I READ IT SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO

I Read It So You Don’t Have To: ‘The Deficit Myth’

We’ve been thinking about the government’s finances all wrong

Matthew McFarlane
Marker
Published in
6 min readJun 28, 2021

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Photo Illustration: Save As/Medium

I Read It So You Don’t Have To is a series that gives you the TL;DR on a business book you want to read — but don’t have time to.

What did I read?

The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People’s Economy by Stephanie Kelton

So who’s this Stephanie Kelton?

Stephanie Kelton is a professor of economics and public policy at Stony Brook University. She is a former chief economist on the U.S. Senate Budget Committee (Democratic Staff), and is a leading expert on Modern monetary theory (MMT), a macroeconomic framework about federal government spending.

Give me the 30-second sell.

There’s a longstanding myth that’s holding back the U.S. economy, keeping millions unemployed, and paralyzing us in the face of once-in-a-generation challenges. Yet this myth is considered dogma by most economists and policy wonks, as well as practically every politician in Congress, on both the left and the right.

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Marker
Marker

Published in Marker

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Matthew McFarlane
Matthew McFarlane

Written by Matthew McFarlane

Reader, writer, content provider. Fan of hand-made guitars, racket-based sports, and houseplants. You can find me in St. Louie.