The government can never run out of money.

What are you talking about? Lol.

 

There is no difference. You can print all the akphidel dollars you want, but if nobody wants them, then they aren't going to do business with you. You are just as constrained as Greece or the US, just in different ways. Money is debt. If you have no debt to secure it, then your money is worthless. Just because it is theoretically possible to print currency as fast as the printers can churn it out does not mean anything. Currency has to represent something. If it is doesn't, it is worthless.

 

There's a huge difference. We just move the debt ceiling whenever we want to spend more money. It is completely meaningless. If I want more USD, I can't just make more. I have to earn from an existing pool or just borrow it from banks. Can't believe you are arguing that they are the same.

 

"We" cannot move the debt ceiling "whenever". It is not "completely meaningless". People have to be willing to buy that debt and have the ability to buy that debt. The government can print as many US dollars as it wants, but whatever one considers them backed by never changes and each new dollar dilutes the purchasing power of an existing dollar. Nothing is added; "full faith and credit" is taken away.

 

Of course we can. We move the debt ceiling all the time. The rest of us constrained folks don't have a made up debt ceiling constraint. We have real constraints.

 

It's like you have $100 in your bank account but you tell yourself that you can only spend $10. You still have $100 regardless of your man made constraint. Just like the US still has an infinite amount of money to spend regardless of it's made up debt ceiling constraint. Huge difference.

 

And there is a giant fight every time it is moved.

Sure you don't. Tell that to the mortgage officer when you are taking out a loan.

Just those who subscribe to MMT.

 

Who cares if there's a fight. Doesn't mean we don't have an infinite amount of money to spend. We just choose to make a made up limit on it then change it whenever we want to. Us real constrained folks don't have an infinite amount of money to spend. If we spend all our money, we have to figure out ways to get more. Not even close to similar to the debt ceiling, lol. They are not even remotely the same things.

 

Actually there is a lot of political posturing

Greece is not the United States. They are tied to the Euro which they have NO control over

 

If you don't understand, this is not my problem.

 

Actually they do. It's called a "grexit" which means that Greece just leaves the EU. Then they can start printing their own currency and tell their debtors to take a long walk off a short pier.

 

I don't think anyone understands what you're talking about but yourself. It is completely nonsensical.

 

That's great if stock market crashes and global financial insecurity is your thing I guess

 

It takes money to make money; only the right fails to have any Faith in Capitalism, even with an official Mint at their disposal.

 

Believe me, my financial security isn't tied to whether or not Greeks decide to exit the EU.

If yours is, then might I suggest rare metals? At the end of the day, we can decide to work for federal reserve notes or gold or soiled condoms.

It's completely up to you.

 

I remember when gold was $2k and all the Libertarian nuts were talking about $5k and that the dollar was going to collapse, hyperinflation was going to happen, there's a debt bubble, we'd lose world reserve currency status, etc, etc, etc. It was absolutely hilarious. I told them they were crazy and they didn't believe me. They sure took a whoopin.

 

They're still talking 5k and more for gold. It's not like gold is volatile while the USD is not. At the end of the day, a dollar is a dollar and an ounce of gold is an ounce of gold.

It's an individual choice. I personally don't keep my wealth in fiat currency, but rather use it as a means of exchange. For that, it is valuable, but I'm happy with how gold has done over the years.

I doubt you'll be able to find somebody with a ton of money in the bank willing to say the same.

 

Yes, but this can only go so far. It can help smooth out fluctuations in the economy, but cannot fix underlying problems. You will still get a recession if there is a bad economic trend.

Of course, there's a wealth redistribution aspect to this type of monetary policy as well, which makes for contentious politics.
I agree with you that this could still be very effective in helping to bring an overall economy out of a recession though.

 

Well my friend...it isn't actually about you and me...although I think you might be a little short sighted.

It's about the health of our ECONOMY and that of the globe in general. And your grexit would have some nasty repercussions.

Is there something about recessions that conservative like?

 

Unless, of course. they run out of people willing to accept that particular currency as anything of value...

 

Gold is speculation. If you think otherwise...well...have fun...

 

And fully expect that no one will ever loan them a dime again...

 

If I recall correctly Hoover tried something very like The Zoroaster quote in the run up to the Great Depression. It failed. MMT is largely the notion that government is magic; and the mages in DC always know exactly what lever to pul and when to pull it. Sadly they do not.

 

Well after having Depressions about every ten years...they kept us out of ANY for almost a hundred. That's some pretty good lever pulling.

 

Of course a government can never run out of money but they can make it worthless.