By and large I enjoy blogging. I rather strongly suspect I would not have done it for the last 14 years if I did not. Nor would I have written an average of 3.4 blogs a day, 365 days a year, over that period otherwise.
But let me also be honest; I clearly do not only write for fun. I have always written with the hope that at least some change might occur as a result. And, as I have noted over the years, some very definitely has. Blogging has been worthwhile, whether in creating tax haven reform, pushing country-by-country reporting, helping promote and then even keep the Green New Deal alive when no one else was much interested in it, by encouraging interest in MMT, and by discussing many other issues; there have been results. I would not have kept going otherwise.
That success has attracted attention. And like any writer, I do of course like people reading what I have to say. That said, not everyone has agreed with me. It would be exceptionally odd if they did. Since I have changed my own mind on some issues over the years it's even true to say that I do not agree with myself on occasion.
I actually welcome disagreement. One reason I have invested considerable effort in the comments section of the blog is that I always wanted to make this blog a safe space for discussion for those who wished to debate differing views on issues of real concern without being trolled by the usual, predictable, and often rather nasty, right wingers from the neoliberal echo-chamber. That has, by and large, worked, even if it has required that many who persist in trolling (often using multiple identities and emails, which I have to then identify) have been consigned to the banned list over the years.
The support of those who are now donating helps this process: with the blog seeing record readership exceeding 3.1 million views last year, I want to continue to commit time to it.
But might I also make a plea for a little understanding? First, please don't expect party loyalty from me. I don't do party politics. I do real world politics, and that does not split on party lines.
Second, for the same reason, please do not make this a party discussion board, because it isn't.
Third, please accept I can be wrong. If I am I will apologise: I did to one person yesterday. But I frequently have to read 20 or more comments in a few minutes to decide if they are acceptable for publication or not. And I at least scan them all, because mistakes can happen. In amongst most batches there will be a troll. Some trolls are immediately obvious. Some take time to show their true colours. Forgive me if I am sceptical of all new commentators, but long experience has taught me that I have to be. Most trolls start by appearing superficially reasonable. If I appear sceptical of a new commentator, it's because I am suspicious that the abuse will start soon. It takes a tough skin, or one that has been toughened by fourteen years of being abused, to blog.
Fourth, please accept that being tough is sometimes necessary. If you think the opponents of the society I would like are nice, just accept that I think that those who want to deny social, economic and personal justice to most in society do not fit the description of ‘nice', and I will call them out for not being so. They are profoundly anti-social at best, and frequently are dangerous because of the causes they espouse.
Fifth, please don't also tell me what I can and cannot do. To take a recent example, I was told I should not comment on Covid vaccines. But the decisions made on double dosing these are, as Prof Devi Sridhar has explained, ethical and political and not scientific, where on the latter the informed opinion is pretty clear and is do what the manufacturers recommend. Ethics and politics are well within the remit if this blog. That we have a coronavirus crisis of the scale that we do is because of neoliberal driven choices. I can definitely discuss vaccines.
Sixth, presume that if you tell me I am off limits I will doubt your motives. You might think you're being helpful, but over many years I have been told that if only I would pipe down on a few issues and just be a little more reasonable, or clubbable even, I would get along so much better. By the measures of convention that might be true. I may have had a more comfortable time. I can also say for sure that the change I wanted would not have happened. And I am not here for the sake of comfort. The creation of disruption as the precursor of change is what I am seeking to do here. If you tell me I am off limits I will presume that you have a comfortable status quo that you want to maintain, because experience shows that to inevitably be the case, whether you are even aware of it, or not.
Finally, I am human. So I will make mistakes. I will try to correct them. But if you think is a mistake is actually me exercising editorial judgement we may have to agree to differ.
Managing a blog is not easy. That's why blogs like this are, I suspect, so rare. I hope understanding where I am coming from helps.
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This is a great post. Thanks for all your efforts.
Thanks
And long may it continue Richard!
Thank you for your efforts on TRUK and elsewhere.
I read your blog daily, and have found your writing and the comment threads underneath stimulating and illuminating. (Not that I agree with everything of course, but it at least gets the grey matter working)
Thanks
As ever Richard – many thanks for your tireless efforts, through this blog I’ve been directed to source direct, read a few books on MMT, been better at understanding tax, and it’s role in the economy and even thought about training as an accountant (still only a thought!)
