The Unz Review • An Alternative Media Selection$
A Collection of Interesting, Important, and Controversial Perspectives Largely Excluded from the American Mainstream Media
Show by  
 Entire ArchiveDebt Items

Bookmark Toggle AllToCAdd to LibraryRemove from Library • B
Show CommentNext New CommentNext New ReplyRead More
ReplyAgree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter This Thread Hide Thread Display All Comments
AgreeDisagreeThanksLOLTroll
These buttons register your public Agreement, Disagreement, Thanks, LOL, or Troll with the selected comment. They are ONLY available to recent, frequent commenters who have saved their Name+Email using the 'Remember My Information' checkbox, and may also ONLY be used three times during any eight hour period.
Ignore Commenter Follow Commenter
On Boom Bust we discuss the Bank of International Settlements Report and where the US macroeconomy is heading. Starts about 4 minutes in.
Interviewed by Lira of Boom Bust, starting at 5 minutes. Pt2 coming soon.
A clip from Surviving Progress as so kindly linked to by Max Keiser and team. Please read my latest book for detail on the structures enhancing oligarchy.
A Land Tax is needed to hold down Housing Prices
How can China avoid the “Western financial disease” – a real estate bubble followed by defaults and foreclosures? The U.S. and European economies originally sought to avoid this fate by taxing the location’s site value. A rent tax was the focus of Progressive Era reforms. Enacting a rent tax remains China’s main challenge to accompany... Read More
This collection contains the most important interviews and speeches that Professor Michael Hudson, Distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Missouri (Kansas City), and president of the Institute for the Study of Long-term Economic Trends (ISLET) has given over the past decade (2003-2012). They span the political spectrum from COUNTERPUNCH.COM and KPFK radio’s GUNS... Read More
There are two quite different perspectives in the set of speeches at this conference. Many on our morning panels – Steve Keen, William Greider, and earlier Yves Smith and Robert Kuttner – have warned about the economy being strapped by debt. The debt we are talking about is private-sector debt. But most officials this afternoon... Read More
A Model for Europe and the US?
A generation ago the Chicago Boys and their financial supporters applauded General Pinochet’s anti-labor Chile as a success story, thanks mainly to its transformation of their Social Security into Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) that almost universally were looted by the employer grupos by the end of the 1970s. In the last decade, the Bush... Read More
Michael Hudson’s talk at the joint seminar on “Modern Monetary Theory” and “Monetary Circuit Theory” held at the Fields Institute on Tuesday July 3rd. Outlining his model at Canada’s Fields Institute, the world’s leading mathematical institute. At the meeting with Steve Keen, Stephanie Kelton,Nathan Tankus et al.
Here is the recording of the presentation I gave at the Modern Money and Public Purpose seminar recently. My delivery begins at the 43 minute mark. I highly recommend Randy’s presentation beforehand.
Below are the transcripts from the film Surviving Progress I was a part of. The film can be purchased here. Canada FILM group on PROGRESS 2010: The Road to Debt Serfdom Cinémaginaire, ASHOP (USA): Interview with Michael Hudson – Tapes #112-113-114 Theme: In the name of “progress,” the world is regressing to neoserfdom. Mainstream economics... Read More
As published in the World Economic Association’s World Economic Review Vol #1. ABSTRACT Current macroeconomics ignores the roles that rent, debt and the financial sector play in shaping our economy. We discuss the Classical view on rents and policy responses to the rentier sector in the 19th century. The finance, insurance & real estate sector... Read More
Why Bondholders Can’t – and Shouldn’t – be Paid
The pace of Wall Street’s war against the 99% is quickening in preparation for the kill. Having demonized public employees for being scheduled to receive pensions on their lifetime employment service, bondholders are insisting on getting the money instead. It is the same austerity philosophy that has been forced on Greece and Spain – and... Read More
The Road from Industrial Capitalism to Finance Capitalism and Debt Peonage Essays on Fictitious Capital, Debt Deflation and the Global Crisis Michael Hudson’s new book The Bubble and Beyond can be purchased here. Preface Summary and Analytic Table of Contents Introduction: Today’s Financial Crisis and Economic Theory I. Fictitious Capital and Economic Fictions 1. Two... Read More
Michael Hudson’s new book The Bubble and Beyond can be purchased here. A recent interview in Frankfurt’s FAZ newspaper: Dr. Schirrmacher: And then, just to find a starting point, maybe we can start with the personal, and then at least I would ask you both. Maybe that is a good starting point, very basic: What... Read More
Europe’s sovereign debt crisis in historical perspective Sankt Georgen University, Frankfurt, June 22, 2012 Michael Hudson’s new book The Bubble and Beyond can be purchased here. The Eurozone lacks a central bank to do what most central banks are supposed to do: finance government deficits. To make matters worse, the Lisbon Agreement limits these deficits... Read More
A discussion with Max Keiser on my new book The Bubble and Beyond.
