This is a great primer for anyone who wants to understand how federal finance actually works and how to use that knowledge to understand the class war being waged against the majority of citizens.
Good stuff, Steve, but I’d be careful in suggesting that proper healthcare reform in the US will be deflationary and will require a reduction in taxation. I’m also not necessarily saying that there will need to be an increase in taxes, but we need to consider both the deflationary and inflationary aspects of healthcare reform.
You’ve mentioned the deflationary aspect. On the inflationary end of things, proper healthcare reform should be designed to expand healthcare access and quality of healthcare. As things are, there are shortages of healthcare workers and facilities in many areas, especially lower-population and lower-income areas, and so the healthcare workforce will need to expand and there will be expenses involved with building/maintaining (hopefully) public healthcare facilities. Proper reform will need to pay healthcare workers fairly. Since we’re talking about public healthcare and not private healthcare, a focus should be on quality and actually treating/preventing problems rather than dealing with them in an austerity-focused manner as is often the case today.
Furthermore, since there will be a significant reduction in out-of-pocket medical expenses incurred by the public, the buying-power of the public should be increased and possibly by a large amount. It is hard to say how inflationary this increased buying-power will be without further research (surely capital which once went to private healthcare will be redirected towards taking advantage of the increased buying power of the public). And, indeed, we do need further research on this subject. There will also have to be policy discussions about employer-provided healthcare. If employer health insurance is eliminated, salaries for those workers might increase through the change in compensation and that would also potentially be inflationary and perhaps even unfair to workers who do not get healthcare through their employers today.
I’m not necessarily saying that taxes will need to be increased for the sake of clearing fiscal space, but without further research, it might be hard to make any claims about taxation other than what you say that this reform will not be funded through taxation. In the end, the public is probably more interested in their out-of-pocket healthcare expenses being cut and the quality/access of healthcare being improved and so that should always be the focus of the healthcare reform narratives.
As far as the topic of the podcast in general, I certainly do agree with your assessment about progressives, and the population, being ignorant about economics. With progressives especially, there is a certain level of willful ignorance as it pertains to economics. It is as if they feel that economics is some kind of capitalist conspiracy and that it should never be discussed or studied. Also, many progressives just want to rant and rave. They do not put in the energy to discuss and formulate policy, as we are here, that we should be presenting to politicians and candidates.
Warren Mosler might well be correct, but there would have to be a formal study to look at the situation before coming to any conclusions. I am also unsure if Mosler and I are looking at the same kind of healthcare reform. If we're talking about a true Medicare-for-all, which keeps the health provider sector privatized, the situation might well be different than what I would advocate for, a nationalization of the healthcare system. I suppose this would be more along the lines of 'VA for all' or a US version of the British NHS.
It also appears Mosler is not considering a just transition for those in the health insurance industry. I don't view that as being favorable either in terms of politics, where I think it will be required to ensure employment, or in fairness to labor in the health insurance industry (along with medical coders, etc.). The JG in this instance is not particularly applicable because it will not be politically favorable to tell people making more than livable wages that they are guaranteed a job at the lowest livable wage. That's not a knock against the JG, it just shouldn't apply to these types of cases where a just transition is necessary.
I believe none of this is really possible at this time, within this system. But on the odd chance it could be, I believe that the unemployed would be deployed to a juat transition. Work in Medicare. But this is intended to be a part of a Green New Deal which would deploy workers to other sectors needed to stave off climate crisis. None of it will happen in this system, but our survival depends on it...
This is a great primer for anyone who wants to understand how federal finance actually works and how to use that knowledge to understand the class war being waged against the majority of citizens.
Good stuff, Steve, but I’d be careful in suggesting that proper healthcare reform in the US will be deflationary and will require a reduction in taxation. I’m also not necessarily saying that there will need to be an increase in taxes, but we need to consider both the deflationary and inflationary aspects of healthcare reform.
You’ve mentioned the deflationary aspect. On the inflationary end of things, proper healthcare reform should be designed to expand healthcare access and quality of healthcare. As things are, there are shortages of healthcare workers and facilities in many areas, especially lower-population and lower-income areas, and so the healthcare workforce will need to expand and there will be expenses involved with building/maintaining (hopefully) public healthcare facilities. Proper reform will need to pay healthcare workers fairly. Since we’re talking about public healthcare and not private healthcare, a focus should be on quality and actually treating/preventing problems rather than dealing with them in an austerity-focused manner as is often the case today.
Furthermore, since there will be a significant reduction in out-of-pocket medical expenses incurred by the public, the buying-power of the public should be increased and possibly by a large amount. It is hard to say how inflationary this increased buying-power will be without further research (surely capital which once went to private healthcare will be redirected towards taking advantage of the increased buying power of the public). And, indeed, we do need further research on this subject. There will also have to be policy discussions about employer-provided healthcare. If employer health insurance is eliminated, salaries for those workers might increase through the change in compensation and that would also potentially be inflationary and perhaps even unfair to workers who do not get healthcare through their employers today.
I’m not necessarily saying that taxes will need to be increased for the sake of clearing fiscal space, but without further research, it might be hard to make any claims about taxation other than what you say that this reform will not be funded through taxation. In the end, the public is probably more interested in their out-of-pocket healthcare expenses being cut and the quality/access of healthcare being improved and so that should always be the focus of the healthcare reform narratives.
As far as the topic of the podcast in general, I certainly do agree with your assessment about progressives, and the population, being ignorant about economics. With progressives especially, there is a certain level of willful ignorance as it pertains to economics. It is as if they feel that economics is some kind of capitalist conspiracy and that it should never be discussed or studied. Also, many progressives just want to rant and rave. They do not put in the energy to discuss and formulate policy, as we are here, that we should be presenting to politicians and candidates.
https://youtu.be/SII2VTZS_Ek?si=lIU-raTzpvlE6Y2X
Warren Mosler might well be correct, but there would have to be a formal study to look at the situation before coming to any conclusions. I am also unsure if Mosler and I are looking at the same kind of healthcare reform. If we're talking about a true Medicare-for-all, which keeps the health provider sector privatized, the situation might well be different than what I would advocate for, a nationalization of the healthcare system. I suppose this would be more along the lines of 'VA for all' or a US version of the British NHS.
It also appears Mosler is not considering a just transition for those in the health insurance industry. I don't view that as being favorable either in terms of politics, where I think it will be required to ensure employment, or in fairness to labor in the health insurance industry (along with medical coders, etc.). The JG in this instance is not particularly applicable because it will not be politically favorable to tell people making more than livable wages that they are guaranteed a job at the lowest livable wage. That's not a knock against the JG, it just shouldn't apply to these types of cases where a just transition is necessary.
I believe none of this is really possible at this time, within this system. But on the odd chance it could be, I believe that the unemployed would be deployed to a juat transition. Work in Medicare. But this is intended to be a part of a Green New Deal which would deploy workers to other sectors needed to stave off climate crisis. None of it will happen in this system, but our survival depends on it...