just the latest example).
No. This isn't true. Printing money isn't about government deficits. Your linked article did *not* say that.
The article is a media one. Although The Conversation aims to cover subjects in more detail than typical news media, it can't be expected to go into things in the same depth as an academic journal article or book. Nevertheless I think the statement from it that "As prices rose, the government printed more money to pay its bills. This cycle is what causes hyperinflation." is clear enough.
Venezuela tried to help its *economy* in the printing money process, not its budget.
Edit: So reading more about it, it seems it's possible, but it's a way of erasing deficits/debts. Essentially the fed buys the bonds the government sells when it runs a deficit the same way they buy securities off the private market in normal "printing money" or quantitative easing fashion.
And it seems some central banks did this in the past, including Venezuela, so I was incorrect there. But again, the US isn't doing this. And it's not a way to generate more government spending, which again is done through a separate authority--Congress, the presidency. So again, it's a possibility that no central bank in an advanced economy seems willing to embrace, I guess that's the most factually correct way to put it. And it would, apparently, be a radical overhaul in standing policy at these banks.
But the important thing is that when we're referencing current acts of "printing money" in the context of coronavirus, we're not talking about government deficits.
It's not clear above whether your statement that "some central banks did this in the past" relates only to the route you identify of central banks buying bonds. While this is one possible route, it is not the only way in which countries have attempted to print money to meet their expenditure requirements.
I have never suggested that the US is doing this - I've said several times that it's a rare thing for countries to attempt and should not in fact be attempted because it's so dangerous.
The approval mechanism for undertaking any form of spending in the US is shared between Congress and the President (as you say). That same mechanism could be used in theory to approve spending without a budget, i.e. using created money. I don't know much about US budget law, but my guess is that this would require them to amend some existing legislative restrictions. Given Trump's creative interpretations of what constitutes emergencies, it's not totally inconceivable that he would want to get around such restrictions without changing the law, but I've seen nothing to suggest such a plan has ever even been considered (and if it were there would probably need to be a long search for someone to act as the Chair of the Federal Reserve who would go along with it). In my list of things to worry about for the US, printing money would be waaay down.
You may have been referencing "printing money" purely in the context of coronavirus, but I was not. Part of the reason for my posts was to respond much more fully than I've done in the past to statements made many times on this thread over a number of years that the government is free to spend as much as it wishes, without regard to the amount of revenue it receives. While this is technically true, I hope I've now explained that it is also a misleading statement and an attempt to put this idea into practice is doomed to failure. The problem is that the government only control the notional value of the money they issue - the real value is controlled by the general population. They will inevitably respond to the government using new money to fund its services in a significant and sustained way by reducing the real value they place upon money, i.e. inflation will result.
I think we're more or less in agreement now. I think it's important to note that there is a term, used in the linked CNBC story that's important to note. Because the financial news press clearly felt the need to distinguish here. It doesn't call the extreme policy of a central bank buying government debt merely "printing money" but clearly uses Modern Monetary Theory (MMT below) to distinguish the two things. I think it's probably wise to stick to this separation in terms, especially considering that almost all (perhaps all) of the "printing money" taking place at the moment is of the variety I've spelled out.
Your points have been mostly well said and just go ahead and assume everything you've said that I haven't noted I agree with. but again, I think you're still dabbling in a bit of confusion here:
"That same mechanism could be used in theory to approve spending without a budget, i.e. using created money. I don't know much about US budget law, but my guess is that this would require them to amend some existing legislative restrictions."
Couple of things here. Federal spending isn't passed by budgets, but by resolutions passed by Congress. Even if Trump could convince the Federal Reserve to buy up a bunch of the government's debt, and thus make its books looked more balanced, there is no authority within the executive branch or the Federal reserve to provide spending on their own via that mechanism. Again, you're still confusing two issues. MMT can pay off current government debt, but that doesn't necessitate spending by the government. What I'm saying is, MMT on its own doesn't actually spend any money. In theory, a government could use MMT and spend no money, merely pay down its debt or even generate a surplus.
Moreover, it can't become just any kind of spending on its own. Not without some specific resolution passed via the normal process. But that spending resolution could happen anyways with or without MMT. So, again, these things are orthogonal, not intertwined, even if MMT was put to use. There's not really a requirement that the US not deficit spend, so I'm not even sure why the federal government has to generate more surplus here. This seems to be the major reason most economists are sour on MMT, from what I've read.
Another way to look at it is the fact that raising or lowering taxes in the US system exists independent of any budget expenses. On occasion, Congress passes bills where both things happen, but, more often than not, spending bills get passed without tax hikes, and tax cuts get passed without spending cuts. The MMT theory is essentially akin to a tax hike in a way. I don't think this is necessarily disagrees with your points, but I also think it might be misleading to say that we could use MMT to back some kind of federal stimulus spending as if that all could happen within the authority of the central bank. The two events (raising money via MMT and passing a spending resolution) would still be separate, and, in constitutional terms, independent of each other.
I think it can also lead to a bit of confusion with the normal "printing money" process which isn't actually just handing over money to banks, but rather buying their assets to open up the lending market -- hence the confusion we see with people calling those injections "bailouts".
Obviously, I'll concede that a politician could pitch the idea to voters -- stimulus spending without debts! -- as connected. But in terms of executing them, they would be two different things.
To clarify a bit more, I'll jump on your Trump hypothetical because it's quite helpful. Let's imagine that Trump did become some overnight MMT advocate, and magically convinced the Federal Reserve to go through with it. He still wouldn't be able to turn those new revenues into any kind of spending without congressional passage of a spending bill. Nor would the Fed be able to outlay that money to people if Trump wanted universal stimulus checks on its own. The money just ends up as another line item of revenue generation, alongside taxes, fees and customs.
I think we're more or less in agreement now. I think it's important to note that there is a term, used in the linked CNBC story that's important to note. Because the financial news press clearly felt the need to distinguish here. It doesn't call the extreme policy of a central bank buying government debt merely "printing money" but clearly uses Modern Monetary Theory (MMT below) to distinguish the two things. I think it's probably wise to stick to this separation in terms, especially considering that almost all (perhaps all) of the "printing money" taking place at the moment is of the variety I've spelled out.
Your points have been mostly well said and just go ahead and assume everything you've said that I haven't noted I agree with. but again, I think you're still dabbling in a bit of confusion here:
"That same mechanism could be used in theory to approve spending without a budget, i.e. using created money. I don't know much about US budget law, but my guess is that this would require them to amend some existing legislative restrictions."
Couple of things here. Federal spending isn't passed by budgets, but by resolutions passed by Congress. Even if Trump could convince the Federal Reserve to buy up a bunch of the government's debt, and thus make its books looked more balanced, there is no authority within the executive branch or the Federal reserve to provide spending on their own via that mechanism. Again, you're still confusing two issues. MMT can pay off current government debt, but that doesn't necessitate spending by the government. What I'm saying is, MMT on its own doesn't actually spend any money. In theory, a government could use MMT and spend no money, merely pay down its debt or even generate a surplus.
