Michael Hudson Quotes - Page 7

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• So the political choice today is much like the 1930s, when the global economy also broke down. The choice is between nationalism and populism on the right, or socialism reviving what used to be left-wing politics.

  Michael Hudson

  Political, Choices, Today

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• The Eurozone die is cast. Countries must withdraw from the euro so that governments can create their own money once again, and resist creditor demands to carve up and privatize their public domain.

  Michael Hudson

  Country, Euro

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• The United States Government has fought against creation of an international court to adjudicate the ability of national economies to pay debts.

  Michael Hudson

  Creation, Economy, Ability

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Debtor countries may postpone the inevitable by borrowing from the IMF or U.S. Treasury to buy out bondholders. This saves the latter from taking a loss - leaving the debtor country with debts that are even harder to annul, because they are to foreign governments and international institutions.

  Michael Hudson

  Country, Loss, Leaving

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Canada is a malstructured. You could almost call it a failed economy, except that its natural resources are so rich that everybody can get wealthy off making holes in the ground and digging up the oil and polluting the environment.

  Michael Hudson

  Environment, Rich, Natural

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Oil is a special case. Saudi Arabia is trying to drive U.S. fracking rivals out of business, while also hurting Russia. This lowers gas prices for U.S. and Eurozone consumers, but not by enough to spur economic recovery.

  Michael Hudson

  Hurt, Recovery, Trying

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• The United States and Europe are in a state of debt deflation, where people and businesses have to pay banks instead of spending their income on goods and services. So markets shrink, sales and profits fall, and the stock market turns down.

  Michael Hudson

  Fall, People

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Income is sucked upward to the creditors, who then foreclose on the assets of debtors. This shrinks tax revenue, forcing public budgets into deficit. And when governments are indebted, they becomemore subject to pressure to privatization of public enterprise.

  Michael Hudson

  Taxes, Enterprise

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Europe is sort of like the Soviet Union in the '30s and '40s. There was an argument, is it reformable or not? There is a feeling, and I think it's correct, that the European Union, the eurozone, and the euro, is not reformable, as a result of the Lisbon treaties and the other treaties that have created the euro. Europe has to be taken apart in order to be put together not on a right-wing, neoliberal basis, but on a more social basis.

  Michael Hudson

  Taken, Thinking, Feelings

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• So, what people are actually left with to spend is maybe 25 to 30% of their income on goods and services, after paying taxes and after paying the FIRE sector (Finance, Insurance, Real Estate). Whether it's housing insurance or mortgage insurance. So there's an idea of distracting people. Don't think of your condition. Think of how the overall economy is doing. But don't think of the economy as an overall unit. Think of the stock market as the economy. Think of the rich people as the economy. Look at the yachts that are made. Somebody's living a lot better. Couldn't it be you?

  Michael Hudson

  Real, Thinking, People

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Most of these charges that people pay are economically unnecessary. There's no real cost behind them. There's no real value behind them. So, they're what the classical economist called empty pricing. Prices with no real cost value. What they called rent and fictitious capital. Capital claims on junk mortgage borrowers. The pretense is that all these debts can be paid but it's all fictitious, because everybody knows - at least on Wall Street everybody knows - that many debts can't be paid.

  Michael Hudson

  Wall, Real, People

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• We're at the end of long cycle that began in 1945, loading the economy with debt. We're not going to be able to get out of it until you write down the debts. But that's what the IMF believes is unthinkable. It can't say that, because it's supposed to represent the interest of the banks.

  Michael Hudson

  Believe, Writing, Long

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Economic polarization is also occurring between creditor and debtor nations. This issplitting the eurozone between Germany, France and the Netherlands in the creditor camp, against Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Italy falling deeper into debt, unemployment and austerity - followed by emigration and capital flight.

  Michael Hudson

  Fall, Flight, Economic

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  5 Copy quote

• You could say that the vote to withdraw from Europe is, it's really a vote of the British middle class, the working class, to withdraw from the U.S. neoliberalism that has been running Europe for the last ten years.

  Michael Hudson

  Running, Vote, Middle Class

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• There really isn't a recovery, and no signs of it on the horizon, because people have to pay the banks. It's a vicious circle - or rather, a downward spiral.

  Michael Hudson

  Recovery, Circles, People

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• If you have to pay about forty to forty-three percent of your income for housing, you also have to pay fifteen percent of your paycheck for the FICA for Social Security wage withholding. You have to pay medical care, you have to pay the banks for your credit card debt, student loans. Then you only have about twenty-five or thirty-five percent, maybe one-third of your salary to buy goods and services. That's all.

  Michael Hudson

  Income, Three, Cards

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• You're having government spending on the economy being cut almost everywhere. That means that the only source of spending for growth has to come from borrowing from the banking system.

  Michael Hudson

  Mean, Cutting, Government

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

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• The companies aren't hiring, because consumers don't have enough money to buy the goods and services.

  Michael Hudson

  Enough, Hiring, Consumers

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

• Now, suppose that a homeowner puts down only 3% of their own money or 3.5% for the FHA. That means if prices go down by only 3%, the house will be in negative equity and it would pay the homeowner just to walk away and say, "The house now is worth less than the mortgage I owe. I think I'm just going to move out and buy a cheaper house." So it's very risky when you have only a 3% or 3.5% equity for the loan. The bank really isn't left with much cushion as collateral.

  Michael Hudson

  Moving, Mean, Thinking

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

  4 Copy quote

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