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Episode 20 – Our Money: From the Pulpit to the Street with Rev. Delman Coates
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“We’ve been given the wrong answers to the right questions,” says Steve’s guest Reverend Delman Coates, founder of the new organization, Our Money. “As a faith leader, it’s time to reclaim a theology of economics.”
Rev. Coates recounts that being a pastor, he sees too many people who follow all the rules yet find themselves dislocated and struggling. He set out to gain a deeper understanding of the structural, systemic causes, which led him to Modern Monetary Theory.
Beyond the perceived differences between communities in SE Washington DC, Appalachia, or Ohio, the one thing that unites us is the reliance on money to buy goods and services, to keep a roof over our heads, and to provide for our families. Our Money advocates for more government investment in society’s priorities, preferring the creation of currency through public spending rather than private lending.
“As a faith leader, it’s time to reclaim a theology of economics.” Rev Coates believes we can move towards a moral economy that works for us and not against us. His eloquence and clarity will make believers of us all.
Macro N Cheese – Episode 20
Our Money: From the Pulpit to the Street with Rev. Delman Coates
June 15, 2019
Delman Coates [intro/music] (00:02):
We are underutilizing the fiscal space and potential that we have to solve some of our greatest crises, because we’re using outdated economic assumptions about money.
Delman Coates [intro/music] (00:14):
I really see myself dedicating my life’s work and my ministry to mainstreaming these core concepts of Modern Monetary Theory. I preached two sermons recently about MMT, you know, kind of like MMT sort of Christianized MMT, like I’m the MMT evangelist.
Geoff Ginter [intro/music] (00:41):
Now let’s see if we can avoid the apocalypse all together. Here’s another episode of Macro N Cheese with your host, Steve Grumbine.
Steve Grumbine (01:30):
Alright, everybody, it is Steve with Real Progressives. I have the pleasure of interviewing a very, very dynamic speaker. A gentleman who I feel has got all the charisma in the world and he’s talking the right language folks. He is talking about Modern Monetary Theory, and he’s talking about expanding the fiscal space and trying to make banking look the way it always was intended to be, back in the beginning, boring.
And so what I want to do is I want to tell you about my guest, his name is Pastor Reverend Delman Coates. This gentlemen is a graduate of Morehouse College, he’s got a BA in Religion. He also graduated from Harvard Divinity School, got a Master of Divinity in 98. And Columbia University and a Master of Philosophy and Religion in 2002 and a PhD.
This is Dr. Delman here with new testament and early Christianity in 2006. Reverend Delman Coates has done some amazing things, and one of the most amazing things he’s done here recently is start the organization called Our Money. And what I want to do is I want to bring on our guest to talk about Our Money. Welcome to the show, sir, how are you?
Delman Coates (02:50):
I’m well Steve, thank you so much for having me on, I’m so thrilled and honored to share with you and to be on this amazing platform. I have admired the work of Real Progressives for quite some time from afar. So it’s just a joy and a delight to be on with you.
Steve Grumbine (03:08):
Well, the feeling is mutual. I’m so happy. I mean, your ministry is in my old stomping grounds right there in Clinton, Maryland, and that wash met region, always pulling up my heart strings, trying to bring me back home. But you get to preach there, you’ve got a huge congregation, you’ve got all kinds of people that are listening to the word and you are bringing about a new consciousness.
You’re joining in the MMT fight here brother, for this wonderful opportunity we have to seize the day and to shed light on how finance and economics actually works. Tell us about Our Money. Tell us about what brought it into existence. Tell us why you’re so passionate about it.
Delman Coates (03:53):
Well, my journey began about 10 years ago as a local pastor, right outside of Washington, DC and suburban Maryland. The state of Maryland leads the country, number two and three, and has led the country on foreclosures, for quite some time. Prince George’s County, where I pastor, leads the state of Maryland in foreclosures.
And about 10 years ago, 11 years ago now, I saw a tremendous uptick in the number of individuals and families coming to our church seeking assistance because they were being foreclosed on. It really broke my heart as a pastor to see people who have been living in their homes for 15, 20, 25 years, literally being put out of their homes.
And yet at the same time, I was seeing on financial news and reading in the newspaper, banks being bailed out. And it seemed morally problematic that families were being put out and bankers and banks were being bailed out. And I really wanted to know what is it that caused this global financial crisis.
That really began my journey probably 10 years ago, to want to understand more about our financial system. And over time, it has resulted, now, into my understanding of the way in which our economy over-relies on money creation through private bank lending and under-utilizes the power of money creation through public spending.
And how we could really solve many of our great social and economic crises today, whether it’s healthcare, unemployment, I mean, you name it, the environmental crisis, climate control, affordable housing, income inequality. We really have the power and the potential to solve some of our greatest challenges, if we utilize the power of money creation.
We are right now, and I know you know this Steve, and I know many of your viewers know this, we are under utilizing the fiscal space, the potential that we have to solve some of our greatest crises, because we’re using outdated economic assumptions about money. And so, I’m a lay person, I’m a pastor, I’m not an economist, I’m not a monetary scientist, I’m not an economics researcher.
I’m a citizen who happens to be a pastor who is deeply concerned about poverty and inequality in our society, and I believe that Modern Monetary Theory provides a highly credible framework for solving our greatest social challenges today. And it’s really changed in my life. I really see myself dedicating my life’s work and my ministry to mainstreaming these core concepts of Modern Monetary Theory concepts that, as you know, have been discussed in small academic circles for 25, 30 years, right?
But now we need to bring these ideas and concepts to the public conversation and expand the public debate. Because I found, Steve, and you know this, that whenever there are policies before elected officials that benefit the public, whether it’s the green new deal, federal job guarantee, medicare for all, free public college, you know, eliminating college loan debt, you name it, the first question politicians debate is, how are you going to pay for it?
And immediately the assumption is, we either don’t have enough money, who are we going to tax, where are we going to borrow the money from in order to fund these major priorities in the public interest. And I just really believe that the public should not be beholden to taxing some rich millionaire/billionaire in order to have these public priorities funded.
There are legitimate reasons for taxation, but we need to liberate ourselves from this idea that taxes fund spending. And I think that if we do that, that really changes the conversation, and it really opens up a huge potential for addressing the range of social and economic realities that are really threatening the stability and the sustainability of our economy and our society.
So recently I organized Our Money, we just launched about three or four weeks ago. The web address is www.ourmoneyus.org and what I’m really seeking to do, are to bring together thought leaders, influencers, faith leaders, the public, to really educate ourselves about money in America and really move towards progressive change so that we can have an economy that is more sustainable, that relies on money creation through public spending, rather than relying on money creation through private lending.
Steve Grumbine (08:45):
Wonderful. I want to say this, this is interesting to me. I’ve been through the local churches in your area, we talked a little bit offline about Pastor Cherry, from the heart. And you know, as you pass through faith and you pass through ministries and so forth, a lot of them don’t focus on the structural issues.
