In Episode 323 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with the former Chief Economist at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Director of the Center for Politics, Economics, and History at the University of Texas at Austin, Charles Calomiris about his recently published paper “Fiscal Dominance and the Return of Zero-Interest Bank Reserve Requirements.”
In the paper, Dr. Calomiris considers the possibility that the United States government will enact new and more onerous forms of financial repression, including commandeering the US banking system to fund unsustainably high debt and deficit payments that would otherwise lead to a sovereign debt crisis.
In the first hour, Calomiris and Kofinas discuss the history of US bank policy and the unique characteristics of the American political economy that inform how the nation responds to political crises and the populist temptation to resolve them through the US banking system.
The second hour is devoted to a discussion about when and how such measures will be taken to resolve an impending fiscal debt crisis that professor Calomiris believes is inevitable. They discuss what the signposts for such an impending crisis could be, the tradeoffs that an economy operating under the conditions of fiscal dominance would have to make, how such a period of fiscal dominance could end (i.e., either through a prolonged period of double-digit inflation or a full-blown debt crisis), and what role fintech, crypto, and other forms of decentralized finance will play in such an economy given the government’s need to fund itself without losing complete control over inflation.
You can subscribe to our premium content and gain access to our premium feed, episode transcripts, and Intelligence Reports (or Key Takeaways) at HiddenForces.io/subscribe.
If you want to join in on the conversation and become a member of the Hidden Forces genius community, which includes Q&A calls with guests, access to special research and analysis, in-person events, and dinners, you can also do that on our subscriber page. If you still have questions, feel free to email info@hiddenforces.io, and Demetri or someone else from our team will get right back to you.
If you enjoyed listening to today’s episode of Hidden Forces you can help support the show by doing the following:
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Spotify | Stitcher | SoundCloud | CastBox | RSS Feed
Write us a review on Apple Podcasts & Spotify
Subscribe to our mailing list at https://hiddenforces.io/newsletter/
Producer & Host: Demetri Kofinas
Editor & Engineer: Stylianos Nicolaou
Subscribe & Support the Podcast at https://hiddenforces.io
Join the conversation on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at @hiddenforcespod
Follow Demetri on Twitter at @Kofinas
Episode Recorded on 08/09/2023
Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe | Niall Ferguson
Existential Risks & the Future of Humanity | Toby Ord
What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters | Steven Koonin
Solving the Oracle Problem: Blockchain’s Missing Link | Sergey Nazarov
Mission Economy: A Moonshot Guide to Changing Capitalism | Mariana Mazzucato
The Lonely Century: Coming Together in a World That’s Pulling Apart | Noreena Hertz
Engine of Inequality: The Fed & the Future of Wealth in America | Karen Petrou
This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyber-Weapons Arms Race | Nicole Perlroth
Silicon Valley’s Ultimate Exit: Arguments for and Against the Network State | Balaji Srinivasan
Podcast Update: Cybersecurity, Financial Warfare, the Mission Driven State, & More
Generational Conflict, Decentralization, & Global Disorder | Radigan Carter
Meme ‘Stonks’: How Call Options & Reddit Broke Wall Street | Lily Francus
Generational Wealth-Building During a Fourth Turning | Radigan Carter
Cryptocurrencies, Foreign Threats, & the Fight of a Generation
Restoring Trust in an Age of Political Polarization | Kevin Vallier
Future of Financial Media & Digital Assets | Jason Yanowitz & Michael Ippolito
Social Media Purge: The Urgent Need to Regulate Big Tech | Matt Stoller
America’s Political Precipice & the Hyperreality of Markets: Grant Williams & Ben Hunt
The Code of Capital: Markets, Big Tech, & Blockchain | Katharina Pistor
The Future of Freedom, Governance, and the Networked State
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The emPOWERed Half Hour
NABOR® TALKS
U.S Property Podcast
Aligned Money Show
The Ramsey Show
Planet Money