Basic Income and the Legitimization Crisis of Neoliberalism

This article conceptualizes recent momentum for basic income in the context of the legitimization crisis of neoliberalism and the dissolution of the ‘progressive neoliberal’ governing bloc that secured its hegemony for more than two decades. Through an assessment of the ideas of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, it argues that basic income is one of the few policy solutions in the mainstream discourse that improves social welfare and income security, while also remaining consistent with neoliberalism’s inner logic. Accordingly, it holds the potential to temporarily stabilize neoliberalism’s political crisis by offering a consensus issue around which a new centrist coalition could emerge. Although much of the basic income literature has focused on grassroots coalitions and synergies between left and right, it has largely overlooked the emergence of the historical forces that have pushed it onto the mainstream policy agenda.

Central banks and inflation: where do we stand and how did we get here?

The inability of central banks to attain their target inflation rates in recent years has raised questions about the extent to which central banks can control the inflation process. This paper discusses the evolution of thought and evidence since the 1960s on the determinants of inflation and the role that should be played by central banks. The paper highlights the roles played by two streams of thought associated with Milton Friedman: monetarist theories predicting a key role for monetary aggregates in determining inflation and the rise in popularity of the expectations-augmented Phillips curve. The author discusses the influence of the latter in determining the modern consensus on central-bank institutions and the relative roles for fiscal and monetary policies. The paper concludes with a discussion of macroeconomic developments since 2010 and current policy options to stimulate the economy and restore inflation to its target levels, including the merits of ‘helicopter money’.

“fascismo de mercado” ao fascismo sem máscaras

Na década de 1970 esfumaram-se os chamados “trinta anos gloriosos” e eclipsou-se o ‘milagre’ da revolução keynesiana. Aproveitando o desnorte do ‘inimigo’, os neoliberais, comandados por Friedrich Hayek e Milton Friedman, passaram ao ataque, colocando no banco dos réus o estado keynesiano e as políticas keynesianas, culpados de todos os males do mundo. Na sequência de uma operação relâmpago de propaganda ideológica sem paralelo (“uma experiência muito corruptora”, confessou Hayek), o “ideological monetarism” afirmou-se como a ideologia do império e do pensamento único. As experiências corruptoras como a de Hayek multiplicaram-se ao longo dos anos, alimentadas pelos mesmos actores, ao serviço dos mesmos interesses. E mantêm-se até hoje, com o recurso às técnicas mais sofisticadas de manipulação ideológica e de corrupção intelectual, que transformaram o neoliberalismo numa espécie de ‘religião’, para cuja “única fé verdadeira” se diz que não há alternativa (o famoso argumento TINA da Srª Tatcher: There Is No Alternative). Desta neutralidade da política económica passou-se, quase sem solução de continuidade, à defesa da morte da política económica, porque esta seria desnecessária e prejudicial. É o regresso ao velho mito liberal da separação estado/economia e estado/sociedade: a economia seria tarefa exclusiva dos privados (da sociedade civil, da sociedade económica), cabendo ao estado simplesmente garantir a liberdade individual, que proporcionaria igualdade de oportunidades para todos.

O “legado” monetarismo de milton Friedman Milton friedman’s “legacy”

O presente estudo se propõe a discutir o legado teórico deixado por um dos maiores economistas do século XX, Milton Friedman, autor esse que revolucionou a teoria econômica ao questionar as proposições keynesianas e propor a moeda como a variável relevante a ser analisada e prescrições políticas que assegurassem a estabilidade econômica por meio de regras sobre esse agregado monetário. O roteiro da avaliação empreendida nesse trabalho foi, primeiramente, uma avaliação empírica da experiência monetarista implementada nos governos Margaret Thatcher (Inglaterra) e Paul Volcker (EUA) e, na sequência, uma discussão teórica sobre o que foi absorvido ou não pelas teorias econômicas que sucederam o monetarismo de Friedman. Com base nessas discussões, o estudo sustenta que a “herança” deixada pelo autor foi pequena quando comparada ao que não foi absorvido pelas demais teorias e a principal razão para esse fato repousa na baixa aderência verificada pela teoria de Friedman e os resultados empíricos observados durante sua experiência nos EUA e na Inglaterra. This study aims to discuss the theoretical legacy left by one of the greatest economists of the 20th century, Milton Friedman, who revolutionized economic theory by questioning Keynesian propositions and proposing money as the relevant variable to be analyzed and political prescriptions that ensure economic stability through rules on this monetary aggregate. The evaluation tour undertaken in this work was, firstly, an empirical evaluation of the monetarist experience implemented in the Margaret Thatcher (England) and Paul Volcker (USA) governments, and then a theoretical discussion on what was or was not absorbed by the economic theories that succeeded Friedman's monetarism. Based on these discussions, the study argues that the legacy left by the author was small when compared to what was not absorbed by other theories and the main reason for this fact lies in the low adherence verified by Friedman's theory and the empirical results observed during his experiment. in the USA and England.