They focus largely on the spiritual realm, and sometimes they miss these things that are right there in front of them. This right here is a case where you’ve taken the spiritual principles that are driving your commitment to trying to help people, and you’re marrying with the science of the economics that is backing the cure, if you will.
I mean, this right here is an amazing thing you’re doing. I watched you at your kickoff and I was just floored by how charismatic you were, but how articulate you were, specifically about these issues. I mean, the people that we were showing this to, they’re like, I love this guy, I love him, love him, I love him.
And for me, seeing someone that can actually reach out, talk to communities, that right now have probably been ignored by people trying to do the good work, but they haven’t really been able to crack into that market, into that demographic. You’ve got an incredible opportunity here to really change the world.
Delman Coates (10:07):
Well, we have an incredible opportunity. To this point, we have been given the wrong answers to the right questions. The public, people on the street, they want to know, you know, we all want the same things, whether you’re black, white, Latino, Asian, gay, straight, atheist, Christian, Muslim, Jew, we all want the same things.
We want safe neighborhoods. We want good jobs with benefits. We want reliable healthcare, clean water, clean air. We want to protect our environment and we want nice roads and infrastructure. We all want the same things, but we’ve been given the wrong answers to the right questions, even in the faith community.
We’ve been given answers that tend to focus on issues of personal piety and personal responsibility, as the only prism through which we solve some of our great macroeconomic and socioeconomic issues. But one of the things that I’ve come to understand is that, you know, there are people who are faithful, who work hard, who are highly educated, who still find themselves dislocated in our society, to no fault of their own doing.
And simply telling people, you know, to just work hard, have faith, pray more. There’s not a group of people who prays more than, you know, African Americans in this society. And I just really believe that it’s really important for us to bring a macroeconomic analysis to where we are. Dr. King said, quoting Victor Hugo in the aftermath of the riots, Dr.
King quoted Victor Hugo, Steve, he says, to the effect, “If a soul lives in darkness, sins will be committed, but the guilty one is not the one who commits the sins, but the one who causes the darkness.” Then he kind of goes on this conversation where he talks about the difference between causative injustices and derivative injustices. It is, in my mind, in order for us to understand what are the causative, structural, systemic realities that caused the collateral consequences that we face all across America, whether you live in Southeast Washington DC, Appalachia, Ohio, or anywhere.
And I really think that we have allowed the political conversation to put people against one another, when we’re really on the same side. Whether you’re working class, you know, middle income, upper middle income. I mean, we’re really talking about shades of gray, when you think about those who benefit at the upper end of a monetary system, that allows beneficiaries of our financial system to benefit, right?
And so we really need to build a bipartisan movement of citizens, across race, across class, to focus on the one thing that unites us, rather than those nuances that might distinguish us. The one thing that unites us in America, is our need for and reliance on money to buy goods and services, to settle our debts and obligations, to keep a roof over our head, food on our table and to provide for our families.
And we believe that it is preferable to rely on the creation of that money through public spending, rather than relying on money created through private lending. There’s a range of collateral consequences that are caused by relying on money to be created by private interests. And as a faith leader, I believe it’s time for us to reclaim a theology of economics, to really think about how we start thinking about moving towards a moral economy that works for us and not against us, that works for all people.
And I just can’t tell you, Steve, how much I am so passionate about this, because what communities that have been underrepresented are looking for right now, is they’re looking for investment, right? And right now, once again, our politicians give us the wrong answers to the right questions. All of these games and tricks with empowerment zones, opportunity zones, which are designed to create avenues for private investors to come in to really displace the communities that have been under invested in.
We need public investment, not private investment. So that those communities that have been in East Baltimore that have been in Harlem, South Central Los Angeles, and all around the country, can benefit from growth and opportunities where they don’t continue to be gentrified. So yeah, I think that we need to reclaim this theology of economics, whether it’s Christian, Jew, Muslim, historically, these major Abrahamic religions have had a very central understanding of the importance of money, how money can be distorted and manipulated, and its relationship to pain and poverty in the world today.
And, you know, as a Christian faith leader, I want to do my part to sort of reclaim that analysis.
Steve Grumbine (15:15):
That’s wonderful. You know, from my vantage point, I come from a Republican background, and it was quite a challenge to swing to the left, and I swang, but it all stemmed from my understanding of money, ironically. I was one of the people that got deeply impacted by the crash in 2007, 2008, 2009. I was displaced, I had a huge family, I had huge bills, I had a life that I had laid out.
I had taken care of myself, I had done the Christian thing, I had gone to school, I had gotten my degrees, I had taken care of first things first, I had put money away, blah, blah, blah. I worked hard. You name it. And then all of a sudden the rug got pulled out from under me. I lost everything. And it made me really take a hard look at, hold on, a guy with two master’s degrees is sitting there looking through the slats in his window to see if somebody’s coming to foreclose on him, something ain’t right here.
And that really, really got the wheels going. And people took a lot of time and patience to educate me on where I went wrong. And I started thinking, my God, if that happened to me, what about all the people that have been living in generational poverty. What about all the people whose father was put in jail for marijuana that should have never happened, no wonder they’re having problems.
My goodness, they’re living on grape drink, why is that? Because that’s what the damn Government’s been giving them, with just these cheap little stipends, when they could be taking care of the whole family. There’s no reason for this poverty. There’s no reason for people to be in jail for these things either, but the poverty was created by government.
Government literally sanctioned poverty so that these markets could be created to solve these problems. So that business could come in and save us from ourselves. Reality is they created the problem and it’s their job to fix the problem, and that’s with fiscal space like you’re saying, man. I love your words.
Delman Coates (17:18):
And if there’s going to be change, it’s going to take a movement of citizens who are calling for these changes, right? I am finding that with many of our elected officials, we have to force them to change, we have to get active, we have to get involved. So often people can feel as if the issues are so big, they’re so great, you know, what can I do as one person?
And we have to let people know that there’s power in one, there’s power in one person, one civic organization, one congregation, one community group, to make a call to your member of Congress to say, “Hey, you know, I support the green new deal, we support Medicare for all, and we want to see you supporting Medicare for all.
We want to see you support getting rid of Citizens United.” Sorry I digress, right? Because it’s not until we return our democracy to the people that we’re going to get the kind of changes that we need. So Our Money, Real Progressives, a range of organizations around the country, are really about citizens waking up to the power that’s within us to make change, and I’m really excited to be a part of that.
There’s a movement of people all across the country who are saying, “We desperately need to reclaim our democracy from the demagogues, from the oligarchs.” And I think the time is now, I think we need a movement of people who put down artificial divides and division between Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Libertarians, and to really think about whether you’re interested in reducing our reliance on taxation, or whether you want to see more investment in public priorities, we really can do both.
Steve Grumbine (19:02):
That’s right.
Delman Coates (19:02):
For people to really think about that, that we can really fund our greatest priorities, public priorities, without this over-reliance and burden of taxation, particularly on the middle class. Then we really have more in common, then we’ve really been artificially pitted against one another. The time for that is over.
