Raising taxes long predates MMT, and it will keep happening long after people have stopped trying to sell MMT. MMT takes the interesting twist of claiming that

Raising taxes long predates MMT, and it will keep happening long after people have stopped trying to sell MMT. MMT takes the interesting twist of claiming that the means, taxation, is actually an end in itself. I don't disagree that it looks like a decent description of how many countries run, but the assumptions propping up the theory would rapidly fall apart if governments acted on the beliefs that MMT espouses. The theory rests on the probably correct assertion that you can only voluntarily default in a currency that you print with impunity. But that statement sits atop a tacit assumption that the money is worth the paper it's printed on. In reality, any country pursuing this theory will inflate its currency to the point where the currency can't be used internationally, and the citizens will abandon the currency to the extent that it hasn't been made illegal to do so. If they can't skip out on the inflationary currency, the people who failed to flee in time will stop working and innovating consistent with the degree to which the hyperinflation means that there is no means of saving for the future. The hyperinflating government will try a combination of preventing emigration and ownership of stable stores of value (gold, foreign currencies.) The leakiness of the system keeps everything from fully and officially failing, but MMT's guarantee of no default will ring hollow when the government can't afford to feed its political prisoners or even the guards watching them. Of course, I've used the wrong verb tense, because I'm describing Venezuela.