In the last week, we have heard from the Chief Economist at the OECD (Laurence Boone), who has been touted on social media as offering a fundamental shift in economic thinking at the institution towards fiscal dominance. This is an example of a series of public statements by various New Keynesian (that is, mainstream macroeconomists) who are apparently defining the new macroeconomics of fiscal dominance. The point is this. Within the mainstream macroeconomics there was always scope for discretionary fiscal intervention under certain conditions. The conditionality is what separates their version of the possibilities from those identified and explained by Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). Just because these characters are coming out of their austerity bunkers to scramble to what they think is the right side of history doesn’t mean their underlying economics has changed. If you dig, you will find the same framework in place, just nuanced a little to suit the times. But the leopard hasn’t changed its spots. The underlying train wreck is still there and will be rehearsed again at some future date unless we push forward in abandoning the whole New Keynesian approach.