I think that all of your viewers need to get involved with Real Progressives, get involved with Our Money, go to ourmoneyus.org and sign up so that you can stay informed. Listen, we’re going to have robust, over the next several months, we’re going to have rallies in which we shine a spotlight on our need for full employment in America.
Steve Grumbine (19:48):
Yes!
Delman Coates (19:48):
We need Congress to do what the Fed cannot do. You know, the Fed may have a mandate to get us towards full employment, but the tinkering with interest rates is not going to get us there, because as we get closer to unemployment, then they have to reel it back in and raise the rates again, which increases unemployment.
And so the Fed doesn’t have the tools to get us to full employment, we need to turn to our members of Congress to really pass legislation so that we can eliminate, you know, involuntary joblessness in America. We can do that. We have to put a floor under wages, and to do that, we have to have full employment in America.
We do it for farmers. We put a floor under their corn prices and all these other kind of prices, you know, because we don’t want their prices to go down. We need to have that same kind of a priority for labor in America. We need unions, labor unions, all across America to realize that we really need a full employment, federal job guarantee strategy in America if we’re going to strengthen workers, families all across this country.
So the time is now, and we need individuals listening to get involved in the organization so that we can make change together.
Intermission (21:19):
You are listening to Macro N Cheese, a podcast, brought to you by Real Progressives, a nonprofit organization dedicated to teaching the masses about MMT or Modern Monetary Theory. Please help our efforts and become a monthly donor at PayPal or Patreon, like and follow our pages on Facebook and YouTube and follow us on Periscope, Twitter, and Instagram.
Steve Grumbine (22:09):
You know, one of the things that jumped out at me, and we’ve said this in different ways, but the same message. I believe that knowledge of MMT eradicates the lines of politics; you’re no longer Democrat or Republican or a libertarian. What you’ve become is a woke 99%er. And this is one of those things that, literally you look at how many debates we’ve had over the years, and you’ve mentioned a few of them, these empowerment zones and things like that, that are just neoliberal snake oil.
You look at these things, they’re done with the right intent, but the reality is it’s putting a bandaid on a heart attack. And if you look, most people, once the lights go on, I mean, the people that I deal with, they’re from all walks of life and they’re out there saying, “Oh my goodness, I can’t even bother with these conversations anymore because it’s farce, it’s not real, it’s like a fake world, when you realize how the system really works.”
The changes going from the sitcoms we see on television, to the things even pastors and churches talk about, to the things we see on the nightly news and our classrooms. The entire language of austerity has been baked into our culture for so long that we almost feel guilty. We almost feel like we’re bad people for acknowledging how it really works, until we realized that’s really how it works.
And that freedom that comes from seeing that, that should empower an incredible revolution of minds, of spirits, of people uniting together to make great change. And I love what you’re trying to do there at Our Money. It’s just really is an empowering thing.
Delman Coates (23:49):
It really should turn the light switch on. It did for me when I started understanding money. I preached two sermons recently about MMT, you know, kind of like MMT, sort of Christianized MMT, you know, like, like I’m the MMT evangelist. And in response to this sermon, someone tweeted and said, “You know, Reverend, our ancestors were wrong, money really does grow on trees.”
And when you think about it, it really does, it really does. And the public has been forced to figure out how to live on a little, how to live with scarcity, live on the crumbs. Meanwhile, those who understand how the system works, utilize the power of money creation for private purposes, for their benefit, to fund wars, to get access to the rich, all kinds of things.
Someone said to me today that it seems as if Republicans have already embraced MMT. It’s the Democrats that haven’t come around yet. So when you understand the workings of money, you understand what money is, where it comes from and what it can do, it’ll change your life. When I drive down the street and I see homeless people, when I see people being put out of their home, as a pastor, you know, we have to do hospital visits and you see people struggling with healthcare issues.
You say to yourself, “My God, in a country like America that is monetarily sovereign, there is no need for these issues to exist in this way.” I’m committed to making a change. And you know, one of the things that I worked on, Steve, you know, we just launched Our Money about three weeks ago, but I’ve been really working the last 18 months to two years doing the one thing that we really have to work on doing. And that is we have to work on our language and nomenclature so that we can translate it to the average person on the street.
I’ve listened to a lot of high level wonky conversations and debates amongst, you know, those who are very much into monetary history, money science, you know, money reform. And there are a range of groups, all different kinds of groups. Everyone’s well-intentioned, I think it’s wrong to kind of demonize people in different quarters and their motivation, that’s just my view.
But as I’ve listened, I’ve said, “Wow, if this is going to work, we’ve got to figure out how to translate what these folks are saying to the person on the street, whose eyes roll in the back of their heads,” when we start talking about . . . I’m not going to start characterizing some of the things I hear people talking about, but the backend workings of the Fed and how the payment system works and interbank settlements, all this kind of stuff, you know.
I don’t even understand it, I mean, I’m aware of it, but we have got to figure out how to translate this language in ways that people on the street can access. And so if you saw our launch presentation a few weeks ago, it’s really the fruit of me working through concepts and framing. And I think the average person on the street, the sixth grader, the person with an eighth grade education can access and understand.
The person who really, at the end of the day, really just wants to know, how can I get a job? How can I get a job? How can I feed my family? That’s really what I want to know. And so I think this is a challenge. I think it’s a challenge to your audience, to really partner with us in developing messaging that the average person on the street can get, so that we can take it from just the 5% and the 10% of highly academic intellectuals who get it, and look, I’m an academic myself in religion, and I know what it’s like to be an academic, but I don’t want to keep my conversations in the cloisters of the academy, and in the stacks in the library.
Steve Grumbine (28:12):
That’s right.
Delman Coates (28:12):
I’ve got to figure out how to take it to the people on the street, because I really believe, like that quote that’s attributed to Henry Ford: “If people actually understood what’s happening in the banking system, there would be a revolution tomorrow.” We have to figure out how to translate it to this.
Steve Grumbine (28:33):
When we came out, we came out with this saying, ‘taxes don’t fund spending,’ right. And it was intended to be like dropping dynamite into the lake and watching the fish rise up, because people are like, “What? Did he just say taxes don’t fund spending, of course taxes fund spending, that’s how we do everything, taxes are what pay for roads, it’s the price of living in civilized society.”
Let me tell you about what monetary sovereignty is. Let me explain to you what taxation is all about, and you break it down in terms that they understand. You’re not going to get them all. Your methods going to hit some people; my method’s going to hit some people; those academics are going to hit some people.
But I remember back when it was a small group of people and they were using big words that didn’t make sense to me, and I have two master’s degrees, so I’m not a dumb guy. And I was like, “How do I figure this out?” And so we started dumbing it down into bite size things and little memes and whatever.
And you know, of course what ends up happening, and it’s funny, you said what you said about hey, I’m not an economist, I’m just a guy that’s trying to change the world. I’m trying to change it through presenting this in a way that people can understand it. And for us, we’re like, you know what, the language may not be exactly precise, we’re not going to put this in the next academic textbook, however, for people that are getting ready to hit the voting button in the booth, they now have ammunition to know that there is no eating your peas, that the country’s not broke, and that we can afford nice things.
