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Banking

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Modern Monetary Theory: A Jeffersonian Critique

The chattering class’ newest obsession, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, has seized the policy initiative from the Democratic Party’s geriatrics by promoting a “Green New Deal.”  T’is clever branding to combine left-wing eco virtue signaling with FDR’s version of “down home” fascism. (If one doubts me on this last point, I refer you to John Garraty’s seminal article, “The New Deal, National Socialism,…
John Devanny
March 4, 2019
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Yankee Finance Capitalism Part III: The Creature from Jekyll Island

The endurance of the system of Jeffersonian finance based upon the Independent Treasury system was remarkable given the post war transformation of the United States from an agrarian country to an industrial one.  Tariff rates had increased, large subsidies were being awarded to the railroads, and the federal government drifted slowly but inexorably toward imperialism.  The last major Jeffersonian edifice,…
John Devanny
June 16, 2017
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Yankee Finance Capitalism Made Simple

Part One: Definitions and Origins Money is a great mystery.  In my years of teaching economics courses and economic history nothing so confuses students, and their elders, as the subject of money.  Or rather I should say the subject of money and currency.  Some of this confusion is a result of the failure of economists to agree on standard definitions…
John Devanny
June 2, 2017