Moreover, it can't become just any kind of spending on its own. Not without some specific resolution passed via the normal process. But that spending resolution could happen anyways with or without MMT. So, again, these things are orthogonal, not intertwined, even if MMT was put to use. There's not really a requirement that the US not deficit spend, so I'm not even sure why the federal government has to generate more surplus here. This seems to be the major reason most economists are sour on MMT, from what I've read.
Another way to look at it is the fact that raising or lowering taxes in the US system exists independent of any budget expenses. On occasion, Congress passes bills where both things happen, but, more often than not, spending bills get passed without tax hikes, and tax cuts get passed without spending cuts. The MMT theory is essentially akin to a tax hike in a way. I don't think this is necessarily disagrees with your points, but I also think it might be misleading to say that we could use MMT to back some kind of federal stimulus spending as if that all could happen within the authority of the central bank. The two events (raising money via MMT and passing a spending resolution) would still be separate, and, in constitutional terms, independent of each other.
I think it can also lead to a bit of confusion with the normal "printing money" process which isn't actually just handing over money to banks, but rather buying their assets to open up the lending market -- hence the confusion we see with people calling those injections "bailouts".
Obviously, I'll concede that a politician could pitch the idea to voters -- stimulus spending without debts! -- as connected. But in terms of executing them, they would be two different things.
I'm sorry (it passed through my mind to say "with respect", but we all know that means the opposite ), but I still don't feel that I'm at all confused about what's possible. I think the reason we continue to be at cross purposes is that I've been mainly talking about what "printing money" can mean on a generic basis (i.e. worldwide and across time). You've been mainly talking about what the current situation is in the US. I think a generic term is required because the possibilities for abuse are manifold. As an example I would include the historic practice of governments adulterating their own coinage with base metal in my use of the term "printing money", even though this was done before paper money was even invented. This sort of practice carried the same sort of risks - 3rd century Rome is the first generally recognized case of hyperinflation as a result of doing this.
Note though that the Romans had been getting away with gradually debasing the currency for over a hundred years at that point - effectively turning it from a commodity currency to a fiat one (as all modern currencies are). It was not that physical act that resulted directly in the inflationary spiral. Rather, it was a change in the community view about trustworthiness of the government (and hence of the coinage they backed). Ironically, the Emperor Aurelian had recognized the potential problem and proposed to slightly increase the gold and silver content of new coins he minted - and assign those with a higher notional value. The populace saw this (correctly) as a signal the government did not trust it's own coinage. By that stage coins had very little inherent value as gold and silver content was so low, so the result was a sudden drop of over 90% in the perceived value of the coins within a few months. The economy collapsed and Aurelian (who by the standards of that time had been a reforming and stable emperor) was assassinated.
You've raised MMT as a potential terminology to cover governments printing money to pay for their own expenses, but that's not really what the term is about - though it's true this theory is I think the original source of all the comments in this thread supporting the idea of printing money to pay for government spending. MMT is an economic theory that extrapolates from the basic idea that governments can in principle treat their powers to spend money and raise money as totally independent from each other. I agree with a lot of the individual components of the theory, such as the use of Keynesian fiscal stimulus to boost the economy during a downturn.
However, I think the overall conclusions reached by the model are mistaken. There are some technical issues with it, such as the way it treats (or ignores) interactions between countries and the conflation of public and private banking operations. In the context of printing money though, my main criticism of the theory is that it assumes what I think is unrealistic behavior by the general population in order to offer a means to control inflation. I've outlined previously what I think would be expected to happen when a population realize the government is issuing new money to pay for their spending. MMT argues this would not happen for 2 reasons:
(i) the expenditure would not be a break from what is expected. Part of the problem with printing money normally is that people naturally see this as devaluing existing money. Under MMT though all money is 'newly printed' and therefore there's no break from existing practice to cause concerns. I agree that there's some validity to this, which would significantly slow down the tendency to get into an inflationary spiral.
(ii) the main way MMT would deal with any signs inflation is rising too high is to increase taxes and sell more bonds. In this theory that has nothing to do with funding spending, but is used to control the money supply - if people have less money available, they can spend less and therefore there's a tendency for prices to come down.
Despite the benefit from point (i), I think inflation would still be significantly less stable than is currently the case. In that situation, I don't believe that using taxation to restrict the money supply would cause a fast enough response to be effective if inflation were starting to rise significantly. I think big increases in taxation with the intention of dampening inflation would probably increase the immediate level of alarm in the general population - thus, at least in the short term, increasing not reducing inflationary pressure (not to mention creating the normal problems associated with sudden and large increases in taxation).
In specific relation to the US, you're of course correct that federal spending should originate with Congress and that there would be a potential conflict with the central bank if Congress currently asked them to print more money to cover government expenditure. However, the way things are currently organized is not fixed in stone. As said above the concept of MMT is that all government spending should be free from budget constraints and the Federal Reserve has little role in that type of system - it would therefore make sense for it just to become another arm of the government (as central banks are in some other countries). There may still be checks and balances as a result of different parties controlling Congress and the presidency, but that will not necessarily stay the same in future.
@DinoDin in my earlier posts I was deliberately trying to avoid straying into MMT as I'm not sure how relevant getting into the economic technicalities is to this politics thread. Reviewing recent postings I also feel the thread has been rather hijacked by this conversation and am not convinced that everyone shares @Balrog99's interest in these issues. I'm happy to continue this conversation and delve further into the details if you want, but would suggest we either do that using direct messaging or start a new thread if you think the topic is of more general interest.
To clarify a bit more, I'll jump on your Trump hypothetical because it's quite helpful. Let's imagine that Trump did become some overnight MMT advocate, and magically convinced the Federal Reserve to go through with it. He still wouldn't be able to turn those new revenues into any kind of spending without congressional passage of a spending bill. Nor would the Fed be able to outlay that money to people if Trump wanted universal stimulus checks on its own. The money just ends up as another line item of revenue generation, alongside taxes, fees and customs.
I started off by editing my post above, as I hadn't read this post of yours before drafting it. However, I think Trump's potential actions are a more appropriate topic of conversation to explore in detail than the intricacies of MMT, so have done this separate response instead .
I don't think the constraints you're referring to are as completely binding as you imagine:
- we've got recent evidence of Trump circumventing Congressional approval of expenditure by inventing emergencies.
- we've also got numerous examples of Trump replacing people with alternatives more to his taste. This would be a possibility in relation to the Federal Reserve. The governance structure that applies to that (see details of how things work here) would make it a more complex procedure than just swapping out one man, but it's far from inconceivable Trump would try to gain more direct control over the Fed.
- we've just been discussing how the creation of new money allows spending outside of normal budgetary processes. I haven't attempted to research how detailed spending legislation works in the US, but I would be surprised if there is no wriggle room there. Certainly, as far as the constitution is concerned, the framers of that did not consider the possibility of printing money to pay for services. Congress is constitutionally responsible for raising money and for authorizing appropriations from the Treasury - but new money could be created and distributed outside of that framework. While no doubt such an attempt would raise legal challenges, I see no reason to believe such challenges would automatically be successful (and Trump would probably welcome them as evidence of dark powers attempting to stop him acting in his role as the People's Champion).
- we've also seen evidence of how keen Trump is to be personally associated with funds being given to voters.