And there’s no reason for poverty, because poverty is a political choice. And when you start realizing that, it fundamentally changes you. So the language, the framing, all that stuff, if you’ve got it down, man, I’m going to be feeding at your trough too brother, because we do need to support each other.
We need to support each other. And we need to work to change the world because I’ve got a child that’s autistic, and that little boy doesn’t have nearly the services he needs, needs, like medical, needs those services because we can’t afford it, the state can’t afford it, why can’t the state afford it?
Because the federal government hasn’t been spending money into the economy. It’s leaving these states with all these unfunded mandates and the states are cutting taxes and they’re pushing people out and you nailed it, gentrification out the wazoo. I mean, people are being pushed out of communities they’ve been in their entire lives in the name of revitalization and so forth.
It’s got to stop. And I think that we’ve got the right answers here and you, my friend, you’re a powerhouse. I really, really appreciate your approach. And I look forward to working with you in the future, big time.
Delman Coates (31:16):
Same here, same here. We’ve got to help every segment of our society understand that you have a stake in this movement. If you are a legislator at the state level, if you’re on the city council or county council in your town or your municipality, you should want more federal spending because that’s going to help you solve some of your local issues, right?
So, there’s a sense in which, and I’ve experienced some, you know, state legislators and city council folks who say, “Oh, Oh, you guys are just talking about federal spending, like this doesn’t really affect me.” Yes, it does. Imagine if there was a very broad, robust commitment to federal spending on a range of state priorities, like rebuilding public schools that are older than 30 or 35 years old. Just think about how that could transform local communities that have been relying on local taxes to build new schools.
Every person in society, veterans, we literally, our tagline is “Change Money, Change the World.” I really believe, Steve, if we change the way we think about money, we can literally change the world.
Steve Grumbine (32:33):
I couldn’t agree with you more.
Delman Coates (32:33):
We could literally change the world, if we change the way we think about money. And I want to thank you for your messaging “taxes don’t fund spending”. We’ve been saying things like, “It’s preferable to rely on money created through public spending rather than private lending.” “Spend it don’t lend it.”
We’ve been sort of working on this similar kind of framing and helping people see the advantages of one form of money creation over the other. And I think when we do that, people get it. I’m so excited about this movement. You’re getting me excited Steve here talking to you.
Steve Grumbine (33:16):
Well, you got me excited too, my friend. It gives me an excuse to sneak home and see mom and come catch up with you guys and see what’s going on at Our Money. So one final thing I wanted to throw at you. Obviously from the seventies on, when the Bretton Woods accord ended, in 71-72 timeframe, things dramatically changed.
And one of the big things was the push for neoliberalism, which is what is largely infecting our world today. Neoliberalism is a global scorch. In fact, the United States’ chief export is neoliberalism around the world. We are trying to get rid of these other countries that have beautiful safety nets, beautiful citizens benefits, you name it.
I mean, Australia who has single payer, they got a national health service in England, you name it, Canada. And the US exports this idea of, “Hey, you’ve got some markets waiting there if you privatize it.” If you look, this is a global movement and it’s not just in the US, and I think that we’re all tied together in this global community of people that are waking up to what’s going on.
I think you’ve got a powerful message, my friend. I think that you should realize that you could speak beyond the borders here, my friend, you’ve got a great voice.
Delman Coates (34:31):
I just want to do my part in this quarter here to work towards influencing the influencers. That’s our strategy. We want to influence the influencers. There are people with congregations, bases, organizations, black lives matter, activists, who really need to understand money. There are sororities, fraternities, lodges, mosques, faith leaders.
We want to influence the influencers to understand this thing. And right now what’s happening is there’s been a delegitimization of the role of government, as you just mentioned since Bretton Woods, maybe before, but certainly since 72 with the neoliberal agenda, right? And this sort of recent iteration of that is tagging anything that talks about the role of government as socialism.
And I say to people, “Are roads socialism?” And they’re like, “What do you mean?” I’m like, “Yeah, roads, when you go out there and drive on the road, is that socialism? What about clean water? Is that socialism? Clean air to breathe? Is that socialism?” So we have to really challenge these assumptions that are put out there to delegitimize the role of the public square, the role of government, and to try to put all of these areas of public life in the private sector.
And you’re right, I think the time is now. We’re really seeing in America, I hope people are seeing this, but we’re really seeing in America the way in which unrestrained wealth is deeply harmful to our values, to our democratic institutions and to our way of life. And if we’re going to make progress, we’ve got to reclaim and relegitimize the role of government.
And people throwing around these buzz words like, Oh, that’s socialism, most of them don’t even understand what they’re talking about. We’re not talking about socialism. We’re not talking about eliminating business or private enterprise, or getting rid of your mom and pop stores. We’re not talking about that.
We’re simply talking about reclaiming who should create the money that we rely on and that we use. Should it be public, which is going to create that money that doesn’t have to be repaid with perpetual intrest, or should it be the private sector?
Steve Grumbine (37:07):
I’m with you, man. Thank you very much. So Rev, you are awesome, I’m so glad I got to talk to you, and what I want to do is I want to give you the last word here. We’ll give you an opportunity to tell everybody how they can get involved with Our Money, how they can find you. And with that, then we’ll go ahead and say, good night.
Delman Coates (37:24):
Well, Steve, I want to thank you and Real Progressives for all of your work, and your viewers for the very robust forum that you all have created over the years. I look forward to more partnership with your viewers and those if they’re not a part of Real Progressives, they can go to Ourmoneyus.org that’s our web address, www.ourmoneyus.org .Take a look at our micro-documentary, take a look at our educational videos.
We have 10, four to six minute short videos about the workings of our monetary system, and join us in changing the public debate about our over-reliance on money created through private lending and our need to shift that balance to relying on money created through public spending. If we do that, we can reduce private debt.
You know, Steve, the average family works 40 to 50 hours a week, to pay interest on borrowed money, on a mortgage, most of which is interest, or car note, or school loan. We need to have a society where, rather than the public being servants of money, the money facilitates and serves the needs of the public.
I’m digressing now. I just want to invite and encourage your members to join us, to partner with us, as we go around the country. I’d love to come to your community. I’d love to come to your church, your mosque, or synagogue, your veterans groups, to introduce myself, to introduce our campaign and to think through how you can organize where you are.
Thank you so much, Steve, for having me on tonight, and I look forward to ongoing conversation and collaboration.
Steve Grumbine (39:13):
Absolutely. So with that folks, thank you so much for joining us tonight. This was a great opportunity to meet Reverend Delman Coates. Just a great guy, and I really appreciate your time, sir. We’ll talk soon.
Delman Coates (39:26):
Thank you so much, Steve.
Steve Grumbine (39:27):
Absolutely.
Ending Credits (00::39:40)
Macro N Cheese is produced by Andy Kennedy, descriptive writing by Virginia Cotts, and promotional artwork by Mindy Donham. Macro N Cheese is publicly funded by our Real Progressives Patreon account. If you would like to donate to Macro N Cheese, please visit patreon.com/realprogressives.
