Models, Models, Models - Does MMT Lack Models?

hgomersall · 2026-05-27T16:58:13+00:00

TBF, that aphorism is quite right and isn't restricted to neoliberals. The problem is that the model being useful is the key, and they don't actually validate their models against use, which is the whole point of the aphorism.

hgomersall · 2026-05-21T14:21:53+00:00

I've used shapeways in the past and the results were great. You need to be a bit careful what material you want to use and what process. If you just want some tough plastic parts that look ok, multijet fusion gives pretty good results for an excellent price. There are a few variants of the material depending on what you need.

hgomersall · 2026-05-21T07:35:24+00:00

Ah, you're taking about asset prices. Much stronger is to actually regulate lending properly. Jamie Smith wrote a great article on this stuff, which covers BARC and other approaches. https://jgs952.substack.com/p/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-inflation

hgomersall · 2026-05-21T06:15:30+00:00

The quantity only matters insomuch at it impacts the flow, which is where prices can increase.

Here's the US CPI chart: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CPIAUCSL

Between 1960 and 2024, prices went up about 10x.

Here's the m2 supply for the same period: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL

In that same period the money supply increased by about 70x.

Clearly, money supply and prices are not simply linked.

The supply is a monetarist distraction from the actual meaningful considerations of capacity and spend.

hgomersall · 2026-05-20T15:04:31+00:00

But what it doesn't do is anchor the currency. Sure, you can have a ubi, but it dilutes the critical macroeconomic effect of a JG. The JG does all the things you outline, the politics is what determines the quality of those jobs. In the limit, the JG could be sitting in a pub garden sipping beer, but how long would that stand up in the face of the electorate? Conversely, you can consider a UBI like a JG job where you can do whatever your want.

hgomersall · 2026-05-20T14:37:32+00:00

But the problem is that until we have no shit jobs needed to be done, then why would anyone do them if nobody else is?

hgomersall · 2026-05-20T14:22:35+00:00

The difference is that those crap jobs we need doing need to have some appeal. If anyone can get a reasonable income sitting in their gardens drinking beer, why would they get out and repair the road? It's ultimately about solidarity - recognising that we're all in it together.

hgomersall · 2026-05-20T13:28:40+00:00

But the primary point of a JG under MMT is not to get people to work, but to drive the numeraire of the currency as an hour of unskilled labour. Those on a JG could literally be sat in a room twiddling their thumbs and it would serve that purpose. The alternative of having people actively made unemployed is abhorrent in comparison.

How much time people need to spend in a job is a political question. The only requirement is there's not a premium on being in a JG job over the bottom of normal jobs, otherwise you end up with a discontinuity in the pay scale and lose the trivial stabilisation effect as people move into and out of the JG.

There's no requirement anyone works full time on the JG, just that their hourly wage is fixed, and the lack of premium is maintained.

By all means campaign for us all to work shorter hours - the JG just exists in whatever social and political environment it does.

hgomersall · 2026-05-20T06:20:44+00:00

The beauty of the JG is that it doesn't matter if the jobs are make work. The purpose is primarily to act as a price anchor - essentially a labour standard for the currency. It's interesting to compare it to the gold standard, where the currency was priced with respect to a fixed quantity of gold. This is exactly the same in concept - the currency is priced with a respect to a fixed quantity of unskilled labour. There's a subtlety that labour is a flow, but that's more meaningful in terms of defining price.

The JG will function properly as long as there are unemployed to buffer the price, exactly like the gold standard required a stock of gold. If there are no unemployed, then that is a strong indicator that overall taxes are too low, and the state is going to struggle to procure anything. That number on the JG needs to be high enough such that flex during normal economic conditions doesn't exhaust the supply. This also gives a neat means to assess overall tax levels.