Keep up the good work !
I have a son now interested in accountancy – which is worrying!
He has the rather odd view that it’s a way to change the world….
I am Douglas Adams answer to life the universe and everything age myself so a few more years in the rearview mirror than your son – but still intrigued about the possibilities of accountancy as force for good.
I think it is the answer to the climate crisis
Thank you Richard
I for one greatly value the debate that happens on this blog which I don’t find elsewhere. I also recognise the work that you put in to filter out the trolls that so often ruin such debate, whilst letting the odd one through so we can see what’s out there.
If all of us who regularly come here encourage as many people as possible to come here, that is at least one way of promoting the ideas and helping people to think that through. If that can include people who have some power and influence even better.
I am way out of my depth on many of the financial issues you discuss, and am grateful you have the ability to explain them in ways that total novices can comprehend. Before I read your blog I had never heard of MMT. (I know, I know.) Thank you for opening that door for me.
Thanks
Cannot imagine how you manage it – and work as well. I imagined you must have teams of zero hours contract research assistants to help vet comments etc etc. It is a brilliant resource, and daily stimulus .
It’s just me…..
And a lot of suggestions from Jacqueline, although that has greater impact on the Twitter feed
Your rationale for blogging is first class Richard and well worth reading
One of my final year undergraduates said that your website was the best source relevant to the coursework assignment on changing attitudes to tax avoidance
That’s a real success
This is indeed a great blog as it discusses matters if most economic/ philosophical importance. For sure I don’t always agree with every single post but generally the points raised are significant in that they attempt to get to the root of our economic woes.
The amount of effort and time you devote to posting threads and then replying individually is phenomenal. With such output is is inevitable that some mistakes will creep in, but that takes a lot of courage to do. It seems nowadays if you say one wrong thing you become entirely discredited, which is ridiculous, who never makes a mistake? It is the only way we learn.
I follow various bloggers but you are without doubt the most prolific and on the right lines as far as I am concerned. So I am very happy you run this blog.
Thanks
yes, thank you for this blog – I read it many times a week and it has informed, educated and entertained (not sure what other organisation is supposed to do that?).
My thoughts are that it helps more to write in such a way that it can capture the interest of the mainstream and when on TV and radio it can be helpful to leave the audience wanting more and knowing how to connect with the listeners, most of whom will not agree with you.
Say for example on the job guarantee it is possible to appeal to the political right wing by allowing the argument to be that it is better to have people in work in good honest and valuable jobs, decided by the local community (rather than the state), that those in employment are better placed to take on new jobs (more appealing to employers). It gently turns the bias from ‘idlers and scroungers’ to the worthy element. It confirms that the majority of people in work should able to live well without needing e.g. UC, and that employers should pay fairly.
Many on the right can be won over to the arguments you make if they are framed well.
You can be passionate without being arrogant, you can be controversial and still be well regarded, angry without being irritable, and so on.
Personally I love the idea of arguing with a Brexit supporting ordinary man in the street and being able to totally quash any of his responses on the benefits of Brexit. But will I have helped that one man to see things differently?
Thanks
Here’s to 14 more years of blogging Richard. I’ve dropped into and out of a number of different economic blogs since becoming interested in economics (I have a science and teaching background), but your blog was one of the first I started reading and it’s one of only 4 blogs that I now read, since it’s both informative and helpful for an amateur in the field without being patronising!
Happy new year to all!
Thanks
What are the other three?
The other three are Bill Mitchell (Bilbo, where I first began to understand MMT. He’s overly technical sometimes though, definitely not as amateur-friendly!), Simon Wren-Lewis (Mainly Macro) and David Andolfatto (Macromedia, interesting for some of the Fed research he blogs about)
I read two
I rarely do Bill, but that’s just because I e=never get to the end of a blog without dying of boredom
As someone who has an interest in political economy but does not have any qualifications in accounting, tax, economics, etc. I have learned untold amounts from your blog Richard. Thank you for that, and it will continue to be appreciated for as long as you decide to keep doing it.
Thanks
Thank you for this excellent post, Richard.
You are always clear about where you stand on the issue up for discussion, and this is a great help in enabling readers to interrogate their own position – certainly for me!
On reflection, your differentiation between party politics and real-world politics is, perhaps, a timely reminder that tribalism, particularly at this time, only obscures our perspectives.
