9 Comments

That's the best article title I have seen in a long time.

Expand full comment

For anyone interested, I have written a paper for a new monetary system that tackles this issue directly. For those interested, the current draft is available at: https://github.com/nlh30/NIYB

Expand full comment

And the circle is presumably: refuse to pay & the bankers will find a NY court to declare you in default and demand penalty payments. If this happens, you get cut off from IMF funding and international capital markets (although presumably they already struggle to borrow private capital?). So then you're pariah nation unable to trade with US or receive any form of aid? And if this represents a geopolitical risk to the West (e.g. you have a huge, young demographic or a nuclear programme), then the US will pay whatever ramshackle group is available to overthrow you. And once they're in power, sell them arms in $$ which becomes the unofficial currency of the country. The new elite spend their dollars in Western capitals and pay their people in shitcoin. The people get poorer & more abused by new authoritarian govt. BUT ... surely a multipolar world would allow some of these states to play a new game of: cancel my debt or we're throwing in our lot with China / Russia. Which appears to be what is happening? E.g. Lula playing divide & conquer: "deal with us on our terms or watch us join forces with your enemies". So a lot of flux at the moment? But yeah, utterly despicable & depressing to watch finance capitalism eat trade and productive capitalism - all in 70 short years.

Expand full comment

Ann, recent research in ergodicity economics suggests that the non-ergodic dynamics of capital growth and decay create sticky extremes - wealth and poverty - unless deliberately countered by an ergodic strategy. In other words, a strategy to restore as best possible ergodicity through cooperation. Some of this is in my book, the Ergodic Investor; and I recall something from February's ergodicity economics paper - I'm digging around to find out more. If you're in contact with Ole Peters it might be worth a conversation.

Expand full comment

Ann Pettifor's analysis simply reinforces the observation that global socio-political arrangements and institutions secure and protect monopoly privilege and rent-seeking behaviors. There is a massive redistribution of wealth from producers to non-producers as a result of legal, quasi-legal and illegal practices. The challenge is how the systemic injustices can be eliminated in the absence of universally-accepted principles. The discussions among thoughtful individuals would benefit considerably by re-examination of the insights offered in the writings of some of the great thinkers on political economy of the past. The American political economist Henry George did just that late in the 19th century. The result was to add scientific validity to the study of political economy and the systemic reforms identified as necessary to: (a) achieve a just distribution of income and wealth; and (b) prevent the cycles of boom and bust characteristic of even those societies committed to equality of opportunity and delivery of a high level of public goods and services.

Expand full comment

"The nationalisation of private debts, the massive accumulation of interest and compound interest on outstanding debts, and the bailing out of creditors by the IMF, makes lending to sovereign governments the most profitable business of all, George Soros once said," writes Ann Pettifor. 📢

Expand full comment

Ugh, Ann, this is so depressing. Capitalism is going to kill us all.

Expand full comment

Wow. Thanks for the info. Keep digging, keep up the faith. The world is ever changing, if only people would be kinder and think of others more often. Thanks.

Expand full comment

I take these loans are not made in the country's sovereign currency?

Expand full comment