News Limited is still (mis)leading the way on the deficit-debt attacks. In another appalling piece of misrepresentation and erroneous reasoning, The Australian ran a story from its economics chief, Michael Stutchbury today entitled Now comes time to pay the piper. This newspaper has really excelled in recent months in the lengths it has gone to mislead and lie to its readers on matters relating to the macroeconomy and the conduct of fiscal policy. There will be a piper to pay – that I agree – but it will be because the federal budget deficit is not large enough right now rather than because it is too high.

The world seems to be going more insane every time I check. I have this naive belief that we bother to elect governments because we understand they can do things (as a collective) that we cannot do very easily (as individuals). I also assume we all think our elected governments will broadly use their fiscal powers to pursue an agenda that will advance public purpose – that is, seek ways to improve our standard of living and ensure all citizens participate in the bounty that the economic system generates (including sharing the losses when it doesn’t so generate). Of-course, I know that our polities basically govern to keep themselves in power. But there is the occasional election. Anyway, recent events suggest that governments seem to be able to construct popularity by taking actions that do us harm.

In an article in yesterday’s WSJ The Fed’s Exit Strategy, federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke provides an account of some of the operations of the monetary system that I write about in billy blog. While he doesn’t say it explicitly, he confirms that debt is issued to support interest rates (not fund net government spending) and that debt is not necessary at all if the central bank pays a “competitive” rate on overnight bank reserves held at the central bank. He also confirms that inflation is not an inevitable aspect of an expansionary package but it could be. All fundamental propositions of a modern monetary view of macroeconomics. So in one week, a Nobel Prize winner and now the Chairman of the Fed are stumbling around logic that confirms the neo-liberal driven deficit-debt-inflation-higher-taxation hysteria is without foundation.

In Deficits saved the world you read that a Nobel Prize winner not previously associated with Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) is starting to come round. The article by Paul Krugman highlights some of the basic elements of the sort of macroeconomics that I have been writing about for years and which forms the basis of this blog. It shows definitively the point I make about the macro balances – that a government surplus will squeeze the non-government sector into deficit and vice versa. It also addresses the current policy debate which is getting swamped a bit by idiots who are saying that fiscal policy is not working and should be constrained to get the government budget back into surplus.

There were two related stories this week from either side of the Pacific Ocean. From the east coast came – Rollout of jobs scheme ‘a sham’ and from the west coast – Stimulus Is Bankrupt Antidote to Failed Stimulus. While the US-based article is a polemic from the right-wing American Enterprise Institute and the second is a journalist’s reporting on Australian political trivia, they both raise interesting issues regarding the way fiscal policy is conducted. The issues raised provide further justification for employment guarantee schemes as a sophisticated addition to the automatic stabilisation capacity that is inherent in fiscal policy and makes it superior to monetary policy.

I read the headline in the UK press this morning – UK can’t afford another fiscal rescue – as a sure sign that all current and future keyboard operators within the UK Government had resolutely decided to refuse to enter a number in any government spending account from now on. This clearly would make it hard for the Government to continue spending given that a sovereign government like in the UK just spends by crediting private bank accounts and only a typist or two is needed to make that happen any time the government desires. I wondered what the Government had done to their operational staff that they would take such drastic action. So I started out to investigate what seemed to be a major yet fascinating industrial relations dispute between a government and its typists.

I had to double-check over the weekend whether I had actually read an article in the Fairfax press – Alarming debt bomb is ticking – given that my flu-ridden state was playing havoc with the clarity of my eyesight. Upon checking today, I concluded that I had read it. It is one of those articles that uninformed readers will consider erudite given the technical language it uses but which in fact is so misinformed at a theoretical level that it is has to be considered pure propaganda. It is sad that this sort of techno-mumbo-jumbo nonsense gets any space in our leading daily newspapers. I would rather more cartoons or brain teasers if they are struggling to fill their pages. Even an advertisement about the latest skin cream that not only eliminates wrinkles but also increases the reliability of the left-hander at Nobby’s would be better (Nobby’s = surf break)!

