Michael Hudson

Break up the Dem Party

By Michael Thursday, September 12, 2019 Articles, USA No tags Permalink

Why we need to abolish the Democratic National Committee, even if that means breaking up the Democratic Party Thursday’s debate on Walt Disney’s ABC channel is shaping up as yet another shameless charade. The pretense is that we are to select who the Democratic presidential candidate will be. But most Americans, as the Irish say, vote with their backsides, belonging to the informal but dominant party of non-voters who choose not to be sucked into legitimizing the bad choices put before them. But the limited airing of their personalities reflects the fact that most Americans, as the Irish say, vote with their backsides, belonging to the informal but dominant party of non-voters who choose not to be sucked into legitimizing the bad choices put before them. The debate is being presented as ...

Ellen Brown on peak debt, Jubilee

By Michael Friday, August 30, 2019 Debt banks Permalink

Cross-posted from Ellen's regular blog on Truth Dig We are again reaching the point in the business cycle known as “peak debt,” when debts have compounded to the point that their cumulative total cannot be paid. Student debt, credit card debt, auto loans, business debt and sovereign debt are all higher than they have ever been. As economist Michael Hudson writes in his provocative 2018 book, “…and forgive them their debts,” debts that can’t be paid won’t be paid. The question, he says, is how they won’t be paid. Mainstream economic models leave this problem to “the invisible hand of the market,” assuming trends will self-correct over time. But while the market may indeed correct, it does so at the expense of the debtors, who become progressively poorer as the rich become ...

Charge us More

By Michael Thursday, August 8, 2019 Articles No tags Permalink

Trump's claim that China is paying for the tariffs is completely false and basically serves to redirect income from his poor supporters to his wealthy supporters. Not only that, the policy will have the consequence of further isolating the United States, says Michael Hudson. unsplash-logoPang Yuhao

Global Warming and U.S. National Security Diplomacy

By Michael Monday, August 5, 2019 Articles No tags Permalink

Control of oil has long been a key aim of U.S. foreign policy. The Paris climate agreements and any other Green programs to reduce the pace of global warming are viewed as threatening the aim of dominating world energy markets by keeping economies dependent on oil under U.S. control. Also blocking U.S. willingness to help stem global warming is the oil industry’s economic and hence political power. Its product is not only energy but also global warming, along with plastic pollution. This fatal combination of the national security state’s mentality and oil industry lobbying threatens to destroy the planet’s climate. The prospect of raising temperatures and sea levels along the coasts while inland regions suffer drought is viewed simply as collateral damage to the geopolitics of oil. The State Department is ...

The Instrument of Empire

By Michael Sunday, August 4, 2019 Interviews No tags Permalink

So, Canada, the Canadian people unfortunately are deprived of honest representation of provincial desires, provincial needs, by the fact that the financial sector, the banks, are pretty much running the country.” – Michael Hudson On the weekend of July 19-21st, 2019, the University of Manitoba became the venue for the 14th Forum of the World Association for Political Economy (WAPE). This annual event represents a gathering of Marxist economists from around the globe, and aims to utilize current understandings on the subject to analyze and study the world economy, reveal its laws of development, and offer policies to promote economic and social progress on national and global levels. One of the keynote speakers at this event was Michael Hudson. He had presented on his ...

Even He Can’t Get Away With It

By Michael Sunday, August 4, 2019 Articles No tags Permalink

Trump’s New Tariffs on China Help Pay for his Corporate Tax Cut, TRNN, August 2, 2019, Trump's claim that China is paying for the tariffs is completely false and basically serves to redirect income from his poor supporters to his wealthy supporters. Not only that, the policy will have the consequence of further isolating the United States, says Michael Hudson GREG WILPERT: Welcome to The Real News Network. I’m Greg Wilpert in Baltimore. President Trump announced on Thursday via Twitter that trade negotiations with China have stalled and that he will now impose a 10% tariff on $300 billion worth of goods imported from China. At a rally later in the day on Thursday, Trump said the following. PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: I just announced another 10% tariff on $300 billion worth of ...

Negative Interest, Debt Jubilee?

By Michael Thursday, August 1, 2019 Interviews Max Keiser Permalink

An interview with Max & Stacy on their Double Down Radio show. Click through to listen on Sputnik News. As interest rates head into negative territory and Greek debt yields less than US Treasury debt, DOUBLE DOWN asks economist and historian, Dr. Michael Hudson if any economic theory has ever suggested negative interest rates. Not since back to the Bronze Age does he recall anything like this being suggested. That’s because, for thousands of years, economic beings have chosen to hold debt jubilees. Negative rates achieve that a bit slower but they do the same thing eventually by bringing the volume of savings on the asset side of the balance sheet down to the volume of debt that can be repaid. Hudson believes rates will quickly go as negative as 25% ...

The Coming Savings Meltdown

By Michael Sunday, July 28, 2019 Articles No tags Permalink

Debts that can’t be paid, won’t be. That point inevitably arrives on the liabilities side of the economy’s balance sheet. But what of the asset side? One person’s debt is a creditor’s claim for payment. This is defined as “savings,” even though banks simply create credit endogenously on their own computers without needing any prior savings. When debts can’t be paid and debtors default, what happens to these creditors? As President Obama showed, banks and bondholders can be bailed out by new Federal Reserve money creation. That is what the $4.6 trillion in Quantitative Easing since 2008 was all about. The Fed has spent the last few years supporting stock market prices (and holding down gold prices) by manipulating the forward option markets. But this artificial life support to keep the debt overhead ...

U.S. Economic Warfare and Likely Foreign Defenses

By Michael Sunday, July 21, 2019 Globalism and its Institutions, Speeches superimperialism Permalink

Keynote Paper delivered at the 14th Forum of the World Association for Political Economy, July 21, 2019. Today’s world is at war on many fronts. The rules of international law and order put in place toward the end of World War II are being broken by U.S. foreign policy escalating its confrontation with countries that refrain from giving its companies control of their economic surpluses. Countries that do not give the United States control of their oil and financial sectors or privatize their key sectors are being isolated by a United States imposing trade sanctions and unilateral tariffs giving special advantages to U.S. producers in violation of free trade agreements with European, Asian and other countries. This global fracture has an increasingly military cast. U.S. officials justify tariffs and import quotas ...