Episode 37 – Organizing, Democracy, and Modern Monetary Theory with Mitch Green

Macro N Cheese – Episode 37
Organizing, Democracy, and Modern Monetary Theory with Mitch Green
October 12, 2019  

Mitch Green [music/intro] (00:00): 

Ecosocialists show up at events where you might have a lot of Democrats who are interested in a cap and trade policy, or they might be interested in a carbon tax policy. But ecosocialists will show up and say, no, you need to have a moratorium on fossil fuel infrastructure. 

Mitch Green [music/intro] (00:20): 

It’s really easy to ignore frontline communities as being rubes or hicks or people who may not necessarily know what’s good for them. So let’s bring some technocrats in to change the situation without consulting anyone. 

Geoff Ginter  [music/intro] (00:40): 

Now let’s see if we can avoid the apocalypse altogether. Here’s another episode of Macro N Cheese with your host, Steve Grumbine. 

Steve Grumbine (01:34): 

Alright, and this is Steve Grumbine with Macro N Cheese. Today, I have a opportunity to speak with a gentleman that I met at the First Modern Monetary Theory Conference at UMKC back in 2017. His name is Mitch Green and he’s a research scholar at the (Global) Institute for Sustainable Prosperity. He’s taught courses in political economy, economic statistics, and applied microeconomics at Franklin and Marshall College and currently moonlights as an adjunct economics instructor at Portland Community College.  

He also participants in the annual meetings of the Association for Evolutionary Economics Union for Radical Political Economists and Association for Social Economics. His areas of research include economic history of the American West, political economy, energy and housing policy, as well as post Keynesian microeconomic theory.  

Dr. Green received his PhD from University of Missouri, Kansas City under the supervision of Frederick S. Lee and James Sturgeon and he’s currently active with the Portland Democratic Socialists of America. And with that, welcome to the show, Mitch. 

Mitch Green (02:51): 

Thanks a lot, Steve. I appreciate it. 

Steve Grumbine (02:52): 

Man, you have been doing so much. I can’t even fathom how you find time to do all of that. Tell me a little bit about what’s been keeping you busy. What have you been up to here recently? 

Mitch Green (03:06): 

So I’ll be honest with you. I recently one of the lucky few in Portland to be able to afford to buy a house with my partner. You know, as you may not know, Portland’s one of those coastal cities that has a really high cost of living driven by , you know, speculative finance and generally bad neoliberal policies over the last several decades.  

But nevertheless, I’m fortunate to be in a situation where my partner and I could buy a house. And so we did, and I’ve been working on restoring an old 1904 bungalow and did some electrical work. So I’ve been doing that. So, yeah, so aside from the activism stuff and the teaching and the MMT advocacy, I’ve been busy. So thanks for having me on. 

Steve Grumbine (03:47): 

Absolutely. All right. So one of the things I want to do is start off right off the bat. You were recently in a Salon article talking about a Green New Deal, and I think that there’s a backstory to how that even came to be. But I guess let’s start first off with, tell us about the article and tell us a little bit about your interest in a Green New Deal. 

Mitch Green (04:10): 

Yeah, so the article was essentially a question and answer style interview with Matt Rosa, who writes for Salon. A very interesting fellow and, you know, he got my contact information from someone else at Salon. I wanted to talk about the Green New Deal and how it intersects with some of the aspects of Modern Monetary Theory.  

So I didn’t really have a lot of context going into that. I didn’t know what to expect in that interview. It was very much a rapid fire question, answer, question, answer kind of thing. But I think that it was a reasonable outcome given . . . I think that Matt was one of those good journalists that try to extract the essence of why I was interested in, which is essentially this, you know, look, we don’t have a lot of time.  

We don’t have a lot of time as a species, but also as a civilization to play around with failed strategies of trying to make the market get to the end state that we would like to get to, such that it’s sustainable. We have 11 years, okay? So the science is very clear and increasingly my academic but mostly my activist focus has been on how can I engage with this political movement that really is about a Green New Deal.  

So I thought, hey, help my local organization, put on an event to talk about what’s possible, what should be in it, and how it should look. And it got some interest so… 

Steve Grumbine (05:31): 

Well, you know, I’ve found it to be very interesting because, you know, I know that you being an active member of DSA, particularly there in Portland, this is an interesting intersection, if you will, because, obviously, DSA has been touched in many ways by not only fiscal conservatism in some respects or sound fiscal policies or sound finance, I should say.  

But there has been very significant strides getting MMT into the DSA space and being that you’ve been involved so much, I’m just curious, where does DSA stand or where do you stand in this DSA quest here to bring about these kind of changes to our society? Does MMT have a role to play in DSA and where are we at in terms of getting into DSA? 