Given all of the above would Trump consider trying to create and distribute money outside the normal approvals mechanism? Yes, absolutely he would. I see no reason at all to believe he would be dissuaded from action by any of the existing political norms. However, I should clarify that the above is a theoretical exercise in thinking about what is possible. I think the chance this will actually happen is incredibly remote. That's not because Trump would be deterred by principles, but because there are quicker and easier routes for him to take if he is concerned he is likely to lose to Biden - like putting off the election, sabotaging turnout or creating foreign crises for distraction & to stoke nationalist support.
So, after a week of it being adjudicated in the media, I am about 50/50 on Tara Reade's allegations against Joe Biden. It absolutely could have happened. The problem is that she has now changed her story multiple times. Last year it was just being uncomfortable at Biden's tendency to not respect personal space (which I think anyone can agree is probably 100% true) and it turned into a full-on assault in the Senate hallway a few weeks back. She has also now changed her story about what kind of complaint she filed after Biden said to investigate the Senate archives. Neither of these things mean she isn't being truthful. But they don't do anything but muddy the waters.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
So, after a week of it being adjudicated in the media, I am about 50/50 on Tara Reade's allegations against Joe Biden. It absolutely could have happened. The problem is that she has now changed her story multiple times. Last year it was just being uncomfortable at Biden's tendency to not respect personal space (which I think anyone can agree is probably 100% true) and it turned into a full-on assault in the Senate hallway a few weeks back. She has also now changed her story about what kind of complaint she filed after Biden said to investigate the Senate archives. Neither of these things mean she isn't being truthful. But they don't do anything but muddy the waters.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
In this day and age nobody knows what to believe. That's why I said I didnt necessarily believe the accusations against Kavanaugh as well as why I don't necessarily believe the accusations against Biden. Trump is a total asshole and although I find his harassment accusers more believable, I don't necessarily agree he's some kind of sexual predator either. We need to get the 'Good Old Boys' out of politics entirely to clean up this mess. This kind of behaviour wasn't officially condoned back in the day, but it sure as Hell was ignored and covered up. It's time for the Boomers to step aside and let the real grown-ups take the reigns...
So, after a week of it being adjudicated in the media, I am about 50/50 on Tara Reade's allegations against Joe Biden. It absolutely could have happened. The problem is that she has now changed her story multiple times. Last year it was just being uncomfortable at Biden's tendency to not respect personal space (which I think anyone can agree is probably 100% true) and it turned into a full-on assault in the Senate hallway a few weeks back. She has also now changed her story about what kind of complaint she filed after Biden said to investigate the Senate archives. Neither of these things mean she isn't being truthful. But they don't do anything but muddy the waters.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
One thing to note, and it was brought up during the Kavanaugh debacle as well, that memory is a shitty thing, and over the years, outside influences can change ones memory.
I believe Eva Murry was approached by an older white male who complimented her on the size of her breasts. I also believe, after those 12 years with ‘creepy’ Biden stories circulating in her republican household that she mistakenly connected the dots between him and the event especially if he was suppose to be in attendance. She could have also connected the dots prior if this older white man was vice-president of some business or organization and that one word is what she clung to after the exchange.
I do believe she has the right to come forward and tell her story, however, I also think publications should at the very least attempt to verify the story that they are being told, and if not, offer clarification when that vetting does happen by other sources.
I highly doubt (just by judging the writing of this one article) that this website will do any such thing.
I do hope Murry isn’t branded a liar because of this, but with the evidence that has been brought forward about him not being in attendance she needs to apologize to him. If she is made out to be a villain in all this, then the next 14 year old girl who is put into a similar situation may not speak up so fast.
So, after a week of it being adjudicated in the media, I am about 50/50 on Tara Reade's allegations against Joe Biden. It absolutely could have happened. The problem is that she has now changed her story multiple times. Last year it was just being uncomfortable at Biden's tendency to not respect personal space (which I think anyone can agree is probably 100% true) and it turned into a full-on assault in the Senate hallway a few weeks back. She has also now changed her story about what kind of complaint she filed after Biden said to investigate the Senate archives. Neither of these things mean she isn't being truthful. But they don't do anything but muddy the waters.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
In this day and age nobody knows what to believe. That's why I said I didnt necessarily believe the accusations against Kavanaugh as well as why I don't necessarily believe the accusations against Biden. Trump is a total asshole and although I find his harassment accusers more believable, I don't necessarily agree he's some kind of sexual predator either. We need to get the 'Good Old Boys' out of politics entirely to clean up this mess. This kind of behaviour wasn't officially condoned back in the day, but it sure as Hell was ignored and covered up. It's time for the Boomers to step aside and let the real grown-ups take the reigns...
I've been fairly consistent in saying that running a woman eliminates this problem entirely, unless that woman is Mary Kay Letourneau.
Speaking of which, there has always been a clear double-standard in my own head to THIS DAY about female teachers having sexual relationships with their male students, because I know for a fact my friends talked about wanting to "get with" certain teachers all the time (and I think one of them may have actually done so). There is absolutely an idea out there (that is as ingrained as the song "Hot for Teacher" by Van Halen) that there is something "cool" about a teenage boy sleeping with his teacher, but a male teacher sleeping with a female student is obviously the height of scandal. And I wonder how this came to be and what to make of it.
So, after a week of it being adjudicated in the media, I am about 50/50 on Tara Reade's allegations against Joe Biden. It absolutely could have happened. The problem is that she has now changed her story multiple times. Last year it was just being uncomfortable at Biden's tendency to not respect personal space (which I think anyone can agree is probably 100% true) and it turned into a full-on assault in the Senate hallway a few weeks back. She has also now changed her story about what kind of complaint she filed after Biden said to investigate the Senate archives. Neither of these things mean she isn't being truthful. But they don't do anything but muddy the waters.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
In this day and age nobody knows what to believe. That's why I said I didnt necessarily believe the accusations against Kavanaugh as well as why I don't necessarily believe the accusations against Biden. Trump is a total asshole and although I find his harassment accusers more believable, I don't necessarily agree he's some kind of sexual predator either. We need to get the 'Good Old Boys' out of politics entirely to clean up this mess. This kind of behaviour wasn't officially condoned back in the day, but it sure as Hell was ignored and covered up. It's time for the Boomers to step aside and let the real grown-ups take the reigns...
I've been fairly consistent in saying that running a woman eliminates this problem entirely, unless that woman is Mary Kay Letourneau.
Speaking of which, there has always been a clear double-standard in my own head to THIS DAY about female teachers having sexual relationships with their male students, because I know for a fact my friends talked about wanting to "get with" certain teachers all the time (and I think one of them may have actually done so). There is absolutely an idea out there (that is as ingrained as the song "Hot for Teacher" by Van Halen) that there is something "cool" about a teenage boy sleeping with his teacher, but a male teacher sleeping with a female student is obviously the height of scandal. And I wonder how this came to be and what to make of it.
That’s in your own head. There have been countless female teachers arrested and charged over the years for having relationships with male students.
But it is also how Western cultures approach to sexual behaviour is accepted. The male who sleeps with all the women is a stud. The woman who does the opposite is a slut.