Food for thought, there, I think.
Just keep up the good work of providing a valuable space for informing and (hopefully) enlightened and enlightening debate. Something for which I, with a desire to learn, am grateful.
Thanks
To blog about blogging!! You really MUST love it!
Very grateful to you for doing it. I have learnt a lot.
To blog, or not to blog?
Actually, that’s not a question, except on Saturdays, sometimes.
You’ve invented a new online activity: Metablogging. Congratulations!
PS And thanks for the excellent economics lessons over the years, much appreciated.
Thanks
Your statements are all reasonable. It seems to me that commentators on personal blogs should act in the same way they might when visiting an acquaintances’ home. The same norms of politeness should prevail.
On the topic of party lines – I’m currently reading Richard Seymour’s book ‘Corbyn’. The book delves into the history of the party and his critiques have really busted some of my personal myths about the Labour Party and allowed me to manage my expectations about what is possible. From an historical perspective Labour is far more Tory than their rhetoric might lead one to believe.
Not sure what to do right now. So much is in flux. But I do know that ideas on how to deliver sustainable social and economic justice is crucial. So, thank you for your blog.
I’m beginning to realise that if the Conservative and Labour parties of nearly the last hundred years had been around as Britain’s incipient Industrial Revolution began to take off they’d have killed it stone dead with their stupid application of an automatic fiscal rule that the government should balance its books.
It’s now clear that the partial democratisation and partial re-design of currency at the end of the 17th century with the issue of bank-notes was alongside the Restoration, with increased Parliamentary legislative power, a prime driver of the Industrial Revolution.
Prior to that the creation of specie money, mainly silver, was driven by the needs of rich merchants and the monarchy with the former melting the predominantly daily usage coin based currency down if they could make money selling it as bullion. The monarchy of course were largely obsessed with needing currency to fight wars (to get silver and gold) and live lavishly to present the perception the country was in good hands in terms of economic management!
Put more simply the huge increase in the volume of currency (through bank-note issue) was the precise opposite of trying to balance the government’s books because there was the recognition that output of goods and services is not static it responds to demand with increased output and currency availability widely distributed is of course demand!
I’d love it if you would write that up as a post Helen
Summarising what you now know in one or a series of posts is, I think, something that could really be helpful now
I’m half-way through reading Moshe Arye Milevsky’s book “The Day The King Defaulted” then I’ll attempt to write up a post. I think there are important lessons to learn from English monetary history although from what I’ve read so far of Milevsky’s book and Desan’s book “Making Money: Coins, Currency and the Coming of Capitalism” I currently think it’s doubtful we’ll ever discover when the English stopped understanding the MMT explanation of currency creation.
Certainly, for approximately 200 years after the Romans left, the indigenous population almost completely stopped using money because they didn’t understand as you put it so well “government has by far the best promise”! I’m doubtful “the penny ever dropped” on this again. If that’s so it some what put’s “world-beating” boasts in the shade and explains we may be a bright people historically but we do tend to stumble upon solutions!
Helen,
I second Richard’s request for you to write up some of this – I find your snippets of the history of money fascinating, and it would be great to see it all brought together.
Richard,
You are a living example, actually exemplar is the better word, of George Bernard Shaw’s “unreasonable man”:
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman
Like other commentators on this post, and whole blog, I never cease to be amazed at your productivity, and at the breadth and depth of your knowledge and understanding.
Like them, I have learned so much, and have definitely had my perceptions and understanding of reality changed. Thank you.
Thanks Andrew
Go well
Some years ago I started reading one of your books where you said that all money is government money. I thought, “this guy’s nuts”. As I read on and began to understand I realised that you’re not and that I and we had been conned by the rich and wealthy and their useful idiots in politics, journalism and “think tanks”.
What really interests me is social justice and is probably the main reason I come here, every day, and of course Tax, MMT, the GND and other related topics feed into that as well as your more obviously social justice blogs.
Thanks for writing one of the most thought provoking blogs on the planet and thanks also to the many commentators who are always worth a read as well.
And, the High Pay Centre has just emailed to tell me “that the median FTSE 100 CEO’s earnings for 2021 will surpass the median annual wage for a full-time worker in the UK by around 5:30 pm on Wednesday 6 January.”