Cross posted from the Financial Times by permission of the authors. Michael Hudson and Jeffery Sommers: a distinguished professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and associate professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee respectively, who have both advised members of Latvia’s government on alternatives to austerity. They are also contributors to the forthcoming book by... Read More
Paul Krugman is widely appreciated for his New York Times columns criticizing Republican demands for fiscal austerity. He rightly argues that cutting back public spending will worsen the economic depression into which we are sinking. And despite his partisan Democratic Party politicking, he warned from the outset in 2009 that President Obama’s modest counter-cyclical spending... Read More
Another Keiser – Hudson discussion. Michael starts about half way through in analysis of austerity, debt and fraudulent conveyance.
This is a re-working of my second talk at the Rimini MMT conference, as heard on Guns and Butter. Suppose you were alive back in 1945 and were told about all the new technology that would be invented between then and now: the computers and internet, mobile phones and other consumer electronics, faster and cheaper... Read More
Prof Hudson appears on the Renegade Economists radio show to discuss the economic growth trap, compound interest, Sumeria, the corruption of economics and how US interests are flexing in the debate over what constitutes a CDO default in the EU. This interview was conducted just days before Greece was given another reprieve. Recorded March 7th... Read More
An excerpt from a paper published for the conference Paradigm Lost: Rethinking Economics and Politics. I am speaking to this paper in Berlin this week. The full paper can be downloaded from their website (PDF). A common denominator runs throughout recorded history: a rising proportion of debts cannot be paid. Adam Smith remarked that no... Read More
Michael Hudson features in this 40 min documentary on the role property speculation and public finance had on this Great Recession. What role does economics itself have to blame for policy failure? More details
2,181 Italians pack a Sports Arena to learn Modern Monetary Theory: The Economy doesn’t Need to suffer Neoliberal Austerity I have just returned from Rimini, Italy, where I experienced one of the most amazing spectacles of my academic life. Four of us associated with the University of Missouri at Kansas City (UMKC) were invited to... Read More
Michael Hudson on the Greek experiment.
As first published in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung The easiest way to understand Europe’s financial crisis is to look at the solutions being proposed to resolve it. They are a banker’s dream, a grab bag of giveaways that few voters would be likely to approve in a democratic referendum. Bank strategists learned not to risk submitting... Read More
Has the Link been Broken?