So, after a week of it being adjudicated in the media, I am about 50/50 on Tara Reade's allegations against Joe Biden. It absolutely could have happened. The problem is that she has now changed her story multiple times. Last year it was just being uncomfortable at Biden's tendency to not respect personal space (which I think anyone can agree is probably 100% true) and it turned into a full-on assault in the Senate hallway a few weeks back. She has also now changed her story about what kind of complaint she filed after Biden said to investigate the Senate archives. Neither of these things mean she isn't being truthful. But they don't do anything but muddy the waters.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
In this day and age nobody knows what to believe. That's why I said I didnt necessarily believe the accusations against Kavanaugh as well as why I don't necessarily believe the accusations against Biden. Trump is a total asshole and although I find his harassment accusers more believable, I don't necessarily agree he's some kind of sexual predator either. We need to get the 'Good Old Boys' out of politics entirely to clean up this mess. This kind of behaviour wasn't officially condoned back in the day, but it sure as Hell was ignored and covered up. It's time for the Boomers to step aside and let the real grown-ups take the reigns...
I've been fairly consistent in saying that running a woman eliminates this problem entirely, unless that woman is Mary Kay Letourneau.
Speaking of which, there has always been a clear double-standard in my own head to THIS DAY about female teachers having sexual relationships with their male students, because I know for a fact my friends talked about wanting to "get with" certain teachers all the time (and I think one of them may have actually done so). There is absolutely an idea out there (that is as ingrained as the song "Hot for Teacher" by Van Halen) that there is something "cool" about a teenage boy sleeping with his teacher, but a male teacher sleeping with a female student is obviously the height of scandal. And I wonder how this came to be and what to make of it.
The double-standard is there because women are at the most risk of adverse consequences (whether that involves a child at an awkward age or an abortion is irrelevant since both require something from the female that the male doesn't have to deal with). Biologically, our bodies are ready and willing to make babies in our young adulthood. Psychologically, not so much.
Both males and females can get messed up sexually, emotionally and/or psychologically because of the hormones, emotions and general anxiety during those years. Throw in the introduction to drugs and alcohol into the equation and it gets even worse. Humans at that age are extremely vulnerable. Predators of either sex that take advantage of that should be prosecuted.
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
The Devil you know? That's the only explanation I can come up with.
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
The Devil you know? That's the only explanation I can come up with.
Trump's latest rape allegation was relegated the the Style section of the NYT, and has basically gotten NO coverage whatsoever, even though she fighting in court to get a DNA sample from him to test against her dress. Since we know from the OJ trial that a DNA sample falsely implicating someone has odds worse than a million to one, if I was innocent and accused of such an act, I'd JUMP at the chance to provide a sample.
But yes, this is what I've been talking about in regards to "flooding the zone" with scandal. Where one Biden scandal becomes equal to a 100 Trump scandals. This was always going to happen.
Wow.....so it's Christine O'Donnell of the famous "I'm not a witch" ad whose niece this is and who's pushing it. They've moved the date to 2007. Biden doesn't appear to have been at THAT dinner either. So I guess we're just going to keep throwing random years at the dartboard on this and see if Biden actually attended any of them:
This has NOTHING to do with the real sexual assault allegation, but it's going to give cover to dismiss it regardless. Which isn't fair at all to Tara Reade. But the push to throw this easily refutable bullshit at the wall is going to make people outright ignore a much more serious and credible one.
I don't know if anyone has watched "The Outsider" on HBO, but maybe we should explore the idea of a Joe Biden doppelganger being on the loose. A shapeshifter of some kind, with a modded kit pack that allows the user once a day to take on the form of a prominent politician (note, this ability does not scale well in Throne of Bhaal).
All kidding aside, this kind of fuck-up is the EXACT narrative the Biden camp needed to move past this. They now have the ammo to dismiss any allegation out of hand (whether legitimate or not) because of this clown show effort. If there ARE more people Biden has assaulted, they have been served very poorly by this transpiring. It's also very likely this is being orchestrated by the aforementioned aunt, and the niece is a pawn. Hell, she might have just TOLD her niece whoever said this was Joe Biden and she didn't know any better.
People who are WAY more invested in tearing down Tara Reade and the media pushing her story than I am (because I'm still genuinely on the fence about that) are pouncing like rabid dogs on Twitter. And this is maybe another sad fact of these type of situations. Even if you were sexually assaulted, if you make a SINGLE mistake in how you talk about it, you'll be destroyed. That is regrettable, to say the least.
Given all of the above would Trump consider trying to create and distribute money outside the normal approvals mechanism? Yes, absolutely he would. I see no reason at all to believe he would be dissuaded from action by any of the existing political norms. However, I should clarify that the above is a theoretical exercise in thinking about what is possible. I think the chance this will actually happen is incredibly remote. That's not because Trump would be deterred by principles, but because there are quicker and easier routes for him to take if he is concerned he is likely to lose to Biden - like putting off the election, sabotaging turnout or creating foreign crises for distraction & to stoke nationalist support.
Just about exhausted my desire to talk on this subject. But he can't. He can't just spend huge sums of money without congressional approval. And there is nothing magical in generating revenue via MMT that gives him this power. If he had this power he could do it with or without MMT/printing money. This is, I think, the fundamental point you're missing.
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
I don't think Trump is "skating by" at the moment. I'm not even sure it's fair to say everyone is focused on Biden's accusations. I suspect a great deal of Americans are still almost entirely focused on coronavirus. And in regards to that, Trump's poor performance is not being overlooked.
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
I don't think Trump is "skating by" at the moment. I'm not even sure it's fair to say everyone is focused on Biden's accusations. I suspect a great deal of Americans are still almost entirely focused on coronavirus. And in regards to that, Trump's poor performance is not being overlooked.
The DNC for whatever reason, decided to ignore this skeleton in the closet when they chose Saint Joseph to be their candidate. I don't believe for one second that they didn't know about this. WTF were they thinking? I just don't get how Biden was their best option. Just like I don't get how Hillary was their best option in 2016. Those people are either idiots or have basically no clue about human nature. My money is on both, idiots with no clue...
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
I don't think Trump is "skating by" at the moment. I'm not even sure it's fair to say everyone is focused on Biden's accusations. I suspect a great deal of Americans are still almost entirely focused on coronavirus. And in regards to that, Trump's poor performance is not being overlooked.
The DNC for whatever reason, decided to ignore this skeleton in the closet when they chose Saint Joseph to be their candidate. I don't believe for one second that they didn't know about this. WTF were they thinking? I just don't get how Biden was their best option. Just like I don't get how Hillary was their best option in 2016. Those people are either idiots or have basically no clue about human nature. My money is on both, idiots with no clue...
No powerful group "chose" Biden to be their candidate. The Democratic primary voters did. We haven't had a Democratic primary (not counting reelection years) where the nominee had this much of an edge in votes in a long long time. Stop crafting baseless conspiracy theories. I'm sorry but we do indeed live in a democracy, imperfect yes. But voters chose Biden.
