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Kevin Mayes's avatar

I know a professional economist can't say it, but I'm just a dirty old farmer and I can say what I like!

Excuse me if I refuse to believe that the dominant economists at HM Treasury and the BoE are merely 'mistaken'. We know that both Government and Commercial banks create money, but in my opinion there's an undeclared war going on all over the 'free' world (USA excepting- they have their own 'scam' as global reserve) whereby the private banking sector is attempting, through the agency of elected but 'captured' politicians, to extinguish the role of government as a currency creator. Here in NZ, the present government wants to get 'back into surplus' and is selling it as creating a 'war chest' for the next earthquake, cyclone, pandemic etc. However, when gov't is in surplus it becomes a currency 'taker' not a currency 'maker', i.e it loses 'a', maybe 'the' (alongside defence of the realm) most important role of a sovereign government. The Sectoral Balances overview indicates that the private non-bank sector (households and businesses) must then be in (profitable) debt to the sole remaining 'maker'- the private banking sector.

Unfortunately, the Treasuries and Reserve Banks of the world are staffed by individuals who are part of a 'revolving door' arrangement between the public and private sectors, sold on the presumption of creating a higher level of expertise in the field, but in fact creating huge conflicts of interest- just as it does in the fields of public infrastructure etc. These neoclassicals are not 'mistaken'. They are a Fifth Column- a legion of traitors and mercenaries driven either by Anarcho-capitalist ideology or by the lure of reward from their past and future masters.

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Steve Keen's avatar

I've spent 50 years of my life surrounded by Neoclassical economists Kevin. I know it's hard to believe that they don't know what they're doing, but they don't.

Yes what they do ends up favouring the financial sector enormously, and yes there's a revolving door from which they benefit.

But they believe their "Loanable Funds" and Equilibrium models in the same way Christians believe in the Virgin Birth. You can throw all the evidence you like at them and they'll continue to believe their nonsense because it's more a religion than a science.

That in fact makes them more dangerous than if they were doing it for malevolent or self-interest reasons. If that were the case you could maybe persuade them it will backfire on them, or pay them more to get (some of) them to change their tune. But when they believe it? There's nothing you can do to change their minds.

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ardj's avatar

My last comment seems to have been suppressed but I note you have made one or two corrections to the Ravel illustration, eg colours. I am still baffled by Taxation appearing as a government liability - though no doubt there is an explanation in the way double entry works. But of course clearly I still don't understand double entry, on the basis of this example, though numbers normally hold no fears for me.. What might be helpful is to show an initial condition and the subsequent changes, as with this example everything seems to happen at once.

None of which is a criticism of what you are doing, which I applaud.

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Steve Hummel's avatar

So you don't think that a 50% Discount/Rebate at retail sale and a 50% Gift to the bank/Debt jubilee to the consumer at the point of loan signing, both utilizing equal debits and credits that sum to zero are good monetary policies? What about ending inflation by implementing beneficial price and asset deflation? And reducing the macro-economic rate of growth of private debt by 75%?

These are policy results you advocate for. No comments? ????

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Sep 30
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Steve Keen's avatar

Thanks Mike!

I could tell some tales... I've made visits to the Bank of England between about 2006 and 2018--not much since I'm afraid. There was a small group of non-mainstream economists before the GFC. When it hit, they suddenly got a jump in status, because the mainstreamers--who were convinced that happy days lay ahead in 2007--were dragged over the coals by the politicians who took their advice seriously, and then were ridiculed by the media as the economy collapsed .

That led to the 2014 paper of course.

Since then, the mainstreamers have regrouped, and while they haven't ellminated the non-orthodox mob--or the physicists and the like brought in by Andy Haldane--the Bank has generally gone back to being dominated by Neoclassicals.

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