Mitch Green (06:23): 

Yeah, so that’s a complicated question and let me just unpack it in pieces here. So to address the last question there directly, I think MMT does have a role to play in helping DSA mobilize its politics. You know, DSA is a big tent with many different legislative priorities and not just like electoral politics, but also boots on the ground, grassroots activism.  

And something like Modern Monetary Theory, which has, you know, grown up in the halls of academia, in practice in the financial sector, moved into this movement. I think that’s a sort of natural marriage in sort of framing how we talk about the demands that activists are asking for as you’re well aware, you and your listeners, Steve.  

So my goal in this is, look, I want to be a member in good standing with the organization. And so my first prerogative is to enter the organization and help get plugged into the priority cause I don’t want to come in and start proselytizing and taking up space that’s not earned, you know. But as an economist, I’m often asked, hey Mitch, what do you think about X, Y, and Z?  

And when I’m asked a question like, well, how do we pay for the Green New Deal or how do we pay for a jobs guarantee, I use MMT to sort of lay out how to ask the right questions, if that makes sense. And so I did like a teacher in about a year and a half ago. I had a summer school that the DSA put on and it wasn’t about the Green New Deal, but it was about sort of how do you pay for a question broadly speaking.  

And I didn’t even use MMT. I didn’t use the term MMT. I didn’t talk about what I was talking about as being an MMT thing, I just use the language and the framing. And folks from the audience said, you know, that sounds an awful lot like Modern Monetary Theory. Have you heard about it? And I was like, I, in fact I have, yeah.  

So we can talk more about that. So the more of these events that I’ve done and the more of these conversations I’ve had, increasingly I’ve seen people say, you know, that’s MMT or what do you think about this idea that we don’t necessarily have to tax to finance the policies that we want to do as a first and foremost primary concern.  

And I found that very encouraging. So where we go from here is a question of, again, making sure that the MMT advocacy is in support of the DSA’s priorities, but also using my knowledge and expertise around the framework to make sure that folks are not misrepresenting it or have the tools to understand it. 

Steve Grumbine (08:52): 

So I guess the DSA goals are worth diving into because I believe they kind of marry into a lot of the things that you see in most of the MMT community working towards as well. I believe that really is a natural marriage here of sorts. You mentioned ecosocialism. Can you define what ecosocialism is? 

Mitch Green (09:12): 

Yeah. So it’s basically saying, look, when you think about what socialists broadly speaking are concerned with, it’s like creating new institutions, new modes of practice to move past capitalism in such a way that workers are in control. Frontline communities are in control and can map out the vision that they want to pursue as people in communities.  

Right? And so what ecosocialism does is said, “There’s many different ways we can approach this problem, but we’re going to approach it through a sort of ecological lens as our primary focus. And so ecosocialists take very positive statement that it’s not enough to do socialist organizing, but we need to do organizing that saves the planet.  

We need to do organizing that has an ecological justice aspect to it. You know, so ecosocialist show up at events where you might have a lot of Democrats who were interested in a cap and trade policy, or they might be interested in a carbon tax policy. But ecosocialist will show up and say, “No, you need to have a moratorium on fossil fuel infrastructure.  

You need to have a much more radical stance and say it’s not enough to say, okay, eventually we’ll get there maybe through market mechanisms.” They marry the kind of moving past markets towards a socialist vision with an ecological emphasis. 

Steve Grumbine (10:34): 

Okay. So, as I talked to various members of, for example, the Green Party, and even within the DSA space, I hear a lot of them reject the basic premises of Modern Monetary Theory, I believe, based on some things from a misunderstanding or perhaps some reading of Marx. Maybe some political bias that has gone through the public culture, pop culture has many people from all angles misrepresented, but there seems to be some serious log jams, if you will, in terms of areas that prevent that very, very forward thinking perspective of moving into an ecosocialist agenda while marrying the economics that will allow that to come to be.  

What do you think is the opportunity there that we could use to get past some of those challenges, or maybe even what are those challenges, if you will, that possibly prevent an understanding of the economic system that enables those policies? 

Mitch Green (11:44): 

What comes to mind immediately is this idea that oftentimes when you’re trying to reach towards a policy goal and articulate something different or envision a different future, it’s hard to see a world outside the one that you live in, okay? And so a lot of people are not necessarily well steeped in economics or even if you rely upon David Harvey for your explanation of how capitalism functions or you rely upon some other Marxist scholar for your critique of capitalism.  

And those are all fine and well to a certain degree. But when you’re talking about something that is a broad based transformation of institutions, then you also have to say, “Look, we have to move beyond a paradigm that relies upon sort of scarcity principles, sort of sound finance principles, in order to actually affect those objectives.”  

