Ep 327 - Isolation with Bill Mitchell

As difficult as it is to get a handle on the chaos and confusion of Trump’s shifting policies, we continue to ask wise friends for their perspective. This week Steve is speaking with Australian economist Bill Mitchell, a founder of MMT and a regular guest of this podcast. Bill helps us unpack the capitalist contradictions driving global instability. Steve asks if we should be looking at Trump’s actions as a continuation of the neoliberal trajectory as described in Bill’s book, Reclaiming the State. Bill replies that he doesn't even see it as a natural extension of neoliberalism: “Neoliberalism is about co-opting the state to pursue advantage for selected groups in the society, the top end of town, as I call them. So there's an element of that, but there's sort of a deep irrationality going on here. Neoliberalism is a systematic, contrived pattern of behavior and strategy, whereas it's hard to assess whether there is anything systematic and strategic going on here.” Bill elaborates on the irrational policy decisions like tariffs and their failure to revive American manufacturing, as well as the repercussions of reduced public investment in education and infrastructure. He talks about international reactions and global repercussions. He and Steve also critique the role of social media and the dangerous effects of the dominant ideological bias. Bill suggests that the disillusionment with traditional political parties is driving many towards reactionary extremism. They discuss the severe decline in education and the move to control universities through ideological audits. Bill Mitchell is a Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at the University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia. His most recent books are Modern Monetary Theory: BIll and Warren’s Excellent Adventure, co-authored with Warren Mosler (2024), and the Modern Monetary Theory textbook, Macroeconomics, co-authored with L. Randall Wray and Martin Watts (2019). Follow Bill’s work at https://billmitchell.org/blog/