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“We’ve been given the wrong answers to the right questions,” says Steve’s guest Reverend Delman Coates, founder of the new organization, Our Money. “As a faith leader, it’s time to reclaim a theology of economics.”
Rev. Coates recounts that being a pastor, he sees too many people who follow all the rules yet find themselves dislocated and struggling. He set out to gain a deeper understanding of the structural, systemic causes, which led him to Modern Monetary Theory.
Beyond the perceived differences between communities in SE Washington DC, Appalachia, or Ohio, the one thing that unites us is the reliance on money to buy goods and services, to keep a roof over our heads, and to provide for our families. Our Money advocates for more government investment in society’s priorities, preferring the creation of currency through public spending rather than private lending.
“As a faith leader, it’s time to reclaim a theology of economics.” Rev Coates believes we can move towards a moral economy that works for us and not against us. His eloquence and clarity will make believers of us all.
Macro N Cheese – Episode 20
Our Money: From the Pulpit to the Street with Rev. Delman Coates
June 15, 2019
Delman Coates [intro/music] (00:02):
We are underutilizing the fiscal space and potential that we have to solve some of our greatest crises, because we’re using outdated economic assumptions about money.
Delman Coates [intro/music] (00:14):
I really see myself dedicating my life’s work and my ministry to mainstreaming these core concepts of Modern Monetary Theory. I preached two sermons recently about MMT, you know, kind of like MMT sort of Christianized MMT, like I’m the MMT evangelist.
Geoff Ginter [intro/music] (00:41):
Now let’s see if we can avoid the apocalypse all together. Here’s another episode of Macro N Cheese with your host, Steve Grumbine.
Steve Grumbine (01:30):
Alright, everybody, it is Steve with Real Progressives. I have the pleasure of interviewing a very, very dynamic speaker. A gentleman who I feel has got all the charisma in the world and he’s talking the right language folks. He is talking about Modern Monetary Theory, and he’s talking about expanding the fiscal space and trying to make banking look the way it always was intended to be, back in the beginning, boring.
And so what I want to do is I want to tell you about my guest, his name is Pastor Reverend Delman Coates. This gentlemen is a graduate of Morehouse College, he’s got a BA in Religion. He also graduated from Harvard Divinity School, got a Master of Divinity in 98. And Columbia University and a Master of Philosophy and Religion in 2002 and a PhD.
This is Dr. Delman here with new testament and early Christianity in 2006. Reverend Delman Coates has done some amazing things, and one of the most amazing things he’s done here recently is start the organization called Our Money. And what I want to do is I want to bring on our guest to talk about Our Money. Welcome to the show, sir, how are you?
Delman Coates (02:50):
I’m well Steve, thank you so much for having me on, I’m so thrilled and honored to share with you and to be on this amazing platform. I have admired the work of Real Progressives for quite some time from afar. So it’s just a joy and a delight to be on with you.
Steve Grumbine (03:08):
Well, the feeling is mutual. I’m so happy. I mean, your ministry is in my old stomping grounds right there in Clinton, Maryland, and that wash met region, always pulling up my heart strings, trying to bring me back home. But you get to preach there, you’ve got a huge congregation, you’ve got all kinds of people that are listening to the word and you are bringing about a new consciousness.
You’re joining in the MMT fight here brother, for this wonderful opportunity we have to seize the day and to shed light on how finance and economics actually works. Tell us about Our Money. Tell us about what brought it into existence. Tell us why you’re so passionate about it.
Delman Coates (03:53):
Well, my journey began about 10 years ago as a local pastor, right outside of Washington, DC and suburban Maryland. The state of Maryland leads the country, number two and three, and has led the country on foreclosures, for quite some time. Prince George’s County, where I pastor, leads the state of Maryland in foreclosures.
And about 10 years ago, 11 years ago now, I saw a tremendous uptick in the number of individuals and families coming to our church seeking assistance because they were being foreclosed on. It really broke my heart as a pastor to see people who have been living in their homes for 15, 20, 25 years, literally being put out of their homes.
And yet at the same time, I was seeing on financial news and reading in the newspaper, banks being bailed out. And it seemed morally problematic that families were being put out and bankers and banks were being bailed out. And I really wanted to know what is it that caused this global financial crisis.
That really began my journey probably 10 years ago, to want to understand more about our financial system. And over time, it has resulted, now, into my understanding of the way in which our economy over-relies on money creation through private bank lending and under-utilizes the power of money creation through public spending.
And how we could really solve many of our great social and economic crises today, whether it’s healthcare, unemployment, I mean, you name it, the environmental crisis, climate control, affordable housing, income inequality. We really have the power and the potential to solve some of our greatest challenges, if we utilize the power of money creation.
We are right now, and I know you know this Steve, and I know many of your viewers know this, we are under utilizing the fiscal space, the potential that we have to solve some of our greatest crises, because we’re using outdated economic assumptions about money. And so, I’m a lay person, I’m a pastor, I’m not an economist, I’m not a monetary scientist, I’m not an economics researcher.
I’m a citizen who happens to be a pastor who is deeply concerned about poverty and inequality in our society, and I believe that Modern Monetary Theory provides a highly credible framework for solving our greatest social challenges today. And it’s really changed in my life. I really see myself dedicating my life’s work and my ministry to mainstreaming these core concepts of Modern Monetary Theory concepts that, as you know, have been discussed in small academic circles for 25, 30 years, right?
But now we need to bring these ideas and concepts to the public conversation and expand the public debate. Because I found, Steve, and you know this, that whenever there are policies before elected officials that benefit the public, whether it’s the green new deal, federal job guarantee, medicare for all, free public college, you know, eliminating college loan debt, you name it, the first question politicians debate is, how are you going to pay for it?
And immediately the assumption is, we either don’t have enough money, who are we going to tax, where are we going to borrow the money from in order to fund these major priorities in the public interest. And I just really believe that the public should not be beholden to taxing some rich millionaire/billionaire in order to have these public priorities funded.
There are legitimate reasons for taxation, but we need to liberate ourselves from this idea that taxes fund spending. And I think that if we do that, that really changes the conversation, and it really opens up a huge potential for addressing the range of social and economic realities that are really threatening the stability and the sustainability of our economy and our society.
So recently I organized Our Money, we just launched about three or four weeks ago. The web address is www.ourmoneyus.org and what I’m really seeking to do, are to bring together thought leaders, influencers, faith leaders, the public, to really educate ourselves about money in America and really move towards progressive change so that we can have an economy that is more sustainable, that relies on money creation through public spending, rather than relying on money creation through private lending.
Steve Grumbine (08:45):
Wonderful. I want to say this, this is interesting to me. I’ve been through the local churches in your area, we talked a little bit offline about Pastor Cherry, from the heart. And you know, as you pass through faith and you pass through ministries and so forth, a lot of them don’t focus on the structural issues.
They focus largely on the spiritual realm, and sometimes they miss these things that are right there in front of them. This right here is a case where you’ve taken the spiritual principles that are driving your commitment to trying to help people, and you’re marrying with the science of the economics that is backing the cure, if you will.