How Milton Friedman Exploited White Supremacy to Privatize Education

This paper traces the origins of today’s campaigns for school vouchers and other modes of public funding for private education to efforts by Milton Friedman beginning in 1955. It reveals that the endgame of the “school choice” enterprise for libertarians was not then—and is not now--to enhance education for all children; it was a strategy, ultimately, to offload the full cost of schooling onto parents as part of a larger quest to privatize public services and resources. Based on extensive original archival research, this paper shows how Friedman’s case for vouchers to promote “educational freedom” buttressed the case of Southern advocates of the policy of massive resistance to Brown v. Board of Education. His approach—supported by many other Mont Pelerin Society members and leading libertarians of the day --taught white supremacists a more sophisticated, and for more than a decade, court-proof way to preserve Jim Crow. All they had to do was cease overt focus on race and instead deploy a neoliberal language of personal liberty, government failure and the need for market competition in the provision of public education.

The Dog that Did Not Bark: The Curious Case of Lloyd Mints, Milton Friedman, and the Emergence of Monetarism

Evidence about Lloyd Mints’s role in the development of monetary economics at the University of Chicago has proven elusive, with the result that Mints has long been considered a peripheral figure at Chicago. We provide evidence showing that the standard assessment of Mints’s standing in Chicago monetary economics—and in American monetary economics more broadly—is deficient. In light of (1) the originality and the breadth of his monetary contributions, (2) the cross-fertilization of his thinking with that of Milton Friedman, and (3) the way Mints’s original contributions helped shape part of Friedman’s framework and were pushed forward by Friedman, we argue that, far from being a peripheral figure in the development of Chicago monetary economics, Mints played a more substantial role than has been previously thought in the emerging Chicago monetary economics of the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Corporate Stakeholders

Chapter 5 echoes the growing sentiment that corporations need to take into account other interests besides that of their shareholders. It traces the origins of the idea that corporations exist solely to increase the wealth of their shareholders and explains how this belief in shareholder primacy came to be accepted as a truism by many scholars, judges, and commentators. When Milton Friedman originally popularized this idea in 1962, he wrote that corporations should serve shareholder interest “within the rules of the game.” These days the rules of the game are influenced tremendously by business lobbying. The chapter explains how the political influence of labor waned and was replaced by business influence in the 1970s. Since that time, Congress has done very little to protect labor because business interests have become extremely powerful lobbyists and substantial donors to political campaigns.

A digitális távoktatás felsőoktatási tapasztalatai: milyen tényezők magyarázzák a blended learning támogatottságát?

A COVID19 járványhelyzet következtében más magyarországi felsőoktatási intézményekhez hasonlóan 2020-ban a Milton Friedman Egyetem is átállt a távoktatásra, amelynek tapasztalatairól kérdőíves felmérés készült 2020 nyári szemeszterének végén. Online vizsgálatunkban oktatókat (80%-os válaszadási arány) és hallgatókat (23%-os válaszadói arány) kérdeztünk meg a digitális oktatásra való átállás és az online oktatás előnyeiről, hátrányairól, általános tapasztalatairól. Célunk többek között az volt, hogy e tapasztalatok segítségével feltérképezzük a digitális oktatás fejlesztendő területeit intézményünkben és következtetéseket vonjuk le a jövőben alkalmazandó módszerekkel kapcsolatban. Kérdőívünk kitért a tanulási környezet, a tantermi tevékenységek, a tanulásszervezés és annak módszertana, az értékelés, a tartalom-, tananyagközvetítés és a kommunikáció jelenségeire is. Tanulmányunkban a tartalom-, tananyagközvetítés és a kommunikáció valós és késleltetett formáival kapcsolatos oktatói és hallgatói attitűdöket mutatjuk be és megvizsgáljuk a hibrid oktatási formák támogatottságát és a támogatottság okait. As a result of the COVID19 pandemic, Milton Friedman University as other higher education institutions in Hungary switched to distance education in 2020. The questionnaire survey presented in this paper was conducted at the end of its summer 2020 semester. In the online survey, the authors asked instructors (80% response rate) and students (23% response rate) about the advantages, disadvantages, and general experiences of transitioning to digital education and online education. The goal was to use these experiences to map the areas of digital education that need to be developed in our institution and draw conclusions about the methods to be applied in the future. The questionnaire also covered the learning environment's issues, classroom activities, learning organization, methodology, assessment, content development, curriculum delivery, and communication. In this study, the authors present teacher and student attitudes towards online learning (distant education) and investigate the support of hybrid forms of education and the reasons leading to this support.