Do We Need To ""Pay For" Federal Programs? Talking Modern Monetary Theory

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Do We Need To ""Pay For" Federal Programs? Talking Modern Monetary Theory

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

Dead Reckoning posted:

Can you explain this part to me? Because I don't really understand it.

I get that deficits don't matter in that the US Government doesn't have a finite supply of dollars it can run out of, but I think a majority of people both inside government and out understood that (although some Republicans pretended otherwise when Dems were in power.)

Under MMT, government spending is still constrained by the need to avoid high inflation, so the government can't run huge deficits year over year by spending past that limit, since its creditors want to get paid evertually... which would require printing more money past that limit.

Pay-as-you go programs are premised on a false idea, yes, but you have to impose fiscal discipline on congress somehow. Given that voters want low taxes, high services, and cuts only to foreign aid, allowing representatives to fund specific programs by contributing to a collective risk of future inflation would have... predictable results.

Not to mention that the entire point of fully funding these bills is to avoid annular appropriations where the funding can just be zeroed out effectively eliminating M4A?

# ¿ Jan 26, 2019 18:50

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# ¿ May 16, 2024 09:27

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

OwlFancier posted:

How do you "fully fund" socialized healthcare for the entire country forever without it being part of the annual budget?

Like isn't it necessarily an ongoing expense subject to modification by subsequent budgets? And necessarily so because obviously the cost is likely to increase with the population and over time as more conditions become treatable and the population subsequently gets older and requires more medical care to sustain?

You fully fund it by increasing the dedicated FICA taxes to the Medicare trust funds. And you can structure those taxes to not only be progressive in nature but to be reactive to the needs of future medical costs.

# ¿ Jan 26, 2019 19:59

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

OwlFancier posted:

Is that... not equally susceptible to manipulation by hostile governments?

If there's one thing the republicans like doing it's cutting taxes, obviously.

I mean I guess it's not a bad thing to try to do but I'm not sure there is a way to credible write "permanent good healthcare" into law and not have it be easily breakable by a government so inclined to doing it. Your insurance against that is popular support for the program which is achieved largely by creating universal dependence on it, so that it becomes politically impossible rather than legally difficult.

The permanent funding method is how Medicare A and B are funded and I think that's pretty drat close to permanent good healthcare. And in regards to making it politically impossible rather than legally difficult how about we do both? I see no reason why we can not fully fund M4A on the backs of the top 5% and send a $100 Medicare for All refund check at the start of every fiscal year on Nov 1st. I'm not opposed to using naked bribes to get what I want.

# ¿ Jan 26, 2019 21:28

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

Wait, is your question straight up "Why is it good policy that the United States of America's macroeconomic policy isn't comprehensible to the average voter?". The answer to that is because you are the average voter and you have no chance of understanding this, and this isn't a college class. If you want to understand more, learn more.
edit:
I can imagine you arguing "This isn't better" or "You haven't demonstrated this is better", but "It's your duty to demonstrate to voters it's better before beginning advocacy" is just clearly ridiculous.

You know what's an easy policy to explain? "Tax the rich to pay for services that you need." You and all MMT proponents oppose this.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 06:38

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

Ok, so you've completely missed the conversation. The conversation we're having is whether we should tax the rich to pay for services or whether we should tax the rich to control money supply. Keep putting words in my mouth or actually participate in the conversation. It's up to you.

So do you support or oppose permenant funding for M4A?

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 06:54

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

While I support providing healthcare and all basic needs to all humans, what possible relevance can you imagine that has to macroeconomic policies of the US or any other nation that issues debt in their own currency?

Because without permenant funding M4A spending will go through the annular budget markup where one single person in House or Senate leadership can remove all funding for M4A. Permenant funding removes the program from the annular budget markup process making it significant harder to cut. Again, do you support or oppose permenant funding for M4A because it sounds like you oppose it.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:02

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

Permanent funding is a completely made up thing that has no relevance to macroeconomic policy. Funding is either protected by majority votes by the legislature (which is basically all funding) or by the Constitution (which is basically no funding). The source of that funding being tax dollars from the general fund (or specific taxes that the legislature can revoke at any moment) or printed dollars given to the general fund has nothing to do with anything.

There was no majority vote for Social Security or Medicare for the last two years and those programs still exist. Your temporary programs would need annular majority votes in the House, Senate and signed by the President. Just the rejection of one of those is needed to eliminate your temporary program. We are trying to solve the political problem, not a monetary one.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:17

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

edit, EXTREME:
Like just recently our entire government was shut down by either incompetence or malice, take you pick. By what measure do you imagine that "permenant[sic] funding" exists?

Social Security and Medicare A and B still existed through the shutdown.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:19

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

Family Values posted:

Programs that have ‘permanent funding’ like Social Security and Medicare are in the very near future going to be contributing to the deficit. Does that matter? MMT says one thing, and ‘pretend the federal budget is a checking account’ says another. Which one is right?

Matter in a political sense or matter in a monetary sense? In a political sense it matters because then the existence of these programs becomes threatened by the annular budget markup process.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:29

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

Do you imagine this happened though magic or because a majority of the legislature agreed that should happen? Assuming you aren't an idiot, what do you imagine stops future programs from enjoying such protections, regardless of the source of their funding?

When did the 115th Congress agree to spend money for Social Security and Medicare A and B over the last two years? What about the 114th Congress?

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:34

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

LuciferMorningstar posted:

This tangent is ridiculous.

MMT doesn't constrain your policy space by forcing you to make everything an annual appropriation.

If you want permanent funding for a program, write it into policy. If you want to do it in a tax-neutral way, you could create a special new payroll tax and decrease income taxes by a commensurate amount. Or you could tax a certain population segment without worrying about neutrality. Or something else entirely.

There is no policy that can commit a future Congress to appropriate money for a program other than dedicated taxes like the payroll taxes you mention effectively making the program budget neutral. This is opposed by MMT proponents.

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:40

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# ¿ May 16, 2024 09:27

karthun: Nov 16, 2006; I forgot to post my food for USPOL Thanksgiving but that's okay too!

twodot posted:

This is just objectively incorrect, because any future Congress can entirely cancel those taxes or repurpose those taxes for literally anything.

Only through new legislation. Absent any new legislation the program will still exist. Not so with the annular budget markup process. That's why the government shut down and SS and Medicare A and B did not. Do you think that SS and Medicare should have shut down?

# ¿ Jan 30, 2019 07:48

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