Everyone is focused on the Biden accusations now. Like how everyone focused on the Hillary email "scandal" in 2016.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
I don't think Trump is "skating by" at the moment. I'm not even sure it's fair to say everyone is focused on Biden's accusations. I suspect a great deal of Americans are still almost entirely focused on coronavirus. And in regards to that, Trump's poor performance is not being overlooked.
The DNC for whatever reason, decided to ignore this skeleton in the closet when they chose Saint Joseph to be their candidate. I don't believe for one second that they didn't know about this. WTF were they thinking? I just don't get how Biden was their best option. Just like I don't get how Hillary was their best option in 2016. Those people are either idiots or have basically no clue about human nature. My money is on both, idiots with no clue...
But voters chose Biden.
Did they? Or did they just follow the script dictated to them? How would you know the difference? Biden somehow beat the odds of the famous Iowa and New Hampshire primaries. It's a miracle! He must be the chosen one...
Tell you what, I'll offer you so-called Biden supporters, or is it 'terrified of Bernie' supporters, a deal. I'll be the first to congratulate you all on a Biden victory if you give me an 'I told you so' nod if Trump wins.
By the way, I never said conspiracy, I said they're dipshits. Big difference. One implies that they're trying to deceive us, my view is that they think we're idiots (and can't conceal it).
By the way, I never said conspiracy, I said they're dipshits. Big difference. One implies that they're trying to deceive us, my view is that they think we're idiots (and can't conceal it).
This is alot of posts, with lots of insults towards lots of voters, but none of it is evidence backing up your original claim that the DNC "chose" Biden. I think reasonable people can conclude you have no basis for this claim.
By the way, I never said conspiracy, I said they're dipshits. Big difference. One implies that they're trying to deceive us, my view is that they think we're idiots (and can't conceal it).
This is alot of posts, with lots of insults towards lots of voters, but none of it is evidence backing up your original claim that the DNC "chose" Biden. I think reasonable people can conclude you have no basis for this claim.
Just chiming in to wholeheartedly agree. The idea that Biden voters had their vote "dictated" to them is a conspiracy. The DNC did not force Biden upon anyone.
They didnt. The fact that he finished in 4th (or was it 5th?) in Iowa and New Hampshire is a literal repudiation of this argument. If Biden was being foisted upon the population, then he would have done better in the early contests. If Biden's situation was the exact same as Clinton's, then no one but Bernie Sanders and Lincoln Chafee would have run against him. Instead - the field was crowded, and only fell away after Biden won SC and pulled *way* ahead in the polls.
Biden won because he was better trusted than Sanders to lead a post Trump America than Samders/
Also: I dont think anyone here is a "terrified of Sanders" voter. I also wouldnt really call myself a "Pro-Biden" voter either. I dont hate him, but he was at the bottom of my list.
By the way, I never said conspiracy, I said they're dipshits. Big difference. One implies that they're trying to deceive us, my view is that they think we're idiots (and can't conceal it).
This is alot of posts, with lots of insults towards lots of voters, but none of it is evidence backing up your original claim that the DNC "chose" Biden. I think reasonable people can conclude you have no basis for this claim.
Just chiming in to wholeheartedly agree. The idea that Biden voters had their vote "dictated" to them is a conspiracy. The DNC did not force Biden upon anyone.
They didnt. The fact that he finished in 4th (or was it 5th?) in Iowa and New Hampshire is a literal repudiation of this argument. If Biden was being foisted upon the population, then he would have done better in the early contests. If Biden's situation was the exact same as Clinton's, then no one but Bernie Sanders and Lincoln Chafee would have run against him. Instead - the field was crowded, and only fell away after Biden won SC and pulled *way* ahead in the polls.
Biden won because he was better trusted than Sanders to lead a post Trump America than Samders/
Also: I dont think anyone here is a "terrified of Sanders" voter. I also wouldnt really call myself a "Pro-Biden" voter either. I dont hate him, but he was at the bottom of my list.
Appreciate it.
One thing that I think threw people off was a failure to appreciate how small Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada are. Just to keep these numbers small, these three states total 10 congressional districts. South Carolina has seven districts. And Biden won an overwhelming majority in SC, while Sanders scraped out plurality wins in those first three states. So the strong SC win literally did wipe out Sanders' voter advantage. And that's not even getting into the Super Tuesday blowout.
There's actually a lesson for sincere leftists in what happened in the primary. A bunch of candidates dropped out and then endorsed the candidate who *most closely* shared their policy positions and had the best chance of winning the primary. There's a strong lesson there about the November election for anyone who wants things like expanded healthcare coverage, a more progressive tax code, or, even a science-based approach to dealing with pandemics.
Comments
I'm obviously not making myself as clear as I thought I was - I am not confused about the differences being talked about
1) The historic norm for countries has been to try and match the amount of government spending with revenue raised by the government through taxes and a wide range of charges. It is common for governments to set various legal targets requiring them to do this.
2) In order to allow for the fact that income and expenditure requirements vary over time, for instance as a result of the economic cycle, all countries allow for the possibility that there will be a budget surplus, i.e. more revenue is raised than spent, or a budget deficit.
3) The main way to fund budget deficits historically has been through borrowing, i.e. a government issues interest bearing securities. Normally those are available for purchase by anyone - both within and outside the country itself.
4) There is though a second way to 'fund' budget deficits and that's to print money, i.e. for the government to issue payments to people without any source for that payment. In the past that would have involved literally printing money, but in the US the main way of doing that now would be either through sending out checks or just directly crediting bank accounts. The point though is that the government is using the new money its created to pay for its own expenditure. It is this use of printing money that @DinoDin has not recognized as a possibility. That's presumably because it is not that common, though the Wikipedia article I linked before refers to quite a number of countries that have had disastrous experiences when trying this during my lifetime (Venezuela being just the latest example).
5) A second type of printing money is the process undertaken by central banks. In the past (and still today) all banks would issue notes and coins in order to ensure that there is a sufficient amount of those to meet the needs of commerce, i.e. that transactions would not be prevented simply because there was an insufficient supply of money. This process is nothing to do with government (except to the extent that the central bank is run directly by the government, as it is in some countries).
If there is an insufficient supply of money that will tend to lead to deflation as people wish to hand over less of a scarce resource to buy goods. If there is an excess supply that will tend to lead to inflation. Milton Friedman made his name as an economist by building up models of how to use this 'monetary policy' effect to steer the economy. Monetarists are not now as influential as they were in Reagan and Thatcher's day, but it's still a significant strand of economic theory.
6) These days (at least in the US) a more important way of creating new money than increasing the physical stock of notes and coins is the transactions central banks undertake with digital money. The process of quantitative easing that's been referred to relates to banks buying up existing government securities. This can be quite an indirect way to put new money into the economy, so the effects can be hard to track. For instance securities could be purchased from a pension fund. The fund would be unlikely to want to hold the new money it now had in the form of cash, so would buy new shares or securities. Although all that has appeared to happen in this instance is that one form of security has been replaced with another, in the process you've changed the balance of the market for securities - both by reducing the supply of securities available for purchase and stimulating the demand for them. This therefore helps drive up the price (this is one way governments try and influence the financial markets). As prices increase, people feel wealthier and are more likely to spend money, which stimulates more activity in the economy to create a multiplier effect.