And so, unfortunately, there’s a lot of left-leaning activists who still think you have to live within a certain monetary budget to accomplish your goals. And so like, for instance, if you look at a tax, the rich campaign, there’s two elements of it. Like one is there’s too many rich people and so let’s tax them out of existence as a class.  

And that’s fine but then the next thing is like, let’s use the taxes to fund the things we want to do. And I think that tends to get blended into too indistinguishable factors. And so when I try to do, and I think what, frankly, the ecosocialists surround me have no problem seeing through that and saying, look, if we’re going to be talking about using all the tools on the table, then when I bring up sort of MMT principles to say, this is how we pay for it, this is how we should conceive of the true costs, nobody bats an eye.  

I think it’s when you don’t have that direct engagement and then sit back and you see someone like, well, we won’t mention names, but there are certain sound finance socialists who are very influential on the left. You would sort of lean on that person’s analysis as a basis of authority. And I think that is a hindrance for sure. 

Steve Grumbine (13:42): 

Yes, absolutely. So I guess, you know, why don’t I give you an opportunity, if you will, to give a shot at what you would describe if you are talking to an ecosocialist who, perhaps, had never heard of MMT before. How would you describe Modern Monetary Theory to them? 

Mitch Green (14:02): 

Well, so the way that I usually approach it, before I use labels, I talk about categories and I talk about sort of processes. So I’ll say, look, we live in a world where we have certain institutions that provide for the material provisioning of our society and they are inherently social. Okay. These things can be banks.  

They can be factories. They can be public institutions like public utilities that provide electricity, large agribusiness. And then you’ve got sort of mechanisms for distributing all that production, right? And there’s ways to sort of figure out who gets what in the process. And most people are nodding along saying, yes, I understand this.  

And then I say, look, that’s a historical phenomenon, you know, and all societies have to grapple with this problem, this basic idea that in any society, there is a social provisioning process that provides for the bread and mechanisms to distribute the bread. Okay. I say, now, if you want to think about what comes next, if you want to think about saying, we want to change dramatically how we do things such that it doesn’t impact the environment in adverse ways and doesn’t screw over people on the frontline communities as we make this change, then you want to think about that as a broad institutional change.  

And so, and then people not along and say, yeah, I’m following you, okay? So by then people say, all right, these certain laws of economics are not immutable, but they are subjects of human creation and their social phenomenon. And then from there, I introduced this idea that our relationship with money is not so clear at the outset.  

Like we’re sort of raised up in the society where we as individuals and households face a monetary scarcity condition, but the federal government does not because it’s the creator of the currency. And so I introduced that sort of issuer versus user of the currency distinction very gently and very incrementally.  

And then I say, look, if we’ve got an opportunity to re-articulate our political institutions and then turn money to account to create and enable the possibilities that we would like to pursue, then we need to think about turning that relationship on its head and ask whether or not it’s scarce in the first place.  

And so by then most folks say, well, money’s not really scarce. It’s just an institution that we live with. And it happens to be scarce by design or by default, or where you want to think about that. But then people then see that as an object of organizing and then say, well, what are you trying to tell me?  

Then that’s when I say, look, we can use the levers of the states. We can use the printing press, if for lack of a better term, to create the spending power necessary to provision ourselves with a clean, bright and safe future. And that’s usually how I set it up. I don’t go down into the details on a lot of spaces.  

A lot of MMT discourse dwells on like operational mechanics, which is all very important. But when I talk to folks, I usually keep it at that level of everyday sort of folk relationships with those principles. 

Steve Grumbine (17:07): 

Now that is really, really good insights. I think that where it gets tricky for many is the mythology, if you will, of a blended history of the creature of Jekyll Isle and the machination that is the federal reserve and how monetary operations occur. And because so many have been infiltrated, if you will, by folks as far right as Alex Jones and some other folks on the left who I guess we’ll leave unnamed at this point.  

There’s a lot of Interesting dichotomies there, the false, completely off the edge, sometimes anti-semitic theology, if you will, from myth tellers and then the actual outcomes that we feel and live every day that, kind of, sometimes reinforce these false paradigms. I think that that has created a situation where the ping pong game, if you will, between those who feel like they do understand, because they’ve watched a documentary on something like, I don’t know, Zeitgeist and Peter Joseph or any number of these other groups that even to some degree, Ellen Brown in the public banking side, whereas you’re very sympathetic to the public banking.  

They don’t quite understand the concept of currency issuer and currency user, and the unit of account that is the federal government. So this concept ends up creating, I think, some of those dynamics that you try to stay away from which is these back and forths about the technical aspects of how money is created and so forth.  

How do you avoid those? How do you get past those kinds of discussions or do you feel that they maybe are not necessarily fruitful? 