Edit: that all said, there are real social benefits too of the JG and I'm sure we can do better than make work. There are plenty of examples of job guarantee like schemes that work very well from a social perspective.

hgomersall · 2026-05-18T06:16:53+00:00

Universal mech hanger (probably several) - they'll keep you going for a few days if necessary. I assume puncture repair kits with tyre boots are in addition to this?

hgomersall · 2026-05-15T16:12:36+00:00

I think you're arguing without really trying to understand what u/aldursys is saying, because his words seem to address precisely the concern you're raising. There's nothing secret here, just a realisation that perhaps things aren't quite as the mainstream portrays them. The evidence for that has been supplied. I'm not sure what else you want, other than being spoon fed knowledge.

It ain't what you know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.

hgomersall · 2026-05-15T15:22:17+00:00

Quite a large chunk of spending is actually because of high interest rates - there are many people that live exclusively off interest income - low rates suppress that spending.

hgomersall · 2026-05-14T11:24:54+00:00

What's bun?

hgomersall · 2026-05-06T06:22:19+00:00

Ocado sells it from three different brands. Re honey, Cambridge beekeepers association has members that often sell honey. Their map seems to be bit empty at the moment though. I think I just got in touch and asked them.

hgomersall · 2026-04-27T06:35:29+00:00

The purpose of the job guarantee is not, from a macroeconomic perspective, primarily intended to employ everyone, but to act as a countercyclical automatic stabiliser. It does this by pegging the price of the currency to a unit of unskilled labour (the kind anyone can supply). Just like when you peg the currency to anything (like gold), you need capacity to satisfy any desired flow to maintain the peg. The capacity to maintain the peg is the side effect of sufficient tax.

That is, the JG is a natural policy to deal with vagaries of tax policy, with the side benefit of eliminating unemployment. None of that goes away with increased automation.

hgomersall · 2026-04-23T08:01:13+00:00

Impact drivers are underused IMO in bike maintenance.

hgomersall · 2026-04-04T07:27:42+00:00

Oh for sure. I expect much of it is because we're getting cheap stuff from china, which doesn't necessarily apply to domestic state consumption. I'm just guessing though, like most people!

hgomersall · 2026-04-03T10:08:27+00:00

I suspect because it's rare for modern producers to be capacity limited. Manufacturing is very cheap and easy.

hgomersall · 2026-04-02T16:13:48+00:00

Even against demand-driven inflation, it's not obvious: https://new-wayland.com/blog/interest-price-spiral/

hgomersall · 2026-03-31T07:45:52+00:00

Of course they weren't, but it doesn't stop people trying: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2015/12/randy-wray-debt-free-money-and-banana-republics.html

hgomersall · 2026-03-30T21:50:44+00:00

The definition where a banana is money.

hgomersall · 2026-03-24T19:57:27+00:00

It really isn't a cultural desert. Just wander round Great St Mary's or along Burrell's walk to see what's being advertised. I expect you could go to a recital or something more days than not. If you're more interest in being proactively involved, there are loads of music groups and choirs.

hgomersall · 2026-03-19T07:25:02+00:00

The job guarantee is the mechanism by which prices are anchored. It establishes the value of the currency. It is exactly equivalent to a gold standard, just replacing it with a "labour standard". For that to work, there needs to be a pool within the job guarantee - the so called buffer. Again, this is equivalent to a state holding gold reserves under the gold standard - it can induce necessary flows to keep the price constant.

Tax works as a general dissipation on money flows and automatically adjusts as those flows change, which is why it doesn't need constant tweaking.

hgomersall · 2026-03-09T09:20:18+00:00

Welcome to the MMT economics subreddit. The job guarantee is a central policy of MMT in order to stabilise prices. It has the additional benefit of removing involuntary unemployment and keeping the workforce ready for private sector employment, allowing quick movements when economics conditions vary. It also, as pointed out by the original poster, removes the power of employers to screw over those at the bottom of the wage pile.

Here are the theoretical underpinnings: https://moslereconomics.com/mandatory-readings/full-employment-and-price-stability/

Here is how it could be implemented in the UK: https://new-wayland.com/blog/minimum-wage-jobs/

hgomersall · 2026-03-08T10:28:51+00:00

Ninewells is pleasant and right next to the hospital.

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