William Blair Santos Allen
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willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen
@willballen.bsky.social
500 followers 130 following 400 posts

Retired consultant in international macro finance and capital markets. Converted to MMT as truth.

Now humble second career as lover of all things nautical and USCG licensed Master Mariner.

Finally doing something socially productive? .. more

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Economics 76%
Political science 18%
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willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 7d
“Equally tenuous fallacies are employed by "pop non-MMT" economics arguing against public spending, and "pop MMT" is a rhetorical response to that tradition of bad economics”

Shall we define the MMT of Mitchell, Wray, Kelton etc as “ Rigorous MMT”? I am a fan of this school.
peark.es George Pearkes @peark.es · 7d
I think this @jomichell.bsky.social is basically fair but is ignoring the context of *why* pop MMT approaches things this way.

Equally tenuous fallacies are employed by "pop non-MMT" economics arguing against public spending, and "pop MMT" is a rhetorical response to that tradition of bad economics
jdportes.bsky.social Jonathan Portes @jdportes.bsky.social · 7d
"Much of MMT is neither new nor wrong: it’s just standard economic theory presented in different language. The disagreement arises not over whether government can compel the central bank to finance its spending, but to what extent government should do this."

criticalfinance.org/2025/12/19/w...

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 7d
What we need is less monopolistic pricing power by big corps to inflict higher prices. Corp profits are running at near all time highs. Not sure Fed is the one to do something about this.

Reposted by William A. Allen

peark.es
George Pearkes @peark.es · 7d
I think this @jomichell.bsky.social is basically fair but is ignoring the context of *why* pop MMT approaches things this way.

Equally tenuous fallacies are employed by "pop non-MMT" economics arguing against public spending, and "pop MMT" is a rhetorical response to that tradition of bad economics
jdportes.bsky.social Jonathan Portes @jdportes.bsky.social · 7d
"Much of MMT is neither new nor wrong: it’s just standard economic theory presented in different language. The disagreement arises not over whether government can compel the central bank to finance its spending, but to what extent government should do this."

criticalfinance.org/2025/12/19/w...
What’s wrong with MMT?
As Marc Lavoie and John Quiggin have noted, there are ‘two MMTs’. Scholars such as Randy Wray, Eric Tymoigne and Scott Fulwiler have contributed to debates on monetary economics, instit…
criticalfinance.org

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 8d
“Pedantry is something up with which I shall not put”. Winston Churchill on being corrected on speech with a preposition dangling at the end of a sentence.

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 8d
Not sure why this is so interesting? Looks like BoJ made a decision to target 2% for 10 yr yield and orderly acceded to markets taking it there. CB can peg anything if it wishes to use its balance sheet. Nothing seems panicked or out of control? Where is the problem?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 9d
When I moved to Boston from the Deep South for grad school I was told to “get the magnolia out of my mouth”

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 9d
I lost my ass shorting Nvidia by selling calls over the last few years. Let us know how you do. Good luck!

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 9d
General Smedley Butler would agree with you.

Reposted by William A. Allen

brianromanchuk.bsky.social
Brian Romanchuk @brianromanchuk.bsky.social · 9d
I just responded to some political points about MMT.

open.substack.com/pub/bondecon...
MMT Wrangling (Again)
I am now being dragged back into Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) online wrangling, to respond to a few points in this post by Darren Quinn.
open.substack.com

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 9d
Any local update on MIT killing? Robbery? Nothing much on US national news. Seeing some coverage on Portuguese news channels.

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 9d
Maybe another Great Depression could bring another FDR

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 9d
Another Minsky Moment?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 11d
Don’t hold back now Adam. Tell us how you really feel! Running out of adjectives? I am.

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 11d
Did Joe or Sarah finally get fired?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 11d
Thanks for pointing out Harvey book. Did not know about it. . History of economic thought was one of my favourite university courses

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 14d
Cocos … pufff!

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 15d
We are seeing walk aways on auto loans now, right?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 15d
“Sir, have you no decency?”

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 16d
2020 happy hour craft beer: $4. 2025 same beer, same bar: $8. Waiter saw only 20% pay rise. Cut my drinking in half though!

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 16d
Go back to Courier and pretend you are using an Underwood manual typewriter?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 17d
Nice Keynes paraphrasing.

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 17d
Thought he already had made his pick? I guess the grift is still on?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 17d
Yes but it also means double powerful blow

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 17d
Better than seeing Fox News on screens?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 17d
Well written. Thanks for the free link

Reposted by Benjamin Braun, Patrick Svensson, William A. Allen , and 1 more

isabellamweber.bsky.social
Isabella M. Weber @isabellamweber.bsky.social · 18d
The affordability crisis is an inequality crisis. When prices spike in key sectors, it's not just inflation—it's a massive redistribution shock that hits poor households hardest.
In our **new working paper**, we identify the sectors that matter most. A thread 🧵
scholarworks.umass.edu/entities/pub...

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 19d
Curious. But you will need to translate! Google translate apparently doesn’t cover Finnish.

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 21d
Btw all ok with your parents?

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 21d
Always tough when I here a commentator say “bonds backed up” and try to figure out if rates went up or down. I once offered to teach a free finance course to FT journalists to help improve their coverage. No interest.

willballen.bsky.social
William Blair Santos Allen @willballen.bsky.social · 21d
As a Portuguese American I have no problem with the name Flávio. I do find “Bolsonaro” humorous. Would mean something like “pocket nose” I think? Sounds appropriate! Native Brasileiros help out here.