Scott Ferguson
@videotroph.bsky.social
associate professor somewhere @moneyontheleft.bsky.social * posts do not reflect the views of my employer
Liberal catastrophizing over public spending is always just a death wish for the very fascism it fears.
Opinion | France Is on the Brink
A fiscal crisis threatens to bring the country to ruin.
nytimes.com
I am entirely serious when I say that this should be seen as a moderate position. It specifically and surgically dismantles institutions that did not exist pre-9/11 and assigns their functions much as they were assigned pre-9/11.
Truthout@truthout.org · 2d agoRep. Delia C. Ramirez has introduced a bill that would abolish not just ICE, but the DHS altogether, repealing the 2002 law establishing the agency and replacing it with one focused on protecting civil and human rights.
solidarity forever at the end was a real chef's kiss moment
Greenb3ar@greenb3ar.bsky.social · 3d agoOkay the best political ad of the year is here from LA-DSA
If you want to efficiently cultivate a well-informed, bird's-eye view of the ecosystem of election defense work being done in these fascist times, and which orgs are doing much of it, then read this outstanding piece by Marcy Rein and Sandra Hinson.
S Hinson@schinson.bsky.social · last wk.Check out this overview of what democracy defenders are doing to make sure the Midterm elections are free and fair: convergencemag.com/articles/gat...
✅ Welfare support is a public good, which should not be means-tested or stigmatized. ✅ UBI is laissez-faire consumerism that repackages welfare in an effort to solve problems that welfare alone cannot. ✅ We need robust public options for work, as long recognized by labor & civil rights movements.
Is Universal Basic Income the Answer to A.I.-Fueled Job Losses?
For more than a year, The New York Times followed recipients of universal basic income programs, which Elon Musk and other tech leaders have promoted as a solution to A.I.-fueled job losses.
nytimes.com
Rather than constitutional obligations being constrained by the budget, the budget becomes an instrument for fulfilling constitutional obligations.
From ‘euthanasia of the rentier’ to ‘euthanasia of the investor’ Constitutionalize the ongoing responsibility to socially provision through public spending, rather than any terminal state of what social provisioning must look like.
‘As Keynes said: “Anything we can actually do, we can afford.”’ The brilliant @sheridanvk.bsky.social at the recent @greenparty.org.uk conference 💚🌍🌱
Money on the Left@moneyontheleft.bsky.social · 6d agoLet's gooooooo!
"[N]aming is everything. What we name things is how we value them. We name them as valuable. And that naming, monetary and legal, is the driving force by which we get the labor and create these things."
Introduction to Theory: Karl Marx’s Value, Price and Profit (New transcript!)
In this third installment of our Introduction to Theory series, Maxximilian Seijo deepens Money on the Left’s analysis of Karl Marx’s critique of political economy. Specifical…
moneyontheleft.org
Money’s Place: Science Fiction, Realism & MMT in The Ministry for the Future moneyontheleft.org/2023/09/05/m...
This matters for after Trump too. Post-authoritarian reconstruction should not merely change who controls concentrated federal public power. It has to democratize where public capacity is located and the institutional forms through which it can be exercised.
Bright D Limm 임대중@bdlimm.myatproto.social · last wk.Saule Omarova's proposed National Investment Authority—basically a national public option for financing public-interest projects—is excellent but depends on federal action. @moneyontheleft.bsky.social's Loop, however, shows how states can create fiscal capacity even without federal currency power.
A corollary of this monetary silencing is suppressing the internal differentiation of universal needs, so that particularity beyond “universal basic ____” doesn’t get translated into frivolous excess, divisive cultural demands, etc.
In order to divide the world into individuated taxpayers and beneficiaries, what must be silenced is the internal differentiation of the monetary medium itself.
The instability of the medium itself—credit creation, endogenous money, conteststion over swap lines between currencies or between debt and credit instruments—is methodologically excluded before the distributive argument even starts.
“Taxpayer dollars” imagines money as a homogeneous substance already belonging to an individuated taxpayer before politics begins. Once that medium is stabilized, political conflict can be rendered as allocation among externally differentiated claimants: my dollars are going to those people.
America was an empty mall. America was shoddy caulk oozing from a vinyl arc in a historic heatwave. America was a brutishly redacted Frederick Douglass speech on foam posterboard in a tractor trailer Freedom Truck. America was not even selling corndogs. www.artnews.com/art-in-ameri...
How Defunding the Arts Wrought Civic Disintegration
What Was America?: Art, Culture, and Politics in the Bicentennial Era tackles United States’ most ambitious cultural project: the bicentennial.
artnews.com
Part (but far from all) of what's horrific here is: a woman weighing the consequences of speaking up about being sexually assaulted, because speaking up imposes burdens and costs (and so does not speaking up).
Congressional candidate is raped while repairing her campaign signs
Embarrassed, she initially didn’t want to report attack. Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office's investigation is ongoing. A Phoenix New Times exclusive.
phoenixnewtimes.com
Ok so it’s puffin, barn owl, bumblebee, hedgehog… Wait what, Nigel Farage WAS making it up when he said they were replacing Churchill with a beaver?!
Animal Spirits and Public Promises: Phantom Beavers and the Politics of Monetary Design
By Rob Hawkes There is a spectre haunting Nigel Farage. The spectre of a beaver. On 11 March 2026, the Bank of England announced that, following a public consultation, its next series of banknotes …
moneyontheleft.org
“We’d all like to see less poverty, properly funded/functioning public services, a liveable planet, etc., but what can you do if the markets aren’t in favour? Sure, we can always pay for wars, but a socially inclusive and ecologically sustainable society is unaffordable. Weird, huh?”
Money on the Left@moneyontheleft.bsky.social · last wk.Money is weird
When Bernie released his proposal to regulate AI, I was glad to see many recognize that public ownership stakes would problematically tie the public's success to the industry's success. We must now understand, as @moneyontheleft.bsky.social does, that this criticism applies also to taxing the rich.
Money on the Left@moneyontheleft.bsky.social · 5mo agoTired: 🥴 Democratic Socialists balancing the budget 🥴 Wired: 🔥 Democratic Municipal Finance 🔥
Whether it's mortgage-backed securities or AI, Wall Street's investments must not + need not be something NYC's public depends on. That is why taxing the rich will never ultimately be enough. We can and must redesign public finance so that the public no longer depends on private markets or wealth.
The City Reporter@thecityreporter.nyc · last wk.NEW: The city’s budget is increasingly dependent on Wall Street profits, which would immediately contract if the AI boom turns into a bust.
There's always money when organized power needs money
Petition to call American supporters of the UK Green Party “Greenbackers”
Money on the Left@moneyontheleft.bsky.social · last wk.That's called Democratic Public Finance.