A fiscal consolidation plan

Another day passes and lots more reading done. Some of it interesting but a significant amount of it tedious even enraging. I hum my mantras as I read to stay calm. But among the things I read there were some stand outs – not all of which I will have time to write about today. But this news report – Estonia Wants Stricter Euro Budget Rules – came in overnight, which caught my eye. Further examination, revealed how skewed policy priorities have become over the course of this economic crisis. The most costly things for an economy are ignored and aspirations that will impose future costs are promoted. Driving this policy agenda (madness) are the false messages that the IMF continually put out which spread a mélange of lies and non-sequiturs across the policy debate. I came up with a fiscal consolidation plan myself today as a result. I will disclose it later.

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Naked Keynesianism

New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman occasionally brushes up against an understanding of how the macroeconomy works. Some people actually have said to me that he does get it but chooses for political purposes not to disclose a full understanding of the basic principles of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). Well in his most recent column – We’re Not Greece – published May 13, 2010, I think you can conclude that when left to his own devices he doesn’t have a clue about what is really happening in the macroeconomy. So today, we are exposing his mainstream (neo-classical) keynesian nakedness – he is now naked and without clothes.

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Saturday Quiz – May 15, 2010 – answers and discussion

Here are the answers with discussion for yesterday’s quiz. The information provided should help you work out why you missed a question or three! If you haven’t already done the Quiz from yesterday then have a go at it before you read the answers. I hope this helps you develop an understanding of modern monetary theory (MMT) and its application to macroeconomic thinking. Comments as usual welcome, especially if I have made an error.

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Doublethink

Yesterday I read an article by Noam Chomsky – Rustbelt rage – which documents the decline of the American dream and extends the malaise to Chinese workers. The hypothesis is that the workers in each country signed up for what they thought was a social contract where if they worked hard they would enjoy secure retirements. Then the meltdown undermines their jobs and they are forced to live on pitiful pensions. And while they watch the top-end-of-town enjoying the benefits of billions of bailout money from government the beneficiaries of these bailouts are leading the charge to take the pensions of the workers and turn them into “financial products” (privatised social security). This raises the concept of doublethink (a term coined by George Orwell) – which “means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them”. That was what interested me today (in blog terms).

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Labour force data – no boom yet!

Australia’s economy is apparently booming. At least that is what all the current public rhetoric is suggesting. Wage breakouts are apparently looming and the Mining boom (is) too hot for Canberra to handle. Today the ABS released the Labour Force data for April 2010 and the data reveals that while there are positive developments in the labour market, employment growth remains sluggish and is barely keeping pace with the growth in the population. Unemployment rose a tad as a result. While the bank economists have hailed today’s figures as “stellar” and indicative of an economy “near full capacity”, I consider their judgement to be seriously impaired and biased. Conditions in the Australian labour market are, in fact, fairly subdued. As I said last month – with the declining fiscal stimulus and private spending remaining subdued – today’s data doesn’t represent a place we would want to be in for very long.

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What part of accounting don’t they get?

Well last night’s Australian federal budget was a total disgrace. Which means I am either crazy or the most of the rest of the commentators are because they are all hailing it as wonderful piece of policy. Lately, I have increasingly been reading this claim that governments have to conduct “fully-funded spending” as some sort of icon of fiscal responsibility. The Australian treasurer said it repeatedly in his speech and in his following press interviews. Whenever I read or hear that idea I say quietly: What part of accounting don’t they get?

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Federal budget 2010-11 – a sad document

Tonight the Federal Treasurer delivered his third budget and it was a disappointing effort. The worst line in his speech was “Best of all, the unemployment rate is expected to fall further from 5.3 per cent today to 4¾ per cent by mid-2012, around the level consistent with full employment”. So their aspirations are that low. There was also nonsensical statements about the government not being able to afford to “invest in skills, infrastructure, renewable energy and hospitals” unless new tax measures were found. There is also some stupid fiscal rules introduced which will not stand scrutiny if Europe melts down and a new crisis emerges. The following is a 550-word Op Ed commentary I wrote for the local Fairfax press. The word limit and the audience constrain what I have to say and how I said it.

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Life in Europe – another day, another (futile) bailout

Last Wednesday (May 5, 2010) I wrote that Bailouts will not save the Eurozone in response to the miserable plan put forward to take the Greek government out of the bond markets for a period. Yesterday they announced a major ramping up of the credit line they are offering which is more characteristic of a fiscal rescue than anything else. However, it amounts to the blind leading the blind. The euro funds to finance the credit line are coming from the same countries that are in trouble. There are no new net financial euro assets entering the system as a consequence of this €750bn bailout plan and, ultimately, that is what is required to ease the recession and restore growth. The restoration of growth will also ease their budget issues. But this is Europe we are talking about. Despite the nice cars and bicycles they make, they are not a very decisive lot and their institutional structures are hamstrung by an arrogant sclerosis that pervades their polity and corporate world.

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It will only take 6 months

I followed the attacks on pro-Israeli New York Times war monger Thomas Friedman some years ago, which centred on his support for the invasion of Iraq and his repeated prognosis that it would only take 6 months to decide the fate of the conflict. The six months never really materialised and by 2007 he was arguing, just as vehemently as he argued for war, for US disengagement because the strategy had failed. He was imbued with the WMD mania that was used by the US, Australian and UK governments to “justify” the unjustifiable despite them knowing there were no such dangers. So he is a guy who obviously knows what he is talking about! In his latest column he tries his hand at economics with a similar intellectual arrogance and lack of judgement that he brought to the Iraq issue.

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