7) It's not been addressed above, but I thought I should also mention that money has never been as strictly controlled by governments as they would like. A few examples off the top of my head of ways other people can increase the effective money supply include:
- forgery
- alternative physical forms of 'money' (such as stamps and vouchers of various kinds)
- banks issuing increased credit. Western governments try to control this by dictating the amount of assets banks have to hold in relation to the amount of credit offered, but constant games are played to find ways round the limitations (that was one of the root causes of the 2008 financial crash).
- mutual schemes allowing groups of people to get together and pool their resources to secure loans to each other (I don't know if that's a feature in the US though).
- alternative digital currencies such as Bitcoins. There are a whole host of these and they offer a real trap for the unwary because the potential instability in perceived value of any type of money is hugely magnified in these digital currencies. The mechanisms supposedly intended to match supply and demand (like data mining for Bitcoins) are ineffective and the currencies represent the 'Wild West' for types of money.
8) As I mentioned before, it is technically true that there is no link between government revenue and government spending (except to the extent countries have legislated to create one). Therefore it is certainly possible for governments to spend far more money than they receive - and doing this may not even be harmful if it is done as a one-off exercise. However, once you've stuck your paw in the honey jar it's very difficult not to go back for another helping and doing this can very quickly get you into an inflationary spiral. The problem is that governments tend to believe their own propaganda that they set the value of money - it's in fact the people who use the money that set its value.
In most circumstances that difference does not become too apparent because people are consciously happy to accept the government valuation, even though there will be some unconscious influences acting on them (such as the monetary theory outlined above). However, as soon as it becomes clear that the government does not in fact believe its own statements about the value of money, that unconscious acceptance becomes a conscious rejection of the stated value. That's a similar sort of position to the one a bank can face. Banks always have less cash available than the amount deposited with them, but in normal circumstances that's not a problem. Even if, in the natural course of variation, more money is asked to be withdrawn than they have available they can always borrow short-term supplies from elsewhere. However, if actions by the bank or information spread about them morphs that natural variation into a focused intention by depositors to get their money back you've got a bank run ...
Perhaps it would make it clearer why printing new money to pay for additional government expenditure is so likely to be a problem to consider an analogous situation at a smaller scale. Think about a corporation which started small, but is expanding and has found the way its shares have been allocated too confining. It wants the ability to be able to increase the number of shareholders. It could just issue more shares in a new market placement, but let's assume it doesn't need the money and only wants to increase the physical number of shares (which is not a particularly uncommon situation). It therefore decides to issue 10 new shares to replace each existing share. Now it could well say that each of those shares had the same notional value as the existing ones, i.e. each shareholder has just hugely increased the value of their notional holdings. However, we're well accustomed to the idea that when dealing with shares it's the market that determines their true value and not the issuer. In this instance the market value of each share would instantly drop to roughly 10% of the earlier price (could be a bit more or less depending upon the market's view of whether the restructuring would be good for the company or not).
We're less used to the idea that the value of currencies are determined by the market (at least within countries, where foreign exchange rates are not relevant), but exactly the same principles do apply. If a government is seen to be diluting the value of a currency by multiplying the amount issued without regard to the actual need for money supply, this will have a far stronger effect on inflation than quantitative easing. If a government keeps doing that an inflationary spiral is inevitable.
No. This isn't true. Printing money isn't about government deficits. Your linked article did *not* say that.
Edit: So reading more about it, it seems it's possible, but it's a way of erasing deficits/debts. Essentially the fed buys the bonds the government sells when it runs a deficit the same way they buy securities off the private market in normal "printing money" or quantitative easing fashion.
And it seems some central banks did this in the past, including Venezuela, so I was incorrect there. But again, the US isn't doing this. And it's not a way to generate more government spending, which again is done through a separate authority--Congress, the presidency. So again, it's a possibility that no central bank in an advanced economy seems willing to embrace, I guess that's the most factually correct way to put it. And it would, apparently, be a radical overhaul in standing policy at these banks.
But the important thing is that when we're referencing current acts of "printing money" in the context of coronavirus, we're not talking about government deficits.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/25/fed-economists-warn-of-inflation-and-economic-ruin-if-mmt-is-adopted.html
So yes, the physical printing of money used to be the system they used, from what I've read. And yes they still ordering the physical printing of money when they determine that the supply of paper dollars is needed, apparently during things like peak retail season around Christmas. But that's now something that's not related to economic stimulus term when we now say printing money.
The article is a media one. Although The Conversation aims to cover subjects in more detail than typical news media, it can't be expected to go into things in the same depth as an academic journal article or book. Nevertheless I think the statement from it that "As prices rose, the government printed more money to pay its bills. This cycle is what causes hyperinflation." is clear enough.
It's not clear above whether your statement that "some central banks did this in the past" relates only to the route you identify of central banks buying bonds. While this is one possible route, it is not the only way in which countries have attempted to print money to meet their expenditure requirements.
I have never suggested that the US is doing this - I've said several times that it's a rare thing for countries to attempt and should not in fact be attempted because it's so dangerous.
The approval mechanism for undertaking any form of spending in the US is shared between Congress and the President (as you say). That same mechanism could be used in theory to approve spending without a budget, i.e. using created money. I don't know much about US budget law, but my guess is that this would require them to amend some existing legislative restrictions. Given Trump's creative interpretations of what constitutes emergencies, it's not totally inconceivable that he would want to get around such restrictions without changing the law, but I've seen nothing to suggest such a plan has ever even been considered (and if it were there would probably need to be a long search for someone to act as the Chair of the Federal Reserve who would go along with it). In my list of things to worry about for the US, printing money would be waaay down.
You may have been referencing "printing money" purely in the context of coronavirus, but I was not. Part of the reason for my posts was to respond much more fully than I've done in the past to statements made many times on this thread over a number of years that the government is free to spend as much as it wishes, without regard to the amount of revenue it receives. While this is technically true, I hope I've now explained that it is also a misleading statement and an attempt to put this idea into practice is doomed to failure. The problem is that the government only control the notional value of the money they issue - the real value is controlled by the general population. They will inevitably respond to the government using new money to fund its services in a significant and sustained way by reducing the real value they place upon money, i.e. inflation will result.
Your points have been mostly well said and just go ahead and assume everything you've said that I haven't noted I agree with. but again, I think you're still dabbling in a bit of confusion here:
"That same mechanism could be used in theory to approve spending without a budget, i.e. using created money. I don't know much about US budget law, but my guess is that this would require them to amend some existing legislative restrictions."
Couple of things here. Federal spending isn't passed by budgets, but by resolutions passed by Congress. Even if Trump could convince the Federal Reserve to buy up a bunch of the government's debt, and thus make its books looked more balanced, there is no authority within the executive branch or the Federal reserve to provide spending on their own via that mechanism. Again, you're still confusing two issues. MMT can pay off current government debt, but that doesn't necessitate spending by the government. What I'm saying is, MMT on its own doesn't actually spend any money. In theory, a government could use MMT and spend no money, merely pay down its debt or even generate a surplus.