I am amused
Your blogging is providing a valuable service. And the message is getting through, at least partially, judging by this paragraph in today’s Independent:
“In any case, every pound that the chancellor has spent in the past year has been matched by a pound created on a keyboard by the Bank of England. There is no reason to believe that the government will ever pay it back. It is money we owe to ourselves. There is no chance that the government will go bust”.
https://edition.independent.co.uk/editions/uk.co.independent.issue.060121/data/9728681/index.html
Article by Ben Chapman.
I think you will be pleased, to an extent anyway, with the Independent’s leader column today.
https://edition.independent.co.uk/editions/uk.co.independent.issue.060121/data/9728682/index.html
Keep up the good work.
Excellent
One article contradicts the other!
“Confidence is a precious and fragile commodity, and there should be no talk of tax hikes or savage cuts to public spending to repair the public finances. There will be time enough for that when the crisis has passed.”
Really!
Just to add to this here is Bill Mitchell in excellent form demolishing the ECB and the new governor of the Bank of England, Andrew Bailey, on the use of QE:-
http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=46649
The BoE is even making up the excuses for fear that rates will rise – when they will not be, as Bill agrees
Helen – a quick note of thanks for all the material that you read and digest for us. Even if I do not wholly agree with every one your conclusions!
I occasion fantasise about the wonderful workshop that could be run with the many contributors here. Not to mention the drinks in the pub afterwards.
Meanwhile, the blog will have to do as a substitute
I admit that one day such a seminar would be a great idea
I had Andrew Bailey as a client for a few years and I would say that he is a very decent and competent man. It’s easy to assume that they are all ogres, whereas my experience was that the central bankers were by and large public servants, though with some rather old fashioned economic views which Id not defend. They are also not entirely free of political pressures.
Very different to the commercial and investment bankers in the City of whom I have nothing positive to say having seen them up close. The decent ones all got culled in the 80s and 90s. Those Captain Mainwarings had their merits. However, I guess he is a product of and constrained by the institution and his education. Andy Haldane the chief economist is a rather more interesting character.
As an aside, the work I was doing involved ‘renegotiating’ and reorganising how the banks cleared money for the government – and ripped us all off something rotten in the process. Saved about £100m pa. One of those very rare occasions when consultants earn their fees! Banks hated it. I learned that RBS really were crooks. And Mr Bailey made it happen.
Perhaps I’d better get back behind the sofa…
🙂
When we’re allowed, I’d happily help organise and would pay to attend
To be done, I think
I have learnt an incredible amount over the last 2 years or so of reading your blog. I still have much to learn. This is the number one resource I point my friends to when discussing these issues.
Please keep up the good work.
Many many thanks.
Thanks
Yours is the only blog I have the time for other than reading books on the subjects it covers and work and family etc (I sometimes delve into Progressive Pulse too).
What I admire about your blog is that for me at least it/you go beyond mere sentiment (that too often dominates in progressive politics) to delve into the technocratic side of achieving social justice – the means.
And its not about necessarily being right – it’s about asking questions and working things through – challenging dominating assumptions and narratives. Those steps are the first big steps to change after all.
You have every right to feel good about this in my view and long may you continue.
Actually, the whole reason for writing that post was not that I was feeling good about it – I was feeling down about it. The comments always help. And thanks.
The general feedback I get is that the difference in what I do is that I always try to find a solution – I am not interested in just moaning. I want to find a way forward. I hope that is true. I admit I get very frustrated by a lot of economics which is all analysis and no solutions.
Be assured that I was inviting you to feel good about it – I got no sense of any triumphalism or negativity either way.
You work bloody hard.
I do work bloody hard
But enjoying it helps
Richard.
I’m so glad I found your blog at the beginning of 2020.
I check in on it every day.
It’s opened up my eyes and given me whole new ways of thinking.
It’s a bit of sanctuary in a crazy world. I realise I’m not alone thinking the way I do.
It’s also given my an avenue to ask questions to develope my ideas.
I love the way it stretches and challenges my brain. The debates in the comments are brilliant.
I don’t know how you find the time to write, moderate and answer comment, but I’m glad you do.
I promise you, I still walk the dog, have a life, have hobbies and give my sons time
I am pretty dedicated when I am in front of the computer though
Well said. I detest trolling; and it seems to me that trolling is much more organised than most people think; although I cannot prove it.
