The Democracy Collaborative

By Tuesday, March 28, 2017 Interviews Permalink

The Next System Project’s Adam Simpson sat down with renowned economist and economic historian Michael Hudson to discuss economic deceptions old and new. Michael Hudson is Distinguished Research Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri, Kansas City and a prolific writer about the global economy and predatory financial practices. Among his latest books are Killing the Host: How Financial Parasites and Debt Bondage Destroy the Global Economy and its follow-up J is for Junk Economics: A Guide to Reality in an Age of Deception. [soundcloud url="https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/313811467" params="auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true" width="100%" height="450" iframe="true" /] The transcript below has been edited for clarity. Adam Simpson: So, Michael, I'm really glad to talk to you today. First, I want to get to know a bit more about you before we dive into your new book. I've heard ...

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Wall Street First

By Thursday, March 23, 2017 Articles , Permalink

Trump is Obama’s Legacy. Will this Break up the Democratic Party? Nobody yet can tell whether Donald Trump is an agent of change with a specific policy in mind, or merely a catalyst heralding an as yet undetermined turning point. His first month in the White House saw him melting into the Republican mélange of corporate lobbyists. Having promised to create jobs, his “America First” policy looks more like “Wall Street First.” His cabinet of billionaires promoting corporate tax cuts, deregulation and dismantling Dodd-Frank bank reform repeats the Junk Economics promise that giving more tax breaks to the richest One Percent may lead them to use their windfall to invest in creating more jobs. What they usually do, of course, is simply buy more property and assets already in place. One ...

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Retirement. What Social Obligation?

By Tuesday, March 7, 2017 Interviews No tags Permalink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdv9EvWxkdc SHARMINI PERIES: It's The Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries, coming to you from Baltimore. I'm speaking with Michael Hudson about his new book J Is For Junk Economics: A Guide to Reality in the Age of Deception. Thanks for joining me again, Michael. MICHAEL HUDSON: Good to be here. SHARMINI PERIES: So, Michael, on page 260 of your book you deal with the issue of Social Security and it’s a myth that Social Security should be pre-funded by its beneficiaries, or that progressive taxes should be abolished in favor of a flat tax. Just one tax rate for everyone you criticize. We talked about this earlier, but let’s apply what this actually means when it comes to Social Security. MICHAEL HUDSON: The mythology aims to convince people that if they’re the beneficiaries of ...

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Why Deficits Hurt Banking Profits

By Monday, March 6, 2017 Interviews No tags Permalink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQmrg8cIjdQ Economist Michael Hudson takes on the mythology surrounding government budgets and explains how the term 'stability' has been used as a cover for financial fraud. SHARMINI PERIES: It's The Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. I am speaking with Michael Hudson in our studio in Baltimore about his new book, "J Is For Junk Economics: A Guide to Reality in the Age of Deception". Thank you again for joining me. MICHAEL HUDSON: Good to be here. SHARMINI PERIES: So, Michael, one of the concepts that you deal with is about balancing the budget, the whole mythology surrounding that. That is your myth number 17, where you say, "Government budget deficits are bad. Balanced budgets are good. And budget surpluses are even better." What's wrong with this? MICHAEL HUDSON: The popular ...

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Focus on Capital Gains

By Friday, March 3, 2017 Interviews No tags Permalink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOk208Rvms8 J is for Junk Economics: Michael Hudson on TRNN (3/5) March 1, 2017, SHARMINI PERIES: It's The Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries, coming to you from Baltimore. In our studios today we have Michael Hudson, who’s written a new book called, J is for Junk Economics: A Guide to Reality in the Age of Deception. All right, Michael, in this book -- and we’re now in segment three – we are going to talk about Trump’s plan to lower taxes. He has said that he would reduce corporate taxes from 35% to 15%. The 35% itself is a bit of a myth, because I don't think there are too many corporations out there who do pay the 35%. But he’s going to reduce the number of tax brackets as well, ...

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Alluring Infrastructure Income

By Thursday, March 2, 2017 Interviews , Permalink

'J is for Junk Economics': Michael Hudson on TRNN (2/5), February 28, 2017. Trump's infrastructure plan will privatize all the benefits for the financiers and make sure that the population at large gets zero benefit from it while paying the costs, says economist Michael Hudson SHARMINI PERIES: Welcome back to The Real News Network. I'm speaking with Michael Hudson, the author of, J is for Junk Economics, a Guide to Reality in the Age of Deception. Don't miss it. We're going to be talking about this book, and some of the misleading concepts that are out there, in terms of economics, and understanding economics. Being able to talk about economic concepts with a bit more knowledge than we have, requires reading this book. So, thank you for joining us, Michael. MICHAEL HUDSON: It's good ...

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