*This article appeared in the Frankfurter Algemeine Zeitung on December 5, 2011. Book V of Aristotle’s Politics describes the eternal transition of oligarchies making themselves into hereditary aristocracies – which end up being overthrown by tyrants or develop internal rivalries as some families decide to “take the multitude into their camp” and usher in democracy,... Read More
Trade and Payments Theory in a Financialized Economy
Paper delivered at the Boeckler Foundation meetings, Berlin, October 29, 2011, #D3. Summary Ricardian trade theory was based on the cost of labor at a time when grain and other consumer goods accounted for most subsistence spending. But today’s budgets are dominated by payments to the finance, insurance and real estate (FIRE) sector, and to... Read More
Michael was recently interviewed on the Renegade Economists following his visit to Medvedev’s Global Policy Forum. Listen here Transcription Karl Fitzgerald: Michael Hudson, our old friend here on the Renegade Economists, from the University of Missouri in Kansas City, has just returned from Russia speaking at the Global Policy Forum. Michael, tell us about the... Read More
Michael Hudson on Bonnie Faulkner’s Guns & Butter. Listen Here Guns and Butter: “Debt Deflation in Europe and America” Edited Interview by Bonnie Faulkner with Michael Hudson, September 2, 2011 (first aired on Pacifica, September 14, 2011). “Without consumption, markets are going to shrink. Companies won’t invest, stores will close, “for rent” signs will spread... Read More
NY Times, August 11, 2011 A debate between five economists on “Why Aren’t Germans Protesting?” Rightly Disgusted at the Banks A bailout, like any other government expenditure, is a tax. Someone must pay all this money. And it is unfair to tax the broad population to pay for a special interest. Instead of being a... Read More
We all know that the world is unfair. The most useful question to ask is how much poverty is economically necessary, how much is a product of policies that can be alleviated? A related question is how financial and fiscal austerity hurts the national economic interest. This problem is especially relevant in Russia today, since... Read More
Free money creation to bail out America’s elite financial speculators, but not for Social Security or Medicare. Only...
Financial crashes were well understood for a hundred years after they became a normal financial phenomenon in the mid-19th century. Much like the buildup of plaque deposits in human veins and arteries, an accumulation of debt gained momentum exponentially until the economy crashed, wiping out bad debts – along with savings on the other side... Read More
How Bankers are using the Debt Crisis to welcome in the Financial Road to Serfdom
Financial strategists do not intend to let today’s debt crisis go to waste. Foreclosure time has arrived. That means revolution – or more accurately, a counter-revolution to roll back the 20th century’s gains made by social democracy: pensions and social security, public health care and other infrastructure providing essential services at subsidized prices or for... Read More
Will Greece Let EU Central Bankers Run Riot Over Sovereignty?
When Greece exchanged its drachma for the euro in 2000, most voters were all for joining the Eurozone. Their hope was that it would ensure stability, and that this would promote rising wages and living standards. Few saw that the stumbling point was tax policy. Greece was excluded from the eurozone the previous year as... Read More
Breakup of the euro?
Is Iceland’s rejection of financial bullying a model for Greece and Ireland? This article is an excerpt from Prof. Hudson’s upcoming book, “Debts that Can’t be Paid, Won’t Be,” to be published later this year. Last month Iceland voted against submitting to British and Dutch demands that it compensate their national bank insurance agencies for... Read More
What does Norway get out of its Oil Fund, if not More Strategic Infrastructure Investment? For the past generation Norway has supplied Europe and other regions with oil, taking payment in euros or dollars. It then sends nearly all this foreign exchange abroad, sequestering its oil-export receipts – which are in foreign currency – in... Read More
Interview with Michael Hudson, Eleftherotypia, Sunday December 12, 2010. 1. A recent article of yours, “Schemes of the Rich and Greedy,” cites the bailouts in Europe among such schemes. What are the main faults with bailouts, and for whom are they designed? The financial sector is trying to get politicians to siphon off money from... Read More
Why Government is More Afraid of Debt than Depression
I almost feel naïve for being so angry at President Obama’s betrayal of his campaign promises regarding taxes. I had never harbored much hope that he actually intended to enact the reforms that his supporters expected – not after he appointed the most right-wing of the Clintonomics gang, Larry Summers, then Tim Geithner, Ben Bernanke... Read More
What would Adam Smith have said about the Bowles-Simpson economic report last week? What a pity the great free marketer was not around to serve on the Deficit Reduction Commission. He not only would have rolled over in his grave, he would have risen up wielding an ax to the fiscal proposals that are diametrically... Read More
Tax-Avoidance – The Worst is Yet to Come
“Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.” “The Rich Boy,” by F. Scott Fitzgerald The 30-year campaign of the wealthy to rig our economic system – especially the tax component – for their own benefit will accelerate with the GOP capture of the House of Representatives and... Read More