I mean, this right here is an amazing thing you’re doing. I watched you at your kickoff and I was just floored by how charismatic you were, but how articulate you were, specifically about these issues. I mean, the people that we were showing this to, they’re like, I love this guy, I love him, love him, I love him.
And for me, seeing someone that can actually reach out, talk to communities, that right now have probably been ignored by people trying to do the good work, but they haven’t really been able to crack into that market, into that demographic. You’ve got an incredible opportunity here to really change the world.
Delman Coates (10:07):
Well, we have an incredible opportunity. To this point, we have been given the wrong answers to the right questions. The public, people on the street, they want to know, you know, we all want the same things, whether you’re black, white, Latino, Asian, gay, straight, atheist, Christian, Muslim, Jew, we all want the same things.
We want safe neighborhoods. We want good jobs with benefits. We want reliable healthcare, clean water, clean air. We want to protect our environment and we want nice roads and infrastructure. We all want the same things, but we’ve been given the wrong answers to the right questions, even in the faith community.
We’ve been given answers that tend to focus on issues of personal piety and personal responsibility, as the only prism through which we solve some of our great macroeconomic and socioeconomic issues. But one of the things that I’ve come to understand is that, you know, there are people who are faithful, who work hard, who are highly educated, who still find themselves dislocated in our society, to no fault of their own doing.
And simply telling people, you know, to just work hard, have faith, pray more. There’s not a group of people who prays more than, you know, African Americans in this society. And I just really believe that it’s really important for us to bring a macroeconomic analysis to where we are. Dr. King said, quoting Victor Hugo in the aftermath of the riots, Dr.
King quoted Victor Hugo, Steve, he says, to the effect, “If a soul lives in darkness, sins will be committed, but the guilty one is not the one who commits the sins, but the one who causes the darkness.” Then he kind of goes on this conversation where he talks about the difference between causative injustices and derivative injustices. It is, in my mind, in order for us to understand what are the causative, structural, systemic realities that caused the collateral consequences that we face all across America, whether you live in Southeast Washington DC, Appalachia, Ohio, or anywhere.
And I really think that we have allowed the political conversation to put people against one another, when we’re really on the same side. Whether you’re working class, you know, middle income, upper middle income. I mean, we’re really talking about shades of gray, when you think about those who benefit at the upper end of a monetary system, that allows beneficiaries of our financial system to benefit, right?
And so we really need to build a bipartisan movement of citizens, across race, across class, to focus on the one thing that unites us, rather than those nuances that might distinguish us. The one thing that unites us in America, is our need for and reliance on money to buy goods and services, to settle our debts and obligations, to keep a roof over our head, food on our table and to provide for our families.
And we believe that it is preferable to rely on the creation of that money through public spending, rather than relying on money created through private lending. There’s a range of collateral consequences that are caused by relying on money to be created by private interests. And as a faith leader, I believe it’s time for us to reclaim a theology of economics, to really think about how we start thinking about moving towards a moral economy that works for us and not against us, that works for all people.
And I just can’t tell you, Steve, how much I am so passionate about this, because what communities that have been underrepresented are looking for right now, is they’re looking for investment, right? And right now, once again, our politicians give us the wrong answers to the right questions. All of these games and tricks with empowerment zones, opportunity zones, which are designed to create avenues for private investors to come in to really displace the communities that have been under invested in.
We need public investment, not private investment. So that those communities that have been in East Baltimore that have been in Harlem, South Central Los Angeles, and all around the country, can benefit from growth and opportunities where they don’t continue to be gentrified. So yeah, I think that we need to reclaim this theology of economics, whether it’s Christian, Jew, Muslim, historically, these major Abrahamic religions have had a very central understanding of the importance of money, how money can be distorted and manipulated, and its relationship to pain and poverty in the world today.
And, you know, as a Christian faith leader, I want to do my part to sort of reclaim that analysis.
Steve Grumbine (15:15):
That’s wonderful. You know, from my vantage point, I come from a Republican background, and it was quite a challenge to swing to the left, and I swang, but it all stemmed from my understanding of money, ironically. I was one of the people that got deeply impacted by the crash in 2007, 2008, 2009. I was displaced, I had a huge family, I had huge bills, I had a life that I had laid out.
I had taken care of myself, I had done the Christian thing, I had gone to school, I had gotten my degrees, I had taken care of first things first, I had put money away, blah, blah, blah. I worked hard. You name it. And then all of a sudden the rug got pulled out from under me. I lost everything. And it made me really take a hard look at, hold on, a guy with two master’s degrees is sitting there looking through the slats in his window to see if somebody’s coming to foreclose on him, something ain’t right here.
And that really, really got the wheels going. And people took a lot of time and patience to educate me on where I went wrong. And I started thinking, my God, if that happened to me, what about all the people that have been living in generational poverty. What about all the people whose father was put in jail for marijuana that should have never happened, no wonder they’re having problems.
My goodness, they’re living on grape drink, why is that? Because that’s what the damn Government’s been giving them, with just these cheap little stipends, when they could be taking care of the whole family. There’s no reason for this poverty. There’s no reason for people to be in jail for these things either, but the poverty was created by government.
Government literally sanctioned poverty so that these markets could be created to solve these problems. So that business could come in and save us from ourselves. Reality is they created the problem and it’s their job to fix the problem, and that’s with fiscal space like you’re saying, man. I love your words.
Delman Coates (17:18):
And if there’s going to be change, it’s going to take a movement of citizens who are calling for these changes, right? I am finding that with many of our elected officials, we have to force them to change, we have to get active, we have to get involved. So often people can feel as if the issues are so big, they’re so great, you know, what can I do as one person?
And we have to let people know that there’s power in one, there’s power in one person, one civic organization, one congregation, one community group, to make a call to your member of Congress to say, “Hey, you know, I support the green new deal, we support Medicare for all, and we want to see you supporting Medicare for all.
We want to see you support getting rid of Citizens United.” Sorry I digress, right? Because it’s not until we return our democracy to the people that we’re going to get the kind of changes that we need. So Our Money, Real Progressives, a range of organizations around the country, are really about citizens waking up to the power that’s within us to make change, and I’m really excited to be a part of that.
There’s a movement of people all across the country who are saying, “We desperately need to reclaim our democracy from the demagogues, from the oligarchs.” And I think the time is now, I think we need a movement of people who put down artificial divides and division between Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Libertarians, and to really think about whether you’re interested in reducing our reliance on taxation, or whether you want to see more investment in public priorities, we really can do both.
Steve Grumbine (19:02):
That’s right.
Delman Coates (19:02):
For people to really think about that, that we can really fund our greatest priorities, public priorities, without this over-reliance and burden of taxation, particularly on the middle class. Then we really have more in common, then we’ve really been artificially pitted against one another. The time for that is over.
I think that all of your viewers need to get involved with Real Progressives, get involved with Our Money, go to ourmoneyus.org and sign up so that you can stay informed. Listen, we’re going to have robust, over the next several months, we’re going to have rallies in which we shine a spotlight on our need for full employment in America.