Moreover, it can't become just any kind of spending on its own. Not without some specific resolution passed via the normal process. But that spending resolution could happen anyways with or without MMT. So, again, these things are orthogonal, not intertwined, even if MMT was put to use. There's not really a requirement that the US not deficit spend, so I'm not even sure why the federal government has to generate more surplus here. This seems to be the major reason most economists are sour on MMT, from what I've read.
Another way to look at it is the fact that raising or lowering taxes in the US system exists independent of any budget expenses. On occasion, Congress passes bills where both things happen, but, more often than not, spending bills get passed without tax hikes, and tax cuts get passed without spending cuts. The MMT theory is essentially akin to a tax hike in a way. I don't think this is necessarily disagrees with your points, but I also think it might be misleading to say that we could use MMT to back some kind of federal stimulus spending as if that all could happen within the authority of the central bank. The two events (raising money via MMT and passing a spending resolution) would still be separate, and, in constitutional terms, independent of each other.
I think it can also lead to a bit of confusion with the normal "printing money" process which isn't actually just handing over money to banks, but rather buying their assets to open up the lending market -- hence the confusion we see with people calling those injections "bailouts".
Obviously, I'll concede that a politician could pitch the idea to voters -- stimulus spending without debts! -- as connected. But in terms of executing them, they would be two different things.
I'm sorry (it passed through my mind to say "with respect", but we all know that means the opposite
You've raised MMT as a potential terminology to cover governments printing money to pay for their own expenses, but that's not really what the term is about - though it's true this theory is I think the original source of all the comments in this thread supporting the idea of printing money to pay for government spending. MMT is an economic theory that extrapolates from the basic idea that governments can in principle treat their powers to spend money and raise money as totally independent from each other. I agree with a lot of the individual components of the theory, such as the use of Keynesian fiscal stimulus to boost the economy during a downturn.
However, I think the overall conclusions reached by the model are mistaken. There are some technical issues with it, such as the way it treats (or ignores) interactions between countries and the conflation of public and private banking operations. In the context of printing money though, my main criticism of the theory is that it assumes what I think is unrealistic behavior by the general population in order to offer a means to control inflation. I've outlined previously what I think would be expected to happen when a population realize the government is issuing new money to pay for their spending. MMT argues this would not happen for 2 reasons:
(i) the expenditure would not be a break from what is expected. Part of the problem with printing money normally is that people naturally see this as devaluing existing money. Under MMT though all money is 'newly printed' and therefore there's no break from existing practice to cause concerns. I agree that there's some validity to this, which would significantly slow down the tendency to get into an inflationary spiral.
(ii) the main way MMT would deal with any signs inflation is rising too high is to increase taxes and sell more bonds. In this theory that has nothing to do with funding spending, but is used to control the money supply - if people have less money available, they can spend less and therefore there's a tendency for prices to come down.
Despite the benefit from point (i), I think inflation would still be significantly less stable than is currently the case. In that situation, I don't believe that using taxation to restrict the money supply would cause a fast enough response to be effective if inflation were starting to rise significantly. I think big increases in taxation with the intention of dampening inflation would probably increase the immediate level of alarm in the general population - thus, at least in the short term, increasing not reducing inflationary pressure (not to mention creating the normal problems associated with sudden and large increases in taxation).
In specific relation to the US, you're of course correct that federal spending should originate with Congress and that there would be a potential conflict with the central bank if Congress currently asked them to print more money to cover government expenditure. However, the way things are currently organized is not fixed in stone. As said above the concept of MMT is that all government spending should be free from budget constraints and the Federal Reserve has little role in that type of system - it would therefore make sense for it just to become another arm of the government (as central banks are in some other countries). There may still be checks and balances as a result of different parties controlling Congress and the presidency, but that will not necessarily stay the same in future.
@DinoDin in my earlier posts I was deliberately trying to avoid straying into MMT as I'm not sure how relevant getting into the economic technicalities is to this politics thread. Reviewing recent postings I also feel the thread has been rather hijacked by this conversation and am not convinced that everyone shares @Balrog99's interest in these issues. I'm happy to continue this conversation and delve further into the details if you want, but would suggest we either do that using direct messaging or start a new thread if you think the topic is of more general interest.
I started off by editing my post above, as I hadn't read this post of yours before drafting it. However, I think Trump's potential actions are a more appropriate topic of conversation to explore in detail than the intricacies of MMT, so have done this separate response instead
I don't think the constraints you're referring to are as completely binding as you imagine:
- we've got recent evidence of Trump circumventing Congressional approval of expenditure by inventing emergencies.
- we've also got numerous examples of Trump replacing people with alternatives more to his taste. This would be a possibility in relation to the Federal Reserve. The governance structure that applies to that (see details of how things work here) would make it a more complex procedure than just swapping out one man, but it's far from inconceivable Trump would try to gain more direct control over the Fed.
- we've just been discussing how the creation of new money allows spending outside of normal budgetary processes. I haven't attempted to research how detailed spending legislation works in the US, but I would be surprised if there is no wriggle room there. Certainly, as far as the constitution is concerned, the framers of that did not consider the possibility of printing money to pay for services. Congress is constitutionally responsible for raising money and for authorizing appropriations from the Treasury - but new money could be created and distributed outside of that framework. While no doubt such an attempt would raise legal challenges, I see no reason to believe such challenges would automatically be successful (and Trump would probably welcome them as evidence of dark powers attempting to stop him acting in his role as the People's Champion).
- we've also seen evidence of how keen Trump is to be personally associated with funds being given to voters.
Given all of the above would Trump consider trying to create and distribute money outside the normal approvals mechanism? Yes, absolutely he would. I see no reason at all to believe he would be dissuaded from action by any of the existing political norms. However, I should clarify that the above is a theoretical exercise in thinking about what is possible. I think the chance this will actually happen is incredibly remote. That's not because Trump would be deterred by principles, but because there are quicker and easier routes for him to take if he is concerned he is likely to lose to Biden - like putting off the election, sabotaging turnout or creating foreign crises for distraction & to stoke nationalist support.
But then I saw this come out this morning. It's a claim about Biden sexually harassing a 14-year old at a dinner in 2008:
The problem?? Biden wasn't at the dinner. He was either ill or recovering from surgery. He sent a letter of regret for not being able to attend. And the organizer of the event also confirms Biden was not in attendance. So something is clearly going on here. This ALSO doesn't mean Tara Reade isn't telling the truth (again, I'm 50/50 on her allegation). But it does indicate there may be a coordinated campaign brewing here.
In this day and age nobody knows what to believe. That's why I said I didnt necessarily believe the accusations against Kavanaugh as well as why I don't necessarily believe the accusations against Biden. Trump is a total asshole and although I find his harassment accusers more believable, I don't necessarily agree he's some kind of sexual predator either. We need to get the 'Good Old Boys' out of politics entirely to clean up this mess. This kind of behaviour wasn't officially condoned back in the day, but it sure as Hell was ignored and covered up. It's time for the Boomers to step aside and let the real grown-ups take the reigns...
One thing to note, and it was brought up during the Kavanaugh debacle as well, that memory is a shitty thing, and over the years, outside influences can change ones memory.
