In a struggle between oligarchy and democracy, something must give

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The Democrats’ Quandary To hear the candidates debate, you would think that their fight was over who could best beat Trump. But when Trump’s billionaire twin Mike Bloomberg throws a quarter-billion dollars into an ad campaign to bypass the candidates actually running for votes in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada, it’s obvious that what really is at issue is the future of the Democrat Party. Bloomberg is banking on a brokered convention held by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in which money votes. (If “corporations are people,” so is money in today’s political world.) Until Nevada, all the presidential candidates except for Bernie Sanders were playing for a brokered convention. The party’s candidates seemed likely to be chosen by the Donor Class, the One Percent and its proxies, not the voting class ...

Ho Hum – More Trade Threats

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Does President Trump know anything about trade?    Left Out, a podcast produced by Paul Sliker, Michael Palmieri, and Dante Dallavalle, creates in-depth conversations with the most interesting political thinkers, heterodox economists, and organizers on the Left.  The Hudson Report is a new weekly series produced by Left Out with the legendary economist Michael Hudson. Every episode we cover an economic or political issue that is either being ignored—or hotly debated—that week in the press.  In this week's episode we talk about the so-called "trade war" developing between the United States and China.  Paul Sliker: Professor Hudson. Welcome back to The Hudson Report.  Michael Hudson: It's good to be here.  Paul Sliker: So the latest breaking news in economics... Washington vs. Beijing. Xi Jinping vs. Donald Trump. A trade confrontation between the two world's largest economies.  China recently responded to President Trump's initial threat ...

High Cost Economy

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Monopoly capitalism and models of resistance. This week, author Michael Hudson on Donald Trump's fake economics. It's all coming up on the Laura Flanders Show, the place where the people who say it can't be done take a back seat to the people who are doing it. Welcome. Infrastructure, we're going to start spending on infrastructure big, said Donald Trump days before he unveiled his $1.5 trillion infrastructure budget proposed by his administration, but as economists have pointed out, Trump's proposed budget requests only $200 billion in federal funds and slashes billions in transportation funding, billions more from water, energy. The rest of the funds comes, supposedly, from the private sector and states. Well, last year I talked to economist Michael Hudson about this exact thing, infrastructure. That is our roads, ...

The Imperial President defends Wall St’s rent-seeking turf

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Trump's Tariff Travesty Will Not Re-Industrialize the US, TRNN, March 15, 2018 SHARMINI PERIES: It's The Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, or known as the OECD, predicted on Tuesday that Trump's tariffs on aluminum and steel imports could initiate a wave of protectionism and slow global economic growth. The tariffs have already spurred various countries to announce retaliatory measures. For example, the European Union plans to impose tariffs on Harley Davidsons and blue jeans. China has also promised to retaliate. Meanwhile, US companies that use steel and aluminum as raw materials for their production processes already report significant cost increases by as much as 40%. Joining me now to analyze Trump's tariffs is Michael Hudson. Michael is a distinguished ...

A Travesty of Protectionism

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Trump’s series of threats this week was a one-two punch. First, he threatened to impose national security tariffs on steel and aluminum, primarily against Canada and Mexico (along with Korea and Japan). Then, he suggested an alternative: He would exempt these countries IF they agree to certain U.S. demands. But these demands make so little economic sense that they should be viewed as an exercise in what academia used to call power politics. Or in Trump’s world, Us versus Them, a zero-sum game in which he has to show that America wins, they lose. It won’t work. Trump’s diplomatic ploy with Mexico is to say that he’ll be willing to exempt them from the steel and aluminum tariffs if they ...

Tollbooth Trump

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The Real News Network, February 13, 2018. SHARMINI PERIES: It's The Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. President Trump presented his infrastructure plan on Monday. The long-awaited plan proposes to spend $200 billion in federal funds over the next 10 years. This is to be complemented with another 1.3 trillion in spending from cities, states, and private investors for a total of 1.5 trillion. Another major component of the plan is to reduce red tape and approval processes so that projects are approved much faster. Here's what Trump had to say in presenting the plan. DONALD TRUMP: This morning, I submitted legislative principles to Congress that will spur the biggest and boldest infrastructure investment in American history. The framework will generate an unprecedented $1.5 to ...

What Tax Plan?

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Transcript “Trump's Tax Plan Helps Wall Street, Not Main Street,” TRNN, October 3, 2017. It should be called the Leona Helmsley tax plan,' says economist Michael Hudson. 'Only the little people will pay taxes'. S. Peries: It's the Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. A general consensus is emerging that Trump's tax plan, which he presented last Wednesday will benefit mostly the country's upper classes and corporations. In fact the only people that got a tax increase are the poorest taxpayers. A quick scan of even business press headlines will reinforce what I'm saying. For example, Bloomberg writes, "Tax reform could open a huge loophole for wealthy Americans", and the conservative magazines National Review has a headline that reads, "Congressional Republicans tax plan isn't great for Trump suburbanites." ...

Stock on Trumponomics

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August 4 2017, The Real News Network “Trump is Turning Against the White Working Class that Elected Him,” The Real News Network, August 4, 2017.  Rising stock prices is not an indicator of financial health like Trump would have you believe, specially when you examine who is buying that stock, says economist Michael Hudson, the author of J Is for Junk Economics. SHARMINI PERIES: It's the Real News Network. I'm Sharmini Peries coming to you from Baltimore. The rise of stock prices in the US stock market could be an indication of economic growth and prosperity, but it could also be an indication of the concentration of wealth of the rich and powerful. Which is it? To answer that question, we need to look at other economic indicators. In the press conference that ...

Harper’s Slow Crash

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As published in Harper's Magazine. Two years before the 2008 Wall Street crash that toppled the global economy into deep recession, Harper’s Magazine published a dark prophecy of what was to come. In “The New Road to Serfdom,” economist Michael Hudson laid out how millions of Americans had taken on huge debts to buy houses on the presumption that they could later sell them at a profit. “Most everyone involved in the real estate bubble so far has made at least a few dollars,” he wrote. “But that is about to change. The bubble will burst, and when it does the people who thought they would be living the easy life of a landlord will soon find out that what they really signed up for is the hard servitude of debt ...

Let’s Run Government for Business

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Trump and Kushner say that the government should be run like a business, but that would mean eliminating regulations and expenses that benefit the people says Michael Hudson. KIM BROWN: Welcome to The Real News Network in Baltimore. I'm Kim Brown. Donald Trump promised repeatedly to, "Drain the swamp," during his presidential campaign, his vow to end the cycle of corruption within the Federal government. All while touting his own experience as a businessman, as reason enough for him to be Commander-in-Chief. Yet, his Cabinet appointments and his hand-picked advisors seem to reflect the contrary to draining the swamp, with former hedge fund manager, Steve Mnuchin, as Secretary of the Treasury; former Exxon Mobil CEO, Rex Tillerson, as Secretary of State; and private equity billionaire Wilbur Ross as Commerce Secretary. But this week Trump's ...