Mitch Green (19:00): 

It really depends on the context. Like, if I’m in a reading group, like, if I’m in a meeting and the whole purpose we’re there is because we read an article and we want to get really academic about it, then I’ll engage directly on those operational, technical things. That doesn’t happen very often, but it does happen.  

But if I’m in a space where we’re trying to articulate a shared vision of what is possible, and what we would like a future to be, then I simply say, “Look, those are interesting questions but it’s beyond the scope of what we’re trying to talk about now.” And I sort of pivot and I bring it back and I always bring it back to this question of like, “Look, even if you don’t buy into what I’m saying, you have to ask yourself this question. How much does it cost to continue to live in this business as usual paradigm?” We suppose we cannot get gifts from the rich, if you will, in the form of taxation to fund the things we want to do, and we spend all this energy and time dwelling upon whether or not we can find concordance between certain sound money principles and MMT style principles.  

Then, the clock is ticking. We don’t have time for this academic discourse right here. And I usually lay out, look, consider the costs of forgone opportunity of catastrophe, of ecological waste and so on and so forth. Like even if you did a very standard mainstream cost benefit analysis, it would seem that taking a risky moonshot approach to just opening up the federal money creation spigot, if you will, it seems less costly than that, you know?  

And so it’s usually diffused at that point; but frankly, in my experience, most people in Portland are not really worried about that. They’re willing to take a stand and try something new and be activists. Which is very encouraging. 

Steve Grumbine (20:50): 

That is encouraging. So let me ask you, in your understanding, you’ve got Bernie Sanders who’s come out with a Green New Deal. You had Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez come out with her framework for a Green New Deal. You had Jill Stein and the Green Party and even before ecosocialists actually brought the Green New Deal to the forefront many, many moons ago.  

What is your understanding of what the Green New Deal is, and maybe lay out what that framework looks like to you? 

Mitch Green (21:21): 

I see it as something bigger and bolder than any list of traditional policy objectives that we’ve seen in a very long time. I see it as a sort of hail Mary. I see it as a bold statement that we want to change every aspect of our society. And we’re using this idea of ecological collapse as a way to galvanize many interests into one, into a sort of organized body of action.  

And so to me, the Green New Deal is an opportunity to say we are going to change how we produce things, where we produce things and for whom we produce them. And we are going to do them irrespective of their financial costs. And while we’re at it, we are going to do it in such a way that places primary emphasis on making sure that those who are immediately affected by that transition have their voices at the table, have an opportunity to lead and are taken care of when we get rid of coal mining jobs, for instance.  

This to me is quite radical. And it’s the closest thing that you can get, I think, to a socialist policy framework inside a capitalist system. 

Steve Grumbine (22:29): 

That is a great segue to the next question I have, which is the concept of a just transition. You know, I hear Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez come out with it. And this is something I think that every project manager of which I’m one often thinks of in our daily work, whether it be information technology, or whether it be any transformational endeavor.  

How do you get from where you are today to where you are tomorrow? And it’s not just good enough to have a great idea. There’s a lot of intermediate steps you have to do to keep people whole, to keep the stakeholders alive and well so to speak. And in this Green New Deal, we’re taking away industries.  

We’re taking people’s livelihoods away, many of which really have a deep emotional attachment to the idea of being a coal miner, any number of these things. And you think about these jobs that are not only dirty, but that are destructive to our society. And it’s easy to get hateful and angry with them, but this is careers.  

So part of the beauty of this Green New Deal, in my opinion, is that it is not inhumane. It does take into account these deep, emotional intricacies that you see, and it does provide for a just transition. What are your thoughts on that? 

Mitch Green (24:03): 

Well, I think that I’m really encouraged that language has made it into the policy and into the ways that these political leaders are talking about it. Because, as you said, it’s really easy to ignore frontline communities as being sort of, I don’t know, rubes or hicks or people who may not necessarily know what’s good for them.  

And so let’s bring some technocrats in to just change the situation without consulting anyone. But aside from that basic level of inclusion, it’s also bad politics to sort of ignore the economic impact to people’s livelihoods. So I’ll give you an example. You know, in Oregon where I’m from, one of the primary points of emphasis for our campaign for a Green New Deal is shutting down a proposed natural gas pipeline extension and export terminal in a place called Jordan Cove.  

Okay? Of course the developers are billionaires and capital stakeholders that don’t even live in the community, but they’re selling the pipeline as an opportunity to provide so many good paying union jobs for pipe fitters and steamfitters and other kind of skilled trades people, okay? And so there’s a certain political leverage piece to that.  

And what they don’t say is that those jobs are temporary and they’re subject to, you know, fluctuations in the business cycle. And long after those jobs have been created and those wages have been paid, that community will then have to deal with the long term effects of environmental degradation due to it.  

