hudson on debt

Debt and the Collapse of Antiquity – Michael Hudson (pt 1/2) – 38 min video – apr 2023 – w paul jay – [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmazxjNHVs4]

first notes on michael hudson here – 1st fight club – michael and thomas piketty – the great debt debate – m of care – sept 23

via nika:

It seems to me that Hudson is about to become the new prophet. He has been describing for years exactly what is happening right now. The erudition and boldness of his coverage of historical eras, and the scope of his findings are as fascinating as they were with David’s books.
However, I disagree entirely with Michael’s conclusions. It seems to me that David would disagree as well.
So I would rather develop the discussion with him, which will take place on May 18, as questions related to chapter 9 of Debt and the relationship of Michael’s research to the context of David’s work.

2 parts to watch in prep for m of care – may 18

notes/quotes from part 1:

8 min – on why can’t go on w/o debt forgiveness

10 min – everyone wanted labor and in order to attract labor to land had to give it some degree of freedom not bondage.. tyrant wasn’t a originally a bad word.. just person in control who paved way for democracy by getting rid of autocratic leaders by cancelling debts and redistributing the land

paul: interesting.. tyrant comes to mean something w very neg connotation but really we’re talking about people who had appeals to the population and could therefore challenge the system

11 min – word in linguistics very much like today.. aristotle said democracies turn into oligarchy.. what romans meant by kingship and greeks meant by tyranny.. a strong govt .. strong enough to prevent creditor oligarchy from emerging and taking over land and extpropriating econ and taking it to serfdom.. need public/private to act together.. role of govt meant to prevent private from taking over

12 min – voting was weighted by how much wealth and land you had.. today we do it by campaign contributions.. privatized.. so we don’t let wealthy people’s votes count more.. just can give more money to political campaign.. so doing best to emulate roman constitution

15 min – question is what is democracy.. artistotle put forth whole idea of triangular flow.. 1\ autocracy to 2\ minor aristocracy taking people into camp to 3\ established democracy.. but w/in it some richer than others so goes into oligarchy.. then oligarchy makes itself hereditary into an aristocracy.. until finally some members say.. killing whole econ.. never be able to fight/win wars so have democratic rev.. and have same cycle again and again..

17 min – common denominator was political correct to say greed is bad.. and yet society was wealth addicted.. egal among each other.. but all addicted.. so had more sophisticated econ theory than today.. all today is based on diminishing model theory.. by time have 10th banana it’s really sickening.. so more you have less you want.. but w aristotle ‘more money you have more you want’.. utility theory taught to econ students.. no idea that can have wealthy people come in and take over econ out of rising egoism

19 min – babylonians had math model far superior to any math model used anywhere in world.. it was a very simple model.. 1\ how long take debt to double.. any interest bearing is a doubling/expo.. that’s an s curve.. also had studies of calc growth of a herd.. tapered off in s curve.. so babylonians realized. that the math of debt are diff than math describe econ of production/consumption.. debt grows expo in excess of real econ ability to grow.. so job of ruler is to restore order by bringing debts back in line w ability to pay.. nothing like this occurred in greece/rome.. when people couldn’t pay lost liberty and moved into bondage to creditors.. that’s what made west civ so diff from rest of world.. up to that time

paul: so not only saying debt has problematic character to it or sometimes have a crisis.. saying this is going to be recurring event .. so have to have an intervention

23 min – on socrates asking about repaying debts.. ie: if someone borrows a weapon.. if give it back and then he does something violent.. money.. then uses debt like a weapon to take away your freedom/land.. same as what would do w weapon.. aristotle: problem is most of rulers today are creditors.. then he comes up w impossibility.. guardians of state who didn’t have money/property.. so not wealth addicted.. so willing to develop society as a whole.. to socrates.. that’s what repbulic is all about.. but that didn’t get into the curriculum about his text

36 min – main cause of borrowing.. was to pay taxes.. so when romans cancelled debts was like cancelling debts of wealthy.. sort of like recent bank bail outs.. wealthy don’t have to pay.. but if not wealthy do.. that’s the basic roman principle and what america calls democracy..t

any form of democratic admin..

Debt and the Collapse of Antiquity – Michael Hudson (pt 2/2) – 27 min video – apr 2023 – w paul jay – [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pCIpGznmyoE]:

notes/quotes from part 2:

skimmed.. mostly on christianity .. lord’s prayer on debt.. et al

20 min – problem.. most historians don’t study econ.. what they do study is the econ taught in uni.. neolib econ.. which doesn’t study history.. because if did would know society is polarized because of debt

21 min – on not needing to reg of market.. today that’s called socialism.. biden calls it oligarchy

23 min – yes.. we’ve adopted failed state as our econ model.. you’ve put it very succinctly

24 min – in order to .. get to balanced econ.. have to have defn of what is the alt.. neoclassic says no alt.. (thatcher and rand).. it believe no alt not going to take steps.. to create more balanced econ

25 min – demo liberty – the many of democracy seems to only be successful when have state strong enough to prevent oligrachy from destroying oligarchy principles

yet.. state ness.. any form of m\a\p already detroyed us.. et al

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from debt (book)

m of care – oct 20 – debt (book) – part 1

m of care – nov 3 – part 2 – ch 1-2

m of care – nov 17 – part 3 – ch 3-4

m of care – dec 1 – part 4 – ch 5-6

m of care – dec 15 – part 5 – ch 6

m of care – jan 5 – part 6 – ch 7

m of care – jan 19 – part 7 – ch 8

m of care – feb 2 – part 8 – ch 9

m of care – feb 16 – part 9 – ch 10

m of care – mar 2 – part 10 – ch 10-11

m of care – mar 16 – part 11 – ch 10-11

m of care – apr 6 – part 12 – ch 11-12

m of care – apr 20 – part 13 – ch 12

m of care – may 18 – part 14 – w/hudson on debt

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