Debunking deficit myths (with Stephanie Kelton)

Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer

Civic Ventures

Business, Government, News, Politics

4.8 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 8 February 2022

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Modern Monetary Theory is an attempt to accurately describe how government debt and complex financial systems actually work and it can help us responsibly use our resources. No one is more knowledgeable on the subject than returning guest, Professor Stephanie Kelton. On this episode, originally released in 2020, Kelton explains the myths surrounding MMT and what a new understanding of the budget could do for our economy. Stephanie Kelton is a Professor of Economics and Public Policy at Stony Brook University. She is the leading expert on Modern Monetary Theory. Her book, The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy, shows how to break free of flawed deficit thinking. Twitter: @StephanieKelton The Deficit Myth: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781541736184 Learn To Love Trillion-Dollar Deficits: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/09/opinion/us-deficit-coronavirus.html Website: http://pitchforkeconomics.com/ Twitter: @PitchforkEcon Instagram: @pitchforkeconomics Nick’s twitter: @NickHanauer

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Ashley, one of the producers here at Pitchfork Economics. Today, we're re-releasing one of our
0:05.3	most popular episodes all about modern monetary theory. MMT is an attempt to accurately describe
0:12.3	how government debt and complex financial systems actually work, and it can help us responsibly
0:18.4	use our resources. No one is more knowledgeable on the subject than returning guest Professor Stephanie
0:24.8	on this episode, originally released in 2020, Kelton explains the myths surrounding MMT,
0:30.3	and what a new understanding of the budget could do for our economy. We hope you enjoy.
0:36.4	We've been running an experiment in MMT for the last 20 or 30 years. I mean, the country
0:42.1	went into the crisis with 20 trillion in deficit and virtually no inflation. We were already doing it,
0:49.7	just calling it a different thing. Well, that's how we think about deficits. There's something
0:54.0	wrong with them. There's something we want to eliminate. They're a problem. I'm telling you what
0:58.6	worries me right now, that we may let the deficit get too small. From the home offices of civic
1:09.2	ventures in downtown Seattle, this is Pitchfork Economics, with Nick Hanauer, the best place to get
1:15.1	the truth about who gets what and why. I'm Nick Hanauer, founder of Civic Ventures.
1:27.3	I'm David Goldstein, senior fellow at Civic Ventures.
1:35.3	Well, Goldie, today we get to interview the woman of the moment, our friend Stephanie Kelton,
1:42.0	who is one of the nation's biggest proponents of modern monetary theory.
1:46.7	And it's the moment because one of the things that MMT says is that federal debts and deficits
1:56.2	don't really matter in and of themselves. The deficit doesn't matter. It's inflation we should
2:02.1	be looking at. Are we maxing out the resources in the economy rather than these fictional numbers
2:10.3	about dollars and the deficit. And right now, Nick, we are just racking up huge deficits all of a
2:17.1	sudden and nobody seems to care. Yeah, we are running a giant natural experiment. As we have been
2:24.9	for the last 30, 40 years, the deficit has gone from essentially zero to 20 trillion or more
	...

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