Saturday morning traditions … a long early ride on my bike (70 odd kms), then off to the local cafe for a cup of tea. Yes, time to read an actual paper paper. Time to talk about the state of the swell and wind direction (off-shore and pumping at present). The big match (Saints v Geelong, both unbeaten after 13 rounds – note no rugby here!). Perhaps some local gossip (who paid off who to get what development up!) … that sort of thing. Probably some politics. But no, before anything interesting could be raised by the assembled regulars … someone (a non-economist who claims he is just interested) had to begin proceedings with “Bill, why does the federal government borrow when you say it does not have too?” Can you put a sock in it, please! What about the surf? But why if they don’t have too? Saturday morning … the problem of being a macro economist. Things started getting ugly at this point.

Well I am now back in Newcastle and in the last two weeks the ocean has slumped from a cold 19 celsius to a freezing 16. See what happens when you turn your back. I think the sharks like the cold water less though. At least that is what I am telling myself as I read another surfer (on the south coast) was mauled last week. Anyway, my casual travel reading also saw me read the July edition of the Harper’s Magazine which had two very interesting articles about developments in the US, which ultimately have global implications. In recent months, I have been becoming more pessimistic about the idea that the current global economic crisis will represent a major change in ideology, away from free market neo-liberalism towards a more sustainable and fairer social democratic policy structure. The articles reinforce that pessimism.

While I am still reflecting on the UNDP workshop I participated at earlier this week in New York, another issue which came up repeatedly during the workshop is the on-going dispute between those who advocate income guarantees against those (such as me) who advocate employment guarantees. I didn’t cover this dispute at all in yesterday’s blog – Bad luck if you are poor!. When you start digging into the claims made by the income guarantee lobby you realise that most of their case is built on a failure to understand how a modern monetary economy works. For those who understand the opportunities available to a government which issues a sovereign currency, then the attractiveness of income guarantees disappears (in my opinion). So this blog documents some of this debate.

Greetings from College Park, Maryland (pronounced Marrilynd! in Australian). It is near Washington (DC) and I have work here (at the UMD) and in the capital for the next 2 days. Weather is hot but we are 189 kms or 2.8 hours from the nearest surf according to Google maps, which is equivalent to being landlocked to me! So no quick surf before work! Losers! I came down here late yesterday (5 hour drive) after a workshop at the Levy Institute jointly hosted with the United Nations Development Program, which was held in upstate New York. No summer up there at the moment but the Catskills Mountains are very beautiful – it is near to Woodstock. Anyway, I left the workshop thinking – bad luck if you are poor!

Several readers have asked me about fiscal rules and I have been promising to write about them for some time now. I was finally goaded into action by the current German rush to madness which will see them constitutionally outlaw deficits. When I saw the news that the German government was pushing constitutional change along these lines I thought good – the Eurozone will be dead soon enough and perhaps a better aligned fiscal and monetary system will emerge. Fiscal rules can take lots of different shapes all of which entrench chronic unemployment and poverty. The only fiscal approach that is applicable to a sovereign government operating within a fiat monetary system is one that ensures full employment is achieved and sustained. Anyway, here is an introduction to the mean-spirited and wrong-headed world of fiscal rules.

Yesterday I reported on a document I received from one of the largest international investment banks in the world. That document is part of that organisation’s advice it gives to bond investors. I used some of the document to illustrate that the understandings of how a modern monetary system operates that I write about here are also now out there in the real world – in the financial markets where bonds are bought and sold. I didn’t identify the document because it is a subscribers-only publication sent to me by the author and I respect his privacy. Today’s blog provides some more insights that will help you better understand the public debate and allow you to cut through the nonsense being peddled by all and sundry.

I am now in the US with a hectic week ahead. At present I am in Florida and for those who haven’t been here just imagine taking a landscape and pouring as much concrete as you can mix over as much of that landscape that you can access. Then once that sets, you build massive high-rise buildings and suburbs that span hundreds of kilometres and you have it. Oh, and plant a few palm trees as you concrete. But then there is surf nearby and before work this morning I am off to check it out. Anyway, in between other things I have been reading the so-called public debt exposition that appears in the latest issue of the The Economist Magazine. It will take a few blogs to work through it but here is Part 1. It might happen that there will be no Part 2 if I get so sick of reading this nonsense.

I saw this story in the Melbourne Age today World’s best airport named. I knew it wouldn’t be Sydney or Melbourne where I am often in and out of much to my displeasure. So I scanned the list. Sure enough a whole lot of airports some of which I regularly fly and know to be excellent in terms of ease of use, charges and available facilities. Anyway, I had intended to write a blog today about trends in world foreign exchange markets (see digression below) but the airport rankings attracted my interest because I am also thinking about infrastructure provision at present.