Steve Grumbine (19:48):
Yes!
Delman Coates (19:48):
We need Congress to do what the Fed cannot do. You know, the Fed may have a mandate to get us towards full employment, but the tinkering with interest rates is not going to get us there, because as we get closer to unemployment, then they have to reel it back in and raise the rates again, which increases unemployment.
And so the Fed doesn’t have the tools to get us to full employment, we need to turn to our members of Congress to really pass legislation so that we can eliminate, you know, involuntary joblessness in America. We can do that. We have to put a floor under wages, and to do that, we have to have full employment in America.
We do it for farmers. We put a floor under their corn prices and all these other kind of prices, you know, because we don’t want their prices to go down. We need to have that same kind of a priority for labor in America. We need unions, labor unions, all across America to realize that we really need a full employment, federal job guarantee strategy in America if we’re going to strengthen workers, families all across this country.
So the time is now, and we need individuals listening to get involved in the organization so that we can make change together.
Intermission (21:19):
You are listening to Macro N Cheese, a podcast, brought to you by Real Progressives, a nonprofit organization dedicated to teaching the masses about MMT or Modern Monetary Theory. Please help our efforts and become a monthly donor at PayPal or Patreon, like and follow our pages on Facebook and YouTube and follow us on Periscope, Twitter, and Instagram.
Steve Grumbine (22:09):
You know, one of the things that jumped out at me, and we’ve said this in different ways, but the same message. I believe that knowledge of MMT eradicates the lines of politics; you’re no longer Democrat or Republican or a libertarian. What you’ve become is a woke 99%er. And this is one of those things that, literally you look at how many debates we’ve had over the years, and you’ve mentioned a few of them, these empowerment zones and things like that, that are just neoliberal snake oil.
You look at these things, they’re done with the right intent, but the reality is it’s putting a bandaid on a heart attack. And if you look, most people, once the lights go on, I mean, the people that I deal with, they’re from all walks of life and they’re out there saying, “Oh my goodness, I can’t even bother with these conversations anymore because it’s farce, it’s not real, it’s like a fake world, when you realize how the system really works.”
The changes going from the sitcoms we see on television, to the things even pastors and churches talk about, to the things we see on the nightly news and our classrooms. The entire language of austerity has been baked into our culture for so long that we almost feel guilty. We almost feel like we’re bad people for acknowledging how it really works, until we realized that’s really how it works.
And that freedom that comes from seeing that, that should empower an incredible revolution of minds, of spirits, of people uniting together to make great change. And I love what you’re trying to do there at Our Money. It’s just really is an empowering thing.
Delman Coates (23:49):
It really should turn the light switch on. It did for me when I started understanding money. I preached two sermons recently about MMT, you know, kind of like MMT, sort of Christianized MMT, you know, like, like I’m the MMT evangelist. And in response to this sermon, someone tweeted and said, “You know, Reverend, our ancestors were wrong, money really does grow on trees.”
And when you think about it, it really does, it really does. And the public has been forced to figure out how to live on a little, how to live with scarcity, live on the crumbs. Meanwhile, those who understand how the system works, utilize the power of money creation for private purposes, for their benefit, to fund wars, to get access to the rich, all kinds of things.
Someone said to me today that it seems as if Republicans have already embraced MMT. It’s the Democrats that haven’t come around yet. So when you understand the workings of money, you understand what money is, where it comes from and what it can do, it’ll change your life. When I drive down the street and I see homeless people, when I see people being put out of their home, as a pastor, you know, we have to do hospital visits and you see people struggling with healthcare issues.
You say to yourself, “My God, in a country like America that is monetarily sovereign, there is no need for these issues to exist in this way.” I’m committed to making a change. And you know, one of the things that I worked on, Steve, you know, we just launched Our Money about three weeks ago, but I’ve been really working the last 18 months to two years doing the one thing that we really have to work on doing. And that is we have to work on our language and nomenclature so that we can translate it to the average person on the street.
I’ve listened to a lot of high level wonky conversations and debates amongst, you know, those who are very much into monetary history, money science, you know, money reform. And there are a range of groups, all different kinds of groups. Everyone’s well-intentioned, I think it’s wrong to kind of demonize people in different quarters and their motivation, that’s just my view.
But as I’ve listened, I’ve said, “Wow, if this is going to work, we’ve got to figure out how to translate what these folks are saying to the person on the street, whose eyes roll in the back of their heads,” when we start talking about . . . I’m not going to start characterizing some of the things I hear people talking about, but the backend workings of the Fed and how the payment system works and interbank settlements, all this kind of stuff, you know.
I don’t even understand it, I mean, I’m aware of it, but we have got to figure out how to translate this language in ways that people on the street can access. And so if you saw our launch presentation a few weeks ago, it’s really the fruit of me working through concepts and framing. And I think the average person on the street, the sixth grader, the person with an eighth grade education can access and understand.
The person who really, at the end of the day, really just wants to know, how can I get a job? How can I get a job? How can I feed my family? That’s really what I want to know. And so I think this is a challenge. I think it’s a challenge to your audience, to really partner with us in developing messaging that the average person on the street can get, so that we can take it from just the 5% and the 10% of highly academic intellectuals who get it, and look, I’m an academic myself in religion, and I know what it’s like to be an academic, but I don’t want to keep my conversations in the cloisters of the academy, and in the stacks in the library.
Steve Grumbine (28:12):
That’s right.
Delman Coates (28:12):
I’ve got to figure out how to take it to the people on the street, because I really believe, like that quote that’s attributed to Henry Ford: “If people actually understood what’s happening in the banking system, there would be a revolution tomorrow.” We have to figure out how to translate it to this.
Steve Grumbine (28:33):
When we came out, we came out with this saying, ‘taxes don’t fund spending,’ right. And it was intended to be like dropping dynamite into the lake and watching the fish rise up, because people are like, “What? Did he just say taxes don’t fund spending, of course taxes fund spending, that’s how we do everything, taxes are what pay for roads, it’s the price of living in civilized society.”
Let me tell you about what monetary sovereignty is. Let me explain to you what taxation is all about, and you break it down in terms that they understand. You’re not going to get them all. Your methods going to hit some people; my method’s going to hit some people; those academics are going to hit some people.
But I remember back when it was a small group of people and they were using big words that didn’t make sense to me, and I have two master’s degrees, so I’m not a dumb guy. And I was like, “How do I figure this out?” And so we started dumbing it down into bite size things and little memes and whatever.
And you know, of course what ends up happening, and it’s funny, you said what you said about hey, I’m not an economist, I’m just a guy that’s trying to change the world. I’m trying to change it through presenting this in a way that people can understand it. And for us, we’re like, you know what, the language may not be exactly precise, we’re not going to put this in the next academic textbook, however, for people that are getting ready to hit the voting button in the booth, they now have ammunition to know that there is no eating your peas, that the country’s not broke, and that we can afford nice things.
