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The Instrument of Empire

By 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 ...

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Negative Interest, Debt Jubilee?

By Thursday, August 1, 2019 Interviews 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% ...

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De-Dollarizing the American Financial Empire

By Thursday, July 11, 2019 Interviews , , Permalink

Guns and Butter. July 3, 2019 Imperialism is getting something for nothing. It is a strategy to obtain other countries’ surplus without playing a productive role, but by creating an extractive rentier system. An imperialist power obliges other countries to pay tribute. Of course, America doesn’t come right out and tell other countries, “You have to pay us tribute,” like Roman emperors told the provinces they governed. U.S. diplomats simply insist that other countries invest their balance-of-payments inflows and official central-bank savings in US dollars, especially U.S. Treasury IOUs. This Treasury-bill standard turns the global monetary and financial system into a tributary system. That is what pays the costs of U.S. military spending, including its 800 military bases throughout the world. I’m Bonnie Faulkner. Today on Guns and Butter, Dr. Michael Hudson. ...

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Food Blackmail, the Washington Consensus and Freedom

By Monday, June 24, 2019 Globalism and its Institutions, Interviews Permalink

  Michael Hudson discusses his seminal work of 1972, Super Imperialism: The Economic Strategy of American Empire, a critique of how the US exploits foreign economies through IMF and World bank debt; difference between the IMF and World Bank; World Bank dysfunctional from the outset; loans made in foreign currency only; policy to provide loans for countries to devote their land to export plantation crops; US food and monetary imperialism; U.S. agricultural protectionism built into the postwar global system; promotion of dependency on the US as food supplier; food blackmail; perpetration of world poverty preferred; no encouragement of land reform; privatization of the public domain; America aided, not foreign economies; exploitation of mineral deposits; bribery; foreign nations politically controlled at the top; veto power for US only. Aired: June 19, 2019 Visit Guns ...

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Super-Imperialism at the Pentagon

By Wednesday, February 13, 2019 Interviews Permalink

picture: Tilo Gräser / Sputniknews Germany An interview on Sputnik News - January 23rd. text / interview: Alexander Boos / Sputniknews Germany Professor Hudson, in January you warned in Berlin at the Rosa Luxemburg Conference, about the still "dangerous" US financial imperialism. The US uses "financial weapons“, you said. Can you explain that briefly? After World War II, the US created the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund IMF. These instruments were created as essential control mechanisms to control other countries financially. This became particularly apparent after the US abolished its gold-standard in 1971. Since then, the US has always sought to force other states to hold their own currency reserves in US dollars. That means that those governments must then obtain the money through the US Federal Reserve. To make it ...

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Venezuela as the pivot for New Internationalism?

By Wednesday, February 6, 2019 Interviews , , Permalink

Saker interview with Michael Hudson on Venezuela, February 7, 2019 Introduction: There is a great deal of controversy about the true shape of the Venezuelan economy and whether Hugo Chavez’ and Nicholas Maduro’s reform and policies were crucial for the people of Venezuela or whether they were completely misguided and precipitated the current crises. Anybody and everybody seems to have very strong held views about this. But I don’t simply because I lack the expertise to have any such opinions. So I decided to ask one of the most respected independent economists out there, Michael Hudson, for whom I have immense respect and whose analyses (including those he co-authored with Paul Craig Roberts) seem to be the most credible and honest ones you can find. In fact, Paul Craig Roberts considers ...

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Guns & Butter: The Vocabulary of Economic Deception

By Friday, December 21, 2018 Articles, Interviews No tags Permalink

This is Guns and Butter, October 8, 2018. Transcript The aim of classical economics was to tax unearned income, not wages and profits. The tax burden was to fall on the landlord class first and foremost, then on monopolists and bankers. The result was to be a circular flow in which taxes would be paid mainly out of rent and other unearned income. The government would spend this revenue on infrastructure, schools and other productive investment to help make the economy more competitive. Socialism was seen as a program to create a more efficient capitalist economy along these lines. I'm Bonnie Faulkner. Today on Guns and Butter, Dr. Michael Hudson. Today's show: The Vocabulary of Economic Deception. Dr. Hudson is a financial economist and historian. He is President of the Institute for the ...

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