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Thrilled to be on the op-ed page of the @FT! word limit was very tight (my 714 cut down to 615) so here follow a few explainers, expansions, further thoughts... 1/x
I was asked to write about mini-BOTS and assignats. Some would say they're complete opposites: assignats "backed" by land, #miniBOTs by nothing. But what gives money value isn't what's "behind" it but what's ahead--who will take it, for what 2/x
If #MiniBots are introduced, they will be circulate as a quasi-currency in parallel w euros. The anti-EU League Party is making vague #MMT anti #Austerity noises, but DO NOT BE FOOLED. A "parallel" voluntary money will not be good for ordinary people 3/x
The League's economics spokesmen say the state would accept #MiniBots as payment for taxes, gasoline, train tickets. But as @toby_n pointed out a year ago, state money (#chartalism) isn't just about "accepting" x in payment, it's about REQUIRING payments to be made in x [4/x]
Because #MiniBots would circulate voluntarily, they will almost certainly be discounted. In 1790, Fr Revn issued assignats marked 50, 100, etc. livres, but nothing required users to accept them at face value. By end of year, National Assembly itself was paying 12% to use them 5/x
Very similar case of Confederate money. The Confederacy issued bills, but didn't require anyone to use them,didn't collect any con-federal taxes ("states' rights"!). So Southerners had choice btw Confed bills + those issued by state-chartered banks. 6/x
Southerners during Civil War first accepted Confed money at face value as show of "patriotism" but when it looked like Confed would lose the war, they preferred bills issued by banks chartered in VA, NC etc. Can track confidence through exchange rates btw bills 7/x
In Italy, the anti-EU, anti-immigrant, far-right League is treating #MiniBots as patriotic/national issue. Even before Party came to power, they asked public to vote for design ilpopulista.it/sondaggi/20-Se…
League MP Claudio Borghi uses photoshopped 10,000-lira notes as banner images on his FB and Twitter pages, with his own photo in place of Volta or Michelangelo (9/x) facebook.com/claudioborghia…
In my @ftopinion piece, I suggest #MiniBots are part of revolt against "money as usual". One commentator asked if it wasn't an effort to return to "normal money" bc isn't it normal for sovereign nations to issue own money? (10/x)
What makes a money BAD isn't what is behind it, what backs it, but who will accept it. And when rich and powerful people or institutions won't accept "bad money," it's left in the hands of the poor and is poor money indeed (13/x)
Just a few more tweets about the conclusion to my @ftopinion piece on #miniBots. Money, like law, is a POLITICAL creation and (like law) it works most smoothly (if not fairly) when it is not recognized as such. Depoliticized money/law means we have something uniting us (14/x)
Some of my #MMT friends think money should always be overtly politicized, but my research on Fr Revn showed that political money furthers polarization, weakens both state and economy (15/x)
.@dgwbirch imagines it won't matter if there are thousands of different political/special interest moneys all voluntarily circulating because they will all be digital and our phones will work out exchange rates--I can't share his techno-utopianism (16/x)
I fully agree that money's current depoliticization via orthodox/mainstream economics is flawed and money is produced today chiefly to benefit the few and privileged (as @AnnePettifor explains, cf @PikettyLeMonde etc.) 17/x
So we need a new, more equitable model for money and money production. But that money should be indefinitely politicized is, I think, truly an awful thing to contemplate. FINIS
