Modern Monetary Theory with the MMT Podcast I: Where Does Money Come From?

We have a special couple of guests on the show today. Listeners
to our episodes about QE for the People will remember that we
briefly mentioned Modern Monetary Theory as a new perspective on
how economics works, and I'd talked about getting some MMT
speakers on the show to explore that in more detail.


I was lucky enough to get the hosts of the MMT Podcast, Patricia
Pino and Christian Reilly, who have interviewed many of the
founding scholars and most active economists in MMT as part of
that brilliant podcast. We had a very wide-ranging discussion,
they were incredibly generous with their time, which I am
grateful for.


In our discussion, we'll be talking about some of Modern Monetary
Theory's big ideas, including:


Why everything you were taught about where money came from, and
comes from is wrong
Why your taxes technically don't pay for the things you think
they pay for
Why the US and UK governments cannot "run out of money", and why
you maybe shouldn't be so afraid of the national debt
What the real limits on government spending actually are
Why the current economic theories require millions of people to
be long-term unemployed, and why


I've divided the podcast into two episodes. The first deals with
a background of MMT, exploring the historical and anthropological
question "Where does money come from?". The second episode (which
is longer!) deals with the consequences of Modern Monetary Theory
for our society, some ideas of how it can be used to run
economies more effectively and solve many of the biggest problems
that we face in the world, and is therefore slightly more
political, so there is a content warning there if you don't want
to hear any discussion of politics.


I realise that this podcast is not an economics podcast, and it's
not billed as such. But I have become convinced, especially
recently, that so many of the concerns that we have been talking
about recently - this intersection between technology,
inequality, and global catastrophic risks, the necessity of
dealing with climate change, and so much else in the world - it
is necessary to have a deeper understanding of economics, which
is in the background of so much that is going on in the world.
MMT, to my mind, when it's properly interpreted and described,
makes some points that the "classical" understanding of economics
misses out on. And even if you disagree with it, I think it's a
fascinating area: I have certainly been fascinated by it - and I
hope that you find it valuable. As ever - if not, you can always
get in touch with me via the contact form on physicspodcast.com
and let me know what you think... or just wait a few days and
we'll have a different episode available for you on a different
subject. Just don't ask for your money back.