I also admit I make mistakes, and I certainly, and without any sense of guilt, change my mind. I cannot understand what the point of serious thought would be if you cannot see the acquisition of knowledge as a permanent, unfinished process of learning. The point of an idea is not its permanence, but its capacity to illuminate; route markers on a journey to an unknown destination.
Many thanks Richard, and to the commenters here, who have also made me think, sometimes read new sources or open new avenues, and most of all, to reflect. This Blog is proof that social media is not exclusively the hell-hole that the (too often ‘bought and sold’) mainstream media glibly like to claim.
There are few great British blogs. Yours and Craig Murray’s are two of them in my opinion. You both absolutely know what your are talking about from the practical expertise of your very different successful careers and you are both fearless and have your heart in the right place. You are both regarded as mavericks by the establishment and support self determination for Scotland. You can definitely be the more acerbic to commenters but you are usually right. Thank you for all you do and long may it continue.
Thanks
I read Craig quite often
Thank you for your blog which has been a wonderful learning experience for me.
It’s made me interested in economics and tax, and I appreciate the insight you give to other issues outside of these areas too.
I’ve read several books because of recommendations here, and I love the intelligent level of discourse on the comments section. Keep it up, you are doing a great job.
Richard, thank you for your efforts. As a techie, I am fairly illiterate when it comes to finance but I have learnt much from you. You are a force for goodness and compassion.
Thanks
@ Helen Schofield
“I’d love it if you would write that up as a post Helen”
For what it’s worth so would I…
Helen, you are a great Desan fan, somebody I first discovered from a throwaway comment from Steve Keen – but you seem to be going quite a bit further…
Thank you for the blog.
I have learned a lot
I am am avid reader of this blog and have been for a good few years now. I am not a very frequent commenter because I hold myself to certain rules, best set out in the form of questions:
1. Will your comment add something to the discussion?
2. Is your comment definitely related to the post itself?
3. Would you be happy to receive such a comment on your own blog?
If my comment meets my own criteria I will post it.
I join the many who have already thanked you for your work and hope that there are plenty more years of it to come.
Thanks
We are living in an era ‘darker’ than mediaeval ‘Dark Age’ but your good self are the light of knowledge and wisdom. Thanks from the heart.
I read your blog every time I receive notification and also view all your videos. I never comment as I do not have the knowledge or experience of the subject matter. However I do enjoy reading both the article and the comments, which have given me an insight into the workings of Government.
Thank you for all the enlightenment which I always post to Facebook (I don’t entertain Twitter) and am seldom on Facebook itself, preferring blogs like yours and some which are more bias towards an Independent Scotland.
Please keep up the great work you do making complex subjects easier for numpties like me to grasp the very basics, much appreciated.
Thanks Stan
Appreciated
More power to our elbow in 2021! Keep up the excellent work. Thank you.
……should have read “more power to YOUR elbow…” And ours too!
🙂
This is my first reply to your blog. I have been following you for over two years but being an economic illiterate did not feel confident I could make a meaningful contribution. At the start of the pandemic I set myself a project to progress beyond the “household” view of economics. Your blog has illuminated many dark corners and I am grateful for the many insights gleaned from the blog.
Thanks again and keep up the good work.
Thanks for reading
I’d like to add my thanks, to those of the many others, for your dedication and clarity of thought and presentation. I’ve only started reading your blog since reading about it on the Scottish Currency Group fb page, but I wish I had been reading it from the day I finished reading your “Joy of Tax” book for the first time. I can only say that I do not read any other blogs, as I have never found any others so well-informed or rich in information. I hope the vast majority of your readers have taken the option to make a regular donation so that you can continue to deliver this invaluable perspective on our society.
Thanks Bill
Donations do help – they effect8ively buy more time for me to do this
But they are not in any way obligatory
Bless you and thank you for your daily Blogs Richard. You help me to make sense of a very chaotic world right now. Keep on keeping on and let’s hope the year gets better eh?
You’ve been a great source of support to me since 2010 but you are a wonderful mentor and a voice of reason in an otherwise rapidly-descending-into-insanity world.
Thanks for all you do. It’s a labour of love, because in the end, you really do care.
Thank you
It’s quite surprising to know people do care about this – I just bash out what I think and apparently it matters