And so one of the things that we’re doing in addition to, and actually really part and parcel to opposing that pipeline, is trying to organize in that part of the state and bring those workers to the table, right? And so, it’s challenging because, I mean, a jobs guarantee as it’s currently being proposed, doesn’t pay as much as what a union pipe fitter is used to getting paid, but not everyone gets that union pipe fitter job anyway.  

And so the idea is, look, if we can offer a job guaranteed to anyone willing and able to work to do things that contribute to a green society, to everyone in the community, that would be a significant economic boon to those living in that community. So you bring those people to the table in a way that maybe you haven’t in the past.  

And so what I like about the Green New Deal is that it provides that opportunity to be a holistic package of transformation. And that we’re not just going to ignore the cost that certain marginalized communities have born all along. You know? 

Intermission (26:44): 

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 (27:32): 

Mitch, one of the things that I’ve wanted to bring up and get your take on, Warren Mosler talked to me about the Green New Deal and the job guarantee and other things. And from his vantage point, he made what seemed like a very, very important distinction about the job guarantee and the government’s ability to fund high end, high skill career level jobs, as opposed to what he considers the transition job, which talks about this just transition.  

And he’s like, you know, don’t confuse this. The government has the ability to hire people at these high skill, high wage jobs that benefits society. And it doesn’t have to be at the wage floor, which is obviously what the job guarantee does and you made the point, doesn’t pay enough to really offset that.  

But as your building up green energy as you’re mobilizing to do this, there are going to be millions of jobs created in order to do this shift anyway. The transitional jobs, if you will, the just transition isn’t necessarily the only jobs that come from this Green New Deal. In fact, the Green New Deal creates many, many jobs far beyond the job guarantee. What are your thoughts on that? 

Mitch Green (28:55): 

Well, that’s absolutely right. I mean, that’s a piece that sometimes you can forget to emphasize. I’m glad that you brought that up. You know, I have some knowledge about the electric utility industry because that’s the industry in which I work. And I can tell you that, you know, it’s not enough to say, all right, the cost of wind is cheap.  

So let’s just replace everything with wind. I mean, it doesn’t quite work that way. You need to have a grid that’s capable of balancing the variability of the generation of wind turbines and sort of blending that in with resources that have different sort of characteristics, such that you can get a reliable and stable mix of energy at all hours of the day.  

So what’s going to need to happen is a significant investments in the transmission grid across the entire United States, a significant investment in alternative storage technologies such as compressed air, you know, retrofitting hydroelectric dam so that they have more efficient turbines, any number of battery projects, just, there’s a whole complex of technologies that can be used at our disposal to just handle one piece of it, which is just the electrification piece.  

And those are labor intensive activities. Okay. There’s a reason why utilities don’t like building transmission and distribution lines. It’s because they’re expensive. And if you’ve got the federal government paying the bills through an appropriations process through say a Green New Deal paradigm, then you can afford to contract and hire folks either within the public sector or the private sector to get the job done on a desired timescale.  

And you would be foolish if you didn’t think that that was going to create a significant demand for labor premium wages. So, so yeah, and the, you know, the job guarantee is part of that. It’s an adjunct to that to make sure that everyone has an opportunity to work in the process. No one’s left behind. 

Steve Grumbine (30:44): 

You know, it’s a beautiful thing because, I mean, as we’re watching Modern Monetary Theory become more in the public space. I mean, going back a few years, it was a very, very select little group of people. I don’t mean to laugh, but I remember 10 years ago and I’ve watched it as it’s creeped out of the basements and gotten out of these small chat rooms and into this larger public space and the possibilities that are there for us, it just opens so many doors, so many incredible opportunities to dream of a different tomorrow.  

To dream of an existence that maybe we’d never considered before or was maybe in a science fiction novel and now it’s suddenly possible if we can embrace and understand what the utility is and how to harness the public purpose, if you want. I think that word public purpose has been lost for so long.  

I think it’s imperative and I think this is a key part of what I hear you talking about from a DSA perspective is basically public purpose. You know, the idea of serving the communities and building that egalitarian next level society, that new society, if you will. Let me just ask you, and this is gonna probably be a little bit more of a difficult question.  

You look at society, we see so many social ills, both in the space of racism. We see so much xenophobia. We see incredible amounts of inequity based on generational wealth and generational poverty. And you see things like Kelton and the gang come out with a plan to eliminate student debt. Bernie Sanders is on the record for trying to get rid of all student debt.  

You’ve got that on the hook. They’re going out there talking about getting rid of medical debt. They’re talking about making housing a right. They’re talking about making a job a right. They’re talking about actually getting rid of this neoliberal paradigm of profit and profit seeking and rent seeking and so forth and really creating citizens benefits, if you will.  

