Do we need a money revolution? Lecture Live Streamed

Do we need a money revolution? Lecture Live Streamed

Professor Bill Mitchell, a noted economist and modern monetary theorist from Newcastle University, NSW will be in Wellington tomorrow speaking at Victoria University’s Law School on New Zealand’s budget surplus, austerity measures and labour under-utilisation. In line with his perspective Professor Mitchell is a trenchant critic of the European Union, an advocate of full employment.

He describes Modern Monetary Theory as a lens on government and the economy to describe “how things really are”. If there is homelessness or unemployment or missing infrastrucutre he argues, then you have to look at why a government with control of its national currency is failing to use the powers available to it to solve these problems.

He proposes that these problems in New Zealand beg some important questions of the political leadership. He estimates that NZ’s labour force is underutilised by about 14% and therefore both NZ workers, and the economy as a whole, are less productive than should be the case. He argues that this is notable given the relatively low level of automation in the NZ workforce implying that the eventual effect of robotics and other technologies have not yet begun to impact .

Statistics New Zealand figures related to labour under-utilisation, including people not in the labour force, the unemployed, those in involuntary part-time and casual work demonstrate this under-utilisation.

Professor Mitchell is a prolific writer and blogger and has attracted a following in Europe including amongst the young activists like those of Podemos and Syriza in Spain and Greece respectively and has promoted tomorrow’s live stream to followers across the world.

A notable blogger Professor Mitchell has written about his NZ visit here and the livestream will be available here.

The visit is being hosted by Strategy 2040 – which is a progressive political project in New Zealand, and the lecture promoting Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) to a wider audience is the first public event for the organisation.

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