Macroeconomics never really mattered to me in either grad school program I completed because I truly thought the US Government had to borrow money from private banks & that the economy was dependent on the private sector. Then I was able to #LearnMMT & now I know its on Congress!
It all came together once I learned the very basic foundational truth that there are currency issuers and currency users. #LearnMMT
That the currency issuer could never go broke on debt denominated in it's own currency... unless their was a commodity peg (like gold) with convertibility associated with it. #LearnMMT
Then the commodity is where the scarcity comes from, not the actual currency. Ultimately the risk of bank runs and insolvency become real concerns when there is no buffer, or "reserves" to allow for clearing payments. #LearnMMT
So, in the fixed commodity pegged currency regime, if we were to "print money", it would devalue that currency and lessen the buying power of the dollar. This is the curse of pegging your currency to a commodity. #LearnMMT
In a sovereign, free floating, non-convertible fiat currency regime, neither the threat of "devaluing" or solvency are ever a concern. So what gives this currency its "value"? #LearnMMT
What makes people even accept a non-gold backed currency? Simple... the imposition of a tax payable ONLY in that currency. The "King's gold" so to speak MUST be used to satisfy the tax liability. Not chicken necks, gold or oil... just... the tax. #LearnMMT
The government's unit of account is its, and its alone means of provisioning itself. And therefore this unit of account is used to acquire real resources and services from the private sector. There is no private sector without the work of the Federal Government. #LearnMMT
When the government spends, it spends new money into existence via keystrokes and accounts marked up and down on a balance sheet. #LearnMMT
And when it is received back from the private sector as a tax, in a free floating float regime, each "dollar" is deleted (destroyed) once it has fulfilled its purpose of satisfying a debt obligation, (tax credit) #LearnMMT
So when we want to advance a New Deal: Medicare for All, Green Energy, Infrastructure, a Federal Job Guarantee, Student Debt Eradication and Free College, we can clearly see that it's not taxes that pay for these programs. Taxes do not pay for spending.
So what does? #LearnMMT
So what does? #LearnMMT
As Dr @StephanieKelton says: the answer to the question of "how are you going to pay for it" should ALWAYS be answered "Congress will authorize spending".
Article 1, section 8 of the US Constitution backs this assertion as well. #LearnMMT
Article 1, section 8 of the US Constitution backs this assertion as well. #LearnMMT
And Balanced Budgets are bad business for currency issuing governments #LearnMMT 
As @ALT_JD so eloquently diagrams, spending & a sovereign currency issuing government has the ability to do what it needs to spend on the people. "Tough choices" are political games. Real resources are the only meaningful constraints. Why do we allow them to starve us? #LearnMMT
We can have full employment thru a Federal Job Guarantee #FJG, and peg the economy to the labor standard as @elliswinningham says rather than the peg to gold, which ensure full employment for gold, let's peg it to we the people & ensure noone suffers from involuntary unemployment
We can easily subsidize or outright pay for a complete conversion to Green Energy, mitigating wars for resources and climate destruction #LearnMMT
We can save lives by creating a healthcare system that tales care of every single human being in need. #LearnMMT
We can rebuild our crumbling infrastructure #LearnMMT
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