And there’s no reason for poverty, because poverty is a political choice. And when you start realizing that, it fundamentally changes you. So the language, the framing, all that stuff, if you’ve got it down, man, I’m going to be feeding at your trough too brother, because we do need to support each other.
We need to support each other. And we need to work to change the world because I’ve got a child that’s autistic, and that little boy doesn’t have nearly the services he needs, needs, like medical, needs those services because we can’t afford it, the state can’t afford it, why can’t the state afford it?
Because the federal government hasn’t been spending money into the economy. It’s leaving these states with all these unfunded mandates and the states are cutting taxes and they’re pushing people out and you nailed it, gentrification out the wazoo. I mean, people are being pushed out of communities they’ve been in their entire lives in the name of revitalization and so forth.
It’s got to stop. And I think that we’ve got the right answers here and you, my friend, you’re a powerhouse. I really, really appreciate your approach. And I look forward to working with you in the future, big time.
Delman Coates (31:16):
Same here, same here. We’ve got to help every segment of our society understand that you have a stake in this movement. If you are a legislator at the state level, if you’re on the city council or county council in your town or your municipality, you should want more federal spending because that’s going to help you solve some of your local issues, right?
So, there’s a sense in which, and I’ve experienced some, you know, state legislators and city council folks who say, “Oh, Oh, you guys are just talking about federal spending, like this doesn’t really affect me.” Yes, it does. Imagine if there was a very broad, robust commitment to federal spending on a range of state priorities, like rebuilding public schools that are older than 30 or 35 years old. Just think about how that could transform local communities that have been relying on local taxes to build new schools.
Every person in society, veterans, we literally, our tagline is “Change Money, Change the World.” I really believe, Steve, if we change the way we think about money, we can literally change the world.
Steve Grumbine (32:33):
I couldn’t agree with you more.
Delman Coates (32:33):
We could literally change the world, if we change the way we think about money. And I want to thank you for your messaging “taxes don’t fund spending”. We’ve been saying things like, “It’s preferable to rely on money created through public spending rather than private lending.” “Spend it don’t lend it.”
We’ve been sort of working on this similar kind of framing and helping people see the advantages of one form of money creation over the other. And I think when we do that, people get it. I’m so excited about this movement. You’re getting me excited Steve here talking to you.
Steve Grumbine (33:16):
Well, you got me excited too, my friend. It gives me an excuse to sneak home and see mom and come catch up with you guys and see what’s going on at Our Money. So one final thing I wanted to throw at you. Obviously from the seventies on, when the Bretton Woods accord ended, in 71-72 timeframe, things dramatically changed.
And one of the big things was the push for neoliberalism, which is what is largely infecting our world today. Neoliberalism is a global scorch. In fact, the United States’ chief export is neoliberalism around the world. We are trying to get rid of these other countries that have beautiful safety nets, beautiful citizens benefits, you name it.
I mean, Australia who has single payer, they got a national health service in England, you name it, Canada. And the US exports this idea of, “Hey, you’ve got some markets waiting there if you privatize it.” If you look, this is a global movement and it’s not just in the US, and I think that we’re all tied together in this global community of people that are waking up to what’s going on.
I think you’ve got a powerful message, my friend. I think that you should realize that you could speak beyond the borders here, my friend, you’ve got a great voice.
Delman Coates (34:31):
I just want to do my part in this quarter here to work towards influencing the influencers. That’s our strategy. We want to influence the influencers. There are people with congregations, bases, organizations, black lives matter, activists, who really need to understand money. There are sororities, fraternities, lodges, mosques, faith leaders.
We want to influence the influencers to understand this thing. And right now what’s happening is there’s been a delegitimization of the role of government, as you just mentioned since Bretton Woods, maybe before, but certainly since 72 with the neoliberal agenda, right? And this sort of recent iteration of that is tagging anything that talks about the role of government as socialism.
And I say to people, “Are roads socialism?” And they’re like, “What do you mean?” I’m like, “Yeah, roads, when you go out there and drive on the road, is that socialism? What about clean water? Is that socialism? Clean air to breathe? Is that socialism?” So we have to really challenge these assumptions that are put out there to delegitimize the role of the public square, the role of government, and to try to put all of these areas of public life in the private sector.
And you’re right, I think the time is now. We’re really seeing in America, I hope people are seeing this, but we’re really seeing in America the way in which unrestrained wealth is deeply harmful to our values, to our democratic institutions and to our way of life. And if we’re going to make progress, we’ve got to reclaim and relegitimize the role of government.
And people throwing around these buzz words like, Oh, that’s socialism, most of them don’t even understand what they’re talking about. We’re not talking about socialism. We’re not talking about eliminating business or private enterprise, or getting rid of your mom and pop stores. We’re not talking about that.
We’re simply talking about reclaiming who should create the money that we rely on and that we use. Should it be public, which is going to create that money that doesn’t have to be repaid with perpetual intrest, or should it be the private sector?
Steve Grumbine (37:07):
I’m with you, man. Thank you very much. So Rev, you are awesome, I’m so glad I got to talk to you, and what I want to do is I want to give you the last word here. We’ll give you an opportunity to tell everybody how they can get involved with Our Money, how they can find you. And with that, then we’ll go ahead and say, good night.
Delman Coates (37:24):
Well, Steve, I want to thank you and Real Progressives for all of your work, and your viewers for the very robust forum that you all have created over the years. I look forward to more partnership with your viewers and those if they’re not a part of Real Progressives, they can go to Ourmoneyus.org that’s our web address, www.ourmoneyus.org .Take a look at our micro-documentary, take a look at our educational videos.
We have 10, four to six minute short videos about the workings of our monetary system, and join us in changing the public debate about our over-reliance on money created through private lending and our need to shift that balance to relying on money created through public spending. If we do that, we can reduce private debt.
You know, Steve, the average family works 40 to 50 hours a week, to pay interest on borrowed money, on a mortgage, most of which is interest, or car note, or school loan. We need to have a society where, rather than the public being servants of money, the money facilitates and serves the needs of the public.
I’m digressing now. I just want to invite and encourage your members to join us, to partner with us, as we go around the country. I’d love to come to your community. I’d love to come to your church, your mosque, or synagogue, your veterans groups, to introduce myself, to introduce our campaign and to think through how you can organize where you are.
Thank you so much, Steve, for having me on tonight, and I look forward to ongoing conversation and collaboration.
Steve Grumbine (39:13):
Absolutely. So with that folks, thank you so much for joining us tonight. This was a great opportunity to meet Reverend Delman Coates. Just a great guy, and I really appreciate your time, sir. We’ll talk soon.
Delman Coates (39:26):
Thank you so much, Steve.
Steve Grumbine (39:27):
Absolutely.
Ending Credits (00::39:40)
Macro N Cheese is produced by Andy Kennedy, descriptive writing by Virginia Cotts, and promotional artwork by Mindy Donham. Macro N Cheese is publicly funded by our Real Progressives Patreon account. If you would like to donate to Macro N Cheese, please visit patreon.com/realprogressives.