I believe Eva Murry was approached by an older white male who complimented her on the size of her breasts. I also believe, after those 12 years with ‘creepy’ Biden stories circulating in her republican household that she mistakenly connected the dots between him and the event especially if he was suppose to be in attendance. She could have also connected the dots prior if this older white man was vice-president of some business or organization and that one word is what she clung to after the exchange.
I do believe she has the right to come forward and tell her story, however, I also think publications should at the very least attempt to verify the story that they are being told, and if not, offer clarification when that vetting does happen by other sources.
I highly doubt (just by judging the writing of this one article) that this website will do any such thing.
I do hope Murry isn’t branded a liar because of this, but with the evidence that has been brought forward about him not being in attendance she needs to apologize to him. If she is made out to be a villain in all this, then the next 14 year old girl who is put into a similar situation may not speak up so fast.
I've been fairly consistent in saying that running a woman eliminates this problem entirely, unless that woman is Mary Kay Letourneau.
Speaking of which, there has always been a clear double-standard in my own head to THIS DAY about female teachers having sexual relationships with their male students, because I know for a fact my friends talked about wanting to "get with" certain teachers all the time (and I think one of them may have actually done so). There is absolutely an idea out there (that is as ingrained as the song "Hot for Teacher" by Van Halen) that there is something "cool" about a teenage boy sleeping with his teacher, but a male teacher sleeping with a female student is obviously the height of scandal. And I wonder how this came to be and what to make of it.
That’s in your own head. There have been countless female teachers arrested and charged over the years for having relationships with male students.
But it is also how Western cultures approach to sexual behaviour is accepted. The male who sleeps with all the women is a stud. The woman who does the opposite is a slut.
The double-standard is there because women are at the most risk of adverse consequences (whether that involves a child at an awkward age or an abortion is irrelevant since both require something from the female that the male doesn't have to deal with). Biologically, our bodies are ready and willing to make babies in our young adulthood. Psychologically, not so much.
Both males and females can get messed up sexually, emotionally and/or psychologically because of the hormones, emotions and general anxiety during those years. Throw in the introduction to drugs and alcohol into the equation and it gets even worse. Humans at that age are extremely vulnerable. Predators of either sex that take advantage of that should be prosecuted.
That lets Trump, who accumulates scandals every 24 hours, skate by. He gets so many than you forget while there's only one it's easier to remember and sink the other candidate.
The Devil you know? That's the only explanation I can come up with.
Trump's latest rape allegation was relegated the the Style section of the NYT, and has basically gotten NO coverage whatsoever, even though she fighting in court to get a DNA sample from him to test against her dress. Since we know from the OJ trial that a DNA sample falsely implicating someone has odds worse than a million to one, if I was innocent and accused of such an act, I'd JUMP at the chance to provide a sample.
But yes, this is what I've been talking about in regards to "flooding the zone" with scandal. Where one Biden scandal becomes equal to a 100 Trump scandals. This was always going to happen.
This has NOTHING to do with the real sexual assault allegation, but it's going to give cover to dismiss it regardless. Which isn't fair at all to Tara Reade. But the push to throw this easily refutable bullshit at the wall is going to make people outright ignore a much more serious and credible one.
I don't know if anyone has watched "The Outsider" on HBO, but maybe we should explore the idea of a Joe Biden doppelganger being on the loose. A shapeshifter of some kind, with a modded kit pack that allows the user once a day to take on the form of a prominent politician (note, this ability does not scale well in Throne of Bhaal).
All kidding aside, this kind of fuck-up is the EXACT narrative the Biden camp needed to move past this. They now have the ammo to dismiss any allegation out of hand (whether legitimate or not) because of this clown show effort. If there ARE more people Biden has assaulted, they have been served very poorly by this transpiring. It's also very likely this is being orchestrated by the aforementioned aunt, and the niece is a pawn. Hell, she might have just TOLD her niece whoever said this was Joe Biden and she didn't know any better.
People who are WAY more invested in tearing down Tara Reade and the media pushing her story than I am (because I'm still genuinely on the fence about that) are pouncing like rabid dogs on Twitter. And this is maybe another sad fact of these type of situations. Even if you were sexually assaulted, if you make a SINGLE mistake in how you talk about it, you'll be destroyed. That is regrettable, to say the least.
Just about exhausted my desire to talk on this subject. But he can't. He can't just spend huge sums of money without congressional approval. And there is nothing magical in generating revenue via MMT that gives him this power. If he had this power he could do it with or without MMT/printing money. This is, I think, the fundamental point you're missing.
I don't think Trump is "skating by" at the moment. I'm not even sure it's fair to say everyone is focused on Biden's accusations. I suspect a great deal of Americans are still almost entirely focused on coronavirus. And in regards to that, Trump's poor performance is not being overlooked.
The DNC for whatever reason, decided to ignore this skeleton in the closet when they chose Saint Joseph to be their candidate. I don't believe for one second that they didn't know about this. WTF were they thinking? I just don't get how Biden was their best option. Just like I don't get how Hillary was their best option in 2016. Those people are either idiots or have basically no clue about human nature. My money is on both, idiots with no clue...
No powerful group "chose" Biden to be their candidate. The Democratic primary voters did. We haven't had a Democratic primary (not counting reelection years) where the nominee had this much of an edge in votes in a long long time. Stop crafting baseless conspiracy theories. I'm sorry but we do indeed live in a democracy, imperfect yes. But voters chose Biden.
Did they? Or did they just follow the script dictated to them? How would you know the difference? Biden somehow beat the odds of the famous Iowa and New Hampshire primaries. It's a miracle! He must be the chosen one...
This is alot of posts, with lots of insults towards lots of voters, but none of it is evidence backing up your original claim that the DNC "chose" Biden. I think reasonable people can conclude you have no basis for this claim.
Just chiming in to wholeheartedly agree. The idea that Biden voters had their vote "dictated" to them is a conspiracy. The DNC did not force Biden upon anyone.
They didnt. The fact that he finished in 4th (or was it 5th?) in Iowa and New Hampshire is a literal repudiation of this argument. If Biden was being foisted upon the population, then he would have done better in the early contests. If Biden's situation was the exact same as Clinton's, then no one but Bernie Sanders and Lincoln Chafee would have run against him. Instead - the field was crowded, and only fell away after Biden won SC and pulled *way* ahead in the polls.
Biden won because he was better trusted than Sanders to lead a post Trump America than Samders/
Also: I dont think anyone here is a "terrified of Sanders" voter. I also wouldnt really call myself a "Pro-Biden" voter either. I dont hate him, but he was at the bottom of my list.
Appreciate it.
One thing that I think threw people off was a failure to appreciate how small Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada are. Just to keep these numbers small, these three states total 10 congressional districts. South Carolina has seven districts. And Biden won an overwhelming majority in SC, while Sanders scraped out plurality wins in those first three states. So the strong SC win literally did wipe out Sanders' voter advantage. And that's not even getting into the Super Tuesday blowout.
There's actually a lesson for sincere leftists in what happened in the primary. A bunch of candidates dropped out and then endorsed the candidate who *most closely* shared their policy positions and had the best chance of winning the primary. There's a strong lesson there about the November election for anyone who wants things like expanded healthcare coverage, a more progressive tax code, or, even a science-based approach to dealing with pandemics.