Is this a bridge too far for people to understand? Do you think that this is just such a paradigm shifting approach that it’s almost impossible? Or do you think that there’s some fundamental taint, if you will, from like the Calvinist side of things or Judeo Christian underpinnings of hard work ethic and all this.  

What do you think is the key blocker there that prevents that cognition of seeing all these possibilities and being able to embrace and transition to them? 

Mitch Green (33:36): 

That is a difficult question. And I tend to be a glass half full kind of guy. And so maybe I have a bias towards seeing the glimmer of opportunity. But whenever I’ve been in a situation where folks have had to deal with a very urgent and immediate crisis, I’ve seen people come together and help each other.  

I’ve seen people pull over and help a stranger on the side of the street. I think human nature is complicated and I think that we have a proclivity for community and stewardship and cooperation. I think we also have a proclivity to combat divisiveness and the like. And I think, by default, the ideology is set up to divide us.  

But the nice thing about taking this rights-based framework and just dispensing with all the qualifications and all the technocratic wonkery and just saying, “We’re going to cancel all your student loan debt because no one should be in debt for going to school. We are going to cancel all of your medical debt because no one should live in fear of medical bankruptcy.  

We’re going to create a sustainable future for our children, for all of our children, because no one should have to live in a world of basically a Mad Max scenario.” Those are inspiring messages and they activate that part of us as humans that say, you know, what, if there’s a chance to help each other, I think let’s try it. And so I don’t think the Calvinist bent is as strong as the powers that be would like us to believe. And I think that what I’ve witnessed with my own local chapter of the DSA is an enormous capacity for people to get together, work on problems together, make solutions.  

It’s incredibly inspiring. And so, you know, the rights-based framework is incredibly powerful. People get it because people have a sense of justice. That’s why folks on the right feel incredibly animated by this idea that someone’s taking away rights. The thing that drives them is, is this fear of losing rights to something.  

They just tend to generally only care about guns that seems, but everyone wants rights to a certain dignified life, okay. And so we get to be in the driver’s seat if we choose and say this is what the dignified life looks like. A right to a job, a right to clean environment and so on. 

Steve Grumbine (35:52): 

This is the most powerful statement to me, what you’re saying right now. To me, this is the inspiration I have in pursuing these things is because we’ve unlocked the door that had blocked our eyes, blocked our vision for being able to see all the possibilities. And now suddenly someone said, I’m not asking permission, I’m kicking the door down and I’m lifting the veil.  

And I’m showing everyone that these things are indeed possible. And you’ve got this guy in Bernie Sanders who for almost half a century has said almost everything. And now you add in the beauty of Stephanie Kelton supporting his campaign. And you not only have the right space to approach as you laid it out there, but you also have the, how you got to pay for it, answer all mixed in one.  

It is so inspiring. It is so exhilarating to me. And I really, really love watching the energy, if you will, going back to the first Bernie Sanders campaign. And quite frankly, I don’t believe that it’s ever stopped. I really do believe that he lit a fire into the minds and imaginations of many across this nation.  

And I really believe that the finishing touch, the master stroke is the economic underpinnings that allow us to say, hey, we really can do this. That isn’t as Hillary Clinton said, pie in the sky, but really is achievable. What would your message be, if you will, to someone who’s skeptical at this point? 

Mitch Green (37:31): 

I would say that after all we’ve been through, all the sort of multiple simultaneous crises that we’re facing, like, what are you so afraid of? Do you honestly think that it’s good practice and good politics to wait for rich people to give us the money that we gave them in the first place? Or do you want to move past them and make them irrelevant?  

And say we are going to move forward with this positive vision. Sure, there are limits, of course. There are limits and there are times where, you know, you could make a series of investments and choices that were not necessarily optimal relative to some uncharted path. But so what? You just correct course, you grab the steering wheel and you make a change.  

That’s what democracy and politics is about. So I would say let’s be bold and let’s be brave. 

Steve Grumbine (38:19): 

What do you think is standing in the way in terms of democracy right now? What are some of the challenges we face as a movement, as people seeking this beautiful invigorating vision? What are some of the institutional and structural challenges we face to making those things happen? 

Mitch Green (38:37): 

Well, I think that there are some personal challenges. I don’t think most Americans know how to do democracy very well. You know, we don’t learn it very well in school and we don’t spend a lot of our time and a lot of our experiences has not been as participating in organizations that have democratic principles.  

And so we’re not really good at it. So we think that because we’ve registered to vote, we go out and vote and we do that, that we’re participating in democracy, but that’s not really true, okay. It’s a much more active thing that you must do. And so I think that a major hindrance is people have to learn how to do democracy well, and the only way you can do that is just on the job training.  

Go out and join an organization that really values democracy like the DSA and find your local DSA chapter. Go to a meeting and see how it works. You’ll find, I think, that it’s very democratic and you might come away with some lessons. That’s the personal take. I think there are structural institutional barriers that are very hard to overcome.  

I mean, you’ve got to get money out of politics. The state itself is an instrument of power and you have to have a theory of democracy that understands power and how power is wielded, okay. And so if you’re naive about the role of power, you know, in politics, then you’re going to be frustrated by your inability to change things.  

So you have to know how to use power and be willing to use it. And those are very difficult things to overcome, but I think we can do it. 

Steve Grumbine (39:57): 

I agree. And one of the things that I want to bring back, because I think that the job guarantee is such a foundational thing in terms of what I call a democracy enhancer. And what you just stated, I want to see if you buy into my theory here, that the job guarantee is the ultimate democracy enhancer because what it does, by being federally funded and locally administered, it puts people in their local communities in the driver’s seat to determine what they value, what they want to accomplish and what they would like to compensate.  

And this, in my opinion, would bring people that have previously not considered being part of a democracy or being part of their local communities or their government, it would get them active by necessity. It will be an opportunity for them to enter into a situation where they have a say in their own future. What do you say about that? 

Mitch Green (40:57): 

Well, I think that’s a great way to describe it. I mean, there are many ways to enhance democracy, but I think a job guarantee has always been about freedom and recognizing that there are sources of unfreedom. And the threat of being thrown off of employment through no fault of your own is a source of significant unfreedom for particularly marginalized communities.  

This is why you see it as a mantle in the civil rights movement. But if you can imagine, as you’re suggesting, this emancipatory program where everyone has an opportunity to participate, but also a right to participate, then you can change that labor dynamic in ways that de-center the power that the boss has over you and take some of that power back.  

And so I remember this one lecture, you know, this is why I’m a post-Keynesian, microeconomist, it’s because I remember this one lecture that Fred Lee was giving at a international post-Keynesian conference and he was giving a lecture and at some point he sort of goes off script. He gets red in the face.  

He starts getting passionate. And just like talking about how microeconomic theory has been an under theorized area, because no one wants to talk about the power that the boss has over a woman with respect to the gendered aspects of that job and how that’s a source of unfreedom when you can just be fired because you don’t want to do a sexual favor, okay.  

I’m paraphrasing. But, you know, it was like one of those uncomfortable moments where all the very serious people in the room, we’re like, come on, Fred, you’re being inflammatory again, but he was hitting the nail on the head. It’s like, you cannot have democracy if you do not have workplace democracy; and you cannot have workplace democracy if workers are afraid. 

Steve Grumbine (42:28): 

Yeah, I want to ask. You made a distinction and I understand the distinction, but I want to give our listeners an opportunity to understand. You focus as a post-Keynesian microeconomist, but there’s the whole macro side. Can you break down the difference at least at a high level between macroeconomics and microeconomics and why the two matter? 

Mitch Green (42:54): 

Yeah, so historically in most economics discourses microeconomics is the theory of individuals, whether they be consumers or the firm and how they go about making decisions under conditions of scarcity and trying to understand choice theory basically. And macroeconomics is this idea that when you add up all those agents, you’ve got a system and the system behaves in certain ways that cause recessions or periods of growth or stagnation.  

So macroeconomics, you talk about big structural categories and in microeconomics, you talk about interactions at the transactional level between agents, okay. But that’s not a very satisfactory distinction because again, most economics frameworks don’t really understand the role of institutions, the role of history and politics.  

And so when a post-Keynesian microeconomist, such as like a, or actually I’m going to use a different phrase, a heterodox microeconomist, such as Fred Lee, and the kind of field that he’s helped pioneer would sort of move away from that choice, theoretic, you know, individual agent framework and say, “What we want to do is talk about the role of the corporation as a powerful actor, the role of labor unions as powerful agents of collective action and their intersection in markets and how markets are governed and sustained and created.” You sort of dissolve that line between micro and macro a little bit, but you’re focusing more upon the peculiar characteristics of certain firms and markets and its history, okay? So you bring in the role of agency, you bring in the role of power dynamics in a very clear cut way there. 

Steve Grumbine (44:29): 

I think this plays into yet another, well, it plays into a lot of things, but one of the big ones that jumps out at me is understanding the role of the states and the federal government. Because as we look at the conflation, we oftentimes like, for example, California talked about doing a lot of things that probably would be best left for the federal government to do.  

And you look around, you realize that maybe California is an economy large enough to handle doing something like a Medicare for All or something like that. But in reality, if you spread that across the entirety of the United States, a lot of these states, they’re not in a position to do something like that.  

It’s not sustainable. They’re not a currency issuer. So in blending the macro, micro, the power dynamics, et cetera, obviously the currency issuer has the most power here and where it spends that first dollar really gives maximum buying power and changes that power dynamic significantly. In terms of that first dollar spent by the currency issuer, how does that play into your understanding of the macro micro dynamic? 

Mitch Green (45:41): 

Yeah, so that’s a good question. I would say first and foremost, MMT is a nice framework for dissolving this a little bit for like actually thinking about it, like making that bridge between the macro and micro. Let me explain. It’s such an institutionally rich framework and understanding how dollars flow from the treasury to sort of ending up in people’s pockets.  

That it’s very specific in understanding like, alright, if the government wants to buy missiles, they contract with Raytheon, right? And that creates a flow of income to a defense contractor. All right, so I’m not interested in that, but I am interested in saying, well, if the federal government wants to have a relationship with the states in such a way that supports the state level prerogatives, it can certainly help enhance that in a way that the states on their own could not do.  

And even macroeconomic phenomenon like fiscal policy and deficit spending has a very specific micro economic impact in the time and place. And so if the state of Oregon wants to pass a Green New Deal package, okay, they’re going to be limited in their ability to finance that. But if they were in partnership in a coalition with the federal government, then they can say, look, we have a set of policy objectives and some priorities.  

We want to engage in this directly. Then, you know, you can create that pathway. And so you’re sending dollars into a community that changes the structure of markets, and that changes the distribution of income and ultimately changes the nature of production. 

Steve Grumbine (47:10): 

When you’re looking at this Green New Deal within that framework you just mentioned, we have Elizabeth Warren going out there saying that she wants to finance a Green New Deal by what sounds like eco- imperialism where she’s going to sell green energy around world to try to quote unquote “finance it.” What is the problem with that? Do you accept that? What is your take on that? 

Mitch Green (47:37): 

Well, I mean, I find it dissatisfactory, okay, for a number of reasons. One is that’s not a very good way to finance something. It relies upon the market in ways that we should be trying to limit and constrain. We do not want to encourage imperialism of any kind. We want to sort of put it in the coffin, so to speak.  

I think that any Green New Deal has to have justice at the center of it, right? And so if you want to be a leader in the world and ushering forth a rapid transition to a sort of so called green economy, then you need to share your technology. And you need to give it away for free, and you need to create fiscal pathways to enable communities to accomplish those goals, okay.  

So if you’re going to try to finance the Green New Deal at home, through intellectual property, essentially through the sale of, you know, Green New Deal energy, or technology, I should say, then that’s just a non-starter. It’s not well thought through. 

Steve Grumbine (48:33): 

I find it fascinating because in my mind you started this broadcast off explaining time is short. We’ve got 11 years and I would say, we’ve got 11 years, not just to come up with a plan, but to mitigate these things. And so we’ve got folks going out there trying to finance these things, people trying to make a buck off these things.  

And what we’re saying is, “Hey guys, there’s a tsunami coming. This is not like time to try and pocket a few greenbacks. There’s a tsunami coming. And there’s a lot of people that are gonna get hurt by the tsunami. There’s a lot of people that are going to die from the tsunami if we don’t take radical action and radical action really quickly.  

And that means that the paper that you’re trying to earn to retain your power and to retain the structure and to retain your dominance, it’s not really conducive to our long term survival.” Do you agree with that statement or am I making more out of it than it is? 

Mitch Green (49:37): 

No, I a hundred percent agree with that. I think that it’s probably a good rule of thumb. If you’re trying to preserve the capital income, the value of intangible capital for US-based corporations, you’re probably slowing down your ability to do a Green New Deal, right? Like we need to be putting to bed these structures that have stood in the way for a long time. 

Steve Grumbine (49:58): 

Very, very good. All right. Well, Mitch, I want to go ahead and just give you an opportunity. If you had a parting word with everyone, what would be your message that you would want people to think about? 

Mitch Green (50:10): 

Yeah, I would just say that, you know, if you’re listening to this and you’re trying to think about, okay, what is the importance of MMT for a Green New Deal or, or maybe I don’t feel confident in some of the technical aspects of the Green New Deal. I would say, you know, you’re not alone. And I think if you can lead with a positive vision, listen to frontline communities and say, this is the kind of society I want to live in, where I have a right to X, Y, and Z, a right to a good job, a clean place to live and a future.  

Then we’re glad to have you on board, join your local DSA ecosocialist group and get to work. And there’s a lot of work to be done, and we’re gonna need all hands on deck. 

Steve Grumbine (50:51): 

All right, man. Look, thank you so much. This was a great podcast. Mitch, I hope I talk to you again real soon. 

Mitch Green (50:58): 

Absolutely. Thank you. 

Steve Grumbine (50:59): 

You got it, man. This is Steve Grumbine with Macro N Cheese. Thank you again for Mitch Green joining me. We’ll talk to y’all soon. 

Ending